The Scooter

The Scooter could go faster and farther than just about anything on the road. It had skates for wheels and an accommodating secret compartment...that just aren't options anymore!

There was no Dick and Jane. The first literary hero whose exploits I joyfully anticipated reading was Tom…of Tom and Nancy. These were the two protagonists (although they did not seem to suffer in the least) who ushered us all, in Mrs. Callanan’s 1A, into the wonderful world of pages. They passed us the keys, showed us how to lift the inky words to the light revealing the color; the stories and the friends the words carried. Tom and Nancy taught us how distracting, how exciting and compelling paper pages could be. And the words were the bridges between thought and imagination. But sometimes the lessons got lost in confusion, oddly brought about.2

There was the steady flow of tears each day for awhile from Nancy Solomon, one of the five- year- olds in our class. I felt complete incomprehension. But her crying was because her name, her private and personal name was carried by Nancy, our heroine, and read aloud by all. Nancy, the student, bitterly complained to her friend Nicole that too much attention was now focused upon her, thanks to the common name. She was no longer sheathed in tolerable anonymity. She now shared attention with the Nancy of fiction which she did not sport comfortably. Perhaps either or both of them were teased, made fun of, pointed to or singled out, and a slight to one was a slight to the other. And maybe Nancy felt her simple life could not compare to our heroine’s exploits; the romance, the adventure. I remember Nicole placing a consoling hand on Nancy’s convulsing shoulder, saying, “I know. I know how you feel; it used to happen to me.” I wondered about that. Such sagacity. Such worldliness. 3

I, on the other hand, wholly identified with Tom. What Tom did, I wanted to do. Tom was my hero. His deeds stood out sharply. They were well defined. What he did was right; the thing to do. And, it was fun.4

The most exciting thing I can recall about Tom was his skates. He had a pair of roller skates. It was my favorite page; the page on which Tom put on his skates. There was an illustration of our hero, rosy-cheeked and pink-faced, seated on a stoop, putting on his skates. It was always the first page I turned to when Mrs. Callanan said: “Take out your readers.” The following page had Tom skating. There wasn’t much more to the episode than that but it was enough. It reaffirmed my identity. It reinforced my interest. It reasserted my goal for the end of the day. Like Tom, when school was out I would go home, put on my roller skates, and like Tom, my friend and hero, I too would skate.5

Fortunately, I had the skates. At my grandmother’s apartment in the Bronx, only a couple of trolley car rides away from Washington Heights, not counting the bus that took us through Crotona Park, to Bryant Avenue, there was one magical spot for me. It was the corner of a hallway closet where my grandmother kept a pair of Everlast boxing gloves and a pair of skates.6

On the Saturdays my mother and I visited, it defined how I spent the afternoon. First stop: The closet! They were still there! I put on the skates and the boxing gloves and exhausted the next few hours skating around the apartment’s wood floors, wearing the oversized boxing gloves. 7

One day, when the war was over and my uncles came home, the skates became mine! They were steel, and for the duration of the war and a time afterward, they could not be found for sale anywhere. Unlike the roller blades of the future these marvels had no attached shoe or boot; they clamped to the sole of your shoe, strapped around your ankle, and got fastened with your skate key, a wrench-like tool made to fit around a small iron rod beneath the skate. This could be rotated, which in turn tightened (or loosened) the front clamps and sent you on your way, skate key hanging around your neck on a piece of string, the entire affair soon to be lost. “Could I borrow your skate key?” 8

On the concrete sidewalks roller skates hardly characterized stealth. The clatter was unmistakable and disturbing, even to the skater, and often forced him or her off the sidewalk into a smoother, quieter, tarred gutter, however parent-frowned upon because of oncoming traffic. “Don’t skate in the street!”9

So it was, expedited by the difficulties and dangers inherent in roller skating, that with little objection or resistance, and minimal regret after a year or so, the skates followed the path of natural skate evolution. And as the egg becomes the chick, as the caterpillar becomes the butterfly, the skate became…the scooter.10

