{"id":7559,"date":"2023-03-20T14:25:58","date_gmt":"2023-03-20T21:25:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/?p=7559"},"modified":"2023-03-20T14:28:56","modified_gmt":"2023-03-20T21:28:56","slug":"clubius-contained-part-7-day-trip-august-1961","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/2023\/03\/20\/clubius-contained-part-7-day-trip-august-1961\/","title":{"rendered":"Clubius Contained Part 7 – Day Trip (August 1961)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The summer didn\u2019t take as long as it used to. I did all the same kind of stuff, playing in the basement, in the backyard, in the park. Playing with Paul or Danny or Gabe, or Molly on Saturdays. Riding my bike to my friends\u2019 houses, though not Molly\u2019s because it was so far away. Climbing Kenny\u2019s cherry tree with him to eat the cherries. Seeing Marybeth in the park playing with other older girls. Going to the bookmobile when it was by the park and \u201cchecking out\u201d books with words and pictures on the cover that looked interesting.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now it was August. That was the last month of summer. Next month was September. That would be fall, and that was when I had to go back to school. I didn\u2019t want to, but all the other kids went to school and said I had to too. Some of the older kids said that if I didn\u2019t go to school the police would come to my house and \u201carrest\u201d me and make me go to \u201creform school\u201d, which sounded really bad. And because mom and dad liked school so much, I never told them that I didn\u2019t want to go back, because I figured they\u2019d think I had turned into a bad kid. I wondered sometimes if I WAS a bad kid, but I didn\u2019t want anybody else, specially mom and dad, thinking that I was.<\/p>\n

I heard mom and dad have one of those \u201carguments\u201d yesterday in the kitchen when I was down in the basement. I snuck up the basement stairs so I could hear their words better. Mom was using her mad voice and dad was using his friendly quiet voice. I didn\u2019t like it when she always talked that way when he was always trying to talk nice.<\/p>\n

\u201cEric, I can\u2019t take it anymore\u201d, she said, \u201cI can\u2019t go on like this.\u201d I heard her start to cry and then say, \u201cAll I do is housework and looking after David. And we have no furniture and all my clothes are rags.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh Liz\u201d, dad said with his nice voice. He always said that when mom started crying, then he\u2019d try to think up something to make it better.<\/p>\n

\u201cDavid\u2019s out of diapers now and Coop pretty much takes care of himself\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEric\u201d, she said fiercely, not crying so much now, \u201cAre you hearing what I\u2019m saying? It feels like TOO DAMN MUCH!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can fix it, Liz\u201d, he said, still talking in his quiet voice, \u201cI\u2019ve submitted a second draft of my dissertation, and once I get my committee\u2019s approval, I\u2019m basically done!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cJesus Christ, Eric\u201d, she said even more fiercely, \u201cIf I had known how long and how much work this damned dissertation was going to be, I don\u2019t know if I\u2019d\u2019ve signed up for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh Liz\u201d, he said again, \u201cYou don\u2019t mean that. We\u2019re finally almost there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYOU\u2019RE almost there\u201d, she said, starting to cry again, \u201cBut where the hell am I? Do you even care?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course I care, Liz\u201d, he said, like he was so sad she felt that way, but also that it wasn\u2019t right what she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a deal\u201d, she said, trying not to cry anymore, \u201cI was going to play the housefrau so you could get your dissertation. Then I was going to go back to school and get my Art degree.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI know, Liz\u201d, he said, \u201cIt just took longer than everyone told me it would. I\u2019ve done everything I possibly can.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess you have, Eric\u201d, she said, still kind of crying, \u201cBut just because you have the damn doctorate, you\u2019re still just an assistant professor, they\u2019re not going to pay you any more.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, eventually\u201d, he said, but mom didn\u2019t let him keep talking.<\/p>\n

\u201cEVENTUALLY is sounding to me like NEVER right now\u201d, she said, starting to cry some more.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook Liz\u201d, dad said, his voice still quiet and friendly, \u201cMy time\u2019s freed up now, and with David out of diapers I can take the kids out for the day on a more regular basis. I\u2019ll throw them in the car and we\u2019ll just head off for the day and leave you be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s not going to be any money for Art school\u201d, she kind of said it but asked it too, \u201cIs there?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell\u201d, he said, and I knew he was trying to figure something out. \u201cAt least you could paint. Use the living room as your studio, since we don\u2019t use it for anything else.\u201d<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t hear mom say anything else<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

Mom was by my top bunk bed when I woke up the next morning.<\/p>\n

\u201cMorning Cooper\u201d, she said, using my regular name that she didn\u2019t usually use unless she was saying it to other grownups who didn\u2019t know who I was. \u201cYour dad\u2019s got a car adventure planned for you and your brother today.\u201d She looked at me and did her biggest smile. \u201cHe said he\u2019s taking you two on an adventure to some new place.\u201d Her eyebrows went up and down as she said it.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour dad will tell you all about it\u201d, she said, \u201cBest get dressed and get yourself some breakfast, because I think he wants to leave as soon as possible. Your brother already finished his.\u201d<\/p>\n

David always got up before I did. I wondered why he did that, and what he was up to. Now that he was three, and talking more like a regular kid like me, I was worried about him more.<\/p>\n

Dad was in the kitchen with David, putting stuff in two canvas bags. Stuff to drink and a book in one. Towels and our bathing suits in the other bigger one.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour other passenger is finally up\u201d, mom said to him about me, \u201cYa got everything?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s see\u201d, he said, rubbing his chin with his hand, \u201cDrinks. My books. Bathing suits and three towels. Band-aids and Bactine. Washtenaw County map. What else? What else?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSounds like a good list Eric. Sorry there\u2019s no food in the house to make sandwiches, but I still haven\u2019t gotten to the store\u201d, mom said, seeming more worried than she usually was. I thought about their argument I had sneaked up and listened to last night.<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t worry about it Liz\u201d, dad said, \u201cWe got it covered!\u201d<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

