6
Safety in Numbers
On an Easter morning, when my dad was a kid, he got up early before his brothers and sisters were awake. He ate the ears off everyone's chocolate Easter bunny. Everyone's that is except for my Aunt Diane's.
Aunt Diane got blamed, but my Dad got caught, because he was the only one who wasn't crying.
There were several televisions located throughout Camp Dearborn. They were locked up, during the day, in large wooden cabinets. Our whole clan gathered around the TVs at night to watch our favorite shows: Wagon Train, Tarzan, and Batman & Robin.
Around the big Totem Pole, during the day, we fought over who got to play Wagon Train's Chris Hale or Barnaby West and who had to be the scouts that went out looking for Indians. The older cousins liked being the Indians, but we had to stop playing because they started taking the game too seriously. On TV, the Indians would capture the scouts and torture them, leaving them tied up in the desert to dehydrate and wither away.
"Where's Billy?" Sharon asked, as she rustled us up for dinner. She had made Sloppy Joes, which were Billy's favorite.
Someone had tied him to a tree and forgot about him. When we found him, he was blindfolded and gagged with two red Indian bandanas. Sharon got mad, and we weren't allowed to play anymore, even though the real reason it happened was because Billy squealed on Ricky and Donny for stealing watermelons out of the creek.
After a few summers, we got bored with these games and sought out more exciting adventures. Given the size of our clan, we developed quite a reputation as we grew older. Cousins Donnie, Marty, and my brother Rick were all teenagers now, but they thought the dances were too square. As we hid on the hill, they used their slingshots and took turns nailing kids in the butt. Bobby and I brought along our peashooters, but they didn't work as well. When Rick took out one of the bug zappers, the camp counselors were on to us.
Occasionally, someone would chase us, but we rarely got caught. One night, when cousin Jamie got nabbed by some kid who tried to take him back to the canteen, the kid ran away quickly when he saw how many of us there were.
Meanwhile, our parents spent nights around the campfire bragging about their own youthful adventures. Like the time Dad and Uncle Ronnie went down the street in the middle of the night pushing cars into the road. People didn't lock their cars back then, so they slipped the gears into neutral and shoved each one down the driveway. When they were done, they banged on a door at the end of the block and then ran into the woods, where they watched in laughter as each house alerted the next and a string of porch lights lit up the neighborhood.
My favorite story involved my Dad putting a bag over his head and robbing the neighborhood paperboy, who happened to be his half-cousin. "I know that's you, Dale!" the kid bellyached, as he handed over his money. "I'm telling your Mom."
They laughed hysterically every time that story was told, as if they hadn't heard it a hundred times before. I guess everything sounded funny when you were happy and drinking. In spite of their own craziness, my family always had a good time when they were together.
Of course, we kids tried to copy our parent's pranks. One of my favorites was to go around at night unplugging trailers. It was especially fun to peep through the window to see what the people were doing. Like when they were playing poker-we'd watch as they raised one another back and forth and then, Boom, just as they were about to show their hand-we'd pull the old plug and run.
For a longest time, I wanted to be a lawyer when I grew up. Perry Mason was my favorite show on TV. I wanted to be just like him. My Dad said you had to be smart to be a lawyer, but since he never finished the sixth gradeand most of my family had no schooling beyond high school-we didn't know how long it would take in school to become one. Some folks had TVs inside their trailers, and I remember watching from the window while Perry Mason, played by Raymond Burr, cross-examined a witness to elicit a lastminute confession. All of the show's hour-long leads would come down to these last few critical moments, when Perry would have the witness quivering on the stand. His secretary, Della Street, or Paul Drake, his private eye, would hand Perry an envelope then, just as the witness was about to confessBAM ... we'd pull the plug. "Oh Shit! You dirty little bastards!" Off into the darkness we'd run.
A lot of our pranks weren't as much fun if we weren't chased afterward. In fact, being chased was one of the most enjoyable things we did together. I liked the rush that came with it-my heart pounding and the shortness of breath. It made my whole body tingle. Like ridding a roller coaster or watching a scary movie-it made you jump, but then it made you laugh, and you wanted to go again.
There were several pavilions, where groups held family picnics that included a variety of games and prizes. We'd sneak in on the fun and share in the ice cream, watermelon, and potato sack races. Since the camp supervised most of the activities, over time, we got to know the games pretty well. Once, after cousin Rusty won several prizes in a row, including the dance contest, someone wanted to know whose little boy he was, and his cover was blown. We didn't get into too much trouble, though, since it was Uncle Ronnie's idea in the first place. That
