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The thing in the basement that you could watch things on, mom called a \u201ctelevision\u201d, and what she watched were \u201cprograms\u201d. Her favorite programs were \u201csoap operas\u201d. I tried watching them with her a couple times but nothing happened except grownup women and men talking and mostly being sad or mad. She also watched the \u201cnews\u201d which I liked sometimes, like that time when we watched a rocket take off.<\/p>\n
Dad also called it a \u201ctelevision\u201d but he called the things you watched \u201cshows\u201d. His favorite shows were \u201cwesterns\u201d where grownup men with guns and cowboy hats were shooting bad guys who usually tried to shoot them first.<\/p>\n
Molly called it a \u201cTV\u201d and watched \u201cshows\u201d. Her favorite was \u201cSky King\u201d of course, which she liked to watch with her dad. It was like a western because they wore cowboy hats and where they were didn\u2019t have many trees, but the good guys flew airplanes instead of shooting guns.<\/p>\n
Molly\u2019s mom called it \u201ctelevision\u201d, but she did not like it so she also called it the \u201cboob tube\u201d. She thought watching it a lot \u201crotted your brain\u201d and made you stupid. She did watch the news, but I don\u2019t think she liked that either.<\/p>\n
I called it \u201ctelevision\u201d sometimes, but mostly \u201cTV\u201d because that was what Molly called it. I also called them \u201cshows\u201d like Molly and my dad, and my favorites were \u201ccartoons\u201d, which Molly watched too sometimes.<\/p>\n
The show I liked the best was called \u201cCaptain Kangaroo\u201d. He was a grownup with white hair on the top part and the bottom part of his head, but he talked more like a kid. He was always trying to figure things out and he would talk to other grownups but also puppets and a big clock with eyes. And best of all he would talk about a cartoon and then you would see it.<\/p>\n
The best cartoon you would see was called \u201cTom Terrific\u201d. He was like Tom Sawyer or Tom Swift, but he was a pretend kid who had a \u201cthinking cap\u201d. Steam would come out of it when he had a good idea. Tom could turn into all sorts of things, like trains, boats and trees and other stuff to help him figure things out and help people. There was a bad guy called \u201cCrabby Appleton\u201d that Tom had to defeat, but Tom never hurt or killed him, like in the westerns. His stories gave me ideas for my own pretending.<\/p>\n
I could watch Captain Kangaroo in the morning after I woke up but sometimes it wasn\u2019t on when I turned on the TV or there was just a little bit and not the beginning part with the music. Sometimes when it wasn\u2019t on if I waited long enough it would start. But other times it would never start.<\/p>\n
I kept asking mom if Captain Kangaroo was on and she figured out that I needed to know how to \u201ctell time\u201d. So she showed me how to do it. She left David on his blanket on the floor with his toys and pretend animals around him and took me into the kitchen.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo Coop\u201d, she said, \u201cThe clock here in the kitchen and on dad\u2019s desk has a \u2018little hand\u2019 and a \u2018big hand\u2019. The \u2018little hand\u2019 is the most important, because it points to the hour.\u201d She pointed at that part of the kitchen clock.<\/p>\n
I nodded. But she could tell I had not figured it out yet.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo see the small hand right now is between the seven and the eight. That means that it is past \u2018seven o\u2019clock\u2019 but it isn\u2019t \u2018eight o\u2019clock\u2019 yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
She looked at me and thought of another part she hadn\u2019t told me. \u201cThe hands of the clock always move around like this.\u201d She moved her finger in a circle over each number in the circle of the clock. \u201cExcept you can\u2019t see them move because they move so slowly.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was interesting. Something could be moving, but so slow that it looked like it wasn\u2019t moving.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo the clock counts the hours just like you or I count.\u201d She counted each number from one to twelve and pointed at it on the clock. \u201cAnd when it gets to twelve at the top, it starts all over again with the one.\u201d<\/p>\n
She stopped talking and looked out the window to help her do thinking.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo\u201d, she said \u201cIf you know that the little hand is always moving this way and counting up to twelve, then if you see it here between the seven and the eight, you know that it\u2019s after seven o\u2019clock but not yet eight o\u2019clock. Eight o\u2019clock is when Captain Kangaroo starts on the television. So when the little hand gets close to the eight then you want to go downstairs and turn the television on to watch. Does that make sense, Coolie?\u201d<\/p>\n
That was a new nickname mom was calling me now. She just kept making up new ones. I nodded. It did make sense!<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course\u201d, she said, shaking her head, \u201cIt\u2019s eight o\u2019clock twice a day, and your program is only on at eight in the morning, not eight in the evening. The clock only counts up to twelve and there are twenty-four hours in a day.\u201d<\/p>\n
She could tell I didn\u2019t get it.<\/p>\n