We had a different car now. It was one of those \u201cstation wagons\u201d. I had gone with dad in our old car to this place that had lots of cars and dad gave them our old one and they gave dad this one. When I asked him if it was \u201cnew\u201d, he shook his head and said it was \u201cused\u201d. I liked it because it had a \u201cwayback\u201d seat like Molly\u2019s mom\u2019s car. That\u2019s where I wanted to sit, and when David saw that I did, he did too. He liked to copy me like that, which made me worried sometimes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I know the route\u201d, dad said from the front seat, \u201cThat is, the roads I want to take. But Coop, maybe you can follow along on the map.\u201d<\/p>\n

He held it up all folded in his hand and waved it so I could see it. He looked back at me like he was saying, \u201cAre you ready?\u201d I nodded. He \u201ctossed\u201d the map to me making it spin when it went through the air. I think that spin helped it keep from opening up. He and mom really liked to \u201ctoss\u201d things to each other, so they could catch it like it was a ball, not just giving it the regular way, which wasn\u2019t as much fun. I guess they tried to make all those \u201cchores\u201d they did more fun by tossing stuff.<\/p>\n

As the car wheels crunched over the stones in our driveway, I opened up the map. You had to be careful opening folded paper stuff like maps or they might rip. I could tell David wanted to see the map too, but I looked at him kind of fiercely, like he should let me open and hold it by myself. I could tell by the way he wrinkled his nose that he didn\u2019t like that, but then he nodded, but just a little bit.<\/p>\n

The map had the \u201cAnn Arbor\u201d words in the middle of it, then a bunch of lines mostly going up and down or sideways that I figured must be roads. There was a red circle with an \u201cx\u201d in it below the \u201cAnn Arbor\u201d words. Dad said that the red roads were the biggest ones, the \u201cfreeways\u201d and \u201chighways\u201d, but we\u2019d be going mostly on the smaller blue ones, the regular \u201croads\u201d, and the red circle with the \u201cx\u201d was where our house was.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust to the right of the red \u2018x\u2019 on the map you can see that blue street going up\u201d, Dad said, \u201cThat\u2019s Main Street. By the Stadium. Find it?\u201d<\/p>\n

I looked and saw the blue line by the long circle that I guess was the Stadium. The tiny letters said, \u201cMain Street\u201d. I liked that I could find it by reading the words. I nodded but then remembered I better say \u201cyep\u201d because he was driving and wasn\u2019t looking at me.<\/p>\n

\u201cGood\u201d, he said, \u201cSo we\u2019re going to head up Main through town and by the river it turns into Huron River Drive and we\u2019ll go west along the river.\u201d I thought it was interesting that a street could \u201cturn into\u201d a different street, so I was waiting to see that.<\/p>\n

Dad turned the car at the Stadium and we went down that main street that I had gone down many times since I was little. Grownups didn\u2019t call it \u201cTHE main street\u201d, they just called it \u201cMain Street\u201d or just \u201cMain\u201d. It was what it was, but it was also like a name, like all the other streets like our \u201cPrescott Street\u201d. It was Saturday, and there were lots of other cars. Once we got to the part with all the stores there were people too. We went kind of down and by the Kiddie Korner, then over the railroad tracks and up to where most of the other stores were, that \u201cdowntown\u201d part. As David and I looked out the back window, we went by that \u201cbakery\u201d place on the left that dad liked to go to to buy donuts and those \u201clong johns\u201d with nuts and cream inside. Now there were people walking on the sidewalks or going in and out of the stores. There were even those buildings farther along that were taller than the other buildings. Dad said those were \u201coffice buildings\u201d.<\/p>\n

Then we went down again, and it wasn\u2019t downtown with stores and offices anymore and the train station was on the left. We went under a bridge and dad said, \u201cWe\u2019re on Huron River Drive\u201d now. I didn\u2019t see anything turn into anything else, though we WERE by the river instead of stores, so maybe that\u2019s what he meant by turning into. Grownups were strange sometimes, thinking things had changed when they seemed to be the same, or thinking things were the same when they seemed really different. It was more about how they wanted things to be than how they really were.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you remember where this road goes?\u201d dad asked. David shook his head and looked at me.<\/p>\n

I remembered being on this road, with mom and dad, but also in Molly\u2019s MOM\u2019S station wagon, in the wayback with Molly. We went to that place with donuts and that apple cider stuff, and that little island in the middle of the little river.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe place with the cider and donuts?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep\u201d, dad said. \u201cDavid, do you remember when we went there last fall?\u201d he asked. David looked worried, like he kind of knew but kind of didn\u2019t. Because he was three years old, he was just starting to figure out that things could have happened a long time ago, and I was trying to tell him about the four parts of the year that went in a circle like the clock. I wasn\u2019t sure if mom had told him about that yet, like she\u2019d told me.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think so\u201d, he said. He was starting to talk like a regular kid, instead of a little one.<\/p>\n

We went over the bridge across the river, and now it was on the right side of David and me as we looked out the back window. Finally we turned off the road and went over another bridge and David and I could see the cider place on our left. I could read the words on the sign.<\/p>\n

I leaned over towards David and pointed at the sign and said, \u201cIt says, \u2018Dexter Cider Mill\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

He looked and pointed at it too and turned his head to Dad in the front and said, \u201cDexter Cider Mill\u201d, just like I had said it to him, but like he was telling dad he had figured it out himself instead of me telling him first.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep\u201d, said dad, \u201cAnd we\u2019d stop and get some donuts, but it\u2019s not open yet, not until next month. But there\u2019s another place just up the road a bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now we were driving down a road with houses and those special houses that had the tall pointy things on top that mom and dad called \u201cchurches\u201d. Then we turned again and we were on a road with stores on it.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo this is Main Street again\u201d, Dad said, \u201cBut Main Street in DEXTER. Dexter is a lot smaller than Ann Arbor so it’s called a \u2018village\u2019 instead of a \u2018town\u2019 like Ann Arbor, or a big \u2018city\u2019 like Detroit.\u201d I had thought that \u201cDexter\u201d was just the name of the cider place like \u201cQuality\u201d was the name of the bakery that we went by before.<\/p>\n