Mostly during the autumn, sometimes with the approach of spring, home-made scooters began to appear. They tore down hills and ripped around corners, the front rider’s foot frantically pumping at the street, his hands grasping the orange crate top. Sometimes the coachman squatted down behind the box, navigating through slats. Sometimes the chauffeur rode two, as a surprise passenger would appear after a harrowing ride, grasping knees, keeping balance, and ducking low, until the last moment. This tactic was useful in war games and smuggling spies into enemy camps.11

All you needed was a crate, a two by four slat, some nails and a pair of skates. Actually, one skate was enough, since it came apart. The front got nailed to one end of the two by four’s underside, the rear wheels fastened to the opposite end. 12

I never got the large orange crate. My box was smaller. It was the only crate the fruit store man had left. It had held peaches. But it made my contraption look different. Across the top were handle bars (which I never held, holding instead to the box itself), and to make it really unique, I inserted a shelf about four inches from the top for magazines; a kind of glove compartment. It could also hold cupcakes and a snack. I even hung a little cloth over the shelf. A kind of curtain. We didn’t own a car, but I was determined to remedy that. This was my vehicle.13

Perhaps the most unique feature of this contraption was that my mother allowed it into the apartment. Most of the kids on the block kept theirs in the cellar. But not mine. Not my cream puff. My mother might have drawn the line had I used an orange crate. But the peach box made the cut.14

On chilly fall days I recall taking the thing down in the elevator, its shelf fully stocked with magazines, cookies and gloves. For the most part, I only sat around our corner on 178th street and read the magazines, my trusty steed at my side. I never even ventured down the block.15

When differences arose at home, and feelings were chafed, I knew I could easily pack the scooter and hop aboard the next day, and before you knew it be well on my way to…who could say? Maybe as far as Oklahoma! Texas! Even though I had hardly ever gotten as far as two blocks. But one day, if they pushed far enough, I would just head south.16

I once owned an old Oldsmobile. It was my first car. It was exciting. At the end of the first week I had it, I drove from North Carolina to New York. But it could never have taken me as far as that scooter.17

In the days of the scooter, just for some perspective, there were three major auto makers in the U.S.: Ford, GM and Chrysler. Top of the line was Lincoln, Cadillac and Chrysler. The more economical cars included the Chevy, Ford and Plymouth. In between were Dodge, Desoto, Pontiac, Oldsmobile and Buick. There was also a smattering of oddball cars: Hudson, Nash, Studebaker, Packard, Kaiser-Fraser. But not so many you couldn’t keep track.18

There have been countless automobiles since; hundreds. But never, anywhere, has there ever been a machine that rode so smooth, that was as powerful, that looked so neat, and that could take you as far as that 1947 scooter. They just don’t build them like that anymore. But there is another factor which should be noted.19

There was this tiny, little four-year-old I saw just the other day. She couldn’t have stood more than two and a half feet off the ground. She was riding, ever so slowly, a shiny, sleek, store bought, state-of-the-art scooter. She was battened down with a helmet that must have weighed more than she did. The thing had more belts, straps and eyelets than you could fasten in a month and most likely cost more than the scooter. It was a manufacturer’s coup. 20

Just looking at it, I knew the little girl’s scooter couldn’t have gone to Oklahoma. It didn’t have the power, it didn’t have a secret, private compartment, and with that helmet over her eyes, you couldn’t even see the fun in front of you. It was no peach crate. They just don’t make them like that anymore.21
 

Reviews

[Rain]

God,
I loved this piece. The mental images you painted made it all real. The metal skates, the key, the crate. You brought it all back. The god aweful noise. I especially remember the skate key, and the crates. I love this style of writing, when written like you have. You actually hear the noise, and feel the aura of that time. You took me through your neighborhood. Great piece. Rain..