A childhood movie playing in my mind

It’s so strange how all of a sudden an image or thought will provoke me to start writing.  I’ve felt a bit blocked lately but I’m kinda feeling it today.  I’m sitting out on my front patio doing some schoolwork and enjoying the beautiful weather.  My cat is laying on the patio slabs completely covered in dirt and looking up at me, I know he is smiling.  I’m so happy about my new iPad that Dale bought for me last week.  I can sit outside and write as a soft breeze blows across my face, I’m in heaven…

The city put in all new grass turf a few weeks ago in the park that lines my street.  There is a huge 6 foot chainlink fence surrounding the fields to allow the grass to get established before any kids can play on it.  I was just watching two boys who were being “total boys” that thought they were being unobserved grab the fence and shake it to see if they could knock it down.  I think they must have sensed someone watching them as they turned and we made eye contact.  I felt like the crazy old lady ready to shake my ratty old slipper at them, “you boys get away from that fence this minute.”  Don’t worry I didn’t say that but my stern look did.  I kept an eye on them as they walked down the end of the street.

 Boys are just so mischievous and I was transported back in time to my childhood.   God, I love when that happens, its almost like a movie playing in my head.  I wonder, does this  this happen to everyone.   Sometimes I think I should write about growing up on 2 Sharp Street, “cause” it sure was fun.

One of the “characters” in my neighborhood was “Frankie Silver,” he was a year younger than me and lived two houses away.  He was always a “little rough” on the pets in my neighborhood and mainly wildlife in general.  I will not go into much detail on that, but once we saw him punch our cat, or was it kick it.  He was banned from our yard for a long time.  He would stare longingly through our chain link fence as all the kids played in our yard on warm summer days.   Looking back, we could have had a future serial killer on our hands and we didn’t even know it.  

Now, as I ponder on my own life and my struggles of figuring out what I want to do with this “so called life,” I think “Frank”, as we call him now was always on the right path even as kid.  He is now the animal ordinance guy who you call when the raccoons decide to make a home in your attic, he get’s “rid of them.” If you were to ask me what he does with them once they are captured I do not know or want to know.  But he’s lucky, he turned his childhood passion into a lucrative job, go figure!

I’m not even sure how this story went where it did.  I was remembering when Frankie shook the heavy metal tie down off the telephone pole on our street.  “Frankie you better stop it,” we said as we saw two wires hit each other and spark above our heads and slowly all the lights on our street went dark, including the houses.  “oh you’re in big trouble now, here comes Mr. Oppenheimer and he looks mad, RUN…”