Off The Wall

Nursery rhymes have been around as long as parents have been putting children to bed.  The stories of Mother Goose and the Brothers Grimm to send the little ones off to dreamland.  For the most part, unchanged for generations upon generations.

When I put my sons to bed, I tell them these classic tales.  With a little twist of my own.  The other night I did this very thing with Humpty Dumpty.  This time, he was pushed.  Sort of.

Once upon a time there was a kind and intelligent accountant.  He had a round face and figure.  Some would call his shape a dumpty one.  With his pale complexion, many people thought of him as closely resembling an egg.  This didn't prevent many of them from trying to get him to crack under the pressure of keeping their complicated accounts and transactions straight.

What none of his clients or friends realized, was a secret he kept tucked away in his inner core.  He guarded it like a mother hen guards her young.  He only practiced his dream hobby in the darkness of his basement.  Nobody else could see him.  Nobody else could hear him.  This is how he practiced his dream.  This is where he would rap.  His used his hip-gyrating moves and beat to give himself a nickname, Humpty.

His outer existence as a quiet accountant and his hidden life as a rapper remained utterly separate.  Until he had a few too many free samples as a citywide Oktoberfest beer party.  With such small amounts from each brewer served in the tiny cup, he didn't realize how much he had consumed until he was standing unsteadily on the wall next to the main stage.  A microphone in his hand and every eye of the festival on him.  With all the liquid courage in him, Humpty Dumpty decided to make his private hobby public.

Humpty laid down his best rhymes.  He whipped out his best moves.  He let the beats flow like water over Niagara Falls. Everyone at the party watched him in stunned silence.  Finally, as Humpty was catching his breath for a moment, someone else climbed onto the wall.  It took Humpty a minute to recognize the face of the infamously famous King of Hip-Hop.  At the base of the wall we his entourage.  His friends were affectionately called The King's Men, while his bodyguards were called The King's Horses.  Humpty now faced the most elite crew in the country.  It was at that moment The King challenged Humpty to a rap battle.

Words flew back and forth.  Each contestant stepped closer to the other as their rhymes collided over the heads of everyone in the crowd.  Subtle comments and outrageous insults slashed into the ego of each one of them.  The audience cheered when one side or the other dropped a line that cut particularly deep.  They booed and hissed when a verbal attack was so weak it was shrugged off with a grimace.

The competitors finally met in the middle of the wall face-to-face.  Humpty threw some words that hit The King directly.  The King struck back so fiercely that Humpty was physically knocked back.  The King kept flinging phrases that forced Humpty to step further and further back.  The King unleashed one final rhyme that literally knocked Humpty off of his feet.  Humpty fell from the wall.

He landed in a heap on the ground.  His arms bent in an unnatural angle.  His legs bent in ways no human should be capable of bending any of their appendages.  The King's Horses and Men rushed to offer some First Aid.  Unfortunately, none of them knew anything about anatomy or treating wounds.  They were unable to help Humpty with any of his broken bones.  All of them tried, but none of them was able to assist.  Finally, an EMT crew arrived and loaded Humpty Dumpty on a stretcher.

After months of healing and time spent rehabilitating, Humpty went back to work at his accounting firm.  His rap equipment left collecting dust in the basement.  He now spent too much time handling the accounts and transactions for the one and only King of Hip-Hop.  He let the numbers flow and the balances rhyme on the sheets.  He was finally happy with the combination of his public face and formerly private hobby.

I have always wondered one thing about the Humpty Dumpty nursery tale.  Who ever said Humpty was an egg in the first place?