Dougy

Fitting for the 70's too! When I was about six, some people came over to visit my parents and their children came into the backyard with me to play.

One was a naughty little boy named Dougy. Dougy was about a year older than me and was a real rough, tough kid. He taught me a few things that day that I'm sure my mom wished he hadn't.

First of all, Dougy had a Hotwheel. He backed up a long way and then Duke's of Hazarded it down a flight of stairs. I was pretty impressed, both with his stupidity and that it actually worked! He didn't even tip over!

Then, he saw my sky-scraper high (at least to a 6 year old) swingset and asked me if I ever climbed on it. NO! Of course I hadn't. The thought had never entered my mind, in fact, so he showed me how: first climb on the support between the legs, hold onto the cross beam on top and shimmy over just a bit more toward the middle. Then you can just hang there.

He also taught me the fine art of picking my nose and eating it.

While he was there, I was in total shock and a little repulsed by his daredevil skills and bad manners. After he left, I mulled over all of the things he had shown me.

I talked to my mom about it all, including the part about climbing on the swing set. "Don't come crying to me if you get hurt" is the only part of her portion of the talk that I remember besides her telling me not to try it. I remember it well, because those words kept circling through my head on a loop as I laid on the ground with the wind knocked out of me after doing exactly what she had told me not to. I never went crying to her either, in fact, I never told her at all. Nor did I ever do it again.

Dougy was probably as good for me as he was bad. He taught me that things that look like fun don't feel very fun when they turn ugly, and that listening to my mom was a pretty good idea, and those are pretty important lessons to learn.