An old memory.

Back when we were kids we played ball of some sorts all year round. If we had a baseball and a bat, we'd play baseball. If we had a football handy we played that. Seasons had little to do with anything. Having a ball of some sort generally meant a game of some sort. Kids were kids.

Anyway, I was the kid of a pickup football game somewhere behind the North Community Church. I only got to play because I raised enough hell and probably got pretty beat up playing with the bigger kids. If I recall there was only one other kid my size.

I was not big for my age to begin with and when you look at it even six months is a lot of difference for a growing boy. These guys were probably three or four years older than I was.

I don't remember a lot about the game except that I sacked the quarterback about a half-dozen times and probably galled him to no end.

I was a hornet in that game and the poor quarterback, probably a foot or more taller than I was was tormented by the half-pint that kept hitting him as hard as he could below the knees and kept bringing him down.

The game was about 50 years ago and I believe the field is still there for kids to play in if they want. It's been about fifty years and I guesss I can let the cat out of the bag now.

Jan and Dean and the Beach Boys were singing a lot of surfing and hot rod songs at the time. It was either the very late fifties or the early sixties. 

The quarterback would recite all sorts of stuff until he hit the chosen word. When the center heard the word he'd snap the ball.

The quarterback would start calling his numbers by using a current tune on the top 40 charts. When it had anything to do with a hotrod I'd listen and when he mentioned something about a deuce coupe the ball would snap.

I simply figured it out and when I heard 'deuce coupe' I'd take off like a shot after him. I think I was only offsides once but only by a second and it went unnoticed. When I took off I made a beeline for him and hit him as hard as I could and as low as I could to jerk his feet out from under him.

All of his calls came from top 40 songs.

This had been out of my mind for decades. 

The only reason it came to mind is that I have been invited to a party back in my hometown and the quarterback I sacked as a kid is supplying the music. He has some kind of band he plays in.

When I heard the name I grinned and said to myself that it was a name I have not heard in decades and wondered how he had gotten involved in music. Then I remembered the game and it came to me. I remembered the game.



Tonight I am going to the HS reunion and he'll be there. I think I'll tell him how I was able to sack him, although I wonder if he remembers the game.



To find out why the blog is pink just cut and paste this: http://piccoloshash.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-feminine-side-blog-stays-pink.html NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE WRITING OF TODAY'S ESSAY