She looked at me and her eyes got even bigger. \u201cSo when the little hand points at the eight it could be eight in the morning or eight in the evening.\u201d She pointed a finger at me. \u201cYou just have to figure out which one it is, most clocks won\u2019t tell you!\u201d<\/p>\n
She could see I was thinking about that and trying to get it.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo when the little hand is on the eight and you just woke up, that\u2019s eight o\u2019clock in the morning. If it\u2019s on the eight and you\u2019ve been up all day, had dinner and are ready to go to bed, that\u2019s eight o\u2019clock in the evening.\u201d<\/p>\n
That sort of made sense. But now I wondered about the big hand. It was bigger, so why was the small hand more important. Usually I wouldn\u2019t ask something like that but it felt like it would be okay right now, and I really really wanted to know.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat about the big hand?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n
She did that really big smile and her eyes opened up and twinkled as she nodded. She seemed happy I was asking a question.<\/p>\n
\u201cCoop\u201d, she said, shaking her head again, \u201cI won\u2019t lie to you, the big hand is more complicated. It tells you exactly how far it is in minutes between the hour the little hand passed and the hour it hasn\u2019t gotten to yet. And when it points at the one, that doesn\u2019t mean one minute, it means five. You have to do multiplication.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grownups knew so much stuff. I wondered how I would ever learn it all. She saw me scrunch my nose. Then we heard David making noises from the living room.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll save multiplication for another lesson\u201d, she said, squeezing my shoulder. \u201cExcuse me dear, I need to tend to your brother!\u201d<\/p>\n
I watched her walk out of the kitchen into the living room. She knew so much more than I did and could do so much more than I could. It wasn\u2019t fair.<\/p>\n
I ran and jumped down the stairs into the basement and headed into my dad\u2019s office part. He wasn\u2019t there and the clock was on the back part of his desk by the wall. I looked at the little hand, which was between the seven and the eight like the clock in the kitchen. The big hand was just below the nine, also like the clock in the kitchen. I moved the clock to the front of dad\u2019s desk, sat in his chair and looked at it really close. Just because mom said you couldn\u2019t see the hands move, didn\u2019t mean I couldn\u2019t somehow see them move. Grownups were different and didn\u2019t know everything.<\/p>\n
I stared at the hands for a long time. I thought I saw them move. But it was more like I could tell that the big hand wasn\u2019t where it had been before. It had been just below the nine, but now it was almost touching it. It got there somehow while I was staring at it, but I wasn\u2019t sure I actually saw it move.<\/p>\n
I wondered if there were other things that moved so slowly that we thought they weren\u2019t moving, but they really were. I thought about mom talking about plants. They moved, but only when the wind made them move. But they grew, got bigger, changed, but I couldn\u2019t see them grow. I remembered her showing me a \u201ctulip\u201d which grew from a \u201cbulb\u201d. In the morning the flower was closed, but after the sun shined on it, it opened. And thinking about the sun, it moved in the sky but you couldn\u2019t see it move. But you weren\u2019t supposed to look at it anyway.<\/p>\n
I wondered if my toy soldiers maybe moved but I couldn\u2019t see it. When I looked at them really close with their tiny faces they seemed like real people to me. And when I came down to play with them in the morning, some of them seemed to not be where I remembered them being before.<\/p>\n
I turned the knob on the TV that made it start working. I heard the button click and then the crackling noise on the glass picture part that was called the \u201cscreen\u201d. The sounds came first. Then that little dot on the screen that opened up into a picture. It was a grownup woman wiping a table and talking about how good it was. Then she held up a big bottle with pictures and words on it. Then the picture changed to a kid playing with tiny cars while some grownup was talking about it. I had seen Danny play with some cars like that when I had gone with mom over to his house.<\/p>\n
Then there was a boy eating cereal from a bowl while a pretend talking tiger with a grownup voice talked about how \u201cgreat\u201d the cereal was. I knew the tiger was pretend but I wondered about the boy, who looked real. I knew you could use a \u201ccamera\u201d to take a picture of a real person because mom and dad had one and had taken pictures of me. Molly\u2019s dad said that there was a \u201cTV camera\u201d and a \u201cmovie camera\u201d that could take pictures of you moving.<\/p>\n
Both mom and dad had told me that these things were called \u201ccommercials\u201d, because they were telling you what to get at the store. They were different than the \u201cprograms\u201d, that were what you wanted to watch, but you had to watch the commercials too. But I wanted to watch all of them, because there was so much stuff to find out about.<\/p>\n
I went back to the clock on dad\u2019s desk. The little hand was getting close to the eight and the big hand was now above the nine. Mom had said when the little hand was pointing straight at the eight then Captain Kangaroo would start.<\/p>\n
