Here I Thought I Was Normal: Micro Memoirs of Mischief

by Mr. Frank Rocco Satullo

  Needless to say, we easily applied our “five-finger discount” and started a library in the woods. When it rained, we’d make another trip to the store. So it goes.

  We were young – too young to do anything that might make us go blind.

  Eventually, in the life of crime, you get comfortable and up the ante. So the magazines found a home in …my home. Well preserved, the stack grew. But so did my conscience. Maybe all that churchin was having an effect.

  I tried to smuggle them out of the house a little at a time, under my shirt.

  And for that, my mom noticed. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing.”

  But dozens were still upstairs. It ate at my brain.

  Well past bedtime, I stood at the top of the stairs crying out to my parents, unable to endure this spot on my soul any longer, “Take them away! I don’t want them anymore! I’m sorry.”

  Both of my parents ran upstairs. They had to think the situation serious for one to come to my aid but both?

  I led them to my room and started shoveling piles of magazines at them, “Take them, take them all.”

  Their eyes bulged to the size of softballs.

  They took them. Baffled and silent, they took them all.

  Trombone Lessons

  We gathered in the cafeteria of Eastview Elementary School for a demonstration of musical instruments.

  I was completely uninterested until I heard the greatest sound – “BoooWaaamp!”

  “What was that?” I asked, abruptly leaving my daydream and tuning in for the first time.

  From the smile on his face, the person playing the instrument surely enjoyed it. How could he not? He took that long thing, the outer slide I think it’s called, pushed it way out and quickly pulled it back in again to make music to my ears.

  The minute I got home, I said, “Mom, I want to play trombone!”

  I think my parents were shocked. They asked me a bazillion questions to make sure I was doing it for the right reasons. They wanted to make sure I’d stick with it. I didn’t realize how much a trombone cost. After I said whatever it took to gain their approval, they signed me up and hunted for a bargain. I was delighted.

  When I had that thing in my hands, sitting in my bedroom, I opened the important looking case and gazed at the shiny brass inside. I opened my window so I could let the world hear the great sounds I was about to breathe.

  “GrrrbrrpUUrumphtphlagrr. Coufflurrrmphtba,” belted out the upper window, echoing all around.

  The heads of neighbors working in their yards turned, looking around, searching for the talent that was me. I knew I could serenade them and bring joy to their labor.

  “GrrrbrrpUUrumphtphlagrr. Coufflurrrmphtba,” I played over and over trying to master that sound that brought me to love the trombone.

  “For crying out loud, shut your window!” …It was Dad but I couldn’t see him wherever he was outside.

  My trombone lessons were at school. It was in the same tiny room I used to have speech therapy. I couldn’t make the “TH” sound. Three was tree and so forth – or forf. But as I mastered that sound, so too would I master, “BoooWaaamp!”

  I worked hard at my craft. I studied my music more than schoolwork. One day, some “fellow” players of musical instruments came a calling at my babysitter’s house.

  “Rocky, some girls want to play music with you in the front yard,” said Mrs. Simpson.

  “Tell them to go away, I’m not ready,” I said, horrified.

  I used to be shy. I suppose I’ve always had situational shyness.

  They persisted so I agreed that if I could play from inside and they from outside, we’d have a compromise. And so it was …until I noticed I was the only one playing. I peeked out the window from behind a curtain. They were gone.

  I had given this my best for nearly two weeks. It was time to face the music – I sucked!

  I went into my lessons and tugged my teacher to the side and said I wanted to quit.

  She said, “Now Rocky, we aren’t allowed to let anyone give up until they’ve tried for at least six weeks (long pause and sigh) but in your case, I’ll make an exception.”

  Playing with Matches

  Like early man, we climbed down from the trees and discovered fire.

  There was a place in the woods, not far back, that was like a hideout. It was surrounded by huge pine trees so dense it created seclusion from the outer world. You’d have to look very closely from the trail right next to it to even know it was there. Inside it was a huge open space. The ground inside was thick with pine needles.

  We used to sneak books of matches taken from parents who still smoked at the time. In our hideout, we’d build stacks of pine needles and set it on fire. Just something about it captivated us. The curdling smoke, the burning needles, and the way it would start slow and grow when you piled more pine needles on top. We were very careful to snuff it out before abandoning the area. We’d even clear a perimeter of pine needles around it so no flames could unexpectedly spread.

  This fascination grew and so did our creativity. We introduced little, plastic, green army men to the scene and pretended the stacks of pine needles were enemy huts in Vietnam. We would spend hours making strongholds and villages. A flick of a match here and there signified the firefights and in the end, the entire scene we built was torched. Some of the army men suffered injuries as was evident in the partially melted pieces. This was because they were heroes throwing themselves in harm’s way to save innocent villagers.

