Terrail Easley

A Childhood Under the Sun 

From my humble abode at 1816 Villa Street, there was a Midwestern ocean that lived three and a half blocks away. Despite a few kids drowning the summer before and my father once launching his non-swimming son into it, I was allowed to visit this ocean on my own. As far as my father, it was his way of teaching me how to not sink and miraculously swim. He found it pretty amusing. I can still hear him laughing in the distance as I flailed in a state of panic. Oddly enough, I can appreciate it. 

None of that was a real concern that existed in, my, nor my parents' mind at the time. Daddy was fixated on the elsewheres. Momma was doing her best to maintain our house of cards. For the at-risk better or worse, I was pretty much free to figure things out on my own. My intentions also weren't anywhere near the interest of swimming. I had other fixations to fulfill while visiting a piece of nature's consciousness. 

This body of water and its personality became a hallowed place for me. Its scenery never the same as the last, yet became a rather familiar friend of sorts. One of my favorite traits, though troubling to a visible Sun, was its response to the rainy and windy conditions during the changing spring-to-summer and fall-to-winter seasons. It couldn't just be any rainy or windy day though. The atmospheric chemistry had to perfectly arrange itself just enough to piss Lake Michigan off to the point of retaliation. 

Waves would crash the coastline reaching ten, fifteen, maybe twenty feet high. I was convinced that spring and fall were arch-enemies to summer and winter. They seemed at their least decisive and profoundly argumentative. Spring didn't want to submit to summer and fall didn't want to give in to winter. They had to make their presence felt before transitionally settling into what, in the end, the Sun ultimately governs. 

 Under the grey skies, I road my bike the short distance before coming to a halt at the top of the hill. This particular bike was pieced together by me and my friend Jason who lived across the street from me. He was like a cool older brother. I haven't seen him in decades. He taught me a lot about how to do things myself. 

The bike had a silver lightweight GT Dyno-type of frame, yet it totally wasn't. I couldn't afford a real GT Dyno, but I convinced myself that it was one anyway. 

I stood over the epic vantage point from above. After a quick survey of the wet grass, I took a deep breath and raced down the steep decent. There wasn't a high probability of me not tumbling into the boulders below. I'd angle my body toward my right leg, extended off of the pedal to maintain balance. Landing at the bottom in half a minute, I pedaled as fast as I could on the gravel trail above the rocky coastline. 

Giant waves exploded aground nearly missing me. The bumps in the unleveled trail made it all the better. I thought I was going at least 60 miles per hour evading incoming artillery. I felt like John Rambo in First Blood, one of my favorite movies at the time. All I was missing was the muddy face for camouflage, black head-tie, bandolier of bullets and an assault rifle. And, of course, a love interest to rescue.

By the time I reached the end of the trail that ended by the sewage plant, the adrenaline from my amazing tour de force left me exhausted. I also had to toil me and my bike all the way uphill in the rain to maybe repeat the mission. Looking back, I was probably more lucky than skillful. 

Somehow I'd usually go unscathed. Nonetheless, the scrapes on my elbows and legs were battle scars that validated my adventure. I'd be banished from the outdoors if my parents knew what the hell I was really doing. I could've easily collided into those immovable rocks with no one around to witness. I was my own nomadic comet aimlessly striving for orbital distance, or something to eventually run into, I guess. Besides, there were only a few activities that weren't a consequential threat. I'm grateful for this place playing an intricate part in the butterfly effect responsible for my livelihood today. 

Intergalactic Interlude:

Me, Steven, Terry

South side community center

Fascinated by the many ways we can dribble a rubber basketball

and the swishing sound it made brushing the nylon without touching the metal rim

"Who can do the coolest lay-up?!"

Through the legs, cross-over, spin-move, up and in

Terry and I oblivious to the incoming trouble...

"You see those dudes?"

"Those are Vice Lords. Ain't nothing but GD's in here"

Steven has the idea of taking our game to the outdoor courts behind the center

Terry and I oblige

Minutes into reconvening with our fascination

people start running out of the gym to nowhere in particular

just out of the way

A gunman stood in the doorway from the outside pointing inward

At least a dozen vengeful shots let off...