I looked back at the TV and it was now that show with the grownup called \u201cMiss Ardis\u201d in a white dress with kids sitting in chairs at tables. She would show the kids stuff and then talk about it, and read them stories. That was what mom and dad and Molly\u2019s mom and dad did too. But the strange part was that she would also tell them what they were supposed to do all the time. Not just when it was time for lunch or dinner or bath and bedtime. The kids never got to figure out what to do. She also asked them questions, not because she didn\u2019t know the answer, but because she wanted to see if they knew the same answer that she already knew. She would really like it when they knew that answer she already knew. It was pretty strange.<\/p>\n
She called it a \u201cschool\u201d. Older kids like Danny or other kids I heard in the park talked about going to \u201cschool\u201d. Dad was even going to school. Mom and Molly\u2019s mom used to go to school. The older kids talked about it like it was something that everybody did once they were old enough. But I had never really seen what a school was.<\/p>\n
Then there were more of those \u201ccommercial\u201d things. One had a toy that looked like a potato and you stuck a pretend mouth, nose, eyes and ears on it. Or you could use a real potato. Another was a tube thing with a bunch of circles that would go back and forth in your hands or go down stairs one at a time all by itself. One was for Cheerios, which was the cereal that we had and I ate for breakfast unless mom made eggs.<\/p>\n
Finally it was the beginning part of Captain Kangaroo with that same music but no words. I ran over to dad\u2019s desk and looked at the clock. Mom was right, the small hand was pointing right at the eight. Also I noticed that the big hand was pointing straight up between the one and the two numbers in the twelve.<\/p>\n
I liked Captain Kangaroo. He was a grownup, but he didn\u2019t talk or do things like other grownups. He was always asking about stuff a lot more than mom or dad and the other grownups that I knew did. Miss Ardis asked things too, but she already knew the answers and was just seeing if the kids knew those same answers too. But Captain Kangaroo asked things because he DIDN\u2019T know the answers. And there was always stuff happening that he didn\u2019t know about.<\/p>\n
And when he was worrying about stuff he told you what he was worrying about with his words. Mom and dad didn\u2019t talk about most of the stuff they were worried about most of the time, except maybe mom sometimes when she got mad at me or dad. But I could tell by watching their faces, and how their voices sounded, when they were worried. But they didn\u2019t talk about it with their words like Captain Kangaroo did.<\/p>\n
And there were cartoons all the time when his show was on. There were pretend people and animals that would talk. They would get into trouble but would talk and figure out how to fix it. Some of the cartoons gave me ideas like drawing lines on the basement floor with chalk for roads and rivers.<\/p>\n
The cartoon I liked the best was \u201cTom Terrific\u201d. He was a pretend kid with a hat that steam came out of when he did his thinking. He could turn into whatever thing he needed to fix things. Into a plane or a bird to fly in the sky. Into a train to go fast. Into a tree to hide in the other trees. He also had a dog called \u201cmighty Manfred the wonder dog\u201d, but most of the time all that Manfred wanted to do was rest upside down on his back and not do anything. It was kind of funny because Tom always was trying to do as much as he could and Manfred was trying to do as little as he could.<\/p>\n
I also liked that you could see through the pretend people and animals in the cartoon. It made them seem even more pretend and more interesting to watch. They looked more like the people I might draw than regular people who weren\u2019t pretend.<\/p>\n
Captain Kangaroo had the cartoon come on this morning. The first part was always the same. Tom sang the same song about who he was and all the things he could do and he told about Manfred too. After that, the story would get different. Manfred was on his back resting. He said to Tom that it was time for his favorite TV program. So Tom turned into a TV so Manfred could watch it. But it was the wrong program. The screen showed a sort of animal thing sitting in the sand and some triangle things next to it. A grownup voice was talking…<\/p>\n
Announcer: And here in Egypt, hidden somewhere in the silent Sphinx is the pill of smartness. And whosoever finds it will become one of great wisdom.<\/p>\n
Manfred: Duh\u2026 who wants to be smart!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
But even though Manfred didn\u2019t want to be smart, Tom did\u2026<\/p>\n
Tom: Did you hear that Manfred? The Pill of Smartness. Oh if I can find it I\u2019ll be so smart I\u2019ll get good grades in school without doing any homework!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
So Tom turned into an \u201cEgyptian chariot\u201d. It was strange because it had wheels like a wagon but it flew in the sky and took Manfred through the sky to this place called \u201cEgypt\u201d. When they came down they saw footprints and Tom said they were Crabby Appleton\u2019s. Tom thought Crabby Appleton wanted to get the \u201cPill of Smartness\u201d before he could get it.<\/p>\n
The big animal looking thing that they called the \u201cSphinx\u201d started talking with a grownup voice telling Tom and Manfred that it was the \u201cvoice of smartness\u201d and that they should go home.<\/p>\n
