Childhood 2.0 – Random Memory Access (part 2)

There was no chinking in between the small logs that made up the walls of the cabin, so we could see it was empty. I volunteered to make a circuit around the house, looking for evidence of parental activity or a potential ambush. The garage door was down, and I peeked through the dusty windows, cupping my hands around my eyes to peer into the gloom. The family truck was gone. A new 10-speed bike was resting on its kickstand close to the door, pointing out toward the driveway so its pilot could rocket directly out from the oil-streaked garage and into a perfect day. I carried the news of the good fortune back to my squad, and we whooped and hollered as we descended on the tiny cabin, as exhilarated as if we’d actually won a victory over a hundred Indians riding dinosaurs and armed with crossbows (no mere black-hatted villains with six-shooters for us!).

Stooping down to enter the pint-sized doorway, we made a beeline for the northwest corner. Brushing aside some of the cut grass that lined the floor (it kept the dust down…fancy!), we revealed a small length of rope. Pulling on that rope raised a piece of ¾” plywood about eighteen inches square. Beneath that…

Treasure.

An old Army ammo box was pulled up, the lid hastily pried open. The box unceremoniously dumped onto a jacket spread out on the ground, we pawed through the figures and cards, momentarily reclaiming those riches which so often act as currency among small boys (Trade you that Cobra Commander for two Ghost Rider comic books!) I say momentarily because we’d only hold onto them for a week or so at most, when our fort would be raided in turn – though once we had kept possession of an original Boba Fett figure for an entire summer because I’d had the idea of burying a new cache (a coffee can) directly under our old one (a small, rusty tool box).

“Holy crap, guys. Look at this.” We clustered around our scout, who had found a creased Polaroid picture stuck between the pages of a MAD magazine. We stared, awed at the scene within that uneven white frame. The older sister of one of the other gang in the act of getting dressed. She was wrestling with a button on her skirt, and her blouse was open. It wasn’t a great picture, motion-blurred and hastily snapped, but we didn’t care. This wasn’t some artificially-posed no-name model; this was a real girl we all knew. She wasn’t the prettiest girl in the neighborhood, but she was more tolerant of us than the other girls were – had even ridden her bike with us on a few occasions.

This picture, just one of an ongoing series of acts designed to irritate an older sibling, and probably long-forgotten by the target, was the equivalent of a nuclear weapon. Like any other dangerous material, we were unsure on how to use it safely. In order to use it as blackmail material, we’d have to admit we had possession of it, which opened us up to all kinds of parental retribution. And even the idea of blackmail was never fully fleshed out. What would we blackmail her for? Money? She had an allowance, but that was it. Driving us to the mall? She had a learner’s permit. French kissing? (The height of sexual favor any of us could imagine at that point.) She was almost another member of the gang, not a girlfriend.

In the end, we cleaned out everything from the box except that picture. We saw no advantage in possessing it other than taunting her little brother with the fact that we had it, a temporary position at best. Leaving it alone in the box assured them that we had seen it.

We left the cabin and went back to our fort to deposit our easily-won goods. We jumped on our bikes and headed to the local arcade to spend our allowances on Centipede, Asteroids, packs of Bubble Yum and greasy pizza slices. As we pedaled back, we worked out a plan to get to the skating rink the next day (My mom’ll take if yours’ll pick up!). As dusk fell, we checked on our fort.

They’d been fast.

Not only had all of our booty been reclaimed, but they’d taken advantage of the fact that our fort was literally held together by old shoelaces, friction, and one bent nail we’d found. It had been taken apart and the pieces tossed into the woods. As we picked them up, we debated on how to avenge this. Arson was suggested. Okay…I suggested it, but no one took me seriously. While we put the fort back together (that being the biggest advantage to using shoelaces), we argued over who had to bring new batteries for the walkie-talkies, who had a higher score on Battle Zone, and which was better: a moped or a go-kart.

Home for supper. (“What did you do today?” “Nothin’.”) But the greatest kind of nothing. The empty schedule of a warm afternoon, where plans for your fantasy worlds have as much weight as the ones for this one, and you casually fight your friends over stupid stuff you don’t even remember an hour later. Everything you want to do falls into two categories: Now, and When I’m grown-up. Immediate gratification or a nebulous Sometime.

Next weekend, we’d do it all again.