\u201cDexter Bakery\u201d, dad said, \u201cHaven\u2019t been there in a while.\u201d<\/p>\n

This time we stopped the car and went inside and dad bought a box of donuts. David wanted the chocolate covered ones like me. Dad got the plain ones for him. Dad got a cup of coffee for him and water with ice in it for us. We sat at a table in front of the place and ate our donuts. David and I each had one. Dad had two. David got chocolate all over his mouth, so dad took one of those \u201cnapkins\u201d and licked it with his tongue and then wiped the chocolate off David\u2019s mouth. David didn\u2019t like that very much.<\/p>\n

When we got back in the car, before dad started driving again, he said to me, \u201cOkay Coop, open up the map and see if you can figure out where we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

That seemed like an interesting thing to try to do. I liked maps, because they helped you do adventures to see what the stuff on the map, like woods, towns, rivers and lakes really looked like. Grownups mostly looked at maps to figure out how to get somewhere that they\u2019d never been to before or maybe another place that they couldn\u2019t remember how to get to. But I looked at maps like they were a book, where it helped you use your thinking to \u201cimagine\u201d somewhere different that you hadn\u2019t been to before. That was the word grownups used for pretending. A kid would say, \u201cLet\u2019s pretend we\u2019re in a giant cave.\u201d A grownup would say, \u201cImagine we\u2019re in a giant cave.\u201d<\/p>\n

And what was really neat is that maps didn\u2019t have to just be about real places, they could be about made up places that weren\u2019t real. Like when mom read me that Winnie the Pooh book. Hearing the story and all the places in it, I used my thinking to pretend what all those places in the \u201cHundred Acre Wood\u201d looked like. The book only had a few pictures and they were really small. But she also showed me a map in the book of that \u201cHundred Acre Wood\u201d place. I asked her if it was a real place, but she wasn\u2019t sure if it was. So I started making my own pretend maps of places I just made up, which was really fun, and easier than having to write all those sentences about a place and where the towns, roads and rivers were.<\/p>\n

So I looked at dad\u2019s map to try and figure out where we were on it. I knew we were in \u201cDexter\u201d, and I knew what that \u201cDexter\u201d word looked like. There was more than one \u201cDexter\u201d word on the map. Some of the lines, those were the roads, had a tiny \u201cDexter\u201d word, but the biggest \u201cDexter\u201d word I figured was the \u201cDexter\u201d place we were in, because the word wasn\u2019t along a road line but went over different ones.<\/p>\n

I pointed at the biggest \u201cDexter\u201d word and asked dad, \u201cAre we here?\u201d He looked back from the front seat at where I was pointing.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep\u201d, he said, \u201cVery good.\u201d David looked at me.<\/p>\n

It was interesting the difference between \u201croads\u201d and \u201cstreets\u201d. Streets were in towns, like our \u201cPrescott\u201d street, and were usually straight and had houses or buildings on them. \u201cRoads\u201d weren\u2019t usually so straight and went from one town to another town through places where there weren\u2019t many houses or buildings, places that grownups said were \u201coutside of town\u201d.<\/p>\n

Dad started driving the car again and we went by more buildings and stores. We stopped because one of those \u201clights\u201d above us was red. There were now two roads ahead of us instead of one.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey call this a \u2018fork\u2019 in the road\u201d, he said, \u201cWe could go either way, so which way do you guys want to go?\u201d I always wanted to go left, because I was left-handed.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeft it is\u201d, dad said, and the green light above us was now turned on instead of the red one, so we went that way. Now there weren\u2019t any more buildings or stores and just a couple houses. There were some trees, but mostly these other kinds of plants that were all the same and next to each other in straight lines.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow about we sing a song\u201d, dad said, \u201cI\u2019ve got a good counting song. It\u2019s a BACKWARD counting song, so it\u2019s a little tricky. Just listen and when you catch on, join in.\u201d He looked back at us and David and I nodded. He sang\u2026<\/p>\n

A hundred bottles of beer on the wall
\nA hundred bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nNinety-nine bottles of beer on the wall<\/p>\n

Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall
\nNinety-nine bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nNinety-eight bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Those were really big numbers he was singing but I knew what they were. Since a hundred was the next number you counted after ninety-nine when you were doing REGULAR counting, when you did BACKWARD counting, you counted the ninety-nine AFTER the hundred, and ninety-eight after the ninety-nine.<\/p>\n

Ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall
\nNinety-eight bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nNinety-seven bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yep. That\u2019s how it worked. So I started singing the next one with him\u2026<\/p>\n

Ninety-seven bottles of beer on the wall
\nNinety-seven bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nNinety-six bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I was still trying to think what the next number was before ninety-seven when he sang ninety-six. David looked worried and looked at me, I guess because he didn\u2019t know how to count that way. It felt good to be able to do something with dad that David couldn\u2019t do yet, so David remembered I knew more stuff than he did.<\/p>\n

Ninety-six bottles of beer on the wall
\nNinety-six bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nNinety-five bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I liked it because it was one of those silly grownup songs, and you could sing it for a really long time without knowing any new words except the next number. Beer was one of those things, like punch and \u201cBloody Marys\u201d that grownups drank at parties. I guess punch and Bloody Marys made them talk silly, and maybe beer made them sing silly.<\/p>\n

We got down to eighty-four when we got to where this other road crossed ours and there was one of those red stop signs so dad stopped the car and stopped singing. Then he turned right onto that other road and started singing the song again\u2026<\/p>\n

Eighty-four bottles of beer on the wall
\nEighty-Four bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nEighty-three bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David and I liked singing the song, though David couldn\u2019t figure out the next number until dad and I sang it the first time, so dad kept singing it as we drove down this road. There were lots of trees and only a few houses, and they were way back from the road with really long driveways. Some of them had these giant gardens out in front and all around them that had all the same kind of plants in straight lines.<\/p>\n

