Knots in My Yo-Yo String: The Autobiography of a Kid by Spinelli Jerry

Author:Spinelli, Jerry [Spinelli, Jerry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography
ISBN: 9780679887911
Barnesnoble:
Goodreads: 7172149
Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers
Published: 1998-04-01T00:00:00+00:00

Like cream soda

Play clarinet without practicing

Stay on my notes when singing harmony

Eat hot peppers

Hit the curve ball

Swim

Understand eternity

A Swooner in Sneakers

Some kids, when no playmates were around, didn't know what to do. I didn't have this problem. There was always exploring, and exploring was best done alone.

The Red Hills, the spear field, the tracks, the path, the dumps—all were sectors to be investigated time and again. But usually my route of exploration followed Norristown's signature waterway: Stony Creek. My territory ranged from two grassy blanket-size islands near the Elm Street bridge to the far end of Elmwood Park, where the creek forked, one branch turning west into the vast farmland of the state hospital, the other meandering north on toward East Norriton Township.

In some places the going was easy, such as the stony flats under the Steriger Street bridge. In others the banks were so steep and near the water that I had to pull myself along with roots for handholds or hop the rocks midstream. The total length was a mile or more— to me it seemed Mississippian—and not an inch along the way, on either side, was unknown to the rubber soles of my black and white hightop Keds.

The zoo toward the far end of the park was, and still is, one of Norristown's treasures, and I visited it often. But it was near the western edge of the zoo, along the creek, where I came to know creatures unpenned. Squatting over the shallows, I studied schools of minnows in the finger-deep water I pulled up a rock, and more often than not a crayfish—we called the tiny lobster look-alikes crawfish—scooted briefly into the sunlight and then under another rock. Water spiders skated over the glaring surface while angel-winged dragonflies and neon blue darning needles shimmered above.

Lurking below was something nasty—leeches. Bloodsuckers. They were everywhere, but unseen, un-felt. The only way to observe them was to leave a hand or foot in the water too long. That's what I did once. It was one of the few times I found myself with others at the creek. I was wading—I don't remember why—with my shoes and socks off and my dungarees rolled up, and when I got out, one of the other kids screeched and pointed. I looked down and saw them—black wormlike bloodsuckers clinging to the snow-white skin of my shins. Frantically I scraped them off. Now I was staring at a half-dozen driblets of blood, where the vampires had been dining. Were leeches poisonous? I didn't know, but rattlesnakes were, and I knew from my cowboy days how to handle a snakebite.

I sat on the bank, hoisted a bare leg into the air, and announced, “Okay, you guys, you gotta get the poison out. Start sucking.” Suddenly everyone remembered they had to be somewhere else that instant. As they clambered up the banks, I wiped off the blood with my shirt, picked up my socks and sneaks, and walked home as delicately as I could, afraid that if I came down too hard on my bloodless legs, they might crumple.

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