Days of Innocence

Summers spent at the local pool, playing Marco Polo. Celebrating with the team at the local pizza joint after winning the last game of the little league season. Ice cold lemonade and fresh baked cookies with friends after a water balloon fight. Many images can come to mind when one starts to reflect on their childhood.

For some reason, when I think of the times I had growing up, I tend to remember the pranks I played on my brothers. As long as I can remember, I have been somewhat mischievous. Strewn about my mother’s photo albums are pictures of me holding down one of my brothers, punching them or pouring some sort of liquid on their heads. In my defense, I saw it as toughening them up. I always saw myself as a very creative child, finding new and interesting ways to (as my parents described it) torture my family.

My brother, 4 years my junior, has always been terrified of Chucky from the “Child’s Play” movies. As a child, whenever a commercial for one of the films started, he would run to his room and shut the door. It would take my parents quite a bit of coaxing before he would come out again, requiring them to convince him that the ad had ended.

As what would be considered to most to be a thoughtful gesture, my grandmother once bought him a My Buddy doll for Christmas. The doll was intended as an educational toy, with buttons, zippers, Velcro fasteners and shoelaces. The popular toy, given to tens of thousands of children, also bore an uncanny resemblance to Chucky.

Upon opening the gift, my brother dropped it and ran to his room. He slammed the door, and was sheltered inside for half an hour before my parents were able to coax him out. The doll was stored in my closet, with my parents and my brother hoping that he would never see it again.

The My Buddy doll, which wrought terror into the heart of my little brother, was the best gift my grandmother ever gave me. Over the months following that Christmas it gave me unbridled joy. Somehow, the doll found its way to the most inexplicable of locations. My brother would often open his toy box to find it sitting atop a fire truck. He would awake early in the morning to find My Buddy lying beside him, smiling. Being woken at 3 A.M. by the screams of a three year old let me know that I had accomplished my mission. I would spend those nights giggling myself back to sleep.

After 3 months of not being able to sleep, and weekly trips to a local department store for replacement sheets, my parents curbed the activity by burying the doll in a box deep within the garage. It was never to be seen again.

At an early age, the youngest out of the three was my shadow. He tried to emulate or be involved with everything that our middle brother and I did. From swordfights in the front yard to chores around the house, he followed us every step of the way.

One summer afternoon, I had just pulled a jar from the refrigerator to snack when curiosity got the better of him. He approached me in the kitchen, wondering what I was eating.

“Whatcha eatin’?” He looked up and asked me.

I pulled the fork out of my mouth. With it still full, I garbled, “Pickles... Ya want some?”

His eyes lit up, and with enthusiasm, he said “Yeah!”

I took the fork and drove it to the bottom of the jar, making sure I could pile on as many of the small green disks as was physically possible. I handed him the fork, and with a swift bite, he cleaned off the tines. His eyes lit up again, when he came to the realization that the kosher dills that I had promised him were in fact, ultra-mega-wicked hot jalapenos. They were of the variety that had labels only written in Spanish. On the front of the jar was emblazoned a yellow triangle with an exclamation mark, and underneath, the word “Aviso!”

He opened wide and started to try fanning the flames, but it did him no good. Laughing, I grabbed a class from the cabinet, filling it with water from the tap. I did this, knowing full well that water has the effect of opening the taste buds on the tongue, intensifying the effect.

“Here! Drink this!” I handed him the full glass of water, and he sucked down every last drop.

My brother started to scream obscenities that were, under the given circumstances, appropriate. However, at his age, they might have gotten the both of us grounded for ten to twenty years. I gave him a few slices of bread to scarf down, and he never asked me for food again.

My mother hated the little pranks I played on my brothers. My father on the other hand, had the tendency of encouraging this type of behavior. He snickered every time I described pranks I would play on by friends. The encouragement ended however, one April Fool’s Day, when he found himself as the target of one of my jokes.

My parents’ room and my brothers’ room happened to lie right across the hall from each other. They both had doors that opened inwards. This makes it rather easy to forcibly prevent the doors from opening by tying the door knobs together. I woke at 4 A.M., tied the doors with a jump rope, and sat in the end of the hall, waiting.

6 o’clock came around, and after a few rattles on the handle, my younger brothers started pounding.

“Jake! I hafta pee!” The youngest one started to scream.

“April Fool’s!” I went into the living room to watch my cartoons, but promptly untied the jump rope as soon as my dad started to yell.

These are the kinds of things that I look back on with a smile. It makes me proud to know that I had a hand in raising my brothers. This is especially true when I see the youngest, now 18, being scolded by his girlfriend for unscrewing the cap of the salt shaker at the dinner table.

Having burgers at my mom’s house, he asks me “Dude, can you pass the pickles?”

I open the jar of jalapenos and slide them his way.

“Very funny…”