So the reason One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish is the best Dr. Seuss book of all time is because the lady who hit me with her van happened to have a copy of it on hand, which her friend read to me as my head rested in her lap, soothing my tears on the way home. Turns out both of the ladies knew my mom from the neighborhood Tupperware parties, because that’s how they rolled in 1977. So instead of calling an ambulance like they would today, they just picked me up from the bottom of Hangman’s Hill and loaded me and my ruined bike into their sweet ’73 Econoline camper-van, and drove me the two blocks back to my house at 27 Mervine Ave., Monterey, CA.
I was thinking of that moment today, recalling the tinted window in the wall of the camper-van and the scratchy texture of the lady’s polyester leisure pants against my cheek as she read those endlessly rhyming Seuss couplets. I’d never seen a van with a picture window or table and chairs in it. I imagined my sister and I playing Go Fish or Battleship at that table—as opposed to being shoehorned into the back seat of our little Datsun—while our family rolled down the highway on any of the infinite road trips we were always making to visit aunt, uncles, and cousins in other states. To this day, that Econoline luxury remains, to me—along with One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish—the pinnacle of awesomeness. But even as I was reminiscing about the incident, the wonders of modern technology were working their particular magic. Namely, letting the air out of my childhood memories as I strolled virtually down the old avenue from the comforts of my couch using Google Earth.
I’d been looking for my former home and discovered that the entire neighborhood had been razed and rebuilt after the Military closed the base and their housing tract during all the consolidations under Clinton. Our old addresses still existed, but instead of the three basic models of DOD domiciles that had proliferated in prosaic little lines to house the ever-rotating roster of Naval officers and their families, newer homes had been erected by civilians which reflected the architectural character of that historic town instead. It’s a much better looking neighborhood now, but I can’t help feeling kind of sad about it. I guess we all want the world of our childhood to stand inviolate as a museum of our lives, a monument to our existence.
Although 27 Mervine Ave. was a totally different house now, it was still cool to roam up and down the streets. From the convenience store on Leahy where I’d plunk down every nickel I’d hoarded in exchange for as much Bazooka-Joe gum as I could cram into my gob, to the mud-flats behind the store where we'd hunt pollywogs; past La Mesa Elementary where I’d fallen in hopelessly in love with Miss Brimmie and enjoyed my only season of athletic prominence as I utterly dominated at 4-square; then all the way up to the much-vaunted Hangman’s Hill at the end of Mervine where it intersects with Shubrick Rd. The Hill was a place that even angels feared to tread, but where fools rushed in. Fools like me.
While we lived on Mervine I made three very serious attempts to become a superhero in complete earnestness, all of them ending badly. Two of them were variations on the theme of me attempting to gain superpowers by purposefully shocking myself with 120 volts of electricity, about which the less said the better. The third was when I attempted to turn my 1977 Murray Eliminator II bicycle, complete with banana seat, into the Batmobile. I accomplished that by means of an ingenious parachute of my own design, which would theoretically stop my bike dragster-style, just like Batman. That’s right, I’m the reason your favorite TV shows have to have the disclaimer: “Kids, don’t try this at home.”
My infallible Bat-parachute was made from the finest materials: a black store-brand garbage bag from under the sink for the ‘chute, and some brown packaging twine from Dad’s tool bench in the garage to anchor it to the rear of my banana seat. I punched several holes in the edge of the garbage bag to knot the twine through, looping it around the tail-reflector behind the seat. I was careful not to unfold the garbage bag before its maiden voyage, lest it get tangled in the rear wheel. Because safety first. Instead I tucked it between the seat and the reflector, ready to deploy for the first time on its maiden voyage down the precipice of Hangman’s Hill.
None of the neighborhood kids had ever dared to go rocketing down The Hill on their bikes, so if my invention worked, I and my bike… nay, Batbike…would be the envy of the entire first grade. I couldn’t have been more ambitious, excited, or filled with unwarranted confidence as I sat astride the Batbike staring down The Hill, ready to launch myself into the annals of history sans helmet, pads, or adult supervision.
Such was my total confidence in the Bat-chute that when it failed to deploy—and my six-year-old brain could only think, “The Bat-chute… it does nothing!”—I never even applied the coaster brakes that the engineers at Murray had so thoughtfully installed on the Eliminator. Instead, I shot full-speed through the stop sign and out into the T-intersection at Mervine and Shubrick, with my unopened ‘chute streaming behind like a black flag. As I collided with the unsuspecting ladies in their groovy Econoline van (complete with desert mural) just behind the driver’s-side door, launching myself ass-over-teakettle into a faceplant against the side panel, rebounding off and rolling out into the road, I cussed myself as a novice. Because I hadn’t unfurled the bag from the factory-folded condition it came from the box in. Except for that, it had been a GREAT idea! You know, if not for that one and only flaw in my otherwise awesome plan.
