The adventures of a Florida boy (part 6)

In the 1960s, kids ran as far and wild as their imaginations would take them

ONE OF AN OCCASIONAL SERIES: My boyhood was spent in Florida in the 1960s on an island called Coquina Key. My parents’ waterfront home overlooked a large expanse of Tampa Bay. Back then, parts of the island were undeveloped, which left plenty of room for climbing trees, digging forts in the sand, and swimming in shark-infested waters (though we didn’t give the latter much thought).

This is part 6 of a random and mostly light-hearted series that I might eventually combine into a memoir. I’m telling these stories to the best of my recollection and changing names and physical descriptions just because it seems like the right thing to do.

Photo by weston m on Unsplash

THE ULTIMATE DROP

During my boyhood, my friends and I were ultra-competitive with each other. Each of us strove to be faster, stronger, smarter, braver, etc. Admittedly, I was among the most competitive, to the point of being quite annoying. (My wife will tell you that I never grew out of it.)

Though I was athletic and in great shape overall, there was simply no denying that I was skinny as a rail. This continued even into my adulthood. I didn’t become what I would consider a normal weight until my mid-30s. (Now of course, I have to watch what I eat like the rest of you mortals.)

One of our favorite activities was climbing trees. We were fearless, climbing fifty feet or higher without concern. As an adult, I developed a mild fear of heights. But between the ages of 10 and 16, it never entered my mind.

We scrambled up pine trees and sat there for long stretches, relishing the warm breezes on our faces and enjoying the view. I don’t know how many trees I clambered up back then. Hundreds, most likely. But now—at age 65—I don’t think I would attempt a single one of them. My wife freaks out when I get on the second rung of a stepladder.

One of my friends had a huge oak tree in his back yard. Oaks and many other hardwoods are easier to climb than pines. They have lots of branches that are easy to grab. Pines, on the other hand, are sort of like barbershop poles and can be quite challenging, like ascending the side of a rock cliff using only your bare hands.

We spent a lot of time in my friend’s oak tree. We sat there and talked while drinking a soda. (We called it soda, not pop.) And as we got older, it was a great place to sneak a cigarette. In the 1960s, most teenagers smoked cigarettes to some degree. Luckily, I quit when I turned 20 and never picked one up again.

Anyway, here’s where our competitiveness kicked in. One of our numerous dares to each other was to hang from a branch and then drop onto the sandy ground. This tree had four drops: an easy one, maybe five feet from the soles of our sneakers to the ground; a medium one, maybe eight feet; a difficult one, maybe twelve feet; and a seemingly impossible one, which was probably twenty feet.

Everyone could do the first two, and most of us even managed the third one, though it sometimes resulted in mildly sprained ankles. But the fourth one, the twenty-footer, was beyond all of us. We would hang there for minutes at a time, attempting to work up the courage to drop. But eventually we would climb back into the safety of the tree. It was just too scary.

I named it THE ULTIMATE DROP. And the name stuck. Over the course of several years, it became legendary throughout the island. Dozens attempted THE ULTIMATE DROP, but none ever managed to let go of the branch.

Eventually, we just gave up.

However …… there was this one boy who was on the small side but who had the heart of a lion. Few of us wanted to fight him, not because he was physically stronger but because he could get mean as a wet hornet. If you got into a fight with him, you would have to knock him unconscious to declare victory. He simply wouldn’t quit.

He reminded me of the famous Mark Twain quote:

“It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.”

The ULTIMATE DROP had been a part of my life for several years. I had witnessed dozens of boys, including me, chicken out. But one day, when I was probably 15 or so, a few of us were up in the tree just hanging out, and the tough boy wandered by and climbed up with us. He seemed in a good mood, so we didn’t push our luck. After a few minutes, I told him the legendary story of THE ULTIMATE DROP.

He listened with interest, and then without hesitation, he climbed out onto the branch, hung there for a second, and dropped. Then he stood and dusted himself off, apparently no worse for wear.

Our jaws dropped in unison. It was like watching someone break a record most believed unbreakable—like Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak.

I’ll never forget it.

And I spent a long time afterward relieved I had never gotten into a fight with that kid.

Read Part 1

Read Part 2

Read Part 3

Read Part 4

Read Part 5

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