Wednesday morning on FirstNews, we had a story about a man facing 15 years in prison for allegedly stealing a donut. The possible sentence actually has to do with the alleged assault he committed after being caught. See how often I use the words "alleged" and "allegedly?" I am, after all, a serious journalist with great integrity...allegedly. The story dredged up memories of my own crime spree. That is an unusual phrase, "crime spree." It sounds like something a fun little crook would create. As if Al Capone was singing show tunes and leaving rose petals as he rampaged through Chicago. If Richard Simmons became a car thief...that would be a crime spree! "Your honor, my client is just very enthusiastic and was engaging in a spree. The crime part was purely incidental." Anyway, in my case it was, as the title states A Crime of Passion. Okay, there was no crime. And, I was about ten years old, so the "passion" had to do with M&Ms.

As a disembodied voice from an old movie once intoned: "There are eight million stories in the naked city and this is one of them." In my case, it would be more accurate to say: "There are a couple dozen stories in the snowmobile-suit-clad village and this is just barely one of them." It all started when a friend of mine named Gregg and I decided to walk downtown and buy some snacks. Now, you may think that someone who uses that many "Gs" in his name would be a little stuck-up but Gregg was just as friendly as someone spelling their name with only two "Gs." Anyway, for a kid with some loose coins, there were three choices on Water Street back then: Mueller's Drug Store, A&A Grocery and Luher's Market.

My mom had worked at the drug store off and on, but I wasn't sure I wanted to go in there for our goodies. A couple years before, for Father's Day, I had gone in there and bought my dad a carton of Kents and a girlie magazine as gifts and I was pretty sure my soiled reputation...stained at the tender age of eight!...would follow me through the aisles. Also, there was a woman working there named "Fanny" and I was always afraid I'd start to giggle when I saw her name-tag. (I know that is very immature but I was only a kid. That does not explain why I am chuckling to myself right now as I write this.) Anyway, we skipped the drug store.

Gregg and I went to A&A Grocery. The A&A stood for Art and Arlyn. Their last name was Wedekind and they lived right behind us. A couple of my brothers had worked there as box boys so I sort of leaned toward that store as first choice. In later years, when A&A had become Don and Ellen's Grocery and Butcher Shop, I worked there. I helped stock shelves and, when the solitary cashier would have a fight with Don and walk out for a day or two, even ran the cash register. This was back in the days when a clerk had to know how to count back change because the machine didn't do it for you, so it was quite a responsibility. The worst jobs at Don and Ellen's fell on alternating Saturdays. One Saturday, I would have to clean out the meat freezer. That meant standing in there, surrounded by bloody ice and mountains of frost...like a Sno-Cone for Dracula...scraping the walls and floor clean. Then, washing it out with a very bleach-y bucket of water. I was usually sick to my stomach by the time I was done. Mr. Hamlin, in his pork pie hat, with a Swisher Sweet clenched in his teeth, would chortle a little and say "It's good for ya!" as I stumbled out the door. The next Saturday that came along would mean I could skip the defrosting duties but had to clean the smoke-house. Instead of carving ice chunks off the walls, I was peeling away fat. At first, the aroma of the smoke house was pleasant, but, after spending an extended period in there...reducing more fat than Kirstie Alley and Valerie Bertinelli put together...I would be a little green around the gills, again. And, again, Mr. Hamlin would assure me "It's good for ya!" Looking back it was...because I realized I never wanted to do that stuff again!

Those Don and Ellen days, though, were a few years in the future when I was ten and visiting A&A Grocery. Gregg and I went in and bought our respective snacks. He got a small bag of Fritos and I got a small bag of M&Ms. We left the store and proceeded down the street and around the corner, arriving at the door of Luher's Market. This is where we made our mistake. We shoved our treats in our pockets and went into Luher's. Once inside, we realized we had no more change and couldn't buy anything so we walked right back out. As we did, we both reached into our pockets and pulled out our previously purchased treats. Our feet had barely hit the sidewalk when Mr. Luher swung open the door of his place, fixed us with a withering glare and said "You boys PAY for those?" We stammered and stumbled...explaining that we'd bought the chips and candy at A&A. We hadn't taken it from his store! Really! Honest! Mr. Luher just shook his head and went back inside. Gregg and I were convinced that there was no way Mr. Luher believed us.

We were pretty sure the headline in the Sauk-Prairie Star the next Thursday would be along the lines of "LOCAL HOODLUMS RANSACK MARKET! STEAL FOOD! LIE TO PILLAR OF COMMUNITY!" It seemed a given that Sunday's sermon would touch on on least two of the commandments, stealing and bearing false witness, using us as examples of what NOT to do. The pastor would lean up on the front of the pulpit, stare down at us quivering in the front pew, and say "I am reminded of a story about two boys who had been loved and supported by their parents only to decide that the rules didn't apply to them. (There's another commandment broken...honor your father and mother. Really, when you're a kid, that one's sort of a catch-all.) They just took what they wanted. They didn't care that the way to heaven is narrow but the way to eternal damnation is wide and easy. They only cared about their basest appetites. They may not have meant to do wrong...to sin, but remember, the road to hades is paved with good intentions and Fritos and M&Ms."

This was a very small town so, even as we walked home from our accusatory episode, we were sure everyone in every house already knew what crime we'd allegedly (there's that word again) committed. We could almost see all the blinds being drawn and shutters being shuttered. We were the Clantons running roughshod through Dodge City! True, Gregg and I had not actually done anything wrong but we had been ignorant and receipt-less! We were convinced that this was the end of our bright futures. At that point, Gregg was going to be an NFL quarterback and I was going to be Frank Sinatra, so it was quite a letdown.

At the very least, Mr. Luher would call our parents and tell them he thought we'd walked out without paying. When Gregg got home, he hid in his room. I climbed up into my dilapidated tree house and waited for the shoe to drop. While sitting up there, I decided I would try to get on the kitchen detail at juvenile hall, because that way, maybe, I'd get extra chocolate milk at chow time. I must have been up in that tree for an hour. (I've now been out of my tree for about 35 years.) Nothing happened. No headlines. No sermon. No parental admonishments. Mr. Luher must not have said a word to anybody about his suspicions! Perhaps, he knew, if we'd actually swiped the stuff, our conscience would get the better of us and that our worry about what might happen would be worse than any actual punishment.

Well, that's the story of my checkered youth. I learned to always save my receipts and, to this day, when I walk down the aisle of a grocery store and see Fritos and M&Ms I break out in a cold sweat and begin to confess to just about anything.