PERFECT MOMENT # 19
We were like prisoners awaiting execution. There were four hours left until our father was coming home. We knew we deserved the punishment that was ours. It had started earlier that afternoon when my brothers and I wanted to play baseball in the driveway. Our mother’s station wagon had to be moved, and she was not available. David got her keys, sat himself behind the wheel and turned on the ignition. My other brother Sandy started laughing hysterically, until a few moments later when the neighborhood filled with the sound of shattering wood and crushed metal. David had miscalculated and took out the side of the carport. Our neighbor LaBabe Corey rushed over, veins popping out of his bald head and shouted at David. If he was that upset, what would our father’s temper be like, we feared. At the appointed hour, Dad arrived, and we must have been a pitiful sight, trembling in our sneakers. He took one look at the damage and kind of shrugged his shoulders. “We’ll take care of all of this” was all that he said. It was a miracle, and a perplexing mystery until I figured it all out years later. Interviewing him for his memoirs, he admitted that he was a mischievous criminal just like us. He had been busted for playing with matches and lighting a grassy field on fire. He had also lied to his school principal and convinced him they should have the day off for a bogus Jewish holiday he had made up. He had been in our shoes.