Let Your Fingers Do the Walking

Last Friday evening I drove home, found a good parking spot (urban denizens who depend on street
parking understand the serendipity in this) and was ready for a weekend in Fells Point. Right there on the front stoop was the new phone book - a large paper anachronism.

Gone are the days when a jerk would leap in joy exclaiming, "The new phone book is here! The new phone book is here!"

Obsolete now, though for some reason they insist on printing it. Another piece of antiquated telecommunication equipment is the telephone booth. Known as a place to cram college students and as Superman's changing room, they have become virtually impossible to find. I'm not talking about the aluminum and plastic shells, but those four-walled, collapsing door sarcophagi.

The phone booth holds a special place in my heart. Well not exactly in my heart. For explanation, enter my way-back machine and travel to the summer of 1967.

It's a sultry July night. Myself and a motley congregation of like-minded, bored 13-year-olds, wander the empty streets of Haddonfield looking for something to occupy our time. One of the group mentioned an older brother who had to "light a fart" as part of a college fraternity initiation. A pack of matches appear. We soon discover that flatulence is indeed flammable.

This provided one night of amusement, but mid-summer tedium was ubiquitous. Our ingenious, yet
perilous, imaginations devise a game to occupy our time - Fart Baseball. The playing field was a phone booth located in the center of town by the A&P market.

We divided into two teams. The back corner of the booth opposite the telephone was marked with four lines - single, double, triple and home run. The batter, well really the farter, would bend over with his posterior pointing at the delineated corner.  He would signal the on-deck farter when he was prepared to expel his "hit". The match was lit, and the height of the ensuing blaze measured against the aforementioned lines. If the flame did not reach a single, or if the gas did not arise before the match extinguished, that was an out. As the "runners" advance by other "hits," scores were tabulated. The abridged game was four innings.

We embraced the competition. Days were spent eating beans, broccoli, cabbage and other ammo-fueled foods. Evenings were spent in camaraderie scented by methane and sulfur. Our amusement generated more players, a league was planned with playoffs and a World Series scheduled for Labor Day weekend.

Eventually, a mob of teenagers hanging in front of a closed grocery accompanied by occasional fiery eruptions attracted the local constabulary. I will never forget the looks on their faces as we described our newly invented American pastime. Haddonfield is a small town, so the officer in charge knew most of us and our parents. Shaking his head, he told us to disperse. He would be too embarrassed to explain this stupidity to our parents, but warned dire circumstances should he see us "playing" again.

We tried a few games in other locations, but our pastime fizzled out...gone with the wind you might say. As ever - BB

"Surprising, given the impact of the fart on the life of the American boy, how little you still hear about it..." - Phillip Roth from The Great American Novel