I stopped singing and asked dad, \u201cWhy are all the houses so far apart?\u201d<\/p>\n

He stopped singing too and said, \u201cBecause we are out in the country. These are farms, where they grow some of the food that we eat.\u201d<\/p>\n

I had heard that \u201ccountry\u201d word before. Sometimes the guys on TV who said the news said that word. I guess we had a \u201ccountry\u201d and other places, like Germany, England and the Soviet Union, had countries too. I think it was really big because people would say stuff like, \u201cin the entire country\u201d. And we were supposed to like ours a lot because they had us sing that song at school\u2026<\/p>\n

This is my country
\nLand of my birth
\nThis is my country
\nGrandest on Earth
\nI pledge you my allegiance
\nAmerica the bold
\nFor this is my country
\nTo have and to hold<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

OUR country was called \u201cAmerica\u201d, and we were supposed to like it best. Better than Germany, because they were the badguys in the war, though maybe not anymore. And better than the Soviet Union, because they were kind of badguys too, or at least the other \u201cteam\u201d, like mom said.<\/p>\n

But then some grownups would say stuff like, \u201cIt\u2019s not in town, it\u2019s out in the country\u201d, like the town, where we lived, was different than the country, where these \u201cfarm\u201d places were. So maybe where we lived, in Ann Arbor, was not in the country, but it was all around us and we still liked it a lot, maybe because that\u2019s where we got some food.<\/p>\n

David said, \u201cSing the next number dad\u201d, and dad said, \u201cSure, but where were we?\u201d<\/p>\n

David pointed at me and said, \u201cCoob knows.\u201d He said my name like Molly did. I liked it that way.<\/p>\n

I liked it that I was the only one who knew. Not even dad knew. So I decided to just start singing by myself.<\/p>\n

Eighty-three bottles of beer on the wall
\nEighty-three bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nEighty-two bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Dad looked back at me and smiled like he did when he was \u201cproud\u201d of me. I liked that a lot. Even though I was a kid and not a grownup, I could do regular stuff that grownups did, like start the singing.<\/p>\n

The road wasn\u2019t straight like the streets \u201cin town\u201d, it had turns in it without going on a different road. Maybe that\u2019s why you called them \u201croads\u201d instead of \u201cstreets\u201d. But then we did get to another road and dad stopped the car at the stop sign.<\/p>\n

\u201cNorth Territorial\u201d, he said, \u201cWe\u2019re getting there.\u201d He started the singing again at the next number\u2026<\/p>\n

Sixty-seven bottles of beer on the wall
\nSixty-seven bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nSixty-six bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cSixty-seven\u201d was really hard to sing and fit it in with the other words in the song. \u201cSeventy-seven\u201d had been even harder, and I couldn\u2019t really say all of it without my mouth getting messed up, though dad could.<\/p>\n

There were trees all around us now, a \u201cwoods\u201d. We could see way up in front of us one of those \u201cfork\u201d things in the road. Dad said, \u201cWell Coop, which way should we go?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLeft\u201d, I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomehow, I KNEW you\u2019d say that\u201d, he said, laughing through his nose, \u201cTurns out that\u2019s the right way to go to get where we\u2019re headed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the LEFT way to go\u201d, I said. This time he did a regular laugh, with his mouth.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe word RIGHT has a lot of different meanings\u201d, he said, \u201cMaking it confusing depending on the other words around it. RIGHT also means CORRECT. If I want to speak clear, easily understandable English I should have said, \u2018It\u2019s the CORRECT way to go\u2019.\u201d He smiled like he had said something really good, but I didn\u2019t like it that \u201cright\u201d meant \u201ccorrect\u201d, but \u201cleft\u201d didn\u2019t. But I guess more people were right-handed than left-handed, so they had more votes. We kept driving by a lot more trees on both sides of the road.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere we go\u201d, dad said, and he turned onto a dirt road that made a crunching noise below the car, and made all those brown clouds behind the car too. We stopped the car next to all the other stopped cars and got out. There were big puffy white clouds floating under the blue parts of the sky, and I could tell that the sun was behind one right now. The air was really warm and the skin on my arms and legs felt kind of wet. Even my hair felt kind of wet. Dad let me carry one of the \u201ccanvas\u201d bags we had brought with stuff in them to go swimming. He carried the biggest one. David wanted to carry a bag too, but there wasn\u2019t a third smaller one, so dad said he could help me with mine, which I didn\u2019t like, because I had to walk more slowly so David didn\u2019t accidentally fall down.<\/p>\n

There were other people sitting on the beach by the lake, mostly grownups. The kids were either playing in the water or building things with the sand by the edge of the water. Dad pulled a folded up blanket out of the big bag he was carrying and spread it out on the ground so we didn\u2019t have to sit on the regular ground part. He gave us our swimsuits and we went into a bathroom to put them on. It was kind of like the bathrooms at the park, there was one with a sign that said \u201cMen\u201d and was for boys too, and another one that said \u201cWomen\u201d and was for them and girls.<\/p>\n

I had always thought it was interesting that these \u201cMen\u201d bathrooms didn\u2019t just have those regular toilets in those tiny rooms with doors, but also the other toilet things against the wall that you couldn\u2019t sit on. But even the regular toilets you could sit on you weren\u2019t supposed to if you just had to pee. Other boys said that only girls sat on toilets when they peed, and if a boy did he was a sissy, which you really did not want to be. I didn\u2019t want to take any chances, even when I was in one of those tiny toilet rooms by myself, because you could see someone\u2019s feet in one of those rooms, under the door, so you could tell whether they were sitting on the toilet or standing in front of it.<\/p>\n

So I changed into my bathing suit in one little room, and dad and David were in the next one, so dad could help David. Then we went back to our blanket and then all three of us walked into the water, dad holding David\u2019s hand. The water felt kind of cold, but it was okay because the top part of me above the water felt so warm.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t want other kids to see me standing next to dad like I was still a little kid, so I walked farther into the water than dad and David did, and it came up above my belly button. There were older kids even farther out than I was. Two of them were sitting on one of those big round things that looked like a giant donut, that kept them above the water. As I walked out further and the water got up to the bottom of my shoulders I started getting worried, but I didn\u2019t want the older kids to see me worried like that.<\/p>\n

