Markie D Takes a Flying Leap

Star Date: Saturday September 10, 1966.  I thought saying "Star Date" was a groovy idea since the new TV show STAR TREK came out two nights ago on Thursday.

This Saturday turns out to be one of the three longest day ever recorded.

We began at 8:00 this morning with a visit from "Honking Jimmy" who had incredibly chapped lips and Vaseline smeared all over his face (Blog post "Hotel Crazy" 7-26-2013) Tommy, Jimmy and I made progress on the cool fort, which was a large hole we had dug in the backyard - thinking that if we kept digging we would end up in China!

The Wolf Pack woke up to my Staff-Sergeant dad - beating the walls with a broom so they could come down to the feeding trough of cold gruel and spoiled milk experiments (see blog post Milk Wars). 


Gustav drove up in his monstrous Hot-Rod and lent his genius to the project of electrifying the crude "fire escape" pole, that dangerously perched from the tippy-top corbel of our three and a half story dilapidated old house.


Chewbacca found the loose rattlesnake, or rather, it found him by crawling up his pant leg and settling in.

Gustav and crew, electrocuted poor Chewbacca in order to extricate the venomous snake from his underwear.

Upon returning the rattlesnake to its habitat on the third floor reptile-cages, Chewy threw a garter-snake at me, which firmly sunk in its fangs attaching itself to my arm. Swinging around, the snake hit Chewy in the face who tripped on a stick that opened the Iguana cage.  Not just any Iguana cage mind you, but Iguana DEL DIABLO.  The demon lizard ran for its life, chased by the Wolf Pack, down all the stairs, across the entry, past the foul-mouthed Minah bird, out the door, across the street and into the Tripp's house - seeking refuge by climbing into the wall furnace. (blog post Iguana Del Diablo 8-1-2013)

We had the entire neighborhood up in arms with "Dahlin" havoc and  mayhem. The Italian family was screaming, the Steadmens made sarcastic remarks, and the famous Lennons on the corner, locked themselves securely in the safety of their living room - rarely seeing the light of day.  

The Gillamonster (Johnny Gillemot) stole his mothers car, hoping to show off, but dumping the clutch instead all he managed to do was break the drive shaft.

The Wolf Pack (that's my Viking brothers) used the broken down car to stage an accident by shoving my 5th grade buddy, who like to call himself Gherhing the Great, under the front fender with ketchup smeared all over his body as a diversion in order to rip off the Helm's Bakery delivery man (Blog post "Heist" 8-3-2013).

Upon discovering the foul smelling poop Jimmy left in the fort, Gherhing the Great and I condemned it and began filling it in with dirt. Sorry China, we had to abandon our efforts to dig that far.

The boys began terrorizing Jerry the weird guest of my mother. Mom had no clue that Jerry like to touch the boys who were now set on driving him looney - thus driving him away. It has worked as he chased Dooh-Dooh Pants (that's my 4th older brother who "cut the cheese" all the time!) up the stairs and into the long back abode of the boys and of snakes. Dooh-Dooh Pants flung himself out the window like a suicidal flying squirrel onto the pole... sliding and eventually falling to safety away from the sinister clutches of Jerry "TT."

Seeing all the action, Gherhing the Great decided to get in on it by running up to the third-floor with Jerry in hot pursuit. I was right behind Gherhing who was running too much too slow. Feeling like I was about to be picked off, I and made a hasty and ill-advised decision by heading for one of the rooms on the second floor instead.

ALL OF THIS had taken place and it is still only two-something in the afternoon - with a lot more to come before the day was over.

I ran down the hall through the door to my bedroom and then proceeded through another door on oppostie side of the room which lead to the sun-porch that was now being used for junk storage. It was filled to about window level of precious stuff that we had long since forgotten about (expect of course, for the buried trunk that had the fox stoles, which my mom used for my very first Halloween costume years earlier-  that caused a nun at the convent to faint and my next door neighbor to call the police - that's another story).

