I began, in 1993, with the reading challenge of 1million pages of collective reading within a 10-month school year. I invited all students, their families, and the school staff to take part. That was 15 years ago. Today, the reading challenge has crept up to 2.5 million pages of reading each year for a 12-month period.
I had wanted to turn my school community into a reading community. Have I succeeded? I truly do not know the extent of the impact. However, there are indicators that glimmer, once in a while, that my antics that accompany my annual reading gauntlets have taken on a life of their own.
You see, as a motivator for the first reading challenge 15 years ago, I told the students, staff, and the community that when 1 million pages would have been read, I would kiss a pig. That went really porky!
They read, and read, and read. I did end up kissing the wet snout of a pig, which was so un-amused and shocked by my affections that it did a smelly number of stage. Stinky stunt No. 1!
After the first challenge, each subsequent challenge stretched the size of reading quantity as well as my imagination as to what Tomfoolery I would be able to pull off next.
Debbie always advises me, ever so wisely, not to do anything that I need to be trained for. Just fool around, in effect. But, my childish and mischievous propensity informs me otherwise over the years.
The second year, I promised that I would milk a goat, thinking that milking anything requires more luck than skills. Know what? I was right!
Had I an inkling that my sand pail would be almost filled to the brim with goat's milk, I would have been cockier than what I had allowed myself to be... I would have a tall clear glass with chocolate powder in it, ready for a warm glass of chocolate goat's milk on tap.
Nonetheless, my reading challenge did backfire on me when the entire auditorium of kids and adults chanted: "Drink the milk! Drink the milk!" Yes, I did... with much theatrics mixed with finesse. It almost brought the house down.
"How do I top the last stunt?" has always been my annual question.
The third stunt required my being trained to exercise my wrist. I promised to lasso a bovine. I received my after-school in-services at Miracle Ranch (out by Bird's Hill Park) in learning the art of lassoing for two months straight.
Everyday after school, I'd be practising the art on my garbage bins at my driveway, much to the puzzling delight of my peeking-through-the-curtain neighbours. The day arrived. My challenge was met with roping this cute little baby calf (I just said bovine, didn't I?). I performed again and again as encores in a warm bath of televion light and media attention.
The third stunt also required acquisition of high level of skills and even higher level of good fortune. You see, it was suggested to me by a farmer that I could hypnotize chickens! Yikes! Being an urban cowboy, I had never heard of that before until I was taught how to do that stunt deftly and effectively.
Just when you are dying to ask me how I hypnotized chickens, I am not about to succumb to betraying a rural farming "trade secret". Suffice it to say that when all three large avians were down on their back with their legs sticking up in the air fast asleep, the audience broke up in a sustained applause of disbelief.
In the midst of a rather high level of noise, blended with applause, cacophony, and kerfuffle, the sleeping beauties awoke, shook their feathers as if clucking, "What's happened to us?"
One chicken did an unexpected. It flew (Yes. A chichen flew!) into the audience, causing more cacophony, kerfuffle, and screams of mixed fear and delight.
I had wanted to ride an ostrich the following year. That stunning scene from the movie, "Swiss Family Robinson", was quickly and cruelly snuffed out in my want-to-do list.
You see, I called all the ostrich farmers across Manitoba about my idea. With one accord (in separate responses, of course) they all said the same: "An ostrich would sooner kill a man than to allow him to ride it." Big time "Yikes!" Time to switch gears.
A llama has got to be tamer and more polite than an ostrich is, I conjectured.
I called all the llama farmers across Manitoba, and there were not a large number of them. One was ready to let me try his llamy.
On the day I made the acquaintance with Mr. Llamy, he decided that I was too heavy for him to fool around with. He refused to cooperate, and eventually galloped (yes. Like a horse) into the sunset.
The farmer, his assistants and I spent the rest of the Sunday afternoon in May chasing after this errant llamy. I could have used my lassoing skills on him, but, running after him already winded me out at that point that I couln't skip rope with the lasso had I wanted to. By sundown, we rounded up the beast, and I gave up on him.
The following week, I got in contact with another llama farmer. He told me that a llama (should be "an" llama because in Spanish, it's pronounced as "yama") is only a pay-load animal, not a riding animal. He allowed me to try his llama, Silver, but he cautioned that I should lie flat on his back and pretend that I was a sack of, you've got it, rice.
Silver was a stronger and more cooperative llama (Is llamo a male llama? One wonders). He let me ride him all right. That made my day as I had bagged another reading challenge Tomfoolery. I garnered the front page of the Winnipeg Free Press, and was interviewed on "This Morning" from Toronto on what in the world was I doing.
What else could top hypnotizing chickens and riding a llama? Everybody wondered aloud with me.
Well, how about doing tricks on horseback and lassoing something? Somebody suggested.
I trained for three weekends with Stephen, an elderly equine (elderly by equine standards). He allowed me to rotate on his saddle as he galloped. I was tickled pink. I even practised my well honed skills in lassoing while riding Stephen.
When the day arrived, the chair of the parent advisory council offered to be the subject of my galloping lasso. It was a sight to behold when the lasso roped around her, she sqealed in excitement as she went down on the ground and was dragged for several metres. She was a good sport and she survived without a scratch while Stephen and I continued to gallop as I did my tricks in turning 360 on the saddle.
Learning to play illusionary trick with a speed that is faster than the eye may discern was my next challenge. Two very prominent "magicians", Brian Glow and Jo Kauffert, donated their time and talents to teach me how to perform an hour-long show of illusions. It went without a hitch. However, the performance failed to garner the same level of enthusiastic response as the previous ones.
