spacematic.net

Check out the pic above. That’s me at around four or five, which puts the photo in the neighborhood of 1977 or 1978. At that time, my older brothers were still both at home and going to high school. Because of the ten year age difference, I wasn’t so much a little brother as I was a personal monkey. They told me to do stuff and I’d have to oblige. Most of the antics involved dressing in garish costumes or drag, harassing Mom or a combination of the two. My oldest brother’s all-time favorite trick was to get me in a frenzy, send me downstairs with my hands on my head and scream “Mommy! Mommy! He put neatsfoot oil in my hair!!!” This invariably shocked and infuriated my poor mother who is genetically pre-disposed to panic, and she would scream bloody and murderous threats to her eldest child. It always ended with me doubled over in laughter as she pried my hands off my head to see what damage came to me from the topical use of leather protectant. For some reason, the unraveling of a lie was a joy beyond joy for me. When she learned there was no neatsfoot oil in my hair, she’d pop me on the bottom and send me back upstairs while muttering something like “I can’t believe y’all just live to make me cuss. What if the preacher was at the door? He’d think we all lost our religion!” This made me laugh just that much harder. “Get in that room, you little demon! And don’t come out ’til I say it’s time for dinnah.” I liked being at the heart of matters of deception.

When I turned five, my brothers thought I was old enough to be competent in performing more complex pranks. My mom used to drag all three of us to the mall so she could shop without fear of the house catching fire while she was away. The problem with this arrangement was that two teenagers and one five year old were stuck in the ladieswear section of Rich’s, bored out of our minds. So my brothers whispered provocative, Enquirer-style headlines into my ears and made me repeat them back until they were confident I had them memorized. Then they set out into the aisles, where I would tug on ladies’ dresses and begin my performance.

“‘Scuze me, Ma’am.”
“Oh my goodness! Where’s your mother? How can I help you?”
“I gotta tell you sumpin’.”
“Well now, are you lost?”
“Nope.”
The unsuspecting ladies’ eyes always searched around briefly before smiling back and asking, “Well, what’s the matter, then?”
“JIMMY CARTER ‘MOKES POT!”
Then I’d cackle madly and run away in search of my devious brothers. I had no idea what I was saying, but my brothers sure thought it was funny, and making them laugh was an achievement I relished. When my mother found out what was going on from another store patron or from management, she dragged us home and gave us a firm talking to regarding possible penalties that could arise from uttering fallacious statements about the leader of the free world.

Following one of these grievous infractions against the establishment, I was sent to my room where my brothers entered and gave me a can of “Billy Beer,” a product of presidential brother Billy Carter and a magazine article regarding the President himself. They then photographed me for the prankster’s hall of fame. The picture above is enduring proof of such shenanigans.

From then on, my mother knew that as long as the three of us were togther, things at the mall would just get worse. So she started allowing my brothers to stay at home while she continued dragging me to the ladieswear section of Rich’s and Davidson’s. The golden days of prankhood were over, and I was doomed to boredom. Or so I thought.

Back in the day, my brothers had competing interests in music and their rooms were right next to each other. My room looked directly at both their doors. My oldest brother listened to Blue Oyster Cult, Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, John Denver, Dan Fogleberg, Asia and Led Zeppelin.

The interests of the younger were more along the lines of Earth, Wind and Fire, Fantastic Voyage, The Village People, Parliament, The Beatles and ELO. The only thing they had in common music-wise was KISS, and even then they’d blare competing tracks. “Detroit Rock City” and “Beth” don’t mix. The cacophonous din that would sail off into the hallway from the two full-volume stereos almost drove me crazy, so I opted for spending time in either room just so I could hear either “Immigrant Song” or “YMCA,” and not have to endure some unbearable ear-shattering hellspawn of both.

The oldest brother loved me no less than the other, but he thought that having me in the room all the time was lame, so I often found myself in the younger brother’s room listening to those damned Village People. Back then, I thought they were super cool. The music was upbeat and lively and all the candy-coated things little kids like happy music for. For my birthday, my brother even gave me a 45 RPM single of “Macho Man.”

