his closet,” I said proudly. “I thought I’d hang it up for everybody to—”
“Oh, my
God,
” said my mother. And with that, she sprinted away from her still-idling car and ran into the house. I’d never seen my mother run before, especially in a pair of low-heeled pumps. And the next thing I knew she ripped the flag down from the window and closed the curtains.
I didn’t get to go to Dairy Queen.
That night, my father gave me a lecture on the horrors of the Nazis and told me that he had saved the flag and the dagger because most of the guys in his division had done the same thing, wanting to keep a few souvenirs of the enemy from their time in the war. Apparently he had picked up the flag and the dagger after his battalion had gone through France when the Germans had been defeated. He told me about friends of his who were killed during the war, and a wave of embarrassment at what I had done overtook me as I tried not to cry. Seeing this, my dad gave me a pat on the shoulder and said, “Hey, it’s okay. At least now you know.”
Since he knew I’d thought I was doing something nice for him by showing off his flag, he thanked me for trying to make him a war hero and told me that he was going to donate the flag and the dagger to a war history museum where they could be properly displayed in the right context. And then he grilled me over and over again to make sure that no one in the neighborhood had driven by and seen the flag in the window.
Fortunately for all of us, nobody had.
Well, that would have been one way to get my dad’s face in the paper.
MY FIRST AND BESTEST
GIRLFRIEND
I met my first real and true girlfriend when I was in the second grade. It turned out to be the beginning of a very long and faithful relationship.
We met in gym class. It was about a month into the new school year when our teacher, Mrs. Handler, informed us that we were going to learn how to climb ropes. We looked over and saw a two-inch-thick cotton cord hanging down from the very high ceiling. I had seen those ropes stored up in the rafters before but always assumed they were there to keep the roof from blowing away if a tornado tore it off. Beneath the rope was an extra-thick mat, signaling to us all that severe injury was possible. Mrs. Handler, making it sound simple, informed us that we were to grab the rope and use our hands to propel ourselves upward. She said that as we climbed we should use our thighs to pinch the cord and hold ourselves in place to prevent us from sliding back down and negating whatever progress we might be making before we reached the top. I was immediately terrified because it looked to me like the ceiling was about one mile up, and if I were to get up there and then lose my grip and fall, the mat would only prevent my body from breaking apart upon impact as I was killed. But like all things in any gym class, we had no say in the matter, and so we lined up to wait for our turns. I watched as each of my friends, both boys and girls, scurried up the rope as if it were the easiest thing in the world. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad, I thought. It sure didn’t look like anyone else was having any problems. However, nobody else in the class cried when they got a mosquito bite, either. So I had no idea what to expect.
When my turn arrived, I approached the rope and awkwardly took it in my hands. It was hard and a bit slick-feeling, not at all what I was expecting. I assumed the rope would be soft and easy to grip, a magical Nerf rope of sorts that would render me weightless and carry me up to the gym ceiling like Mary Martin in that creepy TV version of
Peter Pan
my parents made me watch. But the minute I touched that rope, I knew my success was going to depend strictly on how much strength I did or didn’t have in my arms and legs. I reached up as high as I could on the rope and tried to pull myself off the ground. It was almost impossible. I’ve never had much upper-body strength, and at age seven
“Oh, my
God,
” said my mother. And with that, she sprinted away from her still-idling car and ran into the house. I’d never seen my mother run before, especially in a pair of low-heeled pumps. And the next thing I knew she ripped the flag down from the window and closed the curtains.
I didn’t get to go to Dairy Queen.
That night, my father gave me a lecture on the horrors of the Nazis and told me that he had saved the flag and the dagger because most of the guys in his division had done the same thing, wanting to keep a few souvenirs of the enemy from their time in the war. Apparently he had picked up the flag and the dagger after his battalion had gone through France when the Germans had been defeated. He told me about friends of his who were killed during the war, and a wave of embarrassment at what I had done overtook me as I tried not to cry. Seeing this, my dad gave me a pat on the shoulder and said, “Hey, it’s okay. At least now you know.”
Since he knew I’d thought I was doing something nice for him by showing off his flag, he thanked me for trying to make him a war hero and told me that he was going to donate the flag and the dagger to a war history museum where they could be properly displayed in the right context. And then he grilled me over and over again to make sure that no one in the neighborhood had driven by and seen the flag in the window.
Fortunately for all of us, nobody had.
Well, that would have been one way to get my dad’s face in the paper.
MY FIRST AND BESTEST
GIRLFRIEND
I met my first real and true girlfriend when I was in the second grade. It turned out to be the beginning of a very long and faithful relationship.
We met in gym class. It was about a month into the new school year when our teacher, Mrs. Handler, informed us that we were going to learn how to climb ropes. We looked over and saw a two-inch-thick cotton cord hanging down from the very high ceiling. I had seen those ropes stored up in the rafters before but always assumed they were there to keep the roof from blowing away if a tornado tore it off. Beneath the rope was an extra-thick mat, signaling to us all that severe injury was possible. Mrs. Handler, making it sound simple, informed us that we were to grab the rope and use our hands to propel ourselves upward. She said that as we climbed we should use our thighs to pinch the cord and hold ourselves in place to prevent us from sliding back down and negating whatever progress we might be making before we reached the top. I was immediately terrified because it looked to me like the ceiling was about one mile up, and if I were to get up there and then lose my grip and fall, the mat would only prevent my body from breaking apart upon impact as I was killed. But like all things in any gym class, we had no say in the matter, and so we lined up to wait for our turns. I watched as each of my friends, both boys and girls, scurried up the rope as if it were the easiest thing in the world. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad, I thought. It sure didn’t look like anyone else was having any problems. However, nobody else in the class cried when they got a mosquito bite, either. So I had no idea what to expect.
When my turn arrived, I approached the rope and awkwardly took it in my hands. It was hard and a bit slick-feeling, not at all what I was expecting. I assumed the rope would be soft and easy to grip, a magical Nerf rope of sorts that would render me weightless and carry me up to the gym ceiling like Mary Martin in that creepy TV version of
Peter Pan
my parents made me watch. But the minute I touched that rope, I knew my success was going to depend strictly on how much strength I did or didn’t have in my arms and legs. I reached up as high as I could on the rope and tried to pull myself off the ground. It was almost impossible. I’ve never had much upper-body strength, and at age seven
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