Far from the city and deep in the mountains, in a town called Flintstone, there once was a boy who didn't fit in.
He hated school. The other children had learned to read, but words did not come easily to him.
He didn't like riding the bus. It was a long lonely trip over narrow curvy roads, and he told his mom he had no friends.
At home, the boy got into trouble for being hyper. This explains how he broke his tooth on the bathtub and how the car antenna popped him in the eye.
Matthew, stop it.
Matthew, settle down.
Matthew, how many times do I have to tell you ...
Then one day 6-year-old Matthew Stevey was canoeing with his mom and dad and his little brother Zachary.
In warm weather they float down the Potomac River every chance they get, whenever his dad gets a day off from his job at the cheese factory.
Usually, theirs is a smooth, uneventful ride.
Matthew, stop dragging your hands in the water.
But on this particular day two summers ago, they were three miles downstream from Bond's Landing when the oar struck something hard.
Matthew looked into the glassy water to see what it was, and looking back was a skinny boy with cautious eyes and a few freckles beginning to darken his nose. It was a face that didn't smile often, but when it did it was like a jack-o-lantern: lit up and missing a tooth.
The canoe had come to rest in shallow water at the edge of an island. It was his dad's favorite place to stop and eat the peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches and Little Debbie Snack Cakes they packed for lunch.
The river bank was smooth, and the trees overhead had grown together, so sitting there was sort of like sitting on a porch. The ground felt cool and dark, and because the island was surrounded by the rugged mountains of Western Maryland, his dad said the place looked "prehistoric."
The water there was clear, and when Matthew looked in, he could see the oar had struck a rock that was partially buried in mud.
He pulled, Zack tugged, and what they hoisted from the water was almost as long as Matthew's forearm, about the same width, as smooth as bed sheets, the color of wet leaves, and not so heavy that Zack couldn't hold it by himself.
They showed their dad.
Richard Stevey hunted and fished and spent considerable time in the woods, but he had never seen anything like this.