One of the kids on the big round thing looked at me and smiled and said, \u201cHey kid, want to sit on our inner tube with us?\u201d I nodded, because I always wanted to play, and really liked it when older kids would let me play with them. I reached out toward them and they each grabbed one of my hands and pulled me onto the round \u201cinner tube\u201d thing. I had to slide my legs into the middle part so I could sit like they were, so we could look at each other. It was hard but I did it, and being able to do it made me feel more like a big kid like them.<\/p>\n

\u201cPretty neat\u201d, the other kid said to me. I nodded, but then thought I should be more like a big kid and say something.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really neat\u201d, I said, \u201cLike we\u2019re on a boat.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah\u201d, the first kid said to me, \u201cWe\u2019re on a boat, sailing the seven seas.\u201d I nodded my head and smiled at him. That was a good thing to pretend. The two of them swished their hands in the water to make the inner tube go farther out.<\/p>\n

The other kid looked at me and said, \u201cYou can swim, right?\u201d<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t say anything, and moved my shoulders up and down because I didn\u2019t know. Other times when we went here with mom, she had tried to show me how to swim. But I hadn\u2019t really figured it out yet, because when she showed me I felt like a little kid. I knew you were supposed to splash the water in front of you and kick the water behind you.<\/p>\n

\u201cJeez\u201d, said the other kid, \u201cWe better not go out any farther.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first kid nodded. \u201cYeah we better not\u201d, he said, then looking at me he said, \u201cYou need to learn to swim.\u201d When he said that, I felt like I used to when I was riding my tricycle and the kids around me were riding bicycles and looking at me.<\/p>\n

Then this big black fly thing came buzzing around us. It was so big I could see its eyes. Big flying bugs always scared me because they made me remember those super scary flying monkeys in the Wizard of Oz movie that I had seen again on TV a while ago. The two kids tried to hit it with their hands but it flew around their waving hands and finally landed on the first kid\u2019s back. Then his eyes opened wide.<\/p>\n

\u201cOuch\u201d, he said, \u201cThat hurts really bad!\u201d He tried to wave his hands behind his neck but couldn\u2019t hit the giant fly.<\/p>\n

\u201cGo into the water\u201d, the other kid said, \u201cThat\u2019ll get him off you!\u201d<\/p>\n

The first kid let himself fall backwards into the water. When he did his side of the inner tube went up in the air and I felt myself falling off the other side. My back smacked against the water and suddenly my head and the top part of my body was underwater, and then my legs too, which went down farther. I tried to put my feet on the bottom but it wasn\u2019t there. I got scared and grabbed at the water above me to try to get my head out of it. My head came out and I started to breathe, but I went under again. I grabbed at the water above me again and when my head came out. I wanted to yell for dad, but that would make me seem like a little kid. By slapping the water really hard and kicking with my legs I could just keep my mouth out of the water, and I tried to breathe but all the splashing made some water go in my mouth. I got even more scared.<\/p>\n

I felt a hand try to grab my arm and pull me, but I still could barely keep my head above the water. Then I felt a bigger arm wrap around my stomach and pull me up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI got ya\u201d, I heard dad say from behind me. \u201cThanks, son\u201d, he said to that kid who was holding on to my arm.<\/p>\n

That kid said to dad, \u201cHe needs to learn how to swim.\u201d Dad nodded.<\/p>\n

\u201cThanks again for helping him\u201d, dad said, and then turned around so I was looking at David farther in front of us. David was looking at me and looking really worried. Dad pulled me in towards David.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere\u201d, he said, \u201cYou should be able to touch the bottom now.\u201d He took his hand off my stomach and I slid down until my feet felt the bottom and I was okay. \u201cYou need to be careful how far you go out until you learn to swim\u201d, he said. Those two older kids had swum back out and gotten back on the inner tube, but were both looking at me, and then at each other. I felt like a stupid little kid.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was really scary\u201d, I said to dad. I usually didn\u2019t tell him stuff like that, stuff that I was feeling. He didn\u2019t look at me, but shook his head slowly and pushed his lips together like when he got mad and said, \u201cYou\u2019re fine. You just got flustered. Nothing to be scared about!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll have a talk with your mother about getting you swimming lessons\u201d, dad said, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you come in for a while and play with your brother on the beach?\u201d<\/p>\n

David, standing in the water up above his suit, looked at me and said, \u201cI can\u2019t swim too!\u201d I didn\u2019t like that he\u2019d said that, like I was just a little kid like he was.<\/p>\n

Feeling mad, I looked at David and said, \u201cThat\u2019s not what happened. I was just surprised\u201d, and I turned away from him and walked in toward the sand part on the edge of the water.<\/p>\n

I let myself fall down on my knees in the sand and started digging it up to make a mound. It made me not think so much about what just happened, though I was still thinking about it some. I had to dig right by where the water was so the sand would be wet and stick together better. It was interesting that sand was different from the dirt in our backyard. When sand wasn\u2019t wet, you couldn\u2019t really make any shapes with it, it just kind of fell down. Maybe you could make a hill, but that\u2019s all. When dirt was wet it turned into mud and just fell down too. But regular dirt you could make things with when it WASN\u2019T wet. Mom said the dirt we got from that gravel pit place had \u201cclay\u201d in it, which made it kind of stick together. We had made things with \u201cclay\u201d in art class at school. It was pretty neat stuff that you could squeeze and roll and even bend into different shapes.<\/p>\n

David came up behind me and just stood there looking at what I was doing. I could tell he was there even though I wasn\u2019t looking at him.<\/p>\n

\u201cMe too?\u201d he asked. I wanted to say no, but I knew that would be bad, and dad might get mad at me. But I also just wanted to build my own stuff, so I had an idea.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou build yours over there\u201d, I said, pointing, \u201cAnd then we\u2019ll hook them together.\u201d David nodded, and didn\u2019t look worried anymore. He got down in the sand near me and started digging like I was.<\/p>\n

