Balls Out

I am home right now watching the Clippers attempt to win their first game of the young NBA season. As I sit here and watch in agony as the Clippers slow give away their 20 point lead, I can't help but let my eyes wander to my dog Jack, who is laying in between the television and myself. It's either the fact that he just farted and it smells like a burning, shyt-filled baby diaper that is turning my attention towards him or the fact that he is wearing a "cone of shame" as Ed Noir called it. Yesterday morning was the last time Jack saw his nuts. They are now property of the nearest landfill. I should have had the vet bottle them up for me so I could bronze them and hang them from the back of my lifted truck. Oh well, maybe I next time.

Jack's nut loss reminds me of a time when I........

The year was....some time in the mid-late 80s. My family and I were headed on our second excursion to Ecuador. Were we missionaries? No officially, but for some reason, every time we went to Ecuador (and every time my parents go now) we would take an extreme amount of luggage filled with American treasures for our less fortunate kin. Sure it was clothes from the sale rack at K-Mart but it was new and from California.

We got to the airport 4 hours early as usual. My dad is a real stickler when it comes to flying. He thinks that the earlier one gets to the airport, the better. Keep in mind friends that this was pre-9/11. There was no official, real need to be at the airport so early for these international flights. Nevertheless, there we were, at LAX with 4 hours to spare.

Back in the day, people who weren't scheduled to fly, were allowed to go all the way to the actual terminal to say goodbye to their loved ones or good riddance. Our entourage included all of our Californian family members. When I say all, I mean like 20 people at the airport with us to bid us adieu. It was almost like a family reunion.

On this fateful night, our parents decided to dress my brother Jazz and I in matching outfits. Why? I have no idea. Perhaps they felt that making us wear the same clothes made us look more high class or wealthier? I have never seen the Trumps or the Hiltons dressed alike. Oh well, that is something I will never understand.

Jazz and I were bored of modeling our argyle sweaters and khaki pants for our aunts and uncles so we decided to go on an excursion through LAX. We had nothing else to do for the remaining three and a half hours we had to spare after checking in. We recruited three of our cousins to come with, and we were off.

An airport is quite the playground when you are a youngster. There's tons of places to run around and be mischievous. There's elevators to joyride in and escalators to mess around on. My brother, cousins, and I had found a secluded spot with two of the biggest escalators we had seen all night, to call our playground. We would race up the escalator going down and visa versa. We had found a mechanical playground to kill the leftover time and we were loving it.

After a few times up and down the escalators in reverse fashion, I had a Newtonian idea. As a young boy, I always wondered what would happen if I sat down on the escalator steps and rode them all the way to the bottom. I figured I would get to the bottom and slide right off. This was my hypothesis and on this night, before my brother and cousins,e I would put my hypothesis to the test.

I started off on the top of the escalator and sat down on the first moving step. With hope in my eyes, I let this mechanical beast take me down to my brethren. I did not worry about getting my khakis dirty by sitting down on these steps which had seen the soles of many souls. All I cared about was getting to the bottom and sliding off and hearing cheers from my family waiting below. As I approached the bottom of the escalator, I could see the anxiety and interest in the eyes of Jazz and my cousins. They too were probably wondering what was going to happen once I reached the bottom, and my throne-like step disappeared under me. We were all about to find out.......

"AAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"

I got up as fast as I could. I could feel the fresh night air on my then hairless butt as tears began to run down my cheek.

"Oh my god!" Jazz's voice shrieked as he saw my gluteal damage.

My K-Mart khakis had gotten caught in between the step going under the ground and the teeth-like end that awaits at the bottom of every escalator. My hypothesis had failed. I did not slide off as I had anticipated and there I stood, with my pants and underwear ripped to shreds along with my little butt. The tears looked like claw marks that could have been made by a lion. This was one lion's den I did not survive. My cousins tried to keep their snickering to a minimum but I could faintly hear them as Jazz tried to console me and keep my calm.

"What are we going to do?" I asked in dire despair. "If mom and dad see this, they won't let us go to Ecuador!"

"Relax" Jazz replied, "I have an idea."

Jazz had me remove my sweater and tie it around my waist. I wiped my tears on my little oxford shirt as we walked to the nearest restroom.

"Look, keep the sweater tied around your waist until we get on the airplane." Jazz said in his calmest voice. "Don't show mom and dad until we are up in the air. There is no way they can get mad once we are already flying."

"Ok" I whimpered.

"And stop crying or else they going to know something is wrong." Jazz added.

His plan worked to perfection. With my sweater tied around my waist, there was no proof of the atrocity that had just occurred.

My ass was burning from the blood and open wounds that were left behind. But I sucked it up like Jazz had told me to do. I did not want to ruin our vacation.

Once we were in the airplane and up in the air, Jazz cued me that it was safe to tell our parents what had happened. I walked over to where they were seated and with tears welling up in my eyes, pulled my backwards apron off and showed them my butt. My mom slightly freaked out. As did my dad. I was then taken to the onboard restroom and changed out of my bloodstained khakis and after a few kisses from mommy, I was fast asleep dreaming of my next hypothesis to test....

"What would happen if I jumped of the back of a moving truck...."

4000 miles later, I found out

In the movie Mallrats, Brodie said it best:
"Listen, not a year goes by, not a year, that I don't hear about some escalator accident involving some bastard kid which could have easily been avoided had some parent - I don't care which one - but some parent conditioned him to fear and respect that escalator."

I could have lost my balls that night. Instead, I lost some blood and a good pair of khakis.