Waking Up at the Pearly Gates

Three hours from the time I closed my eyes giving myself over to death I awakened on the other side.

HEAVEN! 

It had to be.


Next to me was the Veloci-Raptor (the one-eyed crazy attack rooster)  uncharacteristically cooing softly like a hen as though I was the baby chick under its maternal care.  Certainly the killer beast had been transformed as it must have made it way over the River Styx into heaven along with me.

The light was blinding and I expected to see Saint Peter granting me permission to enter the pearly gates.

It had to be heaven, for I was no longer trapped and buried in the dark igloo of death!

Pupils adjusting - Eyes focusing - I was both happy and sad to see the plain reality of my fate. A giant nutcracker, car parts, stacks of National Geographic magazines, old boats and a mound of collapsed construction blocks piled next to my body.

Sad  - that I was not in heaven.

Happy - to be alive.

I had been laid out on my back, face-up, eyes adjusting to the bright sun overhead.  This was my backyard and it certainly was not heaven by any stretch of the imagination.  The ropes were off of my hands and feet and I laid there with a daisy clutched in my fist - hands on my chest - as if prepared for burial. Looking past a couple old boats (that had collected water from the sprinkler) towards the window I saw "Lazarus," the miracle cat, staring at me!       

A SIGN!    I had escaped death!

This cat had cheated death and so did I.  "Cats had nine lives" goes the saying, and as I figured it, I was at least on life number 11:  Salton Sea, The hamper, Sister Godzilla, the Templates, the Furnace, the Pool Electrocution, Milk Wars, Fish Sticks, Escaping rattlesnakes, Snapping Turtles, Prankster Presidents, Iguana Del Diablo, the Alligator, Jerry T. T. and the Flying Leap, Albino Camps, Area 51 and our Harding Ave Roswell event,  Third grade and Mrs Simpson, Jalapenos, The Kitchen Electrocutions, Two other burials...and the Severed leg at McIlliot's pool, of course - not all of those incidents meant literal death, but I should have died at least ten times already -
                              AND NOW I WAS ON LIFE -  NUMBER ELEVEN!   For sure!

I think that stupid cat was actually looking at me as an inspiration...believing that if I could escape death this many times (as a mere mortal), then maybe it had a couple more lives on reserve as well.

There was no one around and I don't know how I got out!



                       There were no parents

No Lennon Sisters (who lived down the street)

   


     No Mr. Nargie (the mailman across the street)

No Edna (the grouch next door)


No Jerry T.T.  (Thank heavens)


No Tommy (my bestest buddy ever)


No Jimmy ("the Slurper")




No Wolf Pack ( I think my older brothers and the hippie commies were all still in Tuna Canyon).






No one, I was completely alone!










This was a mystery that rivaled that of the Fraternity Fire!

The only thing I could come up with, was - "My Guardian Angel"   I don't know how many of these angels my family have already sent into early retirement or how many of those angels get "Hazard Pay" when assigned to the Dahlins as a member of God's elite special forces, but I'm sure they deserve every penny of their paycheck.

It was 1969 and the Pope may have decommissioned poor 'O Saint Christopher... but I was saved somehow - and was convinced it was a miracle!




I turned around, shook my fist triumphantly at the Igloo of Death and although becoming more and more numb inside - Less Human - More Robot -  I felt this deadening on the inside that had been cauterizing the soft tissue of my heart, was a way of protected me from being a victim.

Shaking off the dirt...  I ran over to Tommy's house as though none of this had ever happened!



Whistling on the way - I wondered how more escapes, how many more lives, how many more miracles, and how many more angels I would be entitled to (mom, sorry about the dangling preposition at the end, but for now, I'm done ...oops I mean... I'm finished)!  


Until next time... and I can guarantee there is a lot more to come!

Hippies and Mexican Tomato Plants

Whack… slapped the stick, three times on my outstretched rump. Seriously, do you really think for one moment that after all I had been through already, that a couple well placed eraser-bombs and several smacks on my tight little derrière was going to have any effect! I was like one of those used cars for sale that looked good on the outside, but already had a million miles on it.  While still in the "position" (last blog post) I tried my darnedest to pass gas...but to no avail, because I didn't have the superpowers that one of my older brothers, Dooh-Dooh Pants, had who so magnificently mastered. There I was, stomach churning, butt pointed at everyone I wanted to payback, but was unable to channel my gastric juices into a defensive weapon.