Although we weren't in the line of fire, we make a dash towards home

Known as one of the fastest in the neighborhood

I'm out of breath from the sudden terror, limited to a sluggish jog

Fate has it

The wounded made paraplegic by the same fascination he and his assailant both share

consumed by the threat of this circle of fascination to cease to exist

...meanwhile, me, Steven and Terry are back the very next day enjoying ours

I stop, standing motionless...recapping the position and feelings from the day before

Thinking, away, somewhere in the darkness the shooter lies

…at which point do fascinations die?

 Come summer, I'd wake up early with safer adventures in mind. On the weekends, when Mom wasn't working on the assembly line at Western Publishing, a printing and lithography factory, she was working her second job in our kitchen doing hair. After making myself a bowl of hot cereal, I'd plop myself on the living room couch to catch Fishing with Roland Martin, or Orlando Wilson, or Bill Dance on television. Then it was time for me to grab my own rod and backpack and venture back to my oceanic oasis. 

This time when I reached the gravel trail, I had to jump down the rocks to engage the water. I left my bike close to the edge of the small bluff to at least see the front tire. Not that many people came down there. Still, I couldn't take the chance of allowing my precious "GT Dyno" to be stolen. 

Once I found an arrangement of rocks to settle onto, the turquoise hues and the smell of marine life took me in. I look back at my bike one last time and cast out. It never failed. Come June, as the water was getting warmer, a generous steelhead/rainbow trout would make my acquaintance. Each season we’d meet within a dozen casts over the same spinnerbait, a neon-green Rooster-tail. 

As I traced the spinning metallic blade that flickered off of the ascending sunlight through the clear waters, my anticipation grew. Then bam! My reflexes setting the hook whether it be seaweed, a rock or an actual fish. To seize the moment, till this day, without jeopardizing losing the fish, I reel softly to feel the full effect of its instinctive response to this unknown thing (me) pulling it away from its natural habitat. 

I wait for it to make its final dashes before tiring out, then scooped it by hand from underneath its belly or lip, not its gills, above sea level. I discern the differences in the reddish-pink stripe along its side, gradually turning silver. This change happens during its travels from the river here to the open waters. 

I take mental photographs. Not to waste too much time gazing, I remove the hook from its small mouth. Experience taught me to be delicate. Trout aren't a breed that can withstand anything even slightly aggressive, hence not gilling it. Squatting down to release it, holding its tail, I sway it back and forth to get the oxygen flowing through its gills again. A shilly-shally would come over me before I let go. Thinking maybe I could somehow keep it as a pet of sorts. Surrendering to nature’s telepathy; however, I let him go and off it went to live the rest of its trout life.

The triumph from my catch was often short-lived. I would then catch only a few others over the next few hours. They were on to me. Perhaps, teasing me, teaching my young mind the difference between fishing and catching. It was plenty of satisfaction for me.

 After much day dreaming and scaling up and down the coastline, I finally gave up. My Malt-O-Meal also gave up on tiding me over. If I was feeling brave that day and remembered a Ziploc bag of sugar, I'd hop the fence to snatch some rhubarb from the neighboring garden. The yard of this huge brown house with white window sashes descended and rested adjacently to where I was by the trail. 

There were many nice homes like this. All of them parallel to a line that separated two socioeconomic worlds. In the winter, my older brother and I would cross that line, knocking on the doors of these homes offering to shovel their snow for money, or a cup of hot cocoa. Two naive yet ambitious hood kids crossing over into such territory. All we had was that, some shovels and a sales pitch. Trying to make things happen for ourselves from those who presumptuously had the most.

I never met the owners of this particular place though, only their garden full of delectable red stalks. The perennials laid at the bottom of the hill, which was the end point of their backyard. Above, I could see the exact windows where the owners could see me trespassing and stealing their goods. 

Luckily, that I know of, the only thing that ever got caught in the act was my shoestring on the fence when leaping back over to the other side. Once I successfully nabbed my prize, I was off racing towards another coastline location towards the marina somewhere. Each spot was a different perspective of life under the Sun. Between my imagination and the multi-dimensional aspects of Lake Michigan, I wasn't as alone as I truly was. My relationship with the Sun’s creations gifted me a unique and enriching sanctuary. Our time together will be with me forever