PINBALL WHIZARD

Bout 1958, there was a decrepit, broken down, tired, old building across the street from the HUT Cafe in Turnertown that attracted a few folks because among other things it had, pinball machines (I'm also thinking they had a coffee pot, and not much else?).

Pinball machines were the precursor of computer games (about 1,000 years afore?). They cost one NICKEL (5 cents) for a play. A "play" was five steel balls that caromed about the table top of the machine (one ball at a time) with bells ringing, lights flashing, and the "player" hitting a button on each side of the electromechanical (think computerized, NOT) machine that activated a couple of "flippers" to put the steel ball back into play when gravity inevitably drew the ball to the bottom of the tilted table top.

Putting "english" on the machine meant bumping it with your hips, or in the ultimate, putting the front legs of the game on the tops of your shoes so you could have a more level playing field (think, "cheat").

At the ripe old age of likely 8 or 9, said self proclaimed child professional, frankie, would be put at the machine by Dad (Gene) and allowed to perform for the men folk (gratuitous nickels on Dad, of course). If I remember correctly, I was something of a prodigy and the grown men folk were a bit impressed that a young boy with so many patches on his jeans could keep that steel ball "alive" for so long on the machine.

Don't know that anything meaningful whatsoever came of that male testosterone laden experience, but, it is a part of my completely unsheltered childhood that helped to make me the strange person that I am?

Go figger, children of mine?