The really warm day felt good on my skin after being in the cold water. The sun came out from behind a cloud and that felt even better. I started thinking about the fort I was going to build, and then maybe a town around it. When I had a big enough pile of sand I started building the walls and the \u201ctower\u201d parts in the corners. Then I made a road that went from the pretend doors of the fort around it in a circle, and then I had it keep going over to where David was trying to build his own fort. He had watched how I made mine and he was trying to do the same thing but he couldn\u2019t do it very well.<\/p>\n

\u201cSee\u201d, I said to him, \u201cI\u2019m hooking our forts together. You can build your road to hook to mine.\u201d He nodded and smiled at me.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to make a really long road before I hook it to yours\u201d, he said. He really did more talking than I did when I was a little kid like him. I guess I could have been mad that he was trying to build a longer road than mine, but I knew it wouldn\u2019t look as good as mine, so I wasn\u2019t mad anymore.<\/p>\n

We built our forts and our roads and towns for a long time. Other kids would come up and look at them and say things like it was really neat. I would nod and maybe say \u201cyep\u201d but keep working, though I liked that they liked it. A couple kids said they would build their own forts next to mine and David\u2019s and hook those together with roads too. But it got bad because other kids trying to go in the water from the sand part just walked over our roads and towns and wrecked parts of them without even looking or knowing that they were doing that. I don\u2019t think any of them did that on purpose. One of the other kids building his fort said he would be the \u201cwalking police\u201d and tell the other kids to be careful where they walked.<\/p>\n

By the time we all got done building and hooking our stuff together with what became a really neat long road, I could feel my shoulders hurting. Not the inside parts, but the outside parts. Dad came over carrying David and my t-shirts and said we should put them on or we\u2019d get \u201csunburned\u201d. I guess the sun wasn\u2019t just bad to look at, it could do other bad things too, even though it felt really good. That was strange. So I put on my shirt and dad helped David with his. Then dad went back up to our blanket where he was reading one of those big soft books that he and mom called \u201cmagazines\u201d.<\/p>\n

As the four of us kids all stood and looked at what we had made together, David said, \u201cNow let\u2019s be monsters and wreck it!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot yet\u201d, I said. I just wanted to look at it for a while and make up stories about the different forts and what they did in the different towns. But the other two kids liked what David said and started wrecking stuff. David did too, he always really liked wrecking stuff. I just let my body fall down and sat in the sand and imagined all the people in the houses running down the road to get to the forts where they thought they\u2019d be safe. But turns out they weren\u2019t, and lots of them were killed or wounded.<\/p>\n

David and those two other kids had fun wrecking it all, but the problem was, once you did that, it wasn\u2019t fun anymore. Those other two kids didn\u2019t want to make something different so they just went off. Dad came over from where he was sitting on the blanket reading.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou guys getting hungry?\u201d he asked. David and I both nodded.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell why don\u2019t we take one more dip in the lake to wash the sand off\u201d, he said, \u201cThen we\u2019ll change and get back in the car and find a place to get lunch.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOkay\u201d, said David, and he started running into the water by himself. I looked at dad, made a funny face, and did that rolling thing with my eyes when you can\u2019t figure something out. Dad looked at me, his eyes twinkling, and shook his head.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour brother has absolutely no fear of water\u201d, he said, \u201cHe\u2019s like a fish, though he doesn\u2019t have gills like a fish, so he scares me a bit\u201d, and he ran out into the water after David. I decided I could be a fish too, and ran into the water as fast as I could, lifting my knees up high as I ran so the water wouldn\u2019t slow me down. I ran past David who was up to his swimsuit in the water. I looked at him and made a face like he should watch me and then stuck my arms out and jumped head first into the water. My eyes hurt as I opened them underwater, but it was an interesting different kind of place where I could only see the bottom parts of everybody else in the water around me. I looked towards the bottom part of David behind me and I saw his top part come down under the water too, and he saw me and waved his hand. I thought of that Captain Nemo movie where he and his crew did stuff underwater. Then I felt my chest kind of burning which meant I needed to breathe. I had held my breath many times, and knew that feeling.<\/p>\n

When I came out David\u2019s head was still underwater, but he finally came up too. Dad just used his hands to splash water on his body. Then the three of us walked back to the sand part where our blanket was. There were a lot more people around now than when we got here earlier.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe came at the right time\u201d, dad said looking around and smiling, \u201cWe beat the crowds.\u201d He seemed to really like that we had beat them, like beating the other team. We dried off with our towels and then put our regular clothes back on in the bathroom, dad helping David again. Then we went back to our blanket and David and I, mostly me, helped dad roll it up so it could go back in the big canvas bag. Once we had everything \u201cpacked up\u201d, we walked back to the car.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it would be fun to go to a place we\u2019ve never been to before\u201d, dad said, sounding more like a kid than a grownup.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere\u2019s that?\u201d I asked, like I was asking another kid. David tried to say \u201cwhere\u2019s that\u201d too, but it sounded more like \u201cwhere sat\u201d.<\/p>\n

Dad looked at us, did a big smile with all his teeth, then moved his eyebrows up and down and said, \u201cIt\u2019ll be a fun adventure, you\u2019ll see! While you guys were building your sand forts, very impressive by the way, I was studying our Washtenaw County map. The place I\u2019m looking for is not ON the map, at least not that one, but I think it\u2019s just over the county line north of us. Let\u2019s see if we can get there from here.\u201d<\/p>\n

We drove back into the trees on the road with the dirt and the dirt cloud behind us back out to the regular road. Instead of going back the way we had come, we turned right on this other dirt road into a bunch of trees.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe sign says Silver Hill road\u201d, dad said, \u201cIt goes off the top of the map. Let\u2019s see if it goes through to Livingston County. Otherwise we\u2019ll have to drive all the way around the lake.\u201d<\/p>\n

