The End

I don’t remember much of my childhood, so I’ll condense what I can and put it down as quickly as possible. I didn’t come from a broken home or anything, that usually makes for a more compelling story.  My parents had a good marriage — if you can call it that. Dad worked as a lawyer downtown at Grubb & Wade. He did corporate mergers and listened to a lot of classical music. Mom was an artist.  

I grew up without cable television. What we had was a big antenna sticking out of the roof, this really butt-ugly thing, it looked like a bunch of straightened-out coat hangers flopping around. Dad got it closeout like everything else, and it fed into a dial that you turned in the direction of whichever station you wanted to watch.

The Channel Master, it was called. What a piece of crap. There was only one dial, so any time you changed the broadcast, it meant that every set in the house would go all snowy. The worst part was late nights, WKBW used to play these great horror pictures uncut. I’m talking about Midnight Madness. Imagine trying to watch Night of the Living Dead after lights out and having the problem of sneaking downstairs to crank the knob without getting caught.

But anyway.

I grew up (where up is only figurative). I’m five-eight standing on a phone book, not too thin or fat, and you’d never notice me. I have six-minute abs and lumpy potato skin pouring over either side of my belt — when I wear a belt, which is not very often. I did sit-ups, a hundred or so each day, for about three months. I might look pretty good with a little effort, except I’m not at all concerned.