Tag: my childhood

Memory Lane: Spring Shoes REPRINT

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From January 7, 2017

For years I’ve been looking for these, and the closest I could come is this video. Actually, the “Diet Helper” shoes demonstrated by this pair of sages very closely resemble what I have in mind.

My friends across the street always seemed to be the first to get really weird toys that defied our efforts to play with them. Stilts, for instance. But weirdest of all were these shoes with great big springs under them, that were supposed to help you bound around the playground like a kangaroo.

They looked like they should work exactly as expected, but no! We tried and tried, but all that ever happened was, we fell down. Maybe we weren’t heavy enough for the springs. Otherwise, the shoes sort of fit. You just couldn’t go anywhere in them, except down.

Sixty years later, I would love to give them another try. True, the pogo stick was my true art form. You shoulda seen me pogo-stick up and down the bleachers on the football field, up and down the cellar stairs. If my mother could have ever seen that, she would have taken forceful action, if she didn’t keel over in a faint first.

But spring shoes? Oh, to locomote like a human super-ball! Fond dreams of youth…

I Think I’ve Been There REPRINT

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Entelodon | Cool Dino Facts Wiki | Fandom

From July 5, 2020

This is Charles R. Knight’s 1894 painting of Elotherium, an extinct animal that resembled a wild boar. That’s cool–but what I’m really interested in is the backdrop.

This reproduction, the only one I could find, doesn’t quite capture the dried-out yellowish tones of the banks of this gully. You’ll have to imagine that. The gully is full of water and the animals are crossing it. Farther up toward the horizon, the gully feeds into a more permanent stream. And then a river? Then the sea?

The thing is–I think I’ve been there! Years and years and years ago. You got there if you went all the way down Orchard Street, back when there was still an orchard there, well past all the houses, and then just park your bike where this little bridge went across the gully. You could easily climb down and wade in the water–which of course you wouldn’t do if  there were Elotheriums present. They look irritable.

It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that Knight used real places as the backdrops for his paintings of prehistoric life. I wonder: did he wander into my childhood, or did I wander into one of his paintings?

Memory Lane: ‘Melvin the Moon Man’ Reprint

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From June 9, 2018

 

Before the advent of video games featuring blood and guts flying all over the screen, children had to be content with benign, peaceful, harmless games–like this one.

Remco put out “Melvin the Moon Man” in 1959, and it was a hit. My parents got it for us for Christmas, and it was simple enough for all three of us to play: my sister, age 4, my brother, 7, and me, 10. If we had had a cat, he probably could’ve played, too.

You spin the handle of the unique Tumblebum dice glass (that, and the colorful graphics, were the game’s big selling points), and your plastic Spaceman traveled around the United Craters of the Moon collecting Moonbucks. The one with the most Moonbucks wins. No tactics or strategy involved. Just follow the map according to the roll of the dice.

I don’t know what Melvin cost in 1959, but it’s selling on eBay today for up to $150. In 1959 anything over $5 was a major expenditure for my father which my mother would have to weigh carefully. They really must have loved us to buy us silly stuff like this.

And that’s what makes this memory so sweet.

The Doll That Scared a Boy Silly

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From September 22, 2018

It is not the usual thing for boys to be afraid of dolls. Nevertheless, I knew a boy, who grew up to be a star athlete and a model citizen, who had a dreadful experience with a certain doll. I must not reveal his name, lest he be embarrassed by this anecdote. For the sake of convenience, I’ll call him Ariobarzanes.

As he was a new boy in the neighborhood, my friends and I decided to introduce him to our local wilderness, preparing him with lurid tales of Hangman’s Tree, which stood at the very heart of it. To this day, we whispered to him, as we followed the trail beside the creek, some evil force continued to string up people from that tree. But it ought to be safe to go there in the daytime. Probably.

Meanwhile, my friend Ellen, a very good tree climber, went on ahead to set the stage.

We had poor Ario pretty well pumped up by the time we entered the clearing where the tree glowered down on all of Middlesex County. And there Bobby and I stopped short, pointing and crying out, “Oh, no, not again! Oh, no!”

A hapless little doll hung from the lowest branch, swaying dismally in the wind.

With a great cry, Ariobarzanes turned and ran all the way back home without stopping even once, showing great promise of the track star he would one day be. He didn’t even need to use the path: he made one of his own.

I admit that this was a naughty prank, but Ario soon laughed it off and he and I became great friends. Best freakin’ shortstop we ever had, too.

But now you see, I’m sure, that under the right circumstances, a boy can be scared by a doll.

When We Were All Little Sages REPRINT

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Sometimes what you knew turned out to be not true.

All this bowing down to children and asking them to please tell us what our public policies should be, reminds me of how wise we all were when I was in fifth grade.