  Then, we did similar stuff with Star Wars figures. We’d hold the heads or shoulders of storm troopers close to the miniature fires we’d set to melt just the right amount. Then, we’d act out a battle and interchange normal storm troopers with the burned ones to show they had just been hit by a laser gun or light saber. Half of my Star Wars figures looked like they belonged to a burn ward at the hospital. I would hide them in a shoe box under the good ones when I’d go home so my parents wouldn’t see.

  The last fire we ever set was soon after school let out for the summer. We brought a bunch of school papers back to our hideout, started a fire and fed it steadily. The fire grew with every piece added to it. It was not the typical miniature fire we usually burned and put out. We had a pretty good blaze going. The problem with that is it created a lot of smoke. So, our preacher neighbor came to investigate. When we saw him trying to find a way to get in the natural fortress, we low crawled out a back tunnel-like exit and ran home.

  The preacher put out the fire. Many of our papers were just half burned. Unfortunately, our names were on some of the unburned portions. To put it mildly, our parents poured cold water on our pyromania.

  A while later, a couple of younger boys on the street had done exactly what we used to do. Maybe it’s a part of boyhood. Theirs was the mother of all fires. It spread overnight in a slow, smoldering way through the open field and beyond, stretching behind half a dozen houses. Eventually the fire department had to bring fire trucks between two houses to hose everything down. For weeks, maybe months, afterward, if you walked into the charred field, ash smoke would still billow up with each step, emitting the smell of charred earth. Everything was blackened for the longest time.

  So, we went back to climbing trees.

  The Neighborhood Bully

  “Tank” – like any bully – was lashing out at the world for his own unhappiness. You wouldn’t know that back then. Growing up, there was nobody more feared in our neighborhood but, for better or worse, I stood up to him.

  It all started with my new skateboard. A friend and I took it to a freshly repaved, asphalt street with a hill. Before long, Tank walked around the corner, ripped the board from my hands, went down the hill and flipped my new toy high overhead. Bam! It was chipped. I called after him and he flipped me off and went on his way.

  Days later, he was riding a bike past my house and I made him stop. Mind you, he was a couple years older than me. Standing in his way, I confronted him about my da
maged skateboard. He got off his bike, put me in a headlock and proceeded to beat me into oblivion. Unable to move, when the flurry of one-armed punches went from my face to my gut, I was able to cry out loud.

  My mom heard and came to the front steps to see me getting beat up. She felt I was old enough that her interference would only make matters worse for me. So, as difficult as it was, she didn’t break it up. Instead, she became my ring manager.

  “Stop crying and start fighting!”

  I couldn’t believe my ears. I much preferred the embarrassment of mommy to the rescue over the current pain.

  “You can’t cry and fight at the same time,” she continued.

  The punches slowed.

  Tank probably couldn’t believe this was not being broken up. I think he pitied me.

  Mom called out again.

  Then Tank stopped, put me at arm’s length and said, “You got it as bad as I do,” and walked to his bike and left.

  Then, behind closed doors, Mom gave me all the babying I needed.

  Tank disappeared for a while. He spent a year or longer in the detention home.

  After he got out, he rode his bike by my house and asked, “Hey Satullo, want to get your ass beat again?”

  “Not unless you broke something of mine,” I couldn’t believe what just came out of my mouth.

  He smiled and rode on.

  That summer, at the neighborhood park, kids were wrestling on top of what we called the “green box.” It was a large metal box with games, art supplies and sports equipment inside for summer park counselors to open and use with the kids. But it was lunchtime and the green box was closed. Tank rode his bike up and joined the game of king of the mountain atop the green box. Everyone was intimidated, me included. Tank was about to throw me off when something happened to his balance. I found my feet and flipped him over head first. He landed on his shoulder and broke a bone.

  I saw my life flash before my eyes.

  “Rock, you did this, help me.”

  So I did.

  We ended up at his house and called an ambulance.

  I don’t remember seeing him again because he was always in and out of trouble going to kids’ jail. He was never out long enough for our paths to cross.

  At the beginning of a new quarter in high school, Tank walked into one of my classes. The teacher wasn’t there when Tank made his grand entrance by planting a kid standing in his path butt first into a trash can. Then, he eyed up the rows of desks to find a place to sit. All eyes turned from his gaze.

  He came up the row next to mine, stood by the seat next to mine, and told its occupant, “You’re sitting in my chair.”

  That kid moved fast.

  Tank sat down, stretched back low and cool and cocked his head toward me and asked, “Hey Rock, what’s up?” like we were old friends.

  Years later, I heard he had gotten into a knife fight in a nearby city and was stabbed to death by a gang.

  Sticker Confessions

  When I played Little League baseball, we raised money by selling stickers door-to-door. The whole town was basically carved up and each team was assigned various neighborhoods to canvass. We wore our uniforms, partnered up and tried to outdo our teammates because of the incentive awards for the most money raised.

