Shrunken Heads

When I was enrolled in my Masters in Counseling program at Liberty University, the professor asked us to split up into pairs, and do a practice counseling session with one another. I immediately had an idea for my ad-role as a client.

Randy asked me to express my major “issue,” and I began to share my story with him.

“Well, this is hard, but I actually grew up in Africa, and I was the son of a missionary couple. While we were there, and I had just turned six years of age, my parents sent me off to an international school about 200 miles from our mission headquarters in the Congo. Of course, I missed my parents, but they wrote to me, and phoned me occasionally. 

And it was then that I got the news. My parents were missing, and it was feared that they had been kidnapped by a fierce tribe of not so civilized warriors.

Well, eventually there was nothing left to do but return  me to the states. Of course, this whole experience was devastating for a six year old boy. I grew up with my mother’s brother and his wife. They did the best they could, but they weren’t my parents.

After I finished high school, and spent time in the Air Force, I married. While I was still stationed in Tampa, I enjoyed visiting the local flea market there. 

One Saturday as I was browsing through the booths I stopped dead in my tracks. There hanging on the wall of one of the pavilions was a pair of shrunken heads! This was like nothing I’d ever seen before, and their faces looked SO familiar. They were obviously white people, and they were obviously… my parents!

Well, you can imagine, I almost fainted right there in front of God and everybody. After I had caught my breath I asked the fella how much he was asking for the pair. I mean I couldn’t just leave my folks hanging there on the wall of a flea market booth like that. We agreed on $25 per head, and he placed each of them gently into a bag for me.

What a quandary. What would I do with the decapitated, shrunken heads of my parents? I considered a proper burial, but all I had was their heads. I actually thought about setting up a shrine of sorts in our spare bedroom at home. I mean what do you do with something like this? Is there a particular etiquette about the whole thing?”

By now my partner’s face was ashen, and he wore a grim look. I could almost read his mind. How would he handle such an unexpected, singular issue such as this one?

And it was then that I began laughing. I had done all I could to tell the story, and tell it well, but now I just about lost it. Randy’s demeanor changed immediately, and neither of us could contain ourselves. 

Thankfully, that particular issue never came up in my twenty years of counseling experience. But if it does, I expect I’ll be ready for it.

By William McDonald, PhD. Excerpt from (Mc)Donald's Daily Diary, Vol. 17. Copyright pending

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