Link to the n*de dudes (all over 18)
Today summer lasts for 12 weeks; I can see its beginning and end. But when I was nine years old, lasted for months or years, or never ended: somewhere it's still that childhood summer, an endless succession of days, all bright green and dazzling.
A week in Indiana, visiting my parents' family.
A week camping in Minnesota and Canada.
Nazarene summer camp.
Swimming lessons at Longview Park Pool.
The bookmobile every Tuesday.
Dark Shadows. H.R. Pufnstuf. Tarzan Theater.
Posters of teen idols.
All on a golden afternoon, probably a Saturday in July, in my Grandma's farmhouse in northern Indiana. It's a big house, white frame. The living room is pink, with flowered wall paper and thick drapes.
My brother and I are alone. I don't remember why. Maybe Mom and Dad have gone off somewhere, on an expedition of their own, leaving Grandma Davis to babysit, and she has stepped out.
We have just come in from something or other -- puttering around in the apple orchard, playing fetch with the dogs next door, exploring the old barn where Grandpa used to milk cows. We kick off our shoes at the door.
At our house the tv is almost always on, whether anyone is watchng or not, a stable, comforting background noise. But Grandma keeps it off unless someone wants to watch a specific program. It seems unnatural, wrong somehow.
I reach down and turn it on.
Kenny asks "What do you want to watch?"
I shrug. "I don't know. Maybe Tarzan Theater." On Saturday afternoons in Rock Island, when there isn't a game on, you can see old Tarzan and Bomba the Jungle Boy movies.
The black and white screen flickers, and then pops on. A game.
I turn it to the next channel. Some people talking.
"Find some cartoons," Kenny suggests.
There are only three channels, so only three choices. I turn to the third.
A shirtless muscleman.
In my memory he reveals more than that, although he was probably wearing a leotard. Definitely shirtless, though, with taut hard pecs and very thick hard biceps.
You never saw shirtless men on tv in those days, except in Tarzan movies, so I stand dumbstruck, frozen in place, realizing that I will remember this moment forever.
"What's this?" Kenny asks.
The man twirls and high-steps, bulging his calves, across a bare stage to a young blond woman. Then, dancing a sort of tap dance, he asks "Who....are...youuuuuu?"
She starts a tap dance of her own, dances in front of him, and says "I....don't...know. Who...are...youuuuu?"
He stops dancing and glowers at her, his eyes dark, and replies. "I am the Magic Mushroom."
At that moment, Grandma appears at the window leading to the kitchen. "There's nothing for kids on now," she says. "Turn the tv off."
"Wait...I..." I begin. But Kenny obligingly turns it off.
"Now who wants to help me bake a pie for dinner tonight?"
All in a golden afternoon.
The muscleman haunts my dreams, dancing, darting, twirling across the stage, asking "Who...are...youuuuu?" a hundred times. I answer in a hundred ways:
I am a boy.
I am a Nazarene.
I am a fourth grader.
I am a brother.
I am a friend.
But no answer is satisfactory.
A few years later, I realized that the scene was adapted from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, a dream journey published in 1965, and included in my Young People's Classic Library. Except it's a hookah-smoking caterpillar who asks "Who are you?" The mushroom is not a speaking character.
The 1951 Disney movie.
.
Still she haunts me, phantomwise,
Alice moving under skies
Never seen by waking eyes.
The dark dancing man still haunts me, phantomwise. I still wonder about the question. Perhaps it's the big question, the only real question in our lives, and the point is not to find the answer, but to ask, and keep asking.
"Who...are...you?"
The bookmobile every Tuesday.
The Denkmann School Carnival.
Malts at Country Style.
Vacation Bible School
Gold Key comic books at Schneider's Drug Store.
Dark Shadows. H.R. Pufnstuf. Tarzan Theater.
Posters of teen idols.
And the Muscleman's Question:
My brother and I are alone. I don't remember why. Maybe Mom and Dad have gone off somewhere, on an expedition of their own, leaving Grandma Davis to babysit, and she has stepped out.