Out on the playground, which was our grove of Academe, we liked to discuss weighty topics with one another: the more philosophically abstruse, the better. We especially liked scientific subjects.

One of the topics we discussed at great length went like this: “Ya know, every time they talk about shooting a rocket to the moon, these two dubular clouds appear on Mars…”

Dubular? What does that mean? Well, nobody asked! Each of us took it for granted that everybody else knew exactly what it meant. I didn’t know, but that didn’t stop me from repeating that baloney. It got so I didn’t have to know what it meant! Just saying it made us sound so wise.

If only adults had listened to us, back then! Obviously they had no appreciation for our childly wisdom.

But that seems to be changing fast.

Keep your eyes peeled for dubular clouds on Mars.

From November 2019

I’m Sick, All Right

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I haven’t been this sick since I was in knee-pants.

It’s horrible. Everything hurts.  No Daddy to scoop me up from bed and sing Sweet Violets. My wife is very worried. I miss my mother coming up the stairs to serve me ginger ale.

What can I do now, but ask for prayers?

And plenty of ’em.

A Summer’s Day, Back Then

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Let’s go back to 1960, when I was 11 years old. It’s summer vacation, school is out–let’s go! Live it up!

Gobble up my breakfast, then rush outside with mitt and bat to see if my friends Jimmy and Frank are ready to play ball. They are. So we shag flies for a while, until there are enough kids there for a softball game.

Hop on the bikes, race through the woods next door, and stop at the spring for a drink (who would dare to do that now?). Back on the bikes, over to the candy store. And then to Tommy’s Pond to catch frogs… or fish.

Afternoon is almost played out. A quick dip in our backyard pool seems in order: then grab the newspaper before anybody else, so I can see how Willie Mays made out last night. Box scores tell the tale.

Then suppertime. Corn on the cob. The farm is ten minutes away by bike.

After supper, a game of kickball on the street… till it gets dark.

That day it was over 100 degrees outside. We had a lot of days like that! It was the middle of July, of course it was going to be hot. No one heard of “Climbit Change” or “Global Warming.” We did just fine without it. If you wanted air conditioning, go to the movies. Or to the dentist.

That’s how it was.

I’ll Try to Do Better Tomorrow

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Turok: Son of Stone 10 - Turok - Son Of Stone - Mortal Combat - Indians - Dinosaurs

Two little posts today, that was my output. Well three, counting this one.

When I was a boy my absolute favorite comic book was Turok Son of Stone, the adventures of a couple of Native Americans in a lost world chock-full of dinosaurs, cave men, and everything else that made prehistoric life worth living. Dodging a pair of battling tyrannosaurs: it doesn’t get any better than that!

Anyway, I don’t have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow and I’m looking forward to catching up on the nooze.

Meanwhile, if you’ve encountered any nooze articles you think I ought to look into and write about, please let me know.

‘Until We Meet Again’

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Roy Rogers and Dale Evans were BIG, really BIG on TV when I was a boy, back in the 1050s. And among other things, they sang hymns. And no one tried to stop them!

Hard to imagine… but I was there to see and hear it.

Trying to Restore My Memory

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The Cisco Kid - The Carriage and Western Art Museum

Duncan Rinaldo (right) and Leo Carillo (left) in The Cisco Kid

I’m trying to kick my memory back into gear. A spotty memory, part of “chemo brain,” is a standard leftover from chemotherapy and radiation. In my own case it’s taking a lot of time to fade away.

Yesterday I was exercising my memory by asking it what TV shows I used to watch with Grandma. I spent a lot of time at her house. I was too young to realize this, but television had only come along later in her life and still seemed a touch miraculous.

When the weather was nice, of course, we were out on the porch–me with my pick-up sticks, Grandma with her Reader’s Digest. When it wasn’t, we resorted to the living room and turned on the TV.

Here are three shows I remember from back them.

*The Cisco Kid (1950-1956). I loved this show! So exotic! Certainly nothing like it in New Jersey. Grandma always tried to please her grandchildren, so we watched The Cisco Kid. I’m not convinced she thought it was so great.

*Arthur Godfrey. Great Caesar’s ghost! Could this guy put you to sleep, or what? Grandma never missed it. He played a big part in early TV history, on air 1949-1959. And it was live TV: sometimes he liked to just throw away the script and wing it.

*Queen for a Day (1956-64). This started out as a radio show in 1949–and who can forget it? Old ladies competed with each other, and whoever could trot out the most abject misery got to be “Queen for a Day.” Really, this was just awful! Grandma lapped it up like chowder.

I want to get my brain back on line. Somewhere out there is Ozias, Prince Enthroned–but where is it? I’ve got the longhand copy, but the finished manuscript is still hiding in the blahsmos.

Come on, memory! No more lolly-gagging!