As years went by, "do-able" Tomfooleries became harder to come by. Allowing my hair (whatever was left of it) to be dyed by my staff wasn't exactly the same stella performance as before either. But, the enthusiasm for and joy of the reading challenge survived.
As I had studied ballet as a young man for three years, I decided to choreograph a jazz ballet and taught 8 students to dance with me. The entire process was fun! My "ballet troupe" loved it. As it turned out, the jazz ballet Tomfoolery captured the rhythm of the entire audience, and they clapped with zest to the music throughout the entire dance! It was exhilarating and rewarding!
Sitting on the plank-seat of a dunk tank reading the daily in a suit and tie was my next trick. I was quite content to sit there and finish my reading until the first targetted hit of the dunk tank trigger occurred. In I went... very cold tap water 6 feet deep. I persisted. Climbed out in my wet suit (I kept my promise... going into the dunk tank in a wetsuit).
I sat on the plank-seat again, and continued to read. Splash! There I went again...and again... and again. 45 minutes later, I was turning blue with cold. Our phys ed teacher was offered to stand in (sit in and fall in, to be accurate) for me.
The next stunt was inspired by my admiration for the highly energetic and charismatic River Dance. I had wanted to learn how to dance an Irish jig.
The very first dance academy I called was a hit. Yes. They had an Irish dance teacher. And, yes. They had heard about me and my antics. The director offered her studio and teacher time for me, free of charge, to fulfill my dream. I began a dance course of 5 months, having lessons twice a week on learn the Irish jig.
As I learned each disembodied step, nothing truly resembled River Dance at all. It was hard and contortionist foot work. I was getting worried when May rolled around.
However, towards the middle of May, my teacher put all the steps and designs together in one choreographic whole for me. A River Dance emerged. I was thrilled.
The evening of the performance went very well. As a matter of fact, it went too well.
The audience applauded an encore, and my dance teacher, who was my dance partner in the performance, abandoned ship, leaving me alone on stage.
As it turned out, it was all a big conspiracy. Somebody turned on the dance music again. I had little choice but to humour myself and an audience of 500 with an encore. I mused afterwards: "That wasn't too bad!"
A year later, with the help our our very friendly and cooperative Winnipeg Fire and Paramedic Services, I played a fire fighter. This time, no pre-training was required. I felt smug.
The fire captain helped me don a fire fighter's suit, with helmet, mask, and a strapped-on oxygen tank. My job was to enter a "smoke house" (a training trailer with dense artificial smoke) and rescue a "victim" by getting him to safety.
That day, I gained a lot of healthy respect for what our fire fighters do. The smoke was so dense that I might as well have closed my eyes. Through the plexiglass of the mask, I saw nothing... just grey matter. I crawled on the floor and felt with my hands for a door into another room. Couldn't do it. Felt nothing either.
I crawled back to the door where I entered and started moving on my hands and knees again, hoping that my sense of direction would sustain me. I felt a door handle this time as I stood up against a wall. I opened it, entered, and continued to feel my way around the "house" as the sense of touch was the only sense I could summon.
I located my "victim" at the foot of a couch in the living room. I did all the preliminaries to see if he was conscious, breathing, and/or pulsing. No. He displayed no sign of life. I had to move him out of the "house".
I attempted to put him on my shoulders. Forget it! He was much heavier and taller than I. I found the exit door, opened it to the setting sunlight and the loud applause of the crowd gathered. I pulled the victim out of the "burning house" onto the hardtop. I attempted CPR... on this 180-pound training dummy.
That was when it happened. Three fire fighters, turned their hoses on me (not in full pressure, thank God! Otherwise, I would be blowned into the Red River half a mile away) and thoroughly soaked me. Another big conspiracy!
I had always enjoyed and relished the rousing rally scene and the speech made by Mel Gibson as William Wallace in "Brave Heart". That became my inspration as the next Tomfoolery.
Using stage make-up, two make-up artists transformed me into William Wallace, complete with a wig, bi-coloured face, leather armoury, celtic sword, and kilt (I wonder why people always wonder what is worn underneath a kilt). I performed the rally speech with gusto, contextualizing it into a message that we all can rise above any situation that pulls us down. That drove home the point... a social-educational message.
Last year, I dared myself with eating half-a-dozen night crawlers, though fried with onion, garlic and sauces. The event attracted a lot of media attention with all local televison and radio stations and local newspapers. I was on the front page of the Winnipeg Sun this time with that disgusting 12-inch earth worm dangling from a fork into my gaping mouth. Yuk! and Yuk again!
In a week's time, I will be performing a hoop dance. Brian Clyne, a talented young hoop dancer, has been teaching me twice a week for three weeks now. It was such an educational experience for me when Brian took time explaining to me the "story" behind each dance design. I began with two hoops. Now, I am working towards dancing with 7. What a hoot! Hoop!
Tomfooleries are about motivating students and their families to read as a lifestyle. It's not about me. It's all about them. I play the supporting role. No more. No less.
A librarian in New York City has been in touch with me for the past two years now as she was "inspired" by my reading challenges. She is doing very well herself in motivating children to read with her sitting in a tub of jello and being shot at with sticky "silly strings" from a spray can.
Nick Martin, a news reporter in the education beat with the Winnipeg Free Press, attributed to me as having started a zany trend across the country in motivating students to read. While I am happy to be a trend-setter, I have no monopoly in nor copyright to this motivator; nor would I want to.
Reading takes one to places that imagination, spurred on by the written word, may take. It takes you to the centre of the earth, the bottom of the sea, and on the craggy surface of the moon. The sky is, indeed, the limit. What's more, reading is a ticket to places in life... in rising above in life.
Enjoy reading, with or without Tomfooleries!
Best wishes,
Tom