We drove down the long dirt road, which was really bumpy. We bounced up and down in our seats, which was really fun. David and I pretended we were bouncing around even more than we really were. We got to a place where we had to go to the left.<\/p>\n

\u201cHmm\u201d, dad said, rubbing the bottom part of his face as he continued to drive, \u201cThis may not go through. But let\u2019s take it to the end and see.\u201d Then he looked back at us and said, \u201cWe\u2019re on an adventure, right? Things don\u2019t always turn out as planned.\u201d David and I nodded.<\/p>\n

But then on the road ahead there were no more trees, and no more road because there was another lake.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis must be Crooked Lake\u201d, he said, \u201cAnd a dead end for the road. Guess we have to turn around and go the other way.\u201d Dad had to drive backward and then forward again so the car could drive the other way.<\/p>\n

\u201cOkay\u201d, he said, as we bounced up and down back the road, \u201cWhere were we in our song?\u201d I remembered.<\/p>\n

\u201cSixty-six\u201d, I said, and dad started singing\u2026<\/p>\n

Sixty-six bottles of beer on the wall
\nSixty-six bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nSixty-five bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David and I sang too. I sang louder than I had before. We got back to the regular road that wasn\u2019t bumpy and dusty, and drove some more until we came to another road and we turned left. We drove back into a bunch of trees, but then there was another lake on our left, and those wood things that you could walk on going out above the water with boats next to them. The other side of the road had houses with trees all around them.<\/p>\n

\u201cCan you see all those people on the other side of the lake where the brown sand is?\u201d dad asked. I looked hard and could see them.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep\u201d, I said. I didn\u2019t know that David could see them, but he looked at me and decided to say \u201cyep\u201d too.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the Silver Lake beach we were just at\u201d, dad said, \u201cWe\u2019re driving around the other side of the lake.<\/p>\n

Then we drove by a place where there was the big Silver Lake on one side of the car and this other really small lake on the other side. Then there were some roads and houses on the left side, but not the lake anymore, and only trees on the right side. Then there were just trees on both sides of us, and dad started singing again the next number\u2026<\/p>\n

Forty-five bottles of beer on the wall
\nForty-five bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nForty-four bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As we kept singing our road finally ended at a different road that just went to the left and right. There was one of those yellow signs with a black arrow with pointing parts going both ways.<\/p>\n

Dad turned his head to look back at David and me and asked, \u201cWell\u2026 which way do you think we should turn this time?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLeft\u201d. David said it before I could.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what I was hoping for\u201d, Dad said, smiling and his eyes twinkling, \u201cI guess if you\u2019d said \u2018right\u2019 then I would have tried to talk you out of it.\u201d He laughed through his nose as he turned the car to the left. This road was another one of those bumpy dirt ones that made dust behind the car.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is Tiplady road\u201d, he said, \u201cI wonder what that\u2019s all about. So where were we in our song?\u201d I think dad knew where we were, he just liked to see if I could remember what number it was.<\/p>\n

Like before, I just started singing by myself again, and he and David \u201cjoined in\u201d as grownups would say\u2026<\/p>\n

Thirty-eight bottles of beer on the wall
\nThirty-eight bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nThirty-seven bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We sang as dad drove, but then dad stopped singing to say, \u201cLook! A bridge!\u201d<\/p>\n

David got up on his feet and I got on my knees in the wayback seat and turned to see out the front of the car from the \u201ccontrol room\u201d where dad was driving. There were two little walls, one on either side and there was a little river, one of those \u201cstream\u201d things, going under it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell not much of a bridge\u201d, dad said as we bumped across it, \u201cBut where were we?\u201d He looked back at me and winked and I started to sing again and they joined in again\u2026<\/p>\n

Thirty-three bottles of beer on the wall
\nThirty-three bottles of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nThirty-two bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Now our road ended, but another road went left and right.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo HERE we are\u201d, dad said, like he had finally figured something out, \u201cThis is Silver Hill road!\u201d He pointed to the left down the road. \u201cThat\u2019s the road we were coming up when we left the beach but it didn\u2019t go through, remember?\u201d I nodded and then David did too. \u201cSo my instincts weren\u2019t wrong, I just didn\u2019t expect that it didn\u2019t go through. My map of Washtenaw County doesn\u2019t include any Livingston County, that\u2019s the county just north of ours. And the big Michigan roadmap doesn\u2019t have all these little dirt roads.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere are we going?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ll see\u201d, he said, his eyes twinkling again.<\/p>\n

We drove up to this house that kind of looked like our house. It had a screen door, like our house, but it had this giant American flag sticking up from the corner of the roof. It had big words on each of the windows. I could read \u201cLUNCHES\u201d on one of the windows and \u201cPOST CARDS\u201d on another. Then the third window had a word, \u201cSOUVENIRS\u201d, that I didn\u2019t know. Above one of the windows was a sign that said \u201cRANCH HOUSE GRILL\u201d, and I knew the \u201cRANCH\u201d and \u201cHOUSE\u201d words, and I figured out how to say the other \u201cGRILL\u201d one. I knew what a \u201cranch\u201d was from seeing those Western shows on TV, but I didn\u2019t know what a \u201cgrill\u201d was, but maybe I would find out. Mom said that usually the most important word on a sign was the last one. There was also one of those red and white \u201cCoca Cola\u201d signs, and a big picture of that \u201cDevil\u201d guy with the horns on his head and a tail that had an arrow thing at the end, though this guy looked pretty silly instead of scary.<\/p>\n

Some older kids in the park liked to talk about the \u201cDevil\u201d, at least for pretending, but some said that he was real. Those older kids sometimes said stuff that wasn\u2019t right just to scare you, but I think some others really \u201cbelieved\u201d it. That was a word grownups used sometimes about stuff that maybe wasn\u2019t real, or maybe was, but you WANTED it to be real, like Santa Claus. Some older kids used that word too, I guess to sound more right like grownups.<\/p>\n

