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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Fairy Tales & Fantasy
- Subject: Childhood / Youth
- Published: 01/04/2021
The Rubber Band.
Born 1951, M, from Wilmington NC, United States.jpeg)
“Honey, what are you thinking?”
“Oh, I was just thinking about my old boyhood friend; Little Jimmy Johnson.”
His wife laid a hand withered with age but covered with the love and concern of more than eighty years of Life, on her Husband’s shoulders.”
“You haven’t mentioned him in a long time.”
A short nod of agreement. Followed by a quick squeeze of the aged but loving hand on his shoulder.
“I know. I owe him so much. He never got to see what his protege grew up to do…or be.”
A sad smile, one that only those who have lived more than eighty years can manage. A smile that understands what you can’t control, and what you have to live with. It is the hardest earned of all smiles. She smiled down at her husband as she perched on his lap. Her withered hand merely changing location from his shoulder to a light grip around his neck. He leaned over and kissed her forehead. Partly to say thanks for the knowing smile, and partly to link himself to the present moment.
“He was what…nine years old, when that terrible accident happened?”
This time, the hardest earned smile was on his face, as he corrected his wife.
“No. Close, but no cigar. Little Jimmy was ten when he…well…when…the accident happened.”
“You never told me about it. Not the details anyway. Were you there?”
“Yes. We all were. The whole neighborhood gang. Little Jimmy chased a foul ball out of the Fisher Food Parking lot out onto West 25th street. We all yelled, but it was too late. We heard the brakes being slammed on, the squeal of burning tires, the howl of the horn. And then… the thud as Little Jimmy was first hit by the truck, then slammed up against the brick wall of the grocery store. And then…then…then…he was gone.”
Tears didn’t fall from his face. One fell from hers. Time and age round the corners of grief into frescoes on the ceiling of your life, and you have to look up to see them.
“I am so sorry. But tell me again…the story of you and Little Jimmy Johnson.”
She snuggled up on his lap. She had heard this story in the quiet pillow talk at night when they were first married. She had heard it several times when he related it to the kids. And then the grandkids. She never tired of it. She looked over at the mantle piece where the little Balsa Wood glider with its metal clip securely clamped on its nose, sat in a place of Honor.
That small glider was over seventy years old now, yet in perfect condition. In his Study, she knew sat its sister ship. Except the one in his study was propped not by the eager arms of a small child, but by a rubber band and a plastic propellor. That one was more than seventy years old too. Every year, on the Ninth of June, the day her Hubby had graduated from Purdue with a Bachelors Degree in Aeronautical Engineering, and the Day before he was Drafted into the US Air Force, he flew both those Balsa Wood Planes. Much to the delight of his wife, children, and grandchildren. Not to mention a gaggle of Son and Daughter In Laws. He flew them each one time…smartphones tracked them with cameras, small children tracked them by running under them as they glided overhead.
She saw that her Hubby was looking at them (as he often did) with memories gliding to the surface of his mind with the same ease the Balsa Wood gliders rode the wind. The smile she gave her husband now, had none of the hard earned earmarks. No, this was a shared gentle smile. The one’s old people get when asked to revisit some aspect of their youth.
“Little Jimmy Johnson was five years old when I met him. I thought he was three. I tried to hand him a bottle that was on the bench next to the swing set. He damn near clubbed me to death with it. (Her smile broadened, not only at the picture her Hubby was painting, but at her own joy at hearing the tale told so well.)
I told him I thought it was his.
“I am not a baby! I am five years old buddy. Don’t you forget it.”
We were both winded. Because he was trying to whack me with that bottle, and back then there were no plastic baby bottles. The glass bottles were made strong enough to slip out of a baby’s hands, hit a concrete or linoleum floor, and not crack or break. So believe me, getting thwacked with a glass bottle with all the fury of a pissed off five year old, with a two year old’s body, is no picnic.
After the first few blows, I realized how serious he was, and I started dodging behind the sliding board, swing set, and teeter-totter. I kept yelling I was sorry. He kept yelling back…”you better be.” Finally he ran out of steam…and started to cry. (Now a tear was forming in her eyes too…she knew what the little tyke was feeling.)
I didn’t know what to do. I asked him to stop crying…if he would, I would give him my Swiss Knife to play with.
He stopped crying immediately. Looked at me with big eyes: “You have a Swiss Army Knife? Let me see it…please?”
I took it out of my pocket. He held it like it was gold. He opened all the things that earned it its name. He checked the blades and gave me a frown: “Don’t you hone your blades?”
I was flabbergasted. I squeaked out a little high pitched apology.
