GROWING UP
With the right force, the curious contraption seesawed back and forth.
Kids always find a way to play.
Lee Carter, the son of my mom’s friend Ester, had a boat in his backyard, and I was confused. “What do you mean?” I asked. “There’s no water there.” “Well,” replied my mother, Ruth, “his mother says the boat doesn’t need water to rock back and forth.”
As she explained the backyard plaything, all you needed were other kids to make it go. Lee didn’t have many playmates, so his mother had offered it to our family. With me and my sisters, Kay and Pattsie, and all the neighborhood kids, Lee’s mom thought it would get a lot more use at our house.
My father and Lee’s dad had found a truck to move the boat and on Saturday morning, they arrived, hauling something very strange in the truck bed. This was the boat, although it didn’t resemble any boat
I’d ever seen. Uncle Carter and Dad unloaded a big wooden platform and positioned it on the grass in the side yard. Next, they hauled a wooden structure with seats on two ends and big curved rockers below, and they placed it on the platform. “That’s not a boat,” I said, skeptically.
“Wait till you climb into it and you’ll find out,” my dad urged, showing his enthusiasm.
I jumped in and sat at one end while Pattsie and Kay followed and sat at the other end. Dad instructed us to take turns pushing down on our seats. As we did, the boat began to rock from one end to the other like a teeter-totter.
Soon enough, kids from all around the neighborhood were lined up to take turns.
The boat was a big hit and we almost wore it out before growing too old for it.
When we no longer used the boat, Mom gave it to another family with kids.
Little did I anticipate that I would become a naval architect, designing boats for the Navy.