ERIC THE MIDGET (SCOTT MOESLER)

This is going to be another long entry. I have a lot of history with Scott. Most of it's good. Some of it's bad. But it's all interesting.

I first met Scott when I moved to Two Rivers, in 4th grade. I joined him in Mrs. Schmidt's class. I remember him participating in some sort of skit in class, where he played a weatherman. In pointing to the Florida area, he said it was so hot that people's skin was falling off. For 4th grade, that was quality comedy. Everybody laughed.

I don't remember it, but years later, he told me of a memory he had of me. Scott used to walk down 45th St. (where I lived) on his way to Clarke. It was a winter day. He said he was dressed in a sweater and a big coat. He was freezing. Then he saw me waltz out of my house in a T-shirt, and no coat at all. That was me.

Scott was really into ninja stuff. And he loved to emulate them. I believe the following incident took place right before sophomore year started. He was in his black ninja outfit, streaking through some backyards, when someone saw him. In an effort to get away, he tried to leap a fence. He failed. I believe his leg was punctured by the top of the fence. And as his weight came down, it ripped his whole leg - breaking it badly.

Scott and I started hanging out together near the tail end of our junior year. For the life of me, I don't recall how it happened. But I do know that it was Nintendo related. We had a common interest. And thus, we started hanging out.

Scott entered my world just at the same time that Richard was leaving it. I was still hanging out with Dave Svatek at the time. So the three of us became a trio. But we weren't equal. We were far from it. Dave and I often treated Scott like shit. As I mentioned in my post about Richard, he and I used to pick on Dave. And there's no doubt in my mind that Dave wanted he and I to be like Richard I were. But instead of picking on him, we picked on Scott. One of things that really upset Dave was the fact that Richard and I could finish each other's sentences when insulting him. Dave tried to do the same with he and I in regards to Scott. But it simply didn't work. Dave and I didn't have the same chemistry as Richard and I did.

One of the things we did was to come up with a nickname for Scott. And what a name we chose - "Butt." Yes, Butt it was. I still call him Butt to this day. Scott was obviously dismayed at the choice. But in time, he begrudgingly accepted it. We meant nothing by it. It was just a name.

One thing that Dave had in him that I did not, was a touch of cruelty - in a violent way. Dave would bully Scott around, and was not against a punch or two in the arm. Dave also had a habit of forcing Scott to submit to him, and let him pull out hairs from his legs. That hurt! It was some sort of "punishment." If Scott said something that we found to be rude or obnoxious, Dave would punish him. "That's five hairs." I never participated in a physical sense. But I was no better than Dave, as I would laugh about it.

The three of us spent that entire summer together. And for most of it, Scott's mom and stepdad were in New Mexico and Arizona, looking for a place to move. So we literally had the house mostly to ourselves. Scott did have an older brother and sister. But they weren't exactly authority figures.

That summer marked a milestone for me. While at Scott's house (without Dave) we got drunk. For me, it was the first time. I had 10 shots of some sort of whiskey. And seeing as I had never really had any alcohol before, I was very drunk in no time. I remember playing Super Mario Brothers on Nintendo, and beating the game. I was so proud of myself for being able to beat the game while I was intoxicated. When I woke up the next day, I had no hangover whatsoever. Wow! I was so pleased. So two nights later, we got drunk again. This time I wanted to get even more drunk. I ended up drinking 22 shots of either 80 or 88 proof whiskey. And by the end of the night, I couldn't stand up. That's a lot of booze for an experienced drinker, let alone someone who never drinks. Four shots would have been enough.

The rest of that night is kind of hazy. I tried to beat Super Mario Brothers again. But I couldn't get past the second board. So I started a new game. Then suddenly a feeling I'd never known before hit me. It hit me hard. I crawled down the hall to the bathroom, where Scott was cleaning his contact lenses. I pried myself up, announced thatI was going to throw up, then promptly let loose all over the floor. It was red and nasty. I found my way to the toilet, and puked some more, while Scott took the bath mat outside to clean it with a hose. I was in such pain. And all I could hear was that fucking music from the Nintendo game, as the time just ticked down over and over again, for each Mario had. I somehow got to a bed, and tried to sleep. Scott said I threw up a total of 13 times. And at one point, I was throwing up blood. Nasty! For some reason, he put Icy Hot on my stomach, thinking it would help. It didn't. The next morning, I had a slight headache.

The summer went on. And Dave and I took advantage of Scott's house and home. On one occasion, we made him buy us a meal at Pizza Hut. I also remember being at McDonald's. Scott was buying. While we were at the counter waiting for our food, I yelled at him, "You're drunk!" Of course he wasn't. But there were a lot of people around. I thought it was funny. Another time, as Scott took a shower, Dave and I completely dismantled his room, bed and all, and hid it around the house. We thought it was funny. Scott didn't.

