"The Learning Years"
Believe it or not this was where I got most of my education from, magazines. Well yeah there was that place called school, but most of my learning was from magazines. Not just any kind of magazines either, they were Monster magazines! 'Famous Monsters of Filmland', 'For Monsters Only', 'Erie', Creepy', you name it, I probably read it as a youngin. I loved them all!
The kids at school would
always ask why I liked Monster mags so much and not something like sports magazines or
something. I would just tell them that I was studying up on these creatures of the night.
I'd tell them that if the world was suddenly attacked by a giant ant or something like
that I'd be able to tell the president how to stop the monstrosity. Either they would
believe what I said or they thought I was crazy cause they would never ask me again.
It was my brother
Greg who got me interested in Monsters anyway. He would buy a magazine, read it, then hand
it down to me. We'd stay up into the night together watching 'Creature Features'. We would
also spend endless hours building model kits. Not cars or airplanes, but monsters. See, I
think both of us secretly knew that the world was going to be a bitch of a place to live
in, so we would escape into our own little worlds before the real problems in life took
over. Unfortunately for me, those problems took over way too soon.
School was really
beating the H E double toothpicks out of me. See, I wasn't dumb (well at some things I
was), I just got board at school. Soon that magical 'attention' thing kicked in and made
me a little troublemaker. Sure, I was the one who emptied the whole school when I pulled
the fire alarm. Sure I was the kid who brought razorblades to school trying to pass them
off as 'trick blades' and ending up in the principals office while the poor kid who took
the blades lay bleeding in the hospital.
See, the whole thing of it was that I was just having fun. Livin for the moment on the way up the ladder of life. I didn't mean to hurt anyone, just put a little excitement in they're life while exciting the hell out of me.
Little Dennis the menace is what my
teachers would sometimes call me. One of them even threaten my Mom that if I didn't behave
better in her class she would grind me up into hamburger meat and feed me to the class.
And my Mom said go ahead! How's that for child abuse.
You know when your at this young age you feel like you can do anything you want. And sometimes you can. Your mind is still in that experimental phase and hasn't learned the concept of 'It can't be done'. It's a quality we loose when we become adults. But really I feel we should hold on to a little of that feeling. It sure does make livin' in this world of today a little bit easier.
One thing many of us still hold onto is our memories. Back then when things
were so much easier. When all you did was wake up and wonder how you were going to spend
your day. Alright yeah there was that school thing, but after that you had nothing to do.
The sky was the limit. Your imagination when your a kid is activated to it's fullest. Mine
so much so that once I spent the entire morning before school cutting out cardboard wings
for show and tell, all because I had this wild dream of flying (and who hasn't). Once in
class, I put them on and told everyone what they were. The teacher then had the audacity
to say, 'What are you gonna do now, fly around the room for us?". She made one of my
greatest fantasies become the most embarrassing moments of my life. I'm sure glad that I'm
older now because I know she has to be dead. Good for her.
Another thing about growing up as
a youngin is that you don't have this attraction to the opposite sex. Well most kids
didn't, but not me. I was sure interested. I guess my hormones were at full capacity
around the age of eight and nine. What can I say? I was curious. Sure I would take a peek
into the neighbors windows when nobody was lookin. Sure I'd peek up a girls dress when the
situation arose. I didn't know why, I just did, it felt the right thing to do at the
time.
And the really cool thing about being a kid was that if you got caught doing these 'highly unusual things as a child', you'd never get reprimanded. "Oh he's just a kid, he don't know." they would say. Sometimes when we'd go swimming they'd let me change in the same room with them. Believe me, if I didn't know what I was looking at then, I just saved it for when I did know.
Yeah all those childhood memories stay with you, the good and the bad.
Those hot summer days laying at the poolside.
The sound in the early morning of the knife sharpening man. The ding dong of his cart as he would slowly walk up the street.
The time I ripped up my knees trying to jump onto the back of the fruit truck to steal an apple. I missed the truck but for some stupid reason held onto the back and was dragged across the gravel down the alley.
Finding a bottle of 'One-a-Day' vitamins and chewing on one thinking it was candy. I learned never to do that again.
Or how about
the time my mom bought me a pair or Karate pajamas and I was so excited that night that
while she was tucking me in I accidentally kicked her in the face and broke her nose.
Or the time I was sticking my finger into a bowl of something I couldn't see in the refrigerator one hot summer day, thinking it was soft Jell-O and after tasting it realizing it was vinegar.
The childhood memories you acquire fill your brain with knowledge and wisdom. Someone once said that to make a good Jell-O you have to put in all those good fruits before the gel hardens. I guess in a way your mind is like that. The trouble nowadays is that the young children are getting way too many sour fruits in they're gel. It's a shame and it seems nobody is doing anything about it.
It is also a shame to enter your teen years. That's when that evil word 'responsibility' enters your life.
This is the time when all those childhood fantasies should be packed away.
This is the time to move on.
Ahh, but not me. I'm not ready to pack away that child in me just yet.
On to...
Copyright ©1998 Roger B. Domian