As Rascal and I walked out the front door it was like hitting a wall of wet air. It was foggy. Really, really foggy. A real “pea souper” I can imagine an east coast fisherman saying…if I actually knew any east coast fishermen…and if pea soup was grey and damp instead of yellow/green and chunky. Anyway, I digress. The point is, it was really foggy. And as we walked along, it was a little spooky too. We could hear footsteps and the occasional voice of other early morning adventurers, but we couldn’t see anyone.
As we walked along in this surreal world, I realized I was humming…the theme song from the Scooby Doo cartoons I watched when I was a kid. My conscious mind quickly went where my subconscious one had already gone… the home of my early childhood.
[Insert flashback here]
When I was a kid we lived in Burlington for a few years. Right at the edge of Lake Ontario. Literally. There was a frost fence, and then a steep drop to the lake. My younger brother Steve had made it his mission in his, albeit young life, to toss anything left about by anyone over the fence and into the lake. My best friend Launa and I however, had better things to do. Next door was a rather large field of sorts, and at the furthest side from us, a very dilapidated and abandoned motel. This place was the perfect setting for our favourite adventure game….”Scooby Doo Mysteries”. Throw in the fact that living on the lake, it was frequently very foggy, I mean, how could you not play Scooby Doo Mysteries?
One of my big dilemmas in all of this was whether to be Daphne or Velma? Daphne had the advantage of cooler clothes and being pretty, but I always admired Velma’s brains. Generally we settled it the same way we settled our Sonny and Cher karaoke debates: I would be Daphne (or Cher) because I had long hair. Launa got to be all the characters with short hair. [I never said it was fair!]
Sometimes we would rope in other neighbourhood kids to play and we would have a Fred and Shaggy too! If no one else was around though we had no problem just pretending the rest of “the gang” was there!
As far as I can remember neither Launa nor I actually had an Aunt Peggy, but this poor woman was the center of most of our mysteries. She was frequently kidnapped. She had her priceless jewels stolen, works of art went missing, and of course, the bad guys where always trying to scare her out of her old mansion by pretending to be ghosts or ghouls! Aunt Peggy did not have an easy life.
Whatever the mystery of the day, we were on it. And of course, the best days were when we could prowl around the property next door in a thick blanket of fog. One such afternoon, we were hot on the trail of something or someone and we found…gasp…bones! Actual, real life bones! They were in a small pile in the grass and we were in our absolute glory. Here was a real mystery to be solved! Our fervent minds began concocting all kinds of possible horrible ends for “the victim”. Clearly foul play was afoot!
After searching the area for clues (footprints – which were probably our own) and taking pictures, we gathered up the bones and brought them home. Imagine our chagrin when my mother, after yelling at us to go wash our hands for heaven’s sake, informed us that our find belonged to a raccoon or something similar. We were crushed, but not for long. The following day brought a new adventure and a new mystery to solve.
As Launa and I got older, our game became a little more sophisticated. We pretended to be spies! We went so far as to stakeout various neighbours who seemed a little shady and kept notes on their comings and goings. If this were television instead of my life, we would have stumbled upon some real life evil doers – perhaps an international jewel thief living incognito in our little neighbourhood! Alas, we were never that lucky. We did however spend some time staking out the lady who lived down the way. If I remember correctly she made our list because she failed to give out good Halloween candy. We didn’t notice anything exciting over the days and weeks that we watched her place…except for the fact that a lot of random men came and went, on about an hourly basis, while her husband was at work. I did not appreciate the significance of that one until I was much older.
I hope it’s foggy tomorrow too.
As we walked along in this surreal world, I realized I was humming…the theme song from the Scooby Doo cartoons I watched when I was a kid. My conscious mind quickly went where my subconscious one had already gone… the home of my early childhood.
[Insert flashback here]
When I was a kid we lived in Burlington for a few years. Right at the edge of Lake Ontario. Literally. There was a frost fence, and then a steep drop to the lake. My younger brother Steve had made it his mission in his, albeit young life, to toss anything left about by anyone over the fence and into the lake. My best friend Launa and I however, had better things to do. Next door was a rather large field of sorts, and at the furthest side from us, a very dilapidated and abandoned motel. This place was the perfect setting for our favourite adventure game….”Scooby Doo Mysteries”. Throw in the fact that living on the lake, it was frequently very foggy, I mean, how could you not play Scooby Doo Mysteries?
One of my big dilemmas in all of this was whether to be Daphne or Velma? Daphne had the advantage of cooler clothes and being pretty, but I always admired Velma’s brains. Generally we settled it the same way we settled our Sonny and Cher karaoke debates: I would be Daphne (or Cher) because I had long hair. Launa got to be all the characters with short hair. [I never said it was fair!]
Sometimes we would rope in other neighbourhood kids to play and we would have a Fred and Shaggy too! If no one else was around though we had no problem just pretending the rest of “the gang” was there!
As far as I can remember neither Launa nor I actually had an Aunt Peggy, but this poor woman was the center of most of our mysteries. She was frequently kidnapped. She had her priceless jewels stolen, works of art went missing, and of course, the bad guys where always trying to scare her out of her old mansion by pretending to be ghosts or ghouls! Aunt Peggy did not have an easy life.
Whatever the mystery of the day, we were on it. And of course, the best days were when we could prowl around the property next door in a thick blanket of fog. One such afternoon, we were hot on the trail of something or someone and we found…gasp…bones! Actual, real life bones! They were in a small pile in the grass and we were in our absolute glory. Here was a real mystery to be solved! Our fervent minds began concocting all kinds of possible horrible ends for “the victim”. Clearly foul play was afoot!
After searching the area for clues (footprints – which were probably our own) and taking pictures, we gathered up the bones and brought them home. Imagine our chagrin when my mother, after yelling at us to go wash our hands for heaven’s sake, informed us that our find belonged to a raccoon or something similar. We were crushed, but not for long. The following day brought a new adventure and a new mystery to solve.
As Launa and I got older, our game became a little more sophisticated. We pretended to be spies! We went so far as to stakeout various neighbours who seemed a little shady and kept notes on their comings and goings. If this were television instead of my life, we would have stumbled upon some real life evil doers – perhaps an international jewel thief living incognito in our little neighbourhood! Alas, we were never that lucky. We did however spend some time staking out the lady who lived down the way. If I remember correctly she made our list because she failed to give out good Halloween candy. We didn’t notice anything exciting over the days and weeks that we watched her place…except for the fact that a lot of random men came and went, on about an hourly basis, while her husband was at work. I did not appreciate the significance of that one until I was much older.
I hope it’s foggy tomorrow too.
