Jul. 09, 2007 - 23:16 MDT

BUT FOR THE GRACE . . . .

Somewhere around the age of ten I was the proverbial pirate - - - at least at heart. And I had aiders, those sturdy souls who had the same inclinations.

My first sortie into the land of crime was with a pal. I wrote about that early on.

O. Julius

So my pal and I were part of a group of boys of the same age, brigands all we were. And each of us being the proud possesors of skeleton keys of various sorts, we managed to get into a store building that was vacant.

Skeleton keys could be bought at the hardware stores and filed to different shapes in order to unlock locks.

It was at the other end of the block from the original caper.

We knew better than to use the main floor, but went into the basement, got a packing case and a few nail kegs to sit on. Put our pennies together and managed to buy a goodly supply of candles. And were the exclusive members of a very elite private club. We never got around to giving it a name, the best was probably, "I'll meet you at the club tonight."

We bought a few dice and a couple of decks of cards to occupy our busy time. Some form of foodstuffs were smuggled from home by most of us, and a few coins were spent on cold drinks.

We played what we thought was Poker, at a much later age the realization that our intentions were good but we were nowhere near having the game mastered came to my mind.

With dice we did a little better, but at either game huge wagers of matchsticks were made and lost.

We did the usual boy things that many of us did at that age, seeing who could out-cuss everyone else. Guess we all knew all the words, the effort was made to string them together in the most novel way, and who could cuss the longest before losing his breath.

But, you know, it was a SECRET club and we were ever on the lookout for the cops or some know-it-all adult to bust us up. Didn't happen, guess we kept our secret club, secret.

I guess we ran our club pretty much all of one summer, didn't burn the place down, nor did we commit any crime but being in a vacant store. But our egos were a mile high and our chests were puffed out a mile ahead. Funny thing was that none of us ever confided in a friend or acquaintance, remarkable for egotists I would say.

We always felt that we were free from the law, much as present day Republicans and could work our way out of anything.

After that time I stayed pretty squeaky clean for a time, I guess it was about high school when us kids would pool our bucks and give a wino enough cash to buy him a bottle and one for us. That too was hush-hush as well.

Sitting here tonight, remembering the days long gone, and the boys most of who were killed in World War Two and thinking we survived without becoming true criminals. You know, there BUT FOR THE GRACE . . . .