Letting Go

The Keller's family car was a late 1940s Ford station wagon with wood side and rear panels.  His dad had installed an air horn that was powered by a compressor as the area under the hood offered a lot more room to work with than today's cars.  Set into the dashboard was an on/off toggle switch from which hung a short chain whose last link was a gold colored globe.  The chain was the same type that you always saw attached to a lucky rabbit's foot.  To operate the horn, you had to first flick the toggle switch to the "on" position, wait several seconds for the pressure to build up in the compressor tank, then grasp the globe and pull down on the chain to blow the horn.  The lag time made the air horn totally impractical for use in an emergency, but the standard issue horn that originally came with the car was still in working order.  The sound of the horn was not quite equal to that of a locomotive, but coming from a dingy green, eight-year-old station wagon made it seem louder.  Keller's dad would rarely let him drive the car but any time he did, it was with the understanding that the air horn was not to be abused. 

When those few opportunities came for Keller to take the car out for a drive he would take me and some other kids along.  We knew that we had but one shot with the horn and patiently sought out the ideal situation.  This usually resulted in us ending up at the Shopping Bag which was the only large grocery store in town.  The Shopping Bag was on Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock where today sits a Walgreens and a Starbucks.

The Shopping Bag had once run a promotion that really had the Eagle Rock community on the edge of their seats.  The plan was to raffle off a modest sized trailer.  For three months the trailer was displayed inside the store along with posters that pictured a family of six undergoing a near religious experience, exploring the highways and byways of America.  The trailer was suspended on cables, hovering above the center aisle, scaring the bejesus out of anyone who would have to dart in underneath it to retrieve bread or breakfast cereal.  The more trips you made to the store, the more raffle tickets you would receive.  The day of the drawing arrived amid great fanfare and a winning ticket was drawn.  Our neighbor, Mr. Kent, was the winner and his kids and I were good friends.  Shortly after the drawing, the trailer was delivered to their house and placed in the back yard where it remained unused for the next several decades.

With Keller at the wheel, we would pull the car up adjacent to the store's exit and wait with the engine running.  The station wagon was twenty or so feet from the double doors.  Keller had switched on the compressor and had the globe in his grasp.  Shoppers would leave the store, going out through the doors, either carrying their bags of groceries or pushing a cart.  We had a preference for those carrying bags.  It wasn't because they would drop the bags, they never did.  It was the mental concentration required when walking and balancing a load that seemed to magnify the intensity of their reaction to the horn.  We also ruled out the elderly, the feeble, or anyone we suspected might be permanently scarred.  Waiting together in the car, considering each exiting shopper, was both excruciating and delicious.  We understood that it was blatantly cruel to unleash such horror on poor unsuspecting souls, but we couldn't help ourselves.  Once the horn had done it's damage, Keller would apologize to the victim, drive a block away and park.  We would sit there totally incapacitated by a world class laughing fit that would bring us tears and stomach aches.  The visual imagery would stay with us for days and bring on uncontrollable guffawing for no apparent reason to the annoyance of teachers, administrators, librarians, ministers and scout leaders.

Keller was a couple years older than the rest of us and as a consequence was looked up to.  He lived in the basement of his parent's house, the only kid in our school to do so.  He had a leather Air Force jacket from World War II that today would be valued at some outrageous amount on the Antiques Roadshow.  The back of the jacket had a hand-painted risqué illustration with lots of flesh tones and a strategically placed trio of kittens.  None of us had ever imagined such a thing would be permitted to exist.  It was the 1950s, and with things being as they were, Keller's parents made sure the jacket never left the basement. 

When we weren't in school we used to explore the hills north of Colorado Boulevard as this was before the 134 Ventura Freeway came along.  Six of us, including Keller, walked up to where Figueroa Street dead ended at the base of the hills and where sits the town's only landmark known as the "Eagle Rock".  I once read in The Guiness Book of World Records that Figueroa was the longest urban street in the world and that Western Avenue, about ten miles further east,  was the straightest.  We walked north along a stream that meandered up the canyon toward the power station.  Our destination was a giant oak, high up on a slope over looking the canyon.  Hanging from one of the tree's limbs was a two-inch thick rope that looked like a tow line off a tub boat.  We had heard about this spot where you could grab the rope and swing out over the canyon bottom, some thirty feet below.  Scott was the oldest and the first to try it.  It took my breath away just watching him.  None of the rest of us wanted anything to do with it except Keller.  It didn't sit well with him that he should come all this way and not give it a try.  Keller took the rope and climbed further up the side of the canyon until reaching the ledge that served as the take-off area.  He stepped off the ledge, swooped down and out over the canyon, reached the end of the arc, and just prior to beginning to swing back, let go of the rope. 

Keller fell feet first to the base of the canyon and landed with his legs ramrod straight.  We ran to the bottom of the canyon to see how he was.  He wasn't in much pain and was in good spirits despite having broken both legs.  Scott asked him why he let go.  Keller didn't have an answer.  He didn't know why.  Not that day or any time after that day.  We stopped asking.  He just let go.  Keller was lying face up a few feet away from the stream bed.  He was calm and fairly comfortable and that reduced the urge for any of us to panic.  We just sat together and quietly discussed ideas for how to proceed.  We agreed that it was early enough in the day where some of us would walk back to town to get help and the others would stay with Keller.  We were about to split up when two men on horses rode up to where we were sitting.  They offered to go for help so we all stayed with Keller and spent a couple of hours telling jokes and having a good old time.  Help arrived and carted Keller off on a stretcher back down to Figueroa with the rest of us in tow.

Keller spent months with an hip-to-toe plaster cast on each leg.  We would go over to his house that was at the top of a slight rise on Argus Drive.  Keller couldn't walk but we would lead him in his wheelchair down the hill to Yosemite Playground when he needed a break from the basement.  Sometimes on a downhill stretch, we would release our hold on the wheelchair with Keller in it, and watch as it picked up speed with Keller screaming obscenities, but we always caught up with it before anything went horribly wrong.  Keller would make us promise not to do it again before every trip to the park but we couldn't help ourselves.  The best part was when he would angrily shout, "I was on a hill for God's sake! Why would you let go?"