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| Not the slide discussed in this post. https://www.pinterest.com/designingedu/old-playground-equipment/ |
The first house we
lived at in Bonham wasn't the house on 8th Street. For
possibly a year or so we lived on South 3rd Street. I
don't remember if my sister rode the bus to school to Baily English
but I do remember that my mom would walk me south on Bills Street to
Stephenson School. That's where I went to Head Start and
Kindergarten.
I remember going
home from school annoyed all the time because the teachers rewarded
students who slept during nap time with a jolly rancher candy. I
never got one. I never slept, but I'd always forcefully squish my
eyes shut to appear to sleep. My teacher never fell for it though
and I was repeatedly denied my hardened translucent hunk of flavored
corn syrup. If you ask my mom about Stephenson School, she'll tell
you that more than once I ran away from school to home and she'd
march me right up Bills Street back to school. But I digress.
Directly across
the street from our house was Stephenson Park. As a 4 or 5 year old,
living across the street from a park was a godsend. The place was
probably an acre. It had the staples: a swing set, a spider web
dome, animal rockers, a slide, and a merry-go-round. Most of the park
was an open field. I'd occasionally play football there with the
bigger kids.
Merry-go-rounds
have got to be outlawed now, I mean they are particularly
murderous. They did have the potential to be the most fun piece of
equipment though. Trying to make your friend vomit from holding on
for dear life due to the pressure of 7 G's pulling you away as you
spin in circles at fifty million RPM's can be exhilarating, but you could lose your grip and fly
off. And this wasn't a namby pamby playground like we have today.
The ground was solid, no mulch to break your fall. Not to mention the
possibility of being sucked in under the merry-go-round and getting
your clothes wrapped up in that. Everybody knew somebody who knew
somebody whose neighbor had a kid that that happened to. It was
important to respect the merry-go-round.
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| Stephenson Park today. Pretty much how I remember it. maps.google.com |
The slide was my
favorite at Stephenson Park. It was blue and 50 feet tall. Okay, it
seemed like it was that tall at the time as I was like three feet
tall myself, but it was at least six feet up there. It was a circle
with round walls encapsulating it. In the middle of the circle was a
six or eight inch diameter hole that went all the way down who knows
how deep. On one end of the platform was a ladder, on the other was
a shiny metal slide set at 45 degrees. At the right time of day it
was blinding as the midday sun blasted it with light rays. One dared
not go down that slide in shorts in the summer. The center of the
platform was supported by a pole. This explains the hole in the
floor of the platform.
I don't know why,
but I would pray to God on that slide. I may have been influenced by
the church I was attending. An old lady would pick my sister and me up on Sundays and take us to
church. It may have been Calvary Baptist Church? I don't really
know for sure. But when I was on the slide by myself I said a quick
“Dear God, please forgive me for my sins and help me throughout my
life. Amen.” And go about battling unseen enemies. The slide made
a perfect imaginary sentry tower. The prayer was vague, lacking any
specifics whatsoever. And it wasn't a prayer of protection or
guidance. It was merely an uncompelled obligatory acknowledgment to
God. I admitted that I am not perfect and needed help. It was
perfectly suitable for a boy my age.
If I ever said the
prayer twice in a day though, or suspected I may have, I was in
trouble. I developed a superstition with my wham bam drive by quick
shot prayers. An unfounded fear with truly mysterious origins
manifested itself upon my innocent impressionable heart. I somehow
prayed to Satan if I said my fast prayer to God twice. I had to
rectify this situation quickly. I would take the middle finger on my
right hand and stick it down the hole in the slide tower floor and
“flip off” Satan. I'd say a quick, “fuck you Devil” and
remove my finger before the Devil bit it off. I'd say my prayer
again. Apparently once was good, twice was bad, three times was good
again. Everybody knows that the Devil loves even numbers, fears odd
numbers.
But what if I only
suspected I said the prayer twice, but only did it once? When I did
my post Devil cursing prayer it would have actually been twice, not
thrice! That was a chance I had to take. The slide fort would
protect me.
I don't remember
if I quit that insanity on my own, or if it naturally ended when we
moved to the house on 8th Street. Even when I had quit
the church and turned agnostic, I would still say that prayer or a
version of it for many years. It was still ritualistic, but more
conventional. I'd say it at bed time. It wasn't habitual but still
obligatory. I couldn't sleep until I gave a nod and thanks to the
Creator, even if I wasn't sure if He was actually even there. The
fact that he might be there made it necessary to thank Him. And I
did.
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| My dad and me at a different playground. May 1985. |
If I had to pick a single song to be the soundtrack of this post it would be...
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