One day, not too long after the gifted “Macho Man” single, the elder brother had a frank discussion with the younger. He couldn’t believe his ears. They couldn’t be! The Village People!? They just couldn’t be! He got on the phone with his friends – time and time again, the awful truth was confirmed. The VILLAGE PEOPLE WERE GAY. For a teenager in the mid-to-late 1970’s , such a brand was unacceptable. Why, what would his peers think of him? He had to take action and rid himself of all Village People vinyl and swag.

I’ll never forget the day I came home from preschool, opened my bedroom door and found a veritable Village People wonderland in place of my old zoo posters and stuffed animals. All my brother’s LP’s, 45’s, posters and magazines were plastered on every wall and in every corner of my room. There was even a copy of Rolling Stone featuring the Village People on the pillow of my bed. I had to go thank him immediately. Alas, he was nowhere to be found. So I spun up one of my new acquisitions and started to git down with my bad self. Halfway through the second track, I could hear uproarious laughter on the other side of the door. I tried to open it to see what was the matter, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Hey! What’s the big idea? Whatcha doin?!”
A muffled voice from the other side of the door giggled “Nothin’, man. Just lookin’ through the Village Peep-Hole to see if we can find any VILLAGE PEOPLE!” A new wave of guffaws immediately erupted.
“Lemme out!” I shrieked over the din of “In The Navy.” “Lemme out now or I’m tellin’ Mom!

The door swang wide. The faces of my brother and friend were a hazardous shade of red, their mouths twisted into a confused expression that exhibited characteristics both of glee and agony. Unable to breathe through uncontrollable fits of laughter, they gripped at their ribs tightly, letting go only to ocassionally point at me in amused anguish.
“What you guys laughin’ about?” I asked suspiciously.
“Nothin’. Nothin’, Jonny.” My brother heaved, still red-faced from watching me boogie to the music he had forsaken only a day before.
My brother’s friend then blurted, “Man, don’t you know? Those Village People are totally GAY!” After two or three desparate gasps for air, their laughter resumed. They wailed like mad hyenas in a gas chamber.
“Yeah, so?” I asked.
Try explaining what gay is to a five year old.
The laughs subsided and they attempted once more to embarrass me about the “gay” thing. No luck. I just kept saying “So? So what?”

The source of their raucous glee was fading fast, their twisted smiles gradually faded into thin expressions of frustration. They were struck with embarrassment at the prospect of explaining the birds and the bees, or rather the birds-birds/bees-bees. So they simply left me alone to enjoy my new Village People showcase.

When my older brother found out about it, he had a good laugh too. But when I started to put on a Village People record, he grabbed me, sat me down in his room and made me listen to “2112,” “Animals” and “Destroyer,” back to back to back. Even years later, he felt that his task in attempting to remedy my questioable taste in music wasn’t complete, and he prescribed heavy doses of Billy Idol and Def Leppard. Soon enough, he was off to college, and home was host to just me and my middle brother. He found other bands to enjoy, including Big Country and U2. U2 became our new favorite. One day, as we were listening to October, my brother apologized to me. “Sorry about that Village People thing, Jonny. You know we were just kidding, right?”
“Oh yeah. I’ve been done with them for years, anyway.”
As if to make up for the terrible thing he did, he helped guide me in “proper” musical choices from then on out. Thanks to him, I was one of the only children in elementary school to avoid the craze of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.”

But I’ve got to admit that even today, when I find myself stumbling upon a Village People track on a classics radio station, I leave it there. Without fail, I always see my brother and his friend laughing away at me as I flailed about the room listening to the “gay” band. So what? For all the camp and flair of the Village People’s music and costumes, they remind me of an ideal childhood – when I was a joker in a den of scoundrels during the late 70’s. Boy, what a f&%ked-up Mardi Gras that decade was. Let’s write it off and get back to here and now. –mike