You hear folks of a certain age (mine,
for example) say it all the time: It’s a miracle we ever made it to adulthood.
That’s geezer-speak for, “My generation had it so much harder than yours, you
coddled sissies!”
We baby boomers didn’t invent the phrase,
much as we’d like to think we did. We heard it from our parents, who in turn
heard it from theirs, all the way back to Adam on the outskirts of the Garden
of Eden telling Abel, “You think you’ve
got it bad?! When I was your age, it was just me and your mom! At least you have your nice brother Abel to hang
out with! Now, you two get those offerings ready and keep out of my hair!”
The “my generation” comment also refers to
the plethora of safety gizmos – everything from bike helmets to seat belts – which
didn’t even appear on our 1960s radar. It was Darwinism run rampant! Only the
strong survived!
Or, in my case, the lucky. Even for a
kid, I was remarkably stupid. Some would say this is a condition I’ve yet to
outgrow, but if you’re going to listen to my ex-wives, we’re gonna be here all
day.
Sure, all kids get themselves into
trouble from time to time. But I seemed to have a particular gift for it. It
wasn’t that I was evil, exactly. I
just seemed to lack that certain “something” which allows one to foresee the possible
consequences of unwise actions.
In short, I did things, but rarely
thought about them first.
Nobody recognized this failing better
than did my old man. Which is why I found it so remarkable he loaned me the Country
Squire on my 16th birthday, the day I received my driver’s license.
I was even more surprised when the transference of car keys wasn’t accompanied
by a two-hour driver safety lecture.
Instead, my dad said only, “Now, don’t
go getting stuck on any cow paths.”
I assured him I would not, grabbed the
keys and headed out for my first taste of freedom. My first stop was Debbie’s
house.
My goal was to put as many miles on that
Country Squire as the tires and my available gas money would allow. Debbie had
other thoughts. She had, it turned out, been waiting for a boyfriend with a car
for quite a while.
A half-hour later, I found myself being
directed down a lonely country road. Late November rain fell heavily, forming road
puddles big enough to fish in.
“Turn in here,” Debbie advised. I did. I
was a city boy and had never heard of a “two-track,” but I was on one now. The
narrow, dirt lane wandered between the tree-line of a small woods and a farmer’s
fallow field.
A cow path.
A half mile in, we parked, as teenage
couples have done since the invention of the internal combustion engine. The
rain fell as Debbie and I clumsily explored the intricacies of post-pubescent anatomy.
To paraphrase Harry Chapin, the lesson didn’t go too far. Somewhere during that
fondly-remembered hour, the rain turned to sleet and ice.
The Country Squire, a station wagon that
weighed about the same as your average cement mixer, slowly settled into the semi-frozen
mud. Later, there was much spinning of wheels and sailor-grade cursing. A very
cold walk to a nearby farmhouse provided a borrowed phone, upon which I called
my mother.
She arrived an hour later in a tow truck,
along with the driver and – of all people! – my grandmother. The wrecker pulled the car from the mud and we began
the long, infinitely painful, ride home; my mom driving the Country Squire, my
grandmother riding shotgun, Debbie and I sitting in back.
The entire way home my grandmother kept
repeating, “I can’t imagine what you two kids were doing way out there!” My mother provided a running and exquisitely
horrific commentary on what my father was likely to do to me the moment I walked
through the front door. I was a dead man walking. No doubt in my mind.
We dropped Debbie off and drove the rest
of the way in angry silence (angry on my mother’s part; terrified on mine).
My old man was sitting at the kitchen
table, looking at his hands as if he could somehow prevent them from committing
the homicide he was no doubt contemplating. His arms shook with anger. My knees
felt funny; my legs told me to run. But I knew that would only make my inevitable
demise all the slower and more painful.
And then … my dad burst out laughing.
The looks on the faces of my mother and grandmother showed they were as
surprised as I was.
“OK,” said my old man. “You get a pass
on this one. I did the same thing the night I got my license. Damn kid. You’re
grounded for a week. Get upstairs.”
A mere week seemed like nothing when compared with the severity
of the crime. My mom thought the same thing and spent the next ten minutes
telling my dad so in angry whispers. But his sentence stood.
I didn’t have a lot of good moments with
my old man, but that was one of them. Even so, it’s a miracle I lived into
adulthood.
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