As a boy growing up I didn’t know any different. Do other families move as much? How many schools now? 10? 15? More? A kid once said to me his folks said we were white trash. I hit him. But I knew he was right. It is what it is. There is truth to the adage ‘you can run but you can’t hide’.

I didn’t have a cornucopia of good things in my life. Abusive parents. No friends because we moved so much. Being the oldest of eight kids. Never enough money. Blah.. Blah.. Blah..

I did however have favorite things. Soft places to land in my mind. Hot Texas nights with only the thumping of a swamp cooler to keep you from melting. There was no air conditioning in my day. Chasing fireflies as they glowed in the dark. Probably the most beautiful of all nature’s creatures. And so few left my heart aches to give back every one I ever caught. Kick the can. The rattle of tin in the night as it bounced down the street. The knock on the door and every kid’s magic words.. “can Billy come out and play”?

Life was hard but simple back then. You could fill your car up on $2 dollars and drive all week. A guy actually did it for you while he checked your oil and cleaned your windows. Everyone had a bike. We rode all over. We made our own scooters out of a pair of rusty metal roller skates and an old board. Taking the bus was normal. A nickel took you to the end of the world. Going to a movie costs you a quarter. A double feature and a cartoon in between. Another quarter got you a coke and a package of Nechos. My favorites were the pink and the chocolate. A box of Jujubes would last both movies and the cartoon. I used to hold them up and look through them at the movie screen so I could see what color I was eating.

Spam was popular when I was a kid. Somehow it became a special treat to have Spam. My ass!! As one of eight kids we ate a lot of bulk foods. Beans. Spaghetti. Meatloaf. My parents used to sit in another room for their dinner. Usually steak or chicken. Go figure. We drank out of jars. My mom would save the jelly and pickle jars and we would use them as glasses. Pork and beans. A lot of pork and beans. I never found any pork though. Just a big hunk of fat. Still tasted like beans and ketchup.

Fried bologna sandwiches. In my day the butcher would slice the bologna nice and thick. Not paper thin like they do nowadays. Bacon was thick and meaty like ham. Instead of strips of fat like they give us now. A loaf of bread was a nickel. A banana split at the counter was 23 cents and 2 cent tax. A quarter. A fricken quarter for a whole banana, 3 huge scoops of ice cream, nuts, cherries, toppings, and whipped cream. Brylcreem. A little dab will do you. Folgers coffee was about all there was. Pabst Blue Ribbon beer was number one. My uncle would drink a case every Friday night when he watched wrestling on our old Sylvania TV. We had to use pliers to change the channels because we broke the knob off.

Burma shaving cream. We used actual razor blades to scrape our faces. We took baths. Showers were usually in gymnasiums. No fitted sheets. Everything was square. You could go into every house and find mousetraps in corners of the rooms. Dining rooms always had chandeliers. No one had two cars. We hand washed the car every weekend. Then mowed the yard.

Smoking was cool. Everyone had a cocktail before dinner. Sport shirts were just for weekends. Neighbors actually talked. Every boy had a dog. You still needed bottle openers. School dances were still looked forward to by the students. It was the only time you could ‘accidently’ brush your front with her front. Unless of course you happened to date Pearl from 5 th period geography. She let you touch her. All of us had record players. Every 45 rpm had a song on each side.

Somehow we let those simpler times slip away from us when a fried bologna sandwich meant something. Most of you won’t know what I’m talking about. Most of you will just laugh at an old man’s memories.

I’ve been around for a long time. For I have lived before. There was a time I was the maker of dreams. The bringer of desires. I was the secret that made you smile. Now I am but the catcher of such dreams. Caught and kept in a vault where only Dreamcatchers hold the key. To be passed on to the next who shall take my place and write of their memories. Will it be you?