It's funny the things you remember during a crisis. Not a Crisis on Infinite Earths or even Earth 2, but a crisis twenty-odd years ago in my own little corner of Earth Prime, Monroeville, PA.

   As a kid, my friends and I spent a lot of time just horsing around, unsupervised, wrecking our bikes, getting knocked around playing full-contact football without pads and occasionally get ourselves in trouble, as boys tend to do.

   Back then, most news was local, but the world's gotten smaller and smaller since and I think it's possibly had an adverse affect on childrens' sense of exploration. I've read about some kids who have every waking moment planned or monitored short of having a GPS device installed in their neck, like pets. It's a natural protective stance for parents, as, for better or worse, there's now 24/7 news coverage of abductions across the country that feeds our fears. What I'm trying to say as gingerly as I can...If there's not a tragedy presented on the news, it's the anniversary of a tragedy. I'm sure you've heard the term "If it bleeds, it leads..." meaning that fires, death, mayhem and anniversaries of such score high ratings. This media assault is peppered with 'experts', a lot of whom are promoting their own agenda, book or just like being on TV. This way a constant state of alarm is perpetuated. I understand agendas. Whether we admit it to ourselves or not, we all have our own private agendas.

   I know I'm coming close to breaking my 'no politics' edict, but my point in this statement is that I feel sorry for kids today who are growing up in today's security lock-down society (with all the encoutrements purchased from the burgeouning 'safety industry'). I don't have children, so take my point on this matter with a grain of salt. If I had kids, this blog would possibly be about how we're not doing enough to monitor our kids! I've heard that being a parent changes your worldview drastically.

   Me and my unsupervised chums would occasionally have fistfights amongst ourselves, but recover from the fallout within 24 hours or even an hour and get together for kickball as if nothing happened. We were occasionally in dangerous situations, which I do not advocate or dismiss, but we learned hard lessons from those experiences. I can't say we had to be as self-reliant as the children of Jack Kirby's generation (kids who survived the depression), but we took our knocks and learned from them. I was fortunate to grow up among friends who, quite frankly, were strong enough to kick an ass if pressed to do so, but smart enough to flee when we knew we'd be in over our heads. Our parents knew we were fairly responsible, careful and tough enough to handle ourselves for the most part. Not to say we were angels...

   There were lots of wooded areas behind our parents' houses during my youth. Sadly, an office park resides where we had the biggest, best sledridding course in the neighborhood. I spent a lot of time in the woods, with myself or friends. When the weeds would grow taller than I, I would brandish a stick and hack n' slash my way through. In my mind, I was Flash Gordon cutting a path through Ming the Merciless' minions! My friends and I occasionally build forts (treehouses that we rarely put up in a tree) out of scrap lumber we'd cobbled from dumpsters. Shipping palettes were a great resourse. Building forts was a neat way to pass the time during the long days of summer (I can no longer grasp the concept of having three months to goof off). We'd discover how industrious we could become. Lots of self-taught problem-solving lessons.

   We went through a lot of forts growing up. Don't tell anyone, but our parents sometimes gave us permission to sleep in our forts overnight (The statute of limitations for what would be now labelled as 'child neglect' is probably over)! A fort almost never stayed intact for too long. Usually, one day you'd arrive to discover that older kids demolished it, leaving beer bottles, a tattered girly mag and urine as their calling card. We never got broken up about it-we got pissed off for a day or two, but we got over it. Months later, after we'd go through another hobby (like making our own minature wooden boats with working motors, some meeting an ignoble end at the bottom of Rick's pool), we'd talk of making a new fort in a new location.

   When we'd entered our later high school years (I was the oldest on our block), the tone of our conversations had changed. Post-graduation plans and such. There was an unspoken feeling that the real world was quickly encroaching on this fun devil-may-care period of our lives. This fort, which we knew somehow would be our last, would be the bestest one yet!

   This time we didn't go too far into the woods. Just over a tiny creek and up a hill, behind Rob's house. At this time in their lives, my friends Rick, Rob, Deerwood and Danny began taking a strong interest in electronics and cars, developing natural aptitudes for both disciplines. I still had my head in the clouds, drawing and dreaming of being a comic book creator, so I wasn't good for much else at the time besides pounding the occasional nails and carrying stuff. So I watched with admiration as Rick and Rob provided this fort with electricity! They buried a length of extention cords from Rob's parent's house to our fort! We had lights, a secondhand stereo, playing cards and comics. What could be better (besides girls)?

   The first night Rick, Rob and I were to sleep in this, the new and bestest fort, it all ended in a fire that we barely escaped. That closed the book on our cravings for naive and reckless exploration, that's for sure!

   It's funny the things you remember during a crisis. I still remember the comics I lost to the fire (big surprise there)! What Rick remembers, was the last song we heard on that ill-fated stereo: REO Speedwagon's "Keep The Fire Burning"! More on this next week.