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| Come here and help me move this greasy transmission in your school clothes. |
One
of the consequences of my dad running his business out of our house
is that we were press-ganged into work, a lot. My dad would not stop
with the family if their was a neighbor kid who was not quick enough
on his escape when he saw my dad's truck coming down the drive way
then he was compelled by fear of my dad and his load voice to work
until he worked up enough courage to make and excuse and break free.
This drudgery was in stark contrast to my home's usual policy of laissez-faire-free-wheeling-danger
that was generally in effect. We would be tooling along with ten kids
over at our house getting up to some sort of tomfoolery, then without
warning my dad's truck would give off its distinctive rattle and he
would turn down the gravel drive way. We would all spring into a
unrehearsed conceal and disperse drill that had developed
instinctively in the behavior of my dad's kids and the regulars. If
we were in the house everyone would duck under the huge driveway
facing picture windows and army crawl until they were out of sight in
the hall and then either hide in the bedrooms or get out through the
laundry room and the back door. Rookies in the house would not be
sure what they were doing but if you see five other kids hit the deck
and scramble there is a little piece of lizard left in the
hippocampus that releases chemicals that will propel you in the
direction of the fleeing herd while your adrenaline fuels the escape.
Once my friend Joe, in his first time avoiding the press-gang,
blindly followed my brother and I into the room instead of outside
which is where veterans preferred to flee because it gave them all
kinds of options to get home. My dad came in and caught us in the
room and Put us to work while Joe stayed hidden in the closet for a
long time because he was still in there when we had finished the
chore about an hour later. I don't know what he thought would happen
to him if he just made a run for the door but he obviously thought it
was not worth the risk. The whole drill was much simpler if it was
preformed outside because if we were building something behind the
house we could hear and flee before my dad knew what was happening
and the fort being of the far back of the property gave us vision and
a head start. However, we always had to catch my dad before he got
back to the fort because he very rarely went back there and when he
did it was universally bad for us. He was a vicious building
inspector and would require all or most of the fort to be torn down
if he ever saw what kind of deathtrap we had built. In my mind a
little forced labor was better then pulling down the fort we worked
so hard on making.
