Attending a family reunion when I was about 3, everyone had gathered around the swimming pool. An Uncle asked me if I was brave enough to jump off the high dive. I replied “Sure!”, and proceeded to climb the ladder and jump. He never asked if I could swim. I remember being on the bottom of the pool thinking “Hmm, I wonder what I’m supposed to do next?”. Unc got a quick clue and pulled me out.
Doctor Jackson, who has always had more guts than brains.
Sig! Sig a Sog! Sig it loud! Sig it Strog! – Karen Carpenter with a head cold
When I was about 3 years old, I touched one end of a plug that was partly plugged into its outlet. The electricity buzzed me and made me feel really weird, and turned the tip of my finger (where I’d touched the plug) red like a rash. … But since it didn’t hurt, and since I was fascinated by the “buzz” it gave me, i touched it 2 or 3 more times, deliberately, before my mom saw me doing it and made me stop.
It’s a wonder I didn’t turn into a junkie when I grew up.
That’s a theme in Science Fiction. You can wire yourself up to an electrical source and get a buzz. The addicts are called “Wireheads.” I guess you were ahead of the times!
When I was 2, my parents took me on a picnic.
Dad was cruising down the highway at a good clip when he turned white and slowed down gradually.
Apparently I had climbed out the open tailgate window and was standing on it while hanging on to the roof rack. When he looked in the rearview all he saw was cowboy boots and two little legs. (I was precocious).
Apparently I also was good at squeezing between the pales of our picket fence and escaping, and mom would have to remove splinters from my back and chest.
VB
Some people say that cats are sneaky, evil, and cruel. True, and they have many other fine qualities as well.
When I was 5 years old my dad left me alone in the car while he ran into a friends house for a minute, something to do with baseball.
His friend’s house was on the top of a very steep hill, in a very small town. I got behind the wheel and was playing with the steering wheel and I accidentially shifted the car into reverse. Somehow I managed to turn the wheel and the car began to roll downhill. The end result was my running into a house…the editor of the newspaper’s house! Fortunately nobody was hurt but I hear it made a good front page story.
Thanks for the smile this morning.
How do you feel about doing someone you don’t know?
Please, please, please (on my knees) please, please ~~ originally posted by GolfWidow
Once when we I was a kid my parents and I took a day trip up to the mountains somewhere in California. The men and the older kids got to go hiking, and the mothers and the youngsters (like me, around 3 years old) stayed near the campground.
All of a sudden I saw this snake on the ground and went to investigate. The snake started rattling its tail (yes, a rattlesnake) and I thought it would be cool to pick it up.
Unfortunately, my mom came running, and dragged me away, even though (according to her) I was protesting “I wanted to pet it!” Then we had to go sit in the car and stayed there until the hikers came back. The moms were imagining that the woods were teeming with snakes eagerly awaiting to bite their darling babies. :rolleyes:
When I was about 3 or 4 I nearly was hit by a car. I saw a worm in the middle of the road and dashed out to save it from the oncoming car. I didn’t think about saving myself. My mother just about had a coronary. Actually, when i think about it, my first brush with death was in utero. My mother carried me to (almost) fullterm while also carrying uterine cancer. I was born a month early and they did a hysterectomy. I’m the last of five, born within 6 years of each other.
Hey, Angkins, I did the exact same thing when I was around 7 or 8! My brother and I were in my dad’s Aerostar and I wondered what would happen if I put the big stick in the middle to R. The parking lot was inclined so we rolled down while I desperately tried to put the shift back into park. We rolled right through two lanes of traffic (somehow unscathed), jumped the curb on the other side, and was stopped by a small tree.
My brother always said it was my fault for shifting, but I always reminded him that he was in the drivers seat and didn’t think to brake.
I remember my second son, a dear sweet cherub of a boy, with toehead locks, and bright blue eyes, excitedly telling me:
“Guess what! I rode my bike all the way down to the river, without touching the brakes even once!”
We lived in a cabin about fifty feet below the ridge line on The Blue Ridge, about a mile or more of treacherous West Virginia gravel road from the Shennandoah River. He lived. God loves him, I suppose. He has a baby girl now. Revenge is sweet.
Lesse, Sylence and I have something in common with getting stuck in bales of hay. Only mine involves my cousin and a dog and the three of us getting stuck until the damn dog figured out how to back out of the hay tunnel. I’ve never been clausterphobic, but having a panting dog with bad breath inches from your face while you try to order it to back up is a challenge in itself. (12)
Riding on the back of someone’s bicycle I had my foot get caught in the spokes. I was about six.
Use to jump of the roof of our garage into the 4.5 foot deep swimming pool. Ages 8-12, until Mom finally investigated.
Swam to Canada once and back again. On Lake St. Clair ( the narrowest section between US and Canuckville.) Age 13ish.
I was a climber. Anything. Anytime. Anywhere.
Now I’m a sitter.
When I was about a year of age I climbed up a reclining chair and it went back and I did a face plant on the corner of a stereo cabinet. This is the only time in my life I ever went to the hospital for an injury. Until I started wearing glasses, my pupils were always “off”. One bigger than the other.
Use to go skitching. Grabbing the bumper of a car on a good snowy day and hang on for ride. Did this in the summer too with skateboards.
Also: under age 5, recall licking, yes, licking an electrical outlet on the neighbor’s porch. It was exactly on a level with my nose, it was painted white, and I thought it had an interesting taste (must have been the lead in the paint). Age 12, sticking my finger into a strange little cup fastened to the wall in a summer cottage, discovered to my sorrow that it was a fixture to insert a nightlight bulb. The Mr. recalls a neighbor boy in his youth who dug a ditch around his parents back yard shed - poured in gasoline - lit match. End of shed, boy was apparently grounded for life.