Tom: We better find that pill before Crabby Appleton does!<\/p>\n
Voice from the Sphinx: Tom Terrific. Go home! Go home! Listen to the voice of smartness. Be smart. Go home! Go home!<\/p>\n
Tom: What a puzzlement! Should we heed the voice of smartness or should we go resolutely on?<\/p>\n
Manfred: Let\u2019s go resolutely home!<\/p>\n
Tom: But Manfred, the Sphinxes don\u2019t talk! Besides, I don\u2019t know him. I\u2019ve never met him before. If I\u2019m not mistaken, Crabby Appleton is at the bottom of all this. I\u2019ll become a bird and investigate!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
So Tom turned into a bird and flew into the inside of the Sphinx. He saw a square thing with a round thing inside it that looked maybe like a radio.<\/p>\n
Tom: Ah, just as I thought, a hi-fi set!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I remembered that Molly\u2019s dad had a radio he called a \u201chi-fi\u201d. Then loud talking came out of the round part and lines came out of the round part too to show you that the talking was really loud. It was so loud that it made Tom the bird lose his thinking cap and get knocked over. The cap fell down to where Crabby Appleton was running the machines that made the talking…<\/p>\n
Crabby Appleton: So that bird is Tom Terrific! I\u2019ve got to get the Pill of Smartness before he does or he might become smarter than a grownup and that would be terrible!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Grownups were always trying to be smarter than kids, so they could keep telling us what to do. But Tom always knew what to do without grownups telling him. It was like the other Toms too, that dad read me stories about. Tom Sawyer and Tom Swift.<\/p>\n
So the pill was in the hand of a giant \u201cstatue\u201d of \u201cCleofatra\u201d, whatever that was. Tom and Manfred ran up stairs to get it but Crabby Appleton ran too and got there first and swallowed the pill. But instead of making him smart it made him talk like a little kid who spoke his words kind of strange\u2026<\/p>\n
Crabby Appleton: I\u2019m a widdle boy, that\u2019s what I am. A widdle diddle boy!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I never heard real little kids talk that way. But I did remember that some grownups talked that way when they were trying to talk like kids to make other grownups laugh.<\/p>\n
Tom got Crabby to help him by telling Crabby he would give him a lollipop. But Tom was still trying to figure it all out…<\/p>\n
Tom: I still don\u2019t understand why Crabby Appleton turned silly instead of smart when he swallowed the Pill of Smartness!<\/p>\n
Manfred (looking at strange writing on the wall): What does it say?<\/p>\n
Tom: An inscription! Maybe as an Egyptian mummy I could read it!<\/p>\n
Tom turned into an \u201cEgyptian mummy\u201d, which was like a person but all wrapped up in tape stuff, so he could read the Egyptian writing on the wall about the pill.<\/p>\n
Tom: No wonder he didn\u2019t get smart! (Reading) Whosoever shall try to use the Pill of Smartness for evil purposes shall never succeed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I had heard that word \u201cevil\u201d before. It was a word for bad guys who were really bad.<\/p>\n
Tom: Gosh Manfred, I guess the only way to get really smart is to pay attention in school and work really hard!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
That didn\u2019t make sense to me because Tom was not \u201cevil\u201d, or even bad. So if he swallowed the pill it should make him even more smart than he already was. Like Crabby had said, smarter than a grownup.<\/p>\n
I wondered again about school. Tom said it was the only way to get really smart. Would I go to school? I figured I wasn\u2019t old enough yet. I figured Molly wasn\u2019t old enough either, though she was already really smart.<\/p>\n
So in the end Tom and Manfred took Crabby Appleton, who was still acting like a strange little kid, back home\u2026<\/p>\n
Tom: Come on Crabby. I\u2019ll take you home to your mom!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
At the end Tom was back at his little house in the tree with Manfred\u2026<\/p>\n
Tom: Well, we\u2019re back at our headquarters mighty Manfred the wonder dog. But watch for us kids, we\u2019re on our way to another great adventure! Aren\u2019t we Manfred! Manfred? MANFRED!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
But Manfred had fallen asleep like he always did. I liked Tom, because he always figured out what to do and then did it. Nothing could ever stop him even though he was just a kid.<\/p>\n
Dad was still reading me Tom Swift books at night. Right now we were reading the one about Tom\u2019s giant robot. It was a machine that Tom made in his laboratory that looked kind of like a person and could walk and do things with its machine hands and arms like a person. I really liked Tom Swift because he was always making things that could fly or go underwater or even into space. He was always helping people, and he knew more than any of the grownups.<\/p>\n
I also remembered Tom Sawyer, who acted more like a real kid like Danny, or one that I might see in the park. He wasn\u2019t super smart like Tom Swift was, but he did do what he wanted and figured things out.<\/p>\n
But Tom Terrific seemed more like a kid like me, not an older kid like Tom Sawyer, or a really older kid like Tom Swift. And Tom Terrific liked to pretend like I did, except he could make his pretending turn real!<\/p>\n