The next day when I saw the condition of my bike—the handlebars bent 180 degrees around, the front wheel completely crushed in, the tire flat and the rim a twisted wreck—I realized what a bullet I’d dodged. If I’d been a fraction of a second earlier to the bottom... she'd have hit me, instead of me hitting her. But owing to that fraction of a second's difference in time, aside from a skinned knee, I didn’t have a scratch on me. I’d gone head first off the edge of the world like a champion, got hit by a car, and had come out unscathed. So although my plan had failed, I held a place of distinction amongst my fellow first graders for my dauntless bravado. Because you know who else dodges bullets like that? The goddamn Batman, that’s who.
And then adulthood and the Internet happened.
Today, as I was on my virtual walking tour of the neighborhood, I finished with a trip down that Matterhorn precipice of memory, mighty Hangman’s Hill. In my six-year-old’s mind it was a miles-long, vertically diving Olympic-level ski-jump. But thanks to Google Earth I’ve now seen that it was about the length of four houses and was around a 5-6% grade, which is just a tad bit steeper than the drop on the kiddie-coaster at a carnival.
I guess that explains why the Bat-chute didn’t work; there wasn’t enough velocity and wind resistance to force it open. What I really needed was a better quality trashbag, not like that flimsy store-brand kitchen one. Maybe a Hefty Lawn and Leaf bag… some grommets to reinforce the eyelets and keep the bag from tearing… some bailing wire to attach it to my bike… maybe an explosive of some kind to deploy it. And of course a much, much steeper hill.
Quick, Robin! To the Batcave!
While we lived on Mervine I made three very serious attempts to become a superhero in complete earnestness, all of them ending badly. Two of them were variations on the theme of me attempting to gain superpowers by purposefully shocking myself with 120 volts of electricity, about which the less said the better. The third was when I attempted to turn my 1977 Murray Eliminator II bicycle, complete with banana seat, into the Batmobile. I accomplished that by means of an ingenious parachute of my own design, which would theoretically stop my bike dragster-style, just like Batman. That’s right, I’m the reason your favorite TV shows have to have the disclaimer: “Kids, don’t try this at home.”
My infallible Bat-parachute was made from the finest materials: a black store-brand garbage bag from under the sink for the ‘chute, and some brown packaging twine from Dad’s tool bench in the garage to anchor it to the rear of my banana seat. I punched several holes in the edge of the garbage bag to knot the twine through, looping it around the tail-reflector behind the seat. I was careful not to unfold the garbage bag before its maiden voyage, lest it get tangled in the rear wheel. Because safety first. Instead I tucked it between the seat and the reflector, ready to deploy for the first time on its maiden voyage down the precipice of Hangman’s Hill.
None of the neighborhood kids had ever dared to go rocketing down The Hill on their bikes, so if my invention worked, I and my bike… nay, Batbike…would be the envy of the entire first grade. I couldn’t have been more ambitious, excited, or filled with unwarranted confidence as I sat astride the Batbike staring down The Hill, ready to launch myself into the annals of history sans helmet, pads, or adult supervision.
Such was my total confidence in the Bat-chute that when it failed to deploy—and my six-year-old brain could only think, “The Bat-chute… it does nothing!”—I never even applied the coaster brakes that the engineers at Murray had so thoughtfully installed on the Eliminator. Instead, I shot full-speed through the stop sign and out into the T-intersection at Mervine and Shubrick, with my unopened ‘chute streaming behind like a black flag. As I collided with the unsuspecting ladies in their groovy Econoline van (complete with desert mural) just behind the driver’s-side door, launching myself ass-over-teakettle into a faceplant against the side panel, rebounding off and rolling out into the road, I cussed myself as a novice. Because I hadn’t unfurled the bag from the factory-folded condition it came from the box in. Except for that, it had been a GREAT idea! You know, if not for that one and only flaw in my otherwise awesome plan.
The next day when I saw the condition of my bike—the handlebars bent 180 degrees around, the front wheel completely crushed in, the tire flat and the rim a twisted wreck—I realized what a bullet I’d dodged. If I’d been a fraction of a second earlier to the bottom... she'd have hit me, instead of me hitting her. But owing to that fraction of a second's difference in time, aside from a skinned knee, I didn’t have a scratch on me. I’d gone head first off the edge of the world like a champion, got hit by a car, and had come out unscathed. So although my plan had failed, I held a place of distinction amongst my fellow first graders for my dauntless bravado. Because you know who else dodges bullets like that? The goddamn Batman, that’s who.
And then adulthood and the Internet happened.
Today, as I was on my virtual walking tour of the neighborhood, I finished with a trip down that Matterhorn precipice of memory, mighty Hangman’s Hill. In my six-year-old’s mind it was a miles-long, vertically diving Olympic-level ski-jump. But thanks to Google Earth I’ve now seen that it was about the length of four houses and was around a 5-6% grade, which is just a tad bit steeper than the drop on the kiddie-coaster at a carnival.
I guess that explains why the Bat-chute didn’t work; there wasn’t enough velocity and wind resistance to force it open. What I really needed was a better quality trashbag, not like that flimsy store-brand kitchen one. Maybe a Hefty Lawn and Leaf bag… some grommets to reinforce the eyelets and keep the bag from tearing… some bailing wire to attach it to my bike… maybe an explosive of some kind to deploy it. And of course a much, much steeper hill.
Quick, Robin! To the Batcave!
No comments:
Post a Comment