2001-01-21 - 19:13 MST

January 21, 2001

THE WONDERING JEW

Stir The Pot

Rocky Mountain News' Rebecca Jones in her Wacky Questions column this morning dealt with a question by some one asking about "Mumblety Peg" which immediately transported me to a sunny, lightly breezy stretch of front yard lawn and several of us playing that game. Off and on for years I took part in playing that game. My first attempts were pitiful and I usually got kicked out of the game because no one wanted to see young Douggie sweating and groaning trying to pull the Peg out of the ground, the game required the loser be forced to pull up with his teeth a peg driven by the winnner as deep as he could drive it, in three blows. Playing the game out on the lawn guaranteed that the peg would be driven below the surface and the poor loser would have a mouthful of grass and dirt before he brought it up. I never did get to the point that all the tricks were mastered by me, oh, in later years before we moved on to more risky games -- I did come close.

Later we played a game, nameless to me which had no rules, except that if one got cut he would go get the appropriate first aid while the rest of us split. The activity went like this. For a right handed person, the left hand with fingers and thumb spread out wide would go on the playing surface. With the right hand the player would see just how fast he could stab the point of the knife between all his digits, back and forth. It was, of course, a game of escalation, the player trying to up his speed. Usually someone got cut lightly or badly as it should happen. The neighborhood Mamas would keep an eye out for kids crouched on the lawn flashing a jackknife and run out and break it up.

There were other activities requiring skill but little danger. One was spinning tops on the smooth cement. Winding the string properly and tight enough and the the act of whipping it out to spin required skill and coordination. Some of us learned to do a few tricks with tops.

Seems to me that the Duncan Yo-Yo came along in my young years, I remember a man showing Yo-Yo tricks on the stage at a school assembly back then. The first one I had was one where the string was stuck solid to the Yo-Yo by the wooden shaft pinning it to the side. A few tricks could be done with one of those. Man oh man, when the Yo-Yo came out with a looped string we all had black eyes or sore foreheads from trying to do the fancy tricks with the "Spinner" Yo-Yo.

Sometime before I hit Junior High school I learned to juggle three oranges consistently. I ate a lot of oranges during my period of practice, or rather sucked out a whale of a bunch of orange juice. Later I got some tennis balls and kept trying to get four balls in the air, without success, it was an ego buster for sure.

There were the acts of tree climbing where the lightest kid would win because he could climb higher than the boys heavier than he was.

There was a tree across the street from my house, some form of maple I think, that had nice spreading limbs and required a bit of strength and coordination to get into. There were several of us who spent almost all of one summer in that tree. I would load a small bucket with what I wanted to have with me in the tree, throw a strong cord with a rock tied on one end and the bail of the bucket on the other over the lowest limb and then climb up and enjoy. This was SOP with us. I remember that toward the end of summer we would quietly hide out above the sidewalk and either try to see down the front of girl's dresses or frighten them by dropping out of the tree in front of them.

Toys for outdoors ? I had at one time a wooden six shooter that had been made and painted so that it looked like a real one. I can't remember how many box tops that it cost, Then there was the Buck Rogers disintegrator ray gun that went through lighter flints like mad also box top costly.

How could I ever forget the rubber guns. Back then all tires had innertubes. Cutting across the tube in even widths would produce bands of strong rubber. Both ends of apple and orange boxes were of 3/4 " pine and ideal for carving out guns for the game, spring type clothes pins were used to hold the bands and also as a trigger to release them. The type of guns were amazing, pistols, rifles and toward the end of the craze somebody's big brother invented a rubber band machine gun which would fire up to eight bands. Wish I could remember the mechanism, I would like to build one for my grandson.

Even though the wind in Denver was pretty sporadic and never blew the same speed and direction very long at a time we all managed to get kites way up there. I rememer my Dad and Uncle telling me how when they lived back east that when called to dinner they would tie their kite string to a fence rail, go in and eat coming back after to try for more altitude.

For the rainy days and winter days, there were board games de luxe. Pachisi for one, a sort of mindless game of counting from dice throws and moving on the board, there was another board game called Pollyanna that we boys decided was too sissified for us. There were wooden puzzles, wire puzzles, checkers -- there was something in the toy box for most every quirk of a child's lively mind.

There was a deck of cards or two (they had to be hid if the preacher was in sight). Mom had taught me how to play solitaire, it was a good time passer for me when no playmates were around. I learned several types and could amuse myself for hours.

Crayons and paper, water colors and paper, drawing pencils and paper.

My bag though, was books, I would play with the other stuff if I had no book to read. Every summer I would go in for the library reading program and enjoyed every minute of it, my name was usually near the top of the "Books Read," list. That summer in the maple tree a great amount of my time was spent reading, when I wasn't being an ornery boy.

Oh, yes, Marbles. . . . . when the weather was clement and dry enough there were marble circles drawn on the surface of the playground and games of various levels of skill going on. There was always at least one game of "keepers" going on. I would play, but not use my aggies (agates) or favorite ones there. The Mothers used to give us hell for worn out pants knees and scuffed toes on our shoes.

Other than all the mischief we could think up, there was always something we could legitimately use to Stir The Pot . . . . . . .

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