That Devil guy could be really scary when kids talked about him, because they said he was in charge of this place called \u201cHell\u201d, where some kids said you would go after you die if you were bad or if you didn\u2019t \u201cbelieve in\u201d that other \u201cGod\u201d guy. Kids would say that Devil guy was the worst badguy of all, worse than that Hitler guy who was in charge of Germany during the War.<\/p>\n

And that God guy was supposed to be the best goodguy of all, and he was supposed to help you if you believed in him. He was supposed to be in charge of another place called \u201cHeaven\u201d, that you went to when you were dead if you had believed in him before you were dead, and also didn\u2019t do any really bad stuff. But then other kids said that if God was such a good guy, why did he make you go to Hell if you didn\u2019t believe in him.<\/p>\n

It was all interesting, but also scary and made me worried if I thought about it too much. But this picture of the Devil I was looking at was pretty silly, so I don\u2019t think the person who made it really believed in him.<\/p>\n

So dad opened the screen door and we walked into that house with the flag and all the signs. One part had one of those eating places with tables and chairs where you could sit and eat the food you got.<\/p>\n

The other part was pretty strange. It had a window that was open, but when you looked through it you saw another room but not the outside. Then next to the window, coming out of the wall, was this head and front part of some big animal. It LOOKED real, and I was afraid to touch it. But it couldn\u2019t be real, because how could you take it off the rest of the animal? It made me really worried and I looked at dad and he figured out what I was worried about.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the head of a deer, or some animal like that\u201d, he said, \u201cSome guy probably shot the animal when he was hunting and then had its head cut off and mounted like that as a trophy of his hunting ability.\u201d What dad said made me even MORE worried, that grownups did that kind of stuff. I wondered if they did that to people too, but I was afraid to ask.<\/p>\n

A sign on the top of that strange window said \u201cPOST OFFICE\u201d, and I knew what that was, because mom had taken me to the post office on that Stadium street. It was where you went to get those \u201cstamps\u201d you put on letters before you put them in one of those \u201cmailboxes\u201d out next to the sidewalk. We also went there to send \u201cpackages\u201d to other people, like Aunt Pat or my grandmother and grandfather. Mom said a \u201cpackage\u201d, was a box that you put stuff in and wrapped up in this special brown paper and wrote somebody else’s \u201caddress\u201d on so the post office people would take it there, even if it was really far away.<\/p>\n

But then the sign below it, in the middle of the window, said \u201cPOST OFFICE HELL, MICH.\u201d I pointed at the sign and looked at dad.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep\u201d, dad said, nodding slowly with his lips pushed together, \u201cWe\u2019re in Hell. Well\u2026 at least Hell, Michigan. I always knew it was up here north of Silver Lake, but never been.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut we\u2019re not dead\u201d, I said. He laughed through his nose.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot since I last checked\u201d, he said, his eyes twinkling. Then I could tell he was thinking about something that would be fun.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s send your mom a postcard\u201d, he said, with a big smile on his face, \u201cfrom Hell.\u201d I nodded. David nodded too but he still kept looking at that animal head thing on the wall.<\/p>\n

In the store and eating place part of the house there was this metal thing that you could spin around with a bunch of different postcards in it. There was one with a picture of this place we were in and this red Devil guy with a long tail with an arrow on the end. Then red letters said \u201cU.S. POST OFFICE HELL, MICHIGAN\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cShall we send her that one?\u201d dad asked. David and I both nodded. I knew we were being silly, like grownups sometimes were, specially at parties. But I couldn\u2019t remember the last time dad was silly, but I liked that he was. Dad paid money for the postcard and then got us hotdogs to eat and Seven-ups to drink. While we ate we helped him write on the back of the postcard to send to mom. We all figured out things to write on it, though David just wrote his name.<\/p>\n

Dad read to us what he wrote. \u201cLiz\u2026 People have been telling me to go here for years, so I decided to finally take their advice. And by the way, the road here was mostly unpaved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then I wrote, \u201cIt\u2019s not so bad. The hotdog was good.\u201d<\/p>\n

David wrote his name, though it was hard to read. Dad and I wrote our names too. Then dad wrote mom\u2019s name and our \u201caddress\u201d on the other part of the back of the postcard, next to where we\u2019d done our writing.<\/p>\n

The same woman that we gave money for the postcard and gave us our hotdogs went through this other door and then was behind that strange window. Dad gave her more money for that stamp, and dad licked it with his tongue and stuck it on the top right part and gave it back to her.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo a lot of people do this?\u201d he asked her, \u201cSend postcards from here?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh yes\u201d, she said, smiling, \u201cYou folks are probably the tenth today.\u201d<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

When we finally got back home, we had sung that beer song all the way down to the last number.<\/p>\n

One bottle of beer on the wall
\nOne bottle of beer
\nTake one down
\nPass it around
\nNo more bottles of beer on the wall<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Dad sang \u201cno more\u201d, but I sang \u201czero\u201d, because it was my favorite number.<\/p>\n

Mom had her \u201ceasel\u201d in the middle of the living room and the room smelled like that \u201cpaint\u201d stuff. I could tell she was making a picture of that shiny \u201cpitcher\u201d thing she poured those \u201cBloody Marys\u201d out of at my birthday party. When she saw us she smiled and looked happy.<\/p>\n

\u201cGentlemen\u201d, she said, \u201cI had the best day! How was yours?\u201d<\/p>\n

Dad looked at me, his eyes twinkling and his head nodding just a little bit that I should say what we had talked about saying to her.<\/p>\n

\u201cMom\u201d, I said, \u201cWe\u2019ve been to Hell and back!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The summer didn\u2019t take as long as it used to. I did all the same kind of stuff, playing in the basement, in the backyard, in the park. Playing with Paul or Danny or Gabe, or Molly on Saturdays. Riding my bike to my friends\u2019 houses, though not Molly\u2019s because it was so far away. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[1777,13,1774,1799,1800,1775],"class_list":["post-7559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventure","tag-1960s","tag-ann-arbor","tag-autobiography","tag-free-range-kid","tag-growing-up","tag-memoir"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7559"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7564,"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7559\/revisions\/7564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}