I hurdled myself like Iguana Del Diablo across the ancient and smelly boxes of National Geographics, over stacks of newspapers, over old clothes and stuff that was supposed to "come in handy someday" and opened the window on the far east end of the room. Scurrying back across the junk like a terrified rat, I curled up into a ball smaller than my previous record - when I was was shoved into The Hamper of Death (blog post "Hamper" 6-5-2013). Under the window and next to a old forgotten desk, I burrowed into a pile of newspapers covering myself in musty old clothes. There was no way Jerry "TT" could ever find me! I had heard some of the awful rumors and didn't want to find out if they were true or not. I was safe as long as I didn't give myself away by breathing too loud.

Jerry scanned the room and saw the open window. I was hoping he thought maybe I had flung myself to my death, rather than the alternative of being apprehended by his soft icky hands. He clumsily climbed over the piles of junk and viewed out the window; seeing that my body was not lying on the cement below, he proceeded to scrutinized the sloping exterior of the second floor roof for a possible means of escape. He signed in defeated exasperation and departed from the room.


I Had WON!

I had outwitted, out-played, and out-survived - Jerry (Hey, that might be a good idea for a TV show someday - use real people in it...and call it something like "Outwitted" or "Survivor" or something like that! Nah, it would never work!). 

I waited a couple minutes and silently slipped my head up like a prairie dog and cautiously looked around. Like a deer in the meadow, I tuned my ears to the slightest sound as though I were like Bambi trying to see if  "man was in the meadow."   Except for the sound of the Wolf Pack below, I had assumed Jerry to be defeated and gone. Digging myself out of the hole as if pulling myself up out of quicksand I finally emerged standing on the pile of junk pumping my triumphant fist into the air. The celebration didn't last long as Jerry violently swung the door opened jolting my faint heart into shock. Jerry gave that sickening grin and it was at that point that I decided it was best to throw myself out of the window. Turning the latch, with one foot on the sill I catapulted myself aiming for the lawn - hoping only for broken legs - THAT HAD TO BE BETTER, RIGHT?

As I sprung from the window sill, a sickness came over me, realizing the horror that Jerry had me by the belt. Kicking and screaming he drug me back into the room against every fiber that fought against him.

"What big eyes you have" "What big teeth you have"  "What big hands you have Jerry" I thought. Empowered by mom's "Under-Pain-of-Mortal-Sin" clause... Jerry turned me over his lap and began spanking me with too much delight and too much delay in each lingering swat.

The good news and bad news was - that while Jerry had been stalking me, Chewy had preceded to slide down the "fire escape" pole when Gustav and the Wolf Pack threw the electrical switch (after all, he was the one who let Iguana Del Diablo get away - it was his fault). Chewy was only about half way down to the second story when he let go of the electrified pole and tumbled to the azalea bush below breaking his arm in two places. Yes, it was bad for poor- Chewy... but the good news was that the timing probably saved my life from being eaten by the "Big Bad Wolf"

On behalf of my mother, Matilda, my year-older-sister, came into the room screaming for Jerry to drive her and bent arm Chewy to Saint John's emergency room.

Matilda looked at me, horrified that I was in the greasy clutches of Jerry "TT" and trying to protect me she screamed even louder for him to stop what he was doing and to rush to my mother's aid.

"Thank you Matilda...and thank you God for breaking Chewy's arm," I silently prayed, giving thanks for the Wolf Pack's diabolical scheming and for Chewy's willingness to break his arm on my behalf.

There was no such thing as 911 back then and in an emergency, you had to find the phone number of an ambulance company. Our phone books were typically buried under piles of stacked rubble and could never be found or retrieved in urgent moments of an emergency, which meant that mom had to solicit rides to the hospital from the most expedient means. At our house that meant a willing person with a working car which was least likely a Dahlin.

In this case - hallelujah- it was Jerry "TT." This reminds me of Martin Luther King Jr. speech 3 years ago as I began shouting "Free at last, Free at last."



"Yes mam" I thought, as if talking to Irene "I got wings. All God 's chillen's.. we got a wings" (Blog Post "It's Friday July 15th 2013).




Little did the Lennons  (who were tucked away in the safety of their own home) know...Wait ...little did we know that later that night, one of our UFO experiments would go terribly wrong and catch their house on fire.


Tune into: The Great Escape
                The Prank
                The Burning