The year is 1968 and a lot has happened in the last two years - since the 5th grade. Obviously I lived through Sr. Godzilla, the 5th grade "Templates" (blog Post June 26th) and somehow managed to make it this far.

One brother was in Viet Nam. My oldest brother, Gustav had been Honorably Discharged from the military with some lame excuse like having bad teeth or because he had a rare blood type. Three of the other brothers - the ones who were full-fledged, long-haired, Anti-Viet-Nam-War-hippies, didn't just burn their draft cards, but sent them back to President Johnson to make an even bigger statement...

Which reminds me of our chance - impossible - real-live-encounter with the President of the United States, which took place while we were driving across country on our vacation this past summer. 

TRUE STORY

Who else in the world does this happen to?  Nobody, right?  Nobody, other than the Dahlins! We'll get to that in the next couple blog post... but, seriously... what are the mathematical probabilities of running into the Presidential motorcade in North Texas and having a chance encounter.  It is about the same, I guess of having an alien abduction in the middle of New York City.  (You're going to have to wait on that one. Oh, and add snapping turtles to the story - and it must be something like, 1:100,000,000 to the 120th power).

After what happened to John F. Kennedy... it made you wonder why LBJ, the 36th President, of the United States got out of his protected limousine and pulled his dirty rotten trick on us.

Didn't he know he was messing with the "Wolf Pack." 

By this time the Lennons were beginning to wonder off the reservation and the older boys had also begun to let their hair hang low. Pat and Billy had traversed the chasm of our tarry-asphalt street and engaged in some of the bizarre behaviors of Hotel Crazy at our pad. The virus of the hippy-bug made its way across the street, past the Blessed Virgin Mary that stood guard in their front window and spread the infection in their house. Getting into this long-haired-hippy movement, the older Lennon boys began to fit right in with the Dahlins and embraced "what my older brothers had begun cultivating" in the far reaches of the backyard - hidden behind old cars, boats that refused to float, stacks of decaying National Geographics and  lots of junk that was perfect for protecting their secret garden. My older bothers told my parents were "Mexican Tomato Plants"   Heck, I don't know why they spent so much time out there caring the trimming those plants - didn't seem to do any good. The dumb plants never did grow tomatoes - go figure!  

Last year in the Sixth Grade my oldest brother, Gustav and his girl friend, Patty, took me to Sears and bought me a really cool Tobias suit. This is the famous picture that Marilyn Monroe is holding at the top of my Blog Post (until I change it, of course).
 
My Sixth Grade felt like a"life-sentence"  with hard labor. (more about that later). But, look at how cute this little guy is!

These was my first real clothes, that weren't hand-me-down-down-down-down-downs. This didn't come with blood stains or bullet holes or 17 patches over patches... Just look at him.

LADY KILLER right!

Imagine all those six grade girls drooling all over me! I wasn't keeping count and didn't have a clue.  Look into those precious eyes that seem to be lost in deep thought. What do you supposed I was thinking at that moment? Probably didn't have anything to do with girls.  I'll bet anything that I was too busy contemplating my everyday survival to be a "player."  If I had any inkling that a girl liked me, I was so insecure that I couldn't even open my mouth. I stuttered...and most people didn't know because they thought I was just being funny and a lot of my words didn't come out right. (No one in my family listened so anyone, they all just competed for floor time and had no idea that I had speech problems - except for my dad. He kept telling me that I should learn to talk with marbles in my mouth to help my pronuncification)

And what others thought was confidence was really just nothing more than the artful-dodging of a lonely street rat - still searching for the meaning of life and wanting to hear one word spoken in my HOUSE!

Next Time - The infamous story of amateur taxidermy and the SKUNK STINK-SACKS.

Please, no one tell the Blasers - because I don't think they know how their beloved collie got a hold of these things that he dragged like a crazed werewolf into the house. 


The Beatles have a song. It's been a hard days night... but for me it has been a hard-couple years..and I feel like I've been working like a dog just to survive the pits, and the jalapenos, and the big-bang-burnie, and the fights, and the mosquitoes, and leprosy, and the Veloci-rooster and the alligator...

                                                                    Just how much farther would Markie D make it?