We gave Scott two other nicknames as well. One was his African name - Abubaca. The other was his Israeli name - Sayed Ouita. We would make him repeat (and spell) those names from time to time. And if he made a spelling error, he'd get punched. One day, Dave banished Scott to under my bed. He was to stay down there for 15 minutes. If he tried to get out (which he did) Dave jabbed at him with a pool stick. Whenever I would make a point to Scott, I often ended it by saying, "You dig?" I expected Scott to answer with, "I dig it like a rolling stone." If he refused, I wouldn't respond to anything. I would just keep repeating, You dig? You dig? You dig?"

Scott was a very homophobic, anti-gay person. He made fun of homosexuals a lot. So I naturally poked fun at him. I told him that he had girl lips, and that he'd make a good woman. It was all in fun. I'm not anti-gay at all. He knew I was just joking with him. But he was quite vocal in his stance. So I kidded him about it for years.

Dave and I had a game where we tried to borrow the most unusual items from Scott's house. Dave got Scott's DVD player once. I managed to get some bizarre piece of art that his mother had hanging in the dining room.

One might ask just why in the hell Scott put up with all of our shit. That's a very good question. When Scott and I were alone, things were different. We behaved like real friends. When Dave and Scott were alone together (which was almost never) they behaved like friends too. But when the three of us were all together, Dave and I picked on Scott. Needless to say, Scott wasn't happy with the situation. And he would go on and on saying things to me like, "Why are you doing this?" I never had any real answers for him. But to be honest, Scott's lamenting got really tiresome. He would sometimes keep me on the phone for hours. And honestly, sometimes I fell asleep listening to him. He wouldn't let me hang up.

At some point, Dave hit Scott in the chest, knocking him down. I don't think Dave meant to hurt him. But he did. Scott recovered a few minutes later. But he was more embarrased at being caught off guard. Scott had pride and an ego. About a week or so later, he told me that he had "done a few things" to himself so that if he were to ever get hit like that again, he wouldn't be hurt. So he wanted me to punch him in the chest to prove it. I refused. But he was insistent. Still, I refused. Finally I told him to pay me $2.00, and I would. He did. So I hit him. He felt justified after the punch. I didn't have the heart to tell him that the reason he got hurt before was because Dave had caught him completely off guard.

Later on that summer, Meff had come up for a few days. And he was spending the night at my house. My parents were out of town. So we had the place to ourselves. At some point after midnight, Scott came by on his bike. He wanted to come in. He was in a foul mood. So I wouldn't let him. After several minutes, I "went downstairs" to go to bed. Meff was left upstairs to deal with him, talking to him through the window. I actually came back up to listen to the conversation. Meff decided to play with Scott, telling him how great I was. He went so far as to tell Scott that I had special powers, and had actually witnessed me bring a dead bird back to life. I don't know what Scott thought of it all. But he told Meff thatI was all wrong, and that he had to break free from me...

During some of our lengthy phone conversations, Scott would bring up the fact that he had dropped all his other friends for Dave and I. But Dave and I were a lot closer to each other. And we shut Scott out at times. I'll be honest. I always chose Dave over Scott. I refused to make future plans with Scott, simply because I wanted to keep myself available on the chance that Dave wanted to do something. That really frustrated Scott - rightfully so.

As our senior year began, nothing changed. But there was a new wrinkle - Richard. If you read my post about Richard, you'll remember that Richard and I weren't on speaking terms that year. Although both of us were still friends with Meff. Well, Scott had Richard in Spanish class, and would pour his heart out to him about the way Dave and I treated him. He looked to Richard for advice on how to deal with us. But Richard had a much different experience with us than Scott did. According to Meff, Richard got really tired of hearing Scott's stories about us. At one point, Scott had mentioned for days that he wanted to beat me up or something. Finally out of frustration, Richard screamed at him, "Just do it already!" Of course Scott never did.

In the fall of our senior year, Scott's mom and stepdad moved to Las Cruces, New Mexico. And Scott decided to join them after the semester was over. Did Dave and I drive him away? Who knows. But I was sad to see him go. I enjoyed my time with him.

So Scott moved to New Mexico, and ended up graduating down there. After graduation, he moved right back to Two Rivers, and moved in with his dad. We called each other at times, but didn't hang out much. By this time, Scott was boning class of 1990's Molly Jindra. He was also hanging out with Amy Schmidt's little brother, class of 1992's Jon Schmidt.

