This is a sample chapter from my second book, COME ON, FLUFFY, THIS AIN'T NO BALLET, a Novel on Coming of Age. In the chapter, I remember my brother's intense need to be highly competitive and what result it brought one summer evening in the early 1960's.
Chapter 7 Boardwalk and Park Place
My
younger brother David had an extremely competitive nature bordering on
psychotic. I’m not talking just about games like baseball, football,
chess, checkers, and races either. Competition to David meant that
everything was a contest. No matter how insignificant the matter was to
anyone else, Davy had to “win.” It was common while we were growing up
to hear him say things like, “Hey, I can finish my oatmeal first!” My
sister and I would look calmly at each other and then at our brother,
not attempting in any way to compete with him but just to watch him
snarf down his hot oatmeal and then grin at us as though he had just
received a gold medal in some Olympic event and was waiting for
phtographers to begin press coverage. Other common challenges came in
the form of, “I’ll race you up the stairs!” or ”I can button my shirt
first.” or “Let’s see who can hold his breath the longest.” During those
sessions our sister Connie and I would only pretend to hold our breath
until David’s blue face smiled in a kind of outrageous delight over us
after his drawing in a huge amount of air, like a deep-sea diver rising
to the surface after many minutes under water. Connie and I would always
exchange knowing glances and smile faintly in quiet acknowledgement of
our
brother’s idiocy.
None
of us ever knew what had caused David’s obsession with winning. Even
money didn’t mean as much to him as coming out on top in any
competition, no matter how inane. Nothing else on earth seemed as
important to him as being able to say what he believed were the most
important words anyone could utter, “I won.” His attitude about beating
us at games like canasta and Monopoly made our playing against him far
more interesting, as it was so much fun to witness when he occasionally
found himself losing. His transformation was from Dr. Jekyll to Mr.
Hyde. His eyes would begin to blink faster, lips tighten, and his fists
clench until the knuckles whitened. Connie and I would delight in
goading him on to levels of anxiety and rage usually reserved for
Tasmanian Devils, people standing for hours in line only to discover
there are no more tickets, or middle school teachers finding out they’ve
been assigned lunchtime cafeteria duty.
Unfortunately,
Davy’s obsession with competition never carried over into his school
work. He didn’t consider things like algebra and English tests worthy of
his usually intense effort at being the best. Apparently getting the
highest grade in the class on a quiz or exam was not nearly as glorious
as finishing first a big bowl of ice cream, despite the inevitable
headache and eyes the size of pizzas that were parts of winning that
competition. Dad said more than once that had David’s spirit for winning
ever been applied to his school work, he would have ended up being a
senior professor at Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, or Stanford, where he
might also have made his mark in some walnut-paneled faculty lounge
during any whiskey chugging contests that might have been held there to
ease some of the teaching tension of higher education.
Connie
and I share a favorite recollection of David’s indomitable appetite for
winning. It all began when I arrived home from school one Friday
afternoon in June, sitting on a living room sofa, ready to kick off my
shoes and watch The Three Stooges on TV, while listening to mom talk on
the phone. I heard only half the converstion, but what was being said on
the other end became clearer as my mother repeated some of the caller’s
comments and questions. It quickly became obvious about whom the
conversation was.
“He threw WHAT in the cafeteria?” By then I was all ears, as Mom continued.
“And
it hit Mr. Patterson’s sport coat lapel? I’m so very sorry. You know
that kind of cream filling from cupcakes can come right out with some
soda water and a fine brush.”
That
was all I needed in order to piece together what had happened that day
during lunch in the school cafeteria, but there was one more exchange
over the phone that crowned the whole situation with something extra
special.
“Yes,
I understand. Three detentions seem quite fair, but I must tell you
that he will also be punished at home. That’s right. He will be grounded
for
the entire weekend.”
All
right, I was pleased. I admit it, but that doesn’t mean I was
vindictive about David’s weekend incarceration. It just seemed fair that
after his getting away with pretending to do homework, neglecting his
part in cleaning the room we shared, and his general arrogance over
previous weeks, he would now be facing the balance sheet in some way. Of
course being grounded for a whole weekend meant only one thing to him.
Marathon Monopoly! When Connie found out about David’s being grounded,
she tried not to seem too happy, but her doing a little jig around the
living room gave her away.
