I always wanted to be a normal kid. In my mind, normal kids had it made. When things got boring in the house, when the parents became unbearable, normal kids had an outlet, a refuge. Their friend’s house. They could pop next door, where the parents were obviously cooler than yours because they chose the two story floor plan when moving into the tract. Or scoot across the street to the powder blue house kitty-corner to yours with the oil stained driveway. Whichever house it was, it was close and held your best and closest friends.
If you were a normal kid.
In my neighborhood, the family next door, while obviously cooler because they chose the two story floor plan, had children old enough to have engendered me. They didn’t care to play with my vast stuffed animal collection or help brush my Barbies’ hair. Cretins.
The family in the house kitty-corner had children not much older than I, but when an adolescent, a handful of years seems like dozens in terms of maturity. Plus, they didn’t mingle much with the rest of the neighborhood. This did not improve in the succeeding years, especially after the father, late one night, crashed into our front yard after driving drunk. He was sober enough to flee the scene, rouse his son and send the young man to take the rap for the accident, clad only in his skivvies and a ratty blanket. You know, maybe it was good they didn’t mingle.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I had friends. At least a few that I wished I could have chased the tinkling ice cream truck down the street with. But they lived, not blocks, not even neighborhoods away from me. They lived in different cities. They required driving time. They were geographically undesirable.
Normal kids go to the neighborhood public school, which was so close, they could walk to and from, en masse, tired and disheveled in the morning and hyper and disheveled in the afternoon.
I went to private school, two cities away, and was trundled by my frantic mother to and from. There was no one to commiserate with; no one to bemoan the earliness of the hour in the morning, no one to bemoan the unfair burden of homework in the afternoon. Only my mother to bemoan my disheveled state, both ways.
I tried, once, to make friends with the kids directly across the street. That family had a two story house, but not because their parents were cool. It was chosen out of necessity. There were multiple generations living in that house; a hive of familial activity, members of every age flowing in and out of its doors at all times of day. A strange, strange place to someone who grew up in a family unit of four.
The kids, an overwhelming gang of them, were loud, rude, and nothing like me, the parochial school milquetoast. So, of course, I wanted to hang with them. That feeling, thankfully, was transient.
The one and only time we played together, I was convinced by one of the boys to play “King of the Street.” This involved us, running into the middle of the road, standing on the manhole cover and declaring, “I’m King of the Street!” The neighbor kids did this with boldness and cheeky irreverence. I did it with timidity and lightening fast speed. There were cars, for God’s sake!
After tiring ourselves out on that thrilling game, we retired to the garage-slash-rumpus room for conversation. Conversation is probably the wrong word to use, since it implies a two-sided communication. It was, in fact, their discussion of a wide range of naughty and un-Christian topics while I sat, confused, laughing nervously, and hoping my knowing head-nods were convincing.
When it got too much, I fled, retreating to my boring house and unbearable parents. We never tried to socialize again. They were just too much for me and I was, most likely, not enough for them. They would chase after the tinkling ice cream truck with me, sure. But probably just to knock it over.
Forget normal. I just wanted a bomb pop.
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