We all have these moments–these decisions we make that, at the time, made complete sense…or we thought we were going bat shit and sought a psychiatrist, dressing up in Batman costumes, marrying that person–ahem, apologies for the bluntness.

I like to call them The Oh, What the Hell moments.

The only reason I bring this up, truly, is because I like to take trips down Memory Lane, remember all the good times and the bad times–a Dickens in my own standing–and laugh at my stupidity or cleverness.

One time: I was six and living in Montana; liked to play with my friends, especially while bouncing on the sweet trampoline across the street–the kid who owned it ended up breaking his leg jumping.

This day, this specific day, we were bouncing and having fun…and then the new kid appeared: he lived in front of the Trampoline House, none of us had introduced ourselves yet. He showed up, all eager to make friends and impress us–admittedly, much of this is hard to recall–and called to us from his fence, some kid crap..who knows.

I think I waved, then continued bouncing as my friends, and my sister, circulated around the interesting neighbor. I was content with the trampoline…the others? they jumped in glee when neighbor kid invited us to his house to see his toys.

Southpaw say what?

What’s even more outlandish was their reaction…a resounding o-kay; and before I knew it all of them were walking through the fence and talking and laughing and surrendering themselves to freaky neighbor kid. Me? I was still bouncing…until I saw my sister leaving; then I decided oh, what the hell and followed.

Freaky neighbor kid took us to his basement–a single room with a lone bulb; there were model airplanes swinging from the ceiling and toys littered the concrete floor…it looked like the childhood play place of Norman Bates. We took our choice of toy and sat and played for, maybe, thirty minutes–then, oh, then, we heard his mother call us upstairs.

We found nothing less than a mob of pissed off parents, one of the moms had her hair still in rollers and was wearing a bathrobe; their arms were crossed and everything–if they had been angrier storm clouds were liable to shoot out of their asses.

Everyone was scolded by their parents…except me and my sister.

My parents hadn’t shown up at the door.

Put yourself in our shoes, running back to the house, praying so fervently that our grounding would be merciful– please be merciful–and then finding they had had no idea of the incident in the first place.

I asked: “Are you going to ground us?”

My father, watching the television, “What for?”

“Uh…nothing. What’s for dinner?”

And we never ever ever spoke to freaky neighbor kid again.

So, you see, Oh, What the Hell moments aren’t all bad; in fact they can make excellent stories.

But seriously, watch out for those new kids…they’re weird, man.

Think daily,

A Southpaw