I just read another member's story about playing "alligator" in the red mud and digging holes in the dirt to play marbles as a kid. It inspired me to share one of my favorite "boys will be boys" stories.
Me and Jerry Feldman were best of friends at 10 years old. One crisp fall New England day, with the leaves nearly all fallen off the trees and the air extremely dry, we decided to climb up to the top of "History Rock". It was a giant granite rock about 100 feet high with a baron top, a sheer drop off on one side with a sloping vegetative back side.
It was breezy that bright sunny day and when we reached the top we huddled around a small patch of dry straw growing out of the rock. There were many of these smal croppings, just the kind of thing a kid who took a pack of matches from the kitchen counter may have an interest in. As expected, even though it was about 60 degrees outside, I said to Jerry, "You know, it's kinda cold out don't ya think?" With some kind of 6th sense he knew what I meant as I was saying it. "I'm freezing! Got a match? Mabye we could warm up by lighting this patch of grass." Fantastic idea, right?
With complete innocence (maybe not quite complete) we pulled the grass out of the rock and piled up two or three other patches to make a pretty good little starter pile. There it was. Fire. Smoke. We blocked the wind with our bodies so it would really catch on. Mesmerized, we saw a small sparking piece of grass blow out of the pile onto another small patch about 5 feet away. As if there was an open gas line the second patch burst into flames. Not really that big. It just surprised us so I went over to stamp it out with my foot leaving Jerry to guard the larger fire without my body as the wind guard.
I was quickly engaged in chasing the spark that flew out of the second fire that then caught a third patch. I left the second to chase the third and when I looked back the first fire had gotten out of Jerry's control and blew sparking straw to a bush nearby. The bush caught fire so fast in made a "whoosh' sound. That did it. I left my stamping pile and started using my jacket to smother the flames on the bush. Jerry had to abandon me because my third and now forth and fifth fires were leaping to other bushes. We started panicking and decided the spreading inferno was out of our control. We were going to get into BIG trouble. Time to get out.
It only took about 5 minutes before we heard the sounds of fire engines blaring off in the distance. Somehow we knew they were coming to fight our fire and not a burning house. So, we decided the best way to escape was to stroll along the side of the road, acting inconspicuously, and just watch the excitement as the engines roared by. We thought we were pretty cool and nobody could possibly know it was us. Just keep walking casually down the road with our jackets slung over our sholders like a couple of kids coming home from school in the heat of the day.
Just as we began to feel confident we had beaten the law we heard the sound of crunching gravel tires behind us. They were definitely crunching as if rolling very slowly, maybe about as slow as we were walking. The corner of my eye soon caught the hood and headlight of a car. A black and white car. It was best to just be courteous and look to the left as the officer, while keeping pace with our lumbering gait, leaned over and spoke through the passenger window, "You boys know anything about that fire up there?" "No officer. We were just saying the same thing to ourselves, wondering what all the fuss was."
"You sure you don't know ANYTHING about that fire?" "No sir, other than we could see the smoke from here and all the fire engines and stuff." "Nothing?" "Nothing sir." "Well then, do you mind explaining why your jackets are smoldering?"
I held my breath as I slowly pulled my jacket off my back. I'm not a good liar to begin with, never have been. But, my jacket sleeves were charred and still had coals running up the elbow. Jerry's jacket was actually on fire around the collar and neither of us knew it while we were walking away. Could a good liar get out of that? Somehow I think it is possible. But not us. "Get in the car boys."
Now, my Dad ruled with a belt. Sometimes our punishment was him telling us, "Get upstairs, pull down your pants, lean over the bed and wait for me." He'd leave us there for an hour crying with fear, just at the possibility. Sitting in the back of a cruiser had my mind running wild at what could possibly happen to me when he got home from a long hard day of plastering.
My parents did all they could to raise 10 children and keeping them out of jail. Unfortunately, with 7 out of 10 being boys I can understand why we took liberties. But, this may have been a little too much. I remember pulling into the driveway sitting in the back of the cruiser and my mother coming out to meet the cop. The only policeman we ever knew was the one that lived on our street and he loved our family. Thankfully, my mother used one of her "good citizen" cards after the policeman scared the life out of us with the threat of taking us to prison and then having us plant trees on that hill every day for the next 5 years!
You know, I can't remember what happened when my father got home from work. There could either be one of two reasons why. One is that I was beaten so badly with the belt that I can't remember it. (He wailed the belt just enough so it would be a while before we deserved it again, but not as bad as we think it was.)
The more probable reason is that my mother, although wanting Dad to punish us, always wanted to stop it once he started and so she sometimes dished out the punishment while he was at work and kept the violation from him. She may have known that having the police in his yard with one of his kids in the back seat may have crossed the line and she may have wanted to protect us from his wrath.
Make no mistake, my father was a disciplinarian. But, he did what he needed to do at the level he needed to do it in order to get our attention. And, he got our attention. We feared Dad but only in that way and only because we were guilty and knew we had it coming to us.
Mom, on the other hand became a bit of a boys joke. I love ya Mum but you know what I mean. She would pound on the outside of our upper arm in cadence when she punished us. "I'll . break . every . bone . in your . body." The poor woman would spend all that energy and frustration and then we'd spin around and say, "Can you pound on this side now so I can build up my muscles?" Oh man. If Dad ever heard that there is no belt big enough or spikes long enough.
In the end, I survived the complete burning of Natick's History Rock Park Woods. I lost my fascination for pyrotechnics for a while and took up marbles!!!