GOOD TIMES AT HERMAN JUNCTION: POST #41

What can a guy do for fun in Herman Junction? There are no video games, rodeos, TV's, and things like that. I have mentioned before that there was a basketball goal that we made out of a pole and a discarded Texaco sign. There were skates, a stick with a Prince Albert tobacco can on the end of it and bent close together so we could get a hoop off a keg and push it down the road. We could even pick up a couple of beer cans that had been thrown out of a car, stomp our feet down hard on them and walk down to the big bay ditch and it sounded like a horse coming down the road. Then we could throw rocks at the snakes in the ditch or the bottles that someone had thrown in there. We might even get a can and make a hole in top of it and drop marbles from our waist and see who could hit that hole the most times. Shoot, I could take that can to school the next day and if some of my buddies wanted to try it, they could drop marbles with me. That meant if they missed the hole I got the marble but if they hit it, I had to give them two or more depending upon the size of the hole. If there happened to be an old discarded tire around you could push it to Bay and leave it in the ditch on the outskirts of town and then push it back home that evening. There were still a lot of miles on a tire after it was taken off the car, don't you see. My, My, there were all kinds of things to do.

You see, we had to make our things to do because most of the things that some other kids did, we didn't get to. We didn't get to go to the movies unless we snuck in because Mom said that the Catholics got all the money from the movies. We couldn't play the pinball machine because that was gambling. One time I was playing the pinball machine in the Yellow Jacket Cafe and Dad came walking up. That pinball machine was right in the window. I nearly busted the thing trying to get away from it and pretend that I wasn't playing it although that ball was rolling around and bumping into things and making all kinds of racket. I got by with it though because he didn't come in before I could get out to where he was. We could play Rook all we wanted to at home but we couldn't play with the cards that had Kings, Queens, and Jack's on them because they were gambling cards. Mercy, don't you get caught in that pool hall either because that was a gambling den for sure!

Well, you may think that I am complaining and thinking that I was cheated out of having a good time but that sure isn't so. I cannot think of many boring times at Herman Junction. Nowadays kids have all kinds of electronic gadgets and games and they still complain that they are bored. All they need is for someone to take them out and show them how to make a sling shot or a rubber gun and the boredom will be relieved. Or, have them try to walk on a pair of tom-walkers. You don't know what tom-walkers are do you? Figure it out for yourself. I'll tell you this, one of the funniest sights you will ever see in your mind is Harvel walking on a pair of tom-walkers and Dad whipping him and he couldn't walk fast enough to get away. Better than a rodeo!

I have knocked a ton of rocks off the Frisco railroad with a stick about like a baseball bat. I was better than any professional baseball player. And, I have thrown a few of them at Rayburn and others who got close enough to me. Wading water in the ditch catching crawdads was something that every boy should experience unless there was a snake in there too. Aw, the list is endless of good things to do if a feller just put his mind to work inventing good things. There was never a dull moment at Herman Junction for six boys and two girls plus all the neighbor kinds. If you think that it might be boring there today, just get the Mayor, Linda all excited and things start flying again and that's what makes everything well at Herman Junction.