  My buddy, Bobby, and I were on a mission to win. We ran from house to house figuring speed was key. If someone didn’t answer after the second knock, we slowly backed away allowing a few more seconds and then bolted for the next door. We had two hours before our coach would swing by to get us before dark.

  Halfway through, we knew we were raking in the dough at record speed. Our enthusiasm gained more momentum after a generous donation. Once that deal was sealed, we sprinted to the next house, ignoring the driveway and sidewalk. Instead, we cut across the lawn and leaped the waist-high hedges, running to the next door.

  Instead of a knocking sound, the glass on the “screen” door shattered. We paused for the first time in over an hour.

  “Run!”

  We skipped the next two houses and went to the third, figuring that would put us in the clear. We didn’t know what to do so we continued to sell stickers. Resuming our duties, we kept gawking over our shoulders down the street to see if anyone noticed what we had done.

  Minutes later, police arrived at the house we had damaged. Then, our coach caught up to us. There we were, time a ticking, having to explain ourselves to coach and the police.

  We weren’t permitted to continue on our selling spree, but the officer and coach believed what we did was truly an accident. Imagine our surprise when the officer said it wasn’t our fault. It turned out that actual glass in a door like that was illegal. City ordinance or something only permitted Plexiglass – for obvious reasons I supposed.

  We were in the clear and so were our parents as far as having to pay for damages. But the whole fiasco cost us time and therefore prizes. We didn’t seem to mind by the time it was all said and done.

  The next day at school, buzz circulated about how we smashed in someone’s door. People made it sound like we were vandals. I resented that.

  In all the hub-bub of the night before, I neglected to turn in my remaining stickers. I told a kid on the way home from school and he said I should try to sell them and pocket the money. I thought I’d give it a shot just to see if I could pull it off. However, it seemed too devious an act to go the whole nine yards and don my uniform. Therefore, I set out in just my ball cap and stickers.

  People bought my stickers. I couldn’t believe it.

  Sure, there were folks who said, “You boys just came through here last night.”

  I was down to the last of my stickers by the time I made it through the neighborhood and ended up by a tiny old bar. I had never seen the inside of a bar so I walked in, thinking I had good reason. Right away they tried to shoo me out but I told them I was selling stickers to support my little league baseball team. The guy tending bar paused while patrons opened their wallets. Cash was tossed my way by the fistful.

  One guy bellowed, “Hell, I don’t even live here but how ya gonna tell this kid no – he’s got some balls walkin’ in here.”

  Another voice called out, “Hey, where’s your uniform anyway?”

  That night, I lay in my bed counting my money. I was happy I pulled off the unlikely but I couldn’t sleep. My conscience began to plague me. I knew I had been dishonest. I deceived people and basically stole their money. I rolled out of bed, flicked on my desk lamp and wrote a note to go to Confession before church on Sunday.

  At the next baseball practice, I gave the loot to my coach and said I forgot to turn it in. He didn’t think anything of it.

  Ambush!

  My sister, Linda, was three years younger than I. We’d go from being best friends to fighting at the drop of a dime. So it goes for most siblings.

  Very early in life, during a spat with my sister for taking a toy, I smacked her arm to make her drop it. Dad saw this and made it crystal clear that there was never a circumstance that made it okay to hit a girl – ever. That message stuck with me on my buttocks for hours and in my mind – always!

  Still, as we grew older, that didn’t mean I had to be seen with my “embarrassing” little sister. It cramped my style. When we walked to and from elementary school, I would make her walk about 20 feet ahead of me. I didn’t realize until we were much older how much this upset her because she thought the world of me.

  So it was with this rule of mine that we rode our bicycles home from a neighborhood store. Mom had given us some money to get ice cream cones, but I had to ride with my sister. On the way home, I made her speed up so she was several houses ahead of me. We took a side street we barely used. It had a stretch of houses and kids I didn’t like to go past but Linda had a friend near the corner so we rode that way anyway.

  As Linda rode past the stretch of houses, some of the kids I didn’t like were playing out front. I saw one break from the lawn and run into the street at my little sist
er. She was innocently riding her bike, not even paying attention. The event unfolded before my eyes as if it were in slow motion. I couldn’t believe what I just witnessed. The kid, a year older than I, who ran out, said my sister wasn’t to ride down his street. His face grimaced in anger. My sister, scared, slowed down. That’s when he planted a forceful punch square in the middle of her back as she tried to lean forward, barely pedaling.

  I heard the thud. It was that loud. I must have made some sort of noise as I came barreling toward him on my bike. His body gyrated out of surprise and confusion. He was surprised because he had not seen me coming when he ran out and attacked my little sister for no reason. He was confused as to where to retreat because it was clear I was coming to kick his ass!