The Past Lined Up Like Dominoes.

When you get older, you get these nostalgic impulses.

A glimpse of color, couple notes of music, the way someone says a word, the breeze across your face when the screen door closes. Things you don’t even notice.

But somewhere down in the basement, a domino falls, and tap tap tap, up comes the past until, hours later, you got this little ache in your chest.

That’s how I ended up in an arcade with my son, Chip. After twenty years, I suddenly missed pinball. Why now? What does this mean? I have no idea.

When I asked Chip if he’d like to visit an arcade, he looked at me like I was joking. This is a kid with an arcade on his phone.

But like Linus said to Charlie Brown, a son is a built-in best friend, and Chip is usually game for anything. That kid saves me, I swear.

We walked through an arcade the size of the Goodyear Blimp hangar. Wall-to-wall video madness. Kids blasting zombies, hunting T-Rexes, slashing ninjas. One game encouraged kids to heft a sniper rifle and blow a criminal’s brains out the back of his 3D skull. Chunks flew and stuck to the screen (I’m not kidding).

At the end of the game, the FBI logo popped up with the words, “Winners don’t do drugs.” But I guess they do splatter brains against brick walls.

This is entertainment?

I grabbed Chip and headed for the door. And that’s where I saw it. One (just one) beat up, worn out pinball machine.

But not just any pinball machine. Bally’s Space Time.

Space Time!

I just stood there, kind of crying, to tell you the truth. I felt so stupid. Heck, I’m kind of crying now. What’s wrong with me? It’s a pinball machine!

But I know better than that. It’s never just the final thing.

I think we all have domino souls. I don’t know what sensation makes the first tap, don’t understand the random or determined path they follow, clacking up up up, fanning out like those Guinness Book domino extravaganzas, spilling through my subconscious, streams of memories and emotions and archetypes all falling in different directions, then somehow coming back to one purposeful line, tap tap tap, until that final brick falls flat on my heart and I feel absolutely certain that something just happened, but have absolutely no idea what.

I wish I came with a User’s Manual.

​I’ll have to finish this journal entry later. I’m too worked up to write. I need to go to Sears and sit on the riding mower.

Comments

Media Jean: I’m worried about your dad.

Chip: Yeah, me too.

Media Jean: He takes everything so personally.

Chip: I know.

Media Jean: Maybe he should see someone.

Chip: Like a doctor?

Media Jean: Or a dance instructor.

Chip: What?!

Media Jean: I don’t know, something! He needs to do something that’s just fun! Something that doesn’t make him think about everything!

Chip: Everything makes him think about everything.

Media Jean: Maybe he should go to Clown College.

Chip: Ha ha! Clown College?

Media Jean: Yeah! I read about stressed out grown-ups going to Clown College. They learn to juggle, walk a tight rope, get hit with cream pies, the whole clown thing.

Chip: I don’t know...

Media Jean: We can sign him up online. We have his digital signature, credit card numbers, email password.

Chip: Yeah, but he thinks we deleted all that after we bought those stem cells.

Media Jean: Oh, yeah. But this time it’s for him, not us. We can sign you both up. Father and son, clowning around together!

Chip: Actually, I think I’d like Clown College.

Media Jean: Who wouldn’t? Maybe we can sign Johnny up, too.

Chip: Don’t you think that’s going a little too far?

Media Jean: Ha ha! We can say it’s a new employee benefit!

Johnny: I’m not an employee! I’m an officer of this company. I wrote the Employee Handbook. Clown College is NOT a benefit!

Media Jean: Too late! I just signed you up!

Johnny: You can’t sign me up for anything!

Media Jean: Hmmm. On your registration page, they’re asking for a Clown alias. You know, like Bozo or Hobo Kelly.

Johnny: You better be kidding about all this!

Media Jean: How about Nickels? Or Greenbacks?

Johnny: That’s not funny!

Media Jean: Greenbacks the Clown. I like it! It’s YOU!

Johnny: Oooh, you make me so mad!

Chip: She’s kidding, Johnny. But you do stress out kind of easy. Maybe a week at Clown College would be good for you.

Johnny: AARRGHHH!!

​​Comic strip from the series "Employee Handbook"
(Kid, Inc. Volume 1: Look Out, Tomorrow, Here We Come!)

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