“I don’t know how to sharpen a knife.”
“Oh, I didn’t know you were stupid.”
This time it was I who looked like I wanted to wallop him with a glass bottle. He ignored my look, and kept talking as if he was the teacher and I was a slow student.
“Look dummy, the blade is already sharp when you buy it. You need a sharpening tool to resharpen it. Like a grinding wheel or something. Because you would be removing part of the steel. You hone the knife to keep it sharp. I hone my knives after every use. “
“Do you have a lot of knives?”
“Well, none as good as this one. I have some homemade knives I made from paper cutters, and dry wall blades. I use them to cut out balsa wood shapes for my models.”
“What is balsa wood?”
Little Jimmy Johnson looked at me like I just told him I don’t have a Mom…or Dad.“
He made a decision as he handed my knife back (reluctantly and with great respect).
“Come with me, I will show you.”
So off we went to his garage. It was amazing! (She squeezed his neck. She had seen a picture of that garage…and she had to agree. He had balsa wood models of every plane in the Air Force Inventory. He had balsa wood models of James Watt’s first Steam Engine. He had Balsa Wood Models of car engines. But mostly his models were of Airplanes, or rockets. He did have two models of the Titanic and the USS United States too, though.
I couldn’t believe how many, or how good. I pointed to one model hanging from a beam. It was a good three feet long, and four feet wide…a perfect copy of the Wright Brothers first airplane. "Is that the Wright Brother’s first plane?”
He beamed at me. “I guess you aren’t stupid after all. Yes. Yes it is.”
I pointed again: ‘Is that the Spirit of St. Louis?”
Little Jimmy Johnson actually blushed.
“Yeah, I am pretty proud of that one. I had a heck of a time with the fuselage.“
“Wow! It looks like the real thing.”
He stared at me for a second or two:
“Of course its does. These are all scale models. Exactly the same proportions as the full size planes themselves. I usually build at 1/64 scale but (Pointing up to the Wright Brothers plane) that one though is 1/10 . I was only four when I made it. It was easier for my tiny hands. Now I am bigger and older, and I can make them smaller.“
I didn’t say a word. If he was smaller when he was four, he must have been the same size as my baby sister, and she couldn’t walk yet.
He took me to his workbench and showed me his calculations, his plans, and how he made paper models before he carved the wood. I was only five and could barely read…and he was showing me ratio’s and wing aspects. I was in over my head.
“Could I build one?”
“If you buy the wood…sure.”
I talked to my Dad that night. He gave me my first allowance and said: “That sounds like fun, sure. I will take you to the Hardware story tomorrow.”
I build my first glider that day…with little Jimmy Johnson standing over me…well, next to me. Little Jimmy Johnson towered over no one. (And a chuckle of warmth came from her Hubby.) He clapped and cheered as I raced over to retrieve my glider from its first flight.
“Now, what did you notice about your plane?”
I yelled out: “It flew!”
Little Jimmy Johnson laughed.
“No silly. Did you notice that it only rose once? And that is spiraled to the left?”
“No…hmmm.”
“Throw it again.”
I did. And sure enough, it dipped and then circled to the left before crashing into Mr. DiGrgorio’s grape trellis. We had a devil of a time climbing up that trellis to get my glider. One of us playing look out in case Mr. D came out yelling with a strap in his hands. He always thought we were stealing his grapes. (We were, but you can’t snitch on your friends, and that got a real laugh from both her and her Hubby.)
He told me to think about what might be wrong…and what we might do to correct it.
Little Jimmy Johnson taught me to like math, like engineering, like flying. He didn’t live long enough to see the seed he planted grow."
Her husband grew silent. Very quiet. She snuggled up and asked the question she knew would free him from his reverie:
“What do you think he would think about that seed now?”
He hugged his wife closer to him.
Then he laughed and did an awfully good impersonation of Little Jimmy Johnson:
“You flew fighter planes? You went to the Moon? You designed the spaceship that would someday take people to mars?”
And then she waited as her hubby prepared the punchline she knew was coming:
“That’s really neat. Where did you put the Rubber Band?”
The old man reached in his pocket, and took out his key ring. On it was a rubber band. One that had been to the moon. The very same Rubber Band that was on the glider that day long ago in a Fisher Food Parking lot. Taken from the glider Little Jimmy Johnson had set behind the coats and gloves to play baseball.
“Little Jimmy Johnson was the best Engineer I ever knew…and this rubber band got me to the moon!”
The smiles now, were the rosiest of memories colored through the lens of time.
Little Jimmy Johnson was smiling too…wherever he was.
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