The Boy Who Saw Bigfoot by Marian T. Place (An Excerpt)

MY NAME IS Joey Wilson. I am ten, and live in a foster home in the mountains of western Washington. My foster mother's name is Sara Brown. The story I am going to tell happened to her and me both. I got my name and picture in the newspapers, and on television, and in The Weekly Reader. Sara didn't. She told those reporters and cameramen, "You leave me out of this. It's Joey's story."

It isn't all my story. Without Sara I never would have tried to make friends with the hairy monster called Bigfoot. If you saw me on television, you would think that I just walked in the woods one day, and bam! there was Bigfoot! The trouble with television is you get only two or three minutes to talk. No way can you tell the whole story that fast.

Here is my story from the beginning.

First I want to explain something. I did not ask to live with Sara and Mike Brown. The caseworker lady at the county Children's Services office placed me there. Yeah, placed. That's the right word.

Sara and Mike had raised four kids. After they grew up and left home, Sara got lonesome. Mike drives a logging truck. He leaves for work at day-light, six days a week. Sara doesn't sit around all day drinking coffee and watching television. She doesn't have neighbors because the Browns live in the mountains, near logging camps. Sara doesn't fuss much with keeping house, either. The things she likes best are fishing and hiking. Only, Mike would not let her go alone anymore. So that is why Sara asked the caseworker, Mrs. Adams, "Can some boy who likes to fish come to live with us?"

Mrs. Adams answered, "Yes. In fact, right now I am trying to find a home for a boy nobody wants. Let me tell you about him." She said that nobody knows who my folks are, or where they are. My  mother joined a group of hippies who lived on a farm. She told them her name was Mary Wilson, but it wasn't. After I was born, she went away without saying good-bye.

The hippies took care of me until they got arrested for growing marijuana. I was three years old then, and afraid of strangers. None of the hippies claimed me. Right then was when I became a problem, even though it wasn't my fault. The problem was that someone had to look after me. A judge made me a ward of the court. That way there was money from the county Children's Services fund to pay someone to do it. So that's how I got placed in a foster home. I cried so much the foster mother made Mrs. Adams place me somewhere else. After that, I got placed in a different home about every six months, or a year, because I was hard to handle. The foster parents told Mrs. Adams I had awful tantrums. I cussed, and snitched money, and fibbed, and broke windows, and ran away a lot.

This was true. A guy will pull lots of tricks to get attention. The first time I ran away, I thought my foster parents would miss me. When I came back, I didn't get hugs and kisses. I got larruped. So I did other things to get even. Finally, even though foster parents got paid over one hundred dollars a month to look after me, nobody wanted me.

I didn't care. I got used to being traded in like a used car. I just told myself, "Tough luck, kid. Keep your fingers crossed. The next place will be lots better."

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