Head Games

The labor pains were to musc to take at my brothers 5th birthday party on Sand Lake just a few miles west of Remer, Minnesota on a beautiful late summer afternoon on August 27, 1958. Hastily, Carol Bauer made her way into the back seat of an old brown 4-door Chevy for a high-speed race to Itasca Memorial Hospital in Grand Rapids, Minnesota with Migs Ahlbom at the wheel. The pain was excruciating as her soon-to-be-delivered son John, was trying to escape the womb by using his giant head as a battering-ram. After much screaming and blood loss, John Thomas Bauer was born on his brother Pete's birthday. From that day forward, my head became a very big part of my life. Baseball hats wouldn't fit .. class pictures looked awkward .. entrances to snow forts had to be widened .. kids would stop, stare and point .. pillows wore out faster than normal because the constant pounding .. and the one claim to fame was that I was the smallest player on my high school and college football teams but had the largest head ... 7 3/4. The best thing that ever came about because of my giant head was revealed a few weeks ago while visiting a family member in the hospital. Have you ever taken those obesity tests? You know, the ones that say you should weigh this much if you're so tall? Well, while in the hospital room I spotted a devise that measures your height. You back up against the wall and lower the plate to the top of your head to see how tall you are. Well, this one had a weight measure at every inch of height. Mine once again labeled me as obese. This has always puzzled me as I don't think of myself as being obese. I'm 5'7" tall and weigh anywhere from 168 to 172 pounds. Needless to say I walked out of the hospital room with poor self-esteem and a hunger for a diet. That very same night my sister-in-law Andee called my to tell me about her theory on my obesity. She said, "Have you ever given any consideration to how much your head weighs compared to the rest of your body?" She also feels that I'm not obese ... but maybe my head is and thus the extra weight to throw me over the obesity line. I never was so happy in my life. It was my head that was causing all the tonnage issue. Now I can walk away with my head held high.