More from: "Out of the Mouth of Babes:"
Look at that kid with the giant forehead and self made hair cut. Cute as a button. So innocent. Doesn't look like he would create an almost mythical legend in his own family. But wait...
So AIC Rick commented that he looked back at his youth and realized how much fun he had. And I had to laugh because a memory pounded up from the basement of my mind, leaped out as a fully formed, real time, event...and I was five years old again...
Picture the little guy in the photo. All of five years old. And loves playing with his Army men, the tanks, trucks, and planes- all part of the two Armies meeting on his back porch. Mom is in the Kitchen. Little brother is with Mom. Dad is at work. Everyone else is in school.
I set my battlefield up. I want it to look "real". So I go in the house, grab a big bag of cotton balls from under the bathroom sink. I go and get Dad's big tin flask of Ronco Lighter Fluid. And one of his many lighters.
I soak the cotton balls with Ronco lighter fluid. Set them to the side. Then I soak the wood under my Army men, so that when the cotton cannon balls, soaked in Ronco Lighter fluid are lit...they start fires, on a tank, or artillery piece, or truck. I hold them with a stick as they burn, then flick them off on bombing runs.
Then I realize, that the boards are on fire, and not just the ones under my Army men. The paint has caught fire on the side wall.
I am five. But pretty smart. So I run to the back of the house, get the hose, turn it on and run back to the Side porch where I had set up my battlefield.
The flames were taller than me. The whole porch was in flames. It counted as our back porch, because even tho it was on the side of our house, it was the side at the very back.
So right away I realized the hose wasn't going to cut it. So I left. Yep . Walked right across the street to Margaret Trupoe's house. She always gave me a donut and chocolate milk. So I knocked on her door.
She smiled, and let me in her Kitchen and gave me a donut and chocolate milk.
Then she sat down with her coffee...and smiled at me.
"Kevin, I like your company, but why did you come over?"
I swallowed my donut.
"Your husband is a Fireman, right?"
She laughed.
"Yes, he is."
"Well, could you call him?"
"Why?"
"Because I set the porch on fire."
She screamed and ran right out the door. My Mom and little brother already outside. Mrs. Cabcar had called the Fire Department, and Mrs. Sheehan was holding my mother back...barely.
"Kevin might be in there! I don't know where he is."
Luckily Mrs. Truepo got there before my Mom could get free and run into a burning house.
Meanwhile, I was finishing up my donut and chocolate milk. Never even thought about my Mom and little brother being in the house. Just went to get a Fireman. That's their job! (Can you see the early signs of Autism here?)
Then the fire trucks came.
Well, any five year old wants to see that. So I put my dish in Mrs. Truepo's sink. Rinsed out my glass. And went back outside.
My Mom hugged me, hugged me again. Laughing and crying at the same time.
"I am so glad you are safe. What did you do? I am so glad you are okay. What did you do."
So I told her.
Remember that old saying: "Wait till your Dad gets home."
Yeah, well. Expand that a bit. Apparently every living male relative over the age of 16 was allowed to give me a spanking for the next few days. I think Dad's belt was thinner by the weekend.
I had no clue how much money it cost to fixe the mess up. I know we couldn't use that porch for a few weeks, and we had tarps to cover the holes where the wall was chopped or burned out.
So when we gathered in the Kitchen for Breakfast, or Supper...well, there was a reminder to everyone what happened, and who did it. But it turns out, I wasn't the first kid to set the house on fire, nor was I the last.
But I didn't find that out until my little brother's "Celebration of Life."
But that's another story. And in one of those weird twists of fate and life, what was a tragedy with appropriate punishments - became a fun story to tell later in life.
And from then on, I played with my Army men in dirt or gravel. And no more lighter fluid. But a few years later...I discovered fire works make great bombs.