No worries

A relative of the victim 


Growing up in the valley was pretty cool. Though the valley was on the verge of making its transition to a wasteland of homes and mini-malls, there was still plenty of open lots, orange groves and even the occasional cornfield where a gaggle of boys could find an adventure. Despite the sometimes oppressive heat, summers were great. My parents were divorced when I was little, so my sister and I had free reign while my mom worked. It was sweet freedom to a ten-year old boy. If I close my eyes I can still picture the front-yard football games, the swim parties at Greg McGuire’s house, and Evil Knievel jumps we used to set up in the streets. What I’d give to go back to that time. Days spent without a single worry. Those really were the good old days. Well, most of them...

Gary’s dad had promised to take him and three friends of his choosing to the beach. I was fortunate to be among the chosen few. Matt Merkley and Wayne Zuko rounded out the foursome. It was going to be great – riding boogie boards while the unwashed masses sweated it out in the valley. Just as we were about to load into the van, his dad received a call from the office saying he had to go into work immediately. What a drag. We sat around the air conditioned house, moaning and complaining until his mother finally told us to go outside and play while she finished her housework. We had really gloated about our impending beach trip and our other friends were going to pay us back with interest. We couldn’t bear the shame of showing our faces. Rather than hang around where they might spot us, we decided to walk to the mall where we’d sneak into a movie and spend the rest of the daylight hours in hiding. It was a masterful plan.

To shave some time off our trek to the mall, I suggested we hop the Handyman fence and cut through their lot. A little background on Handyman stores... they were just like today’s Home Depot stores only without the incompetent, know-nothing employees. The place was huge and unfinished like a warehouse. They had pretty much everything you’d need to build and maintain a house. I sometimes wonder why Home Depot has thrived and Handyman went bust. Maybe if they had fired the conscientious, intelligent personnel, and hired the mouth-breathers that Home Depot employs they’d still be around. I don’t know. Annnywwaaaayyy…. Handyman had this huge sign in their lot, similar in design to the one in the picture, except much larger. It was made of plastic with fluorescent lights inside of it and it sat about 40 feet in the air atop two enormous pillars. At the base of the pillars was a rock bed with some flowers in it. Whoever decided to put the rocks at the base was obviously never a young boy. It was common practice for passing kids to test their manhood by attempting to punch a hole in the sign with one of the rocks. Many were successful as evidenced by the swiss-cheese appearance of the sign. Slinging stones at the sign had to be done relatively quickly and discreetly because the store manager was aware of this little ritual and watched the sign like a hawk, attempting to seize any vandals and holding them for the cops. Why he didn’t just remove all the rocks is beyond me, but it would have saved us all a whole bunch of misery if he had.

On this particular day, we were all feeling a bit adventurous so we made our way to the rock bed. Just when we had each selected a suitable candidate for the deed, Wayne remembered that he had some “smoke pots” in his pocket. You remember these things, you get them at the fireworks stand. You light the fuse and they make a big cloud of smoke. They are instrumental in the healthy development of the male juvenile. Wayne pulled out a smoke pot, I lit it, and he let it rip. His aim was true and the pyrotechnic sailed right into one of the holes. There were high-fives all around as we eagerly anticipated the great smoke-out. We were not disappointed. Within seconds gray smoke poured from the sign. We stood in awe, our heads tilted back, mouths open, marveling at the sight. This beat going to the beach any day. After admiring our handiwork for a few moments, we split for the mall before the evil store manager could get his hooks into us.

After our failed attempt to sneak into a movie and being tossed out of the mall, we sat dejectedly on the curb. We all thought the same thing: “Those other guys are probably going for a swim right now.” We decided we’d take our lumps from our friends, fall on our swords, and hopefully they’d let us join them for a dip. We were soon on our way. Just as we cleared the mall parking structure the Handyman store came into view. The sign, which had only been smoking when we left it, was now fully engulfed in flames. Thick, black smoke billowed into the air. Melted plastic oozed and dripped from the sign’s frame. Fire trucks surrounded the blazing structure and showered it with water. The manager stood to the side and conversed with a police officer, gesturing wildly with his hands. I nearly committed a hygienic indiscretion in my pants. I was speechless. Wayne started to whimper. Gary began stammering, “Nnnnooo, nnno, nnoo!!!”. Only Matt kept a cool head. "We didn’t do nothin’. We were at the beach. We’re takin' the long way home. Let’s go.” And the long way we did. I conservatively estimate that we walked five miles to make a one-mile journey. Nobody spoke the whole time. When we got back to our neighborhood, we all split and went to our own homes. I don’t know what those other guys did, but I locked the doors, closed the blinds, and hid in my room. I pondered my fate. Would I go to jail? Or even worse, would my mom find out? Whenever the phone rang or there was a knock at the door I was sure that they were coming to take me to the Big House. It’s really a burden bigger than any ten-year old boy should have to bear. I finally decided I’d play it cool. After all, I had only lit the smoke pot, I hadn’t thrown it. Just for some insurance, I stayed on my best behavior doing all my chores unasked. I didn’t backtalk. I didn’t feign illness on Sunday mornings to get out of church. I recall my mom saying to me one day, completely out of the blue, “I don’t know what you did, but it must have really been something.” She’s a smart woman. Over the next several weeks the fear slowly subsided. A new sign went up at the Handyman and the manager had all the rocks removed. My mom didn’t kill me, I didn’t go to jail. Life just moved on. A year or so later I even managed to sleep through the night.