Fun Things and Stuffs...that are..fun?

Caution: Tree Ahead #nature #outside #hashtaghashtag (Taken with Instagram)

My blackberry tried, but sadly does not do it any justice. Absolutely beautiful.

Once again, I was somewhere between the age of 6 and 8 years old and it was summer. Other than playing Power Rangers, my brother and I had a lot of free time to either figure out something fun to do or figure out a way to get into trouble.

This happened to be both.

Alright, so, this is what the layout of my back(side)yard was growing up [click here]. For the record, that tree, as small as it seems, was a HUGGGGE bitch. Just sayin.

In any case, this was my playground when I didn’t feel like walking in either direction to my school’s playground or the park [seriously, my parents are pretty awesome at choosing housing locales. When I was a kid, right kitty-korner across the street was a tennis court; one block away was a big-ass park and a block in the other direction was my elementary school. Holler at your boy.] and it’s not like I was lazy, not at all (just as my mother). I would literally, maybe, have 15minutes after I woke up until my imagination kicked in and I was off the to the races, lost in my own little creative mind. Many times, though, my adventures would take me all around town, even if they started humbly enough in my own backyard. 

ANYWAY [hot damn I tangent a bunch, don’t I?], this one summer afternoon, my brother and I were chilling out, doing what we do in the backyard, when we decided to see if we could climb up on the roof of the shed. It wasn’t a hard climb- a foot here, a reach there, and BOOM! there you were on top of the world that was Ritzville, Washington [and actually, that’s false: the top of the world was on the water tower in the park which we climbed ALLLLL the damn time. No popo, even my own father, could stop me. Suck it, park regulations!]. So, there we were, on top of our shed and naturally and logically we come to inevitable “what’s next?”

If you look on the picture again, you’ll see a small gap between our fence line and my neighbor’s, and if you look even closer, you’ll notice a small gap between our shed and our fence line. If you’re thinking “oh boy, I hope this small boy didn’t see this gap and decided to jump into the neighbors yard!”, well, you’re wrong; I didn’t decide anything- I was dared. And as everyone knows, there’s no challenge too great for Michael B******** Snowden Barthelamous Beethoven Junior III! Here’s how it went down: my brother knew that I looked up to him and his approval, so he exploited me, exploited me, I say! He walked up the edge of the slightly downgraded roof of our shed, looked down, looked across the gap(s), and then looked at me. It seemed like he was calculating if I could actually do it, like he was trying to justify what he was about to say..

Ryan: “I bet you can’t jump over the fence into [neighbor’s] yard!”

Me: “Yes, huh! I can do that, Wyan*”

Ryan: “Nope, I don’t think you can..”

Me: “YEAH HUH!”

Ryan: “Then I dare you to jump into their yard!”

Me: “But…they have dogs…!”

Ryan: “Then…I guess you’re too afraid”

Me: “Nuh-uh!”

Ryan: “….Prove it.”

What a dick, right? Attacking his little brother’s pride like that—who does that? He did. And it worked. 

And yes- there were two dogs. I don’t know what breed they were, but let me tell you something…they were FAST.

[Back to the jump] I was getting upset that my brother didn’t think I was cool enough to do this, so of course, in an act that will define my character (and justify my high insurance rates), I walked to the top of our shed and bolted for the edge. When I reached the edge, I planted my foot and launched off the roof and was soaring over the gap(s). Momentarily….I was free…but then I hit the dirt harder than I expected and got the wind knocked out of me. Little did I know, at that point anyway, that rolling when hitting the ground would help absorb the blow/shock of impact; Lesson learned. I really didn’t have much time to write it down before the dogs were on my ass faster than [enter preferred cliche here]. As I mentioned, they were fast-ass dogs, but luckily for me, I was a fast-ass little kid. Not as fast as other kids, but definitely faster than a couple of bitches [finally! I used this term somewhat appropriately!]; unluckily for me, the wind that was stolen from me hadn’t quite been given back. As my brother watched, the dogs nipped at my heels for three laps around the backyard. Couple of dekes here, twists there, and a run about gave me enough time to avoid multiple bite-wounds and figure out how the hell I was supposed to get out of the yard. Turns out, there was a bit of chain link fence in the corner that would have put me in the small “alley” between our two houses. So, I ran one more lap, put some distance between me and the doggies, and then tore across the yard, launched onto the fence, and flipped over before they dogs caught my heels. 

I could hear Ryan laughing on the roof of the shed, enjoying the excitement that was his stupid little brother. I knew at that moment I had been duped. And you know what? Homey don’t play that.

So I told my parents Ryan was on the roof of the shed. 

Question: Which one of us was grounded the rest of the day and which one rode their bike to Zips for an Oreo hurricane? 

BOOM!

Everyday!