More Colorful Forrester Memories

also published here:

http://www.capaccess.org/forest/memories.html

By Jim Banholzer

I always admired dad for the choices he made buying houses adjacent to wilderness areas. The house he purchased in the mid-sixties at 140 North Columbus Street, affording us young rascals rich opportunities to run around in the woods and sprout up without “nature deficit disorder.”

Our Arlington Forest home stood next to one of the paved paths that funneled down into the park. It was the perfect intersection for us to set up a lemonade stand on sweltering Saturday afternoons. Sometimes, as we rapscallions barked out fruit juice availability, we would receive cherished mercury dimes for the fare. And sometimes our lemonade profits became as elusive as quicksilver as my brother; David would promptly spend them on Italian Ices from the Popsicle truck.

During this era, Batman was one of our favorite shows on TV. One sunny afternoon, I dressed up in my yard as a caped crusader in my miniature Batman Costume. Wandering over to the park entrance, I noticed that some “bad teenagers” had furled up the metal “No Parking” signs, so that they were illegible. With all the tremendous strength my six-year-old body could muster, I tried unfurling the bent signs, so that the good Arlington Forest citizenry could again follow the posted law. But it was to no avail. Just then, a police car screeched to a halt in front of our house. Although I was in the right, I became nervous, ran and hid behind a rock in my own front yard. The policemen shouted, “Hey you!”

I emerged from the rock with a meek, “Who me?”

“Yes, what are you doing damaging that sign?”

I started to whimper, explained that I was fixing it and added, “I’m Batman. I’m a good guy!”

The officers politely laughed, saw that it was a misunderstanding, sternly thanked me for trying to mend the sign and drove off in the dust to fight some larger crimes.

I always thought that I would like to tell this story to Adam West, the actor who originally portrayed Batman, since I am a writer living in the same Idaho valley as he. It would be extra bat-nice if he could sign my bat-heroic photo. Perhaps he has an online fan club of some sort. Hmmm…

~ ~ ~

Another friend from Virginia, Colt, told me a related story from this era. One morning he was watching the Ranger Rick show on his black and white Zenith television. The Ranger appeared holding a black and white spiraled spinning top.

He proclaimed that once it started turning that the kids would see colors emanating from the spiral, even if they only had a black and white TV. Colt called to his ma in the other room to announce what was about to happen. She brushed it off nicely with a, “sure that’s nice, son”, but after he became more adamant, she stepped into the room in the nick of time to witness the optical illusion miracle of colors dancing out from their black and white TV.

Part two: Grinning back at Barrett:
http://greenvanholzer.blogspot.com/2007/09/grinning-back-at-barrett-by-jim_17.html

Part one: Shopping Center Dreams and Depts Unpaid:

http://greenvanholzer.blogspot.com/2007/08/kindly-recompensating-impossible-man-in.html