We have just come in from something or other -- puttering around in the apple orchard, playing fetch with the dogs next door, exploring the old barn where Grandpa used to milk cows. We kick off our shoes at the door.
Maybe we're going to head up to our room which happens to be Dad's old room, with his pictures and schoolbooks and baseball glove), or up to the attic to sort through the bundles of old magazines in search of comic books.
I stop in front of the tv set, a big piece of furniture, wood-brown, with curved pillars on the sides. There's an empty candy dish and a photo of my Cousin Phil on top.
At our house the tv is almost always on, whether anyone is watchng or not, a stable, comforting background noise. But Grandma keeps it off unless someone wants to watch a specific program. It seems unnatural, wrong somehow.
I reach down and turn it on.
Kenny asks "What do you want to watch?"
I shrug. "I don't know. Maybe Tarzan Theater." On Saturday afternoons in Rock Island, when there isn't a game on, you can see old Tarzan and Bomba the Jungle Boy movies.
The black and white screen flickers, and then pops on. A game.
I turn it to the next channel. Some people talking.
"Find some cartoons," Kenny suggests.
There are only three channels, so only three choices. I turn to the third.
A shirtless muscleman.
In my memory he reveals more than that, although he was probably wearing a leotard. Definitely shirtless, though, with taut hard pecs and very thick hard biceps.
You never saw shirtless men on tv in those days, except in Tarzan movies, so I stand dumbstruck, frozen in place, realizing that I will remember this moment forever.
"What's this?" Kenny asks.
The man twirls and high-steps, bulging his calves, across a bare stage to a young blond woman. Then, dancing a sort of tap dance, he asks "Who....are...youuuuuu?"
She starts a tap dance of her own, dances in front of him, and says "I....don't...know. Who...are...youuuuu?"
He stops dancing and glowers at her, his eyes dark, and replies. "I am the Magic Mushroom."
At that moment, Grandma appears at the window leading to the kitchen. "There's nothing for kids on now," she says. "Turn the tv off."
"Wait...I..." I begin. But Kenny obligingly turns it off.
"Now who wants to help me bake a pie for dinner tonight?"
All in a golden afternoon.
More after the break
The muscleman haunts my dreams, dancing, darting, twirling across the stage, asking "Who...are...youuuuu?" a hundred times. I answer in a hundred ways:
I am a boy.
I am a Nazarene.
I am a fourth grader.
I am a brother.
I am a friend.
But no answer is satisfactory.
If you go chasing rabbits, and you know you're going to fall.
Tell them a hookah-smoking caterpillar has given you the call.
He called Alice, when she was just small.
So where did the muscleman come from?
The TV Guides for Fort Wayne, Indiana list no Alice movies on Satuday afternoons in June or July of any year when I was 8-12. It must have been a last-minute substitution for a game that was cancelled.
So where did the muscleman come from?
The TV Guides for Fort Wayne, Indiana list no Alice movies on Satuday afternoons in June or July of any year when I was 8-12. It must have been a last-minute substitution for a game that was cancelled.
Alice's Adventure's in Wonderland remains one of my favorite books. I've read The Annotated Alice, Aspects of Alice, The Dream Child, and a lot of criticism and analysis. I've watched or investigated dozens of Alice movies, stage plays, and ballets.
The 1951 Disney movie.
The 1966 cartoon where Rat Packer Sammy Davis Jr. sings "What's a nice kid like you doing in a place like this?"
The 1972 live action film with Peter Sellers and Dudley Moore.
The 1985 tv special with Sherman Hemsley and Scott Baio
The 1999 tv movie with Whoopie Goldberg as the Cheshire Cat.
The 2010 Tim Burton version with Johnny Depp.
The 2011 ballet, where Alice gets a boyfriend.
None of them feature a talking, dancing, shirtless mushroom.
He remains a mystery.
Still she haunts me, phantomwise,
Alice moving under skies
Never seen by waking eyes.
"Who...are...you?"
See also: Alice's Queer Wonderland
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