At some point around December, 1990, I know that Dave and I went to see Scott at his father's home. He was showing us his new Sega Genesis. He'd also taken up the nasty habit of smoking. God, did his room reek of that stench!

After that, I don't think I had any contact with Scott for about five years. Then in December, 1995, I was a senior in college. It was the winter break. I was working at T&R Video. When out of the blue, Scott called me.

ME: "Hello, T&R Video?"

SCOTT: "Hey Burt, it's Scott."

ME: "Oh, hi Butt."

SCOTT "Who do you call me that?"

ME: "Cuz it's your name."

SCOTT: "No it's not."

ME: "You said a long time ago, that you'd accept it. It is what it is."

Anyway, Scott was now lving in Manitowoc, with a roommate - class of 1992's, Brodie Reichardt. Their landlord (some sort of smelly mongoloid) lived downstairs. Scott invited me over. So I went. We started to hang around together again, mostly on weekends. It was fun. We drove around, caused a little trobule, played video games, got drunk, made prank phone calls and watched a lot of movies.

In the fall of 1996, Scott lost his job at Food Country. I think he was fired. But he was never clear as to what actually happened. From that moment on, things changed for him. For whatever reason, he really dragged his feet in finding another job. He basically laid around his apartment all day. Eventually he and Brodie moved out, and found another apartment in Two Rivers. They had a third roommate (his name escapes me) join them.

As the winter moved into 1997, Scott was still unemployed, and was feeling great pressure from his roommates to come up with the rent. His third roommate had also brought something else into the equation - a computer. Scott beacme obsessed with the computer, spending most of his waking hours on it. It was like a drug to him. He was surfing, and chatting, and everything else. He was a madman!

In March, 1997, I finally found a real job. The job was in Milwaukee. I moved to Sheboygan, and lived with Dave Svatek and his wife. I had Wednesdays off, and would often come back to Manitowoc to do my laundry at my parents' home. I would visit Scott as well. He was still unemployed, and was really catching hell from his roommates. Then the unthinkable happened. He lost use of the computer. I believe the computer actually belonged to the mother of the third roommate. And she came to get it. Meff and I were visiting him one evening. And he was literally pacing back and forth, saying that he needed a computer. It was like he was suffering from drug withdrawl symptoms.

Prior to getting my own place, I hooked up with Scott one more time. I'm not sure how it happened. But somehow he made contact with me. And I invited him over to the apartment in Sheboygan. Dave and his wife were gone for the weekend (as they were every weekend). So Scott and I had the place to ourselves. We watched some TV, went to Burger King, and basically did nothing.

I'm not exactly sure what happened next in his life. But I believe that Scott's mother came up from New Mexico to get him. I could be wrong though. But I think she was somehow involved in getting his life straightened out a bit. I spoke with Brodie at one point. And I believe Brodie told me that Scott had literally left in the middle of the night, packed a few clothes in his car, took his cat, and drove off to St. Louis, leaving nearly all of his possessions behind. Apparently Scott's thinking was that all his stuff would make up for the lost rent. In May, I got my own apartment in Grafton. And I bought a couple of items of Scotts, that Brodie sold me. Up until three months ago, I still had the entertainment center.

So what was in St. Louis? Apparently he met someone online, and went to live there.

I'm not sure how long the St. Louis affair lasted. But eventually Scott came back to Wisconsin, and moved to Sheboygan, and found a roommate named Dave. That lasted for several years. But tragedy struck in 2001. A fire broke out in their apartment. A wall of flame struck Scott, horribly burning his neck and back. He was sent to a hospital in Milwaukee, where he eventually recovered. My wife and I went to see him. He was in a lot of pain. To add insult to injury, the homeowners blamed them for the fire, and sued. Neither Scott nor Dave fought it. They may not have even been aware. But a judgement of over $34,000 was entered against both of them.

The two of them eventually stopped hanging out. And Scott was on the move again. This time he drove west, arriving in Idaho, to live with someone else he met online. That apparently didn't last long. He then moved to Spokane, Washington. Today he is back in Idaho once again. I E-mail with him from time to time. Although he doesn't keep up with E-mailing as often as he should. He says he misses Manitowoc though.

Come back to Wisconsin, Butt. You've got some friends here.

UPDATE - 6/20/06 - I talked to Scott for about 40 minutes on the phone the other night. He directed me to a recent photo of him which is online. You can see it below. The next three pictures are ones that he sent me. Also, by request, I have edited our portions of this entry. If you want the "uncut" version, E-mail me.









UPDATE - 12/14/06 - I found some old camcorder footage of Scott. I believe these two clips are from March or April, 1990. The clips are of Scott doing some impressions of L.B. Clarke teachers. I believe the other guy is a friend of his by the name of Aaron Rathsack.