Meanwhile,
the last week of school was looming before us as we looked forward to
the freedom of summer vacation afterward. Even though David was grounded
for the weekend, Dad expected him to help me with our yard duties,
which included mowing and trimming the front and back lawns. Because it
had rained the day before, the still-moist grass clippings were much
heavier than usual. We were out of lawn bags, so David and I stuffed all
the clippings into a large empty trash can, David jumping down on each
load and maximizing the density of all that grass. When we finished, the
yard looked great, but the trash can was so packed, that it would have
made a terrific science project. The promo at the science fair might
have been, “How much grass can be put into a twenty-gallon container?”
Science project or not, I think we found the answer that day. The can
was so dense with grass clippings we had stuffed into it, that its
weight made the can immovable. I remembered Mr. Gilbert, our science
teacher, talking about “star matter” so dense that even a teaspoon of it
would sink to the center of our planet. Yes, now I understood how such a
thing might be possible. It appeared that the can of grass clippings,
even if it didn’t sink to the earth’s core, would be a permanent part of
our yard’s landscape.
That
Saturday evening after dinner, the marathon of Monopoly games began
with David insisting upon being banker and using the race car as his
token. I was the top hat, and Connie was the Scottish Terrier. All the
years we played the game, that tradition had prevailed. We played into
the wee hours of Sunday morning, breaking finally only for church and
lunch, which the family ate in the kitchen so as not to disturb the
Monopoly board still on the dining room table from the unfinished game
of the night before. Having played until three in the moring and been
awakened for church at seven, we knew at this point the only thing
keeping us awake was each one’s determination to win the championship
before bed on Sunday night. After dinner, as Mom and Dad watched an
episode of a TV show called, “One Step Beyond,” David, Connie and I
resumed our game, the third one in our marathon, which Connie won,
making the series a perfect tie, each of us having taken one game. David
hated that. The final game didn’t begin until eight that Sunday
evening, and David was on the verge of hysteria in his desire to win the
game and take the championship.
At
ten o’clock Mom and Dad were going to bed, and Dad told us not to stay
up too late, because there was school the next morning. He also reminded
David and me that the trash can filled with grass clippings had to be
taken to the front curb for garbage pick-up the next morning. We decided
to do that unpleasant chore at the end of the last Monoply game. Two
more hours passed as we approached the end of that final game, one which
I seemed to be winning, as David grew more and more anxious. He stared
at my deeds to Boardwalk and Park Place with covetous and bloodshot
eyes, while the old Linden clock in our dining room ticked toward one
A.M..
Suddenly,
due probably to fatigue and the knowledge that there would be school
the next morning, my brain experienced its last hurrah for the day in a
brilliant coup of negotiation with David. His eyes widened, as on
Christmas mornings, when I told him he could have my deeds to Boardwalk
and Park Place if he would make sure the big can of grass clippings got
to the front of the house before bed. After David took an oath,
witnessed by Connie, to take the clippings around front, I handed over
to him the two valuable deeds and their little red hotels. Then the game
came to a quick conclusion as David ran away with enough rent money
from his swanky properties to bankrupt Connie and me. By then we were
all three yawning, but to make sure that David upheld his part of our
bargain, Connie and I accompanied him to the trash can, which he managed
after several minutes of sheer determination to move in tiny rolling
motions, inch by inch down the long driveway to the little brick paved
area on the street parkway in front of our house. As the can wouldn’t
roll easily over grass toward the bricked area, David put his arms
around it, his knees bent in a lifting position. His whole body moved
upward in a strained but useless effort to budge the huge container.
Then he fell backward, rolling on the grass and onto the sidewalk in
deep and agonized grunts of physical pain. Through clenched teeth in
what might well have been taken as the voice of a dieing man, David’s
final half-grunted message was, “But....I won the championship!” Connie
and I looked at each other under the street lamp post just smiling and
shaking our heads.
David
was finally able to get up very slowly, limping triumphantly into the
house behind us, like a wounded soldier in line for his Purple Heart.
The last thing I saw before turning out the lights in the dining room
was the Monopoly board with all its pieces exactly as we had left them
along with David’s final “Chance” card which read, “Do not pass Go. Do
not collect $200.”
