Page 12 - Boca ViewPointe - April '21

Page 12, Viewpointe April 2021

Losing Your Marbles

“In every neighborhood there balanced it on the first digit of the forefinger and propelled the afternoon he had taken everyone’s all but mine. How
And that you had to do. To “flick” a marble, one
he did this was what made him fearsome.
was a marble king.” it with a—yes—flick of the thumb. The rest of the fingers You see there was no rule book definition of what
had to be held tight and parallel, seated flat, resting on the constituted a marble. If it was round and glass it was a
By William A. Gralnick field. If they were not, you were cheating and could forfeit marble, even if you took it off the top of a light fixture and
the match. Depending on the play, one “cunny-thumbed it was half again as big as a golf ball. With his strong hands
There were many a game played on the streets before it,” hitting it gently, or one “let-it-rip,” propelling it far and thick fingers he truly rolled over the competition.
electronics filled those streets with kids looking down across the field of play. On a good day, one left a game of Finesse was not an issue. All one’s marble had to do was
while they were walking. There were the ones played with marbles excreting dust from one’s sneakers, pant cuffs, make a loud enough click to be heard and the clicked
a Spauldeen, or Pinky if you prefer, including stickball, knees if wearing shorts, hands and forearms. Add hair if marble was yours. With “Big Bertha” all he needed to do
the king of them all. it was windy. was come close. Goliath rolled on.
There were the games of imagination, mostly Cowboy “This,” you say, “makes no sense?” I’ve just told you I however, had other ideas. The “no definition” cut
and Indians. There is one however that sticks out because that two kids are inhaling dust into everything that will both ways. I had found a blue marble about the size of a
it had no pink balls attached to them, only glass ones. hold it to shoot little round glass balls with their fingers at pea, nick-named of course “Pee-Wee” after the Brooklyn
It was marbles and this is about the ending of its reign other little glass balls for the prize of taking home more Dodger short-stop of the same nick-name. In order to hit it
as a game played in the dirt of Waldorf Court, Flatbush little glass balls than they started with. And you expect it one had to have a direct hit. Also it was so small that unless
Brooklyn, Midwood section. Remember back with me. to make sense? Come now. one did roll right over it one would never hear a click.
It was clearly a replay of David vs. Goliath, but let In every neighborhood there was a marble king, a David had arrived; he (it?) would rise to the challenge.
me take you to the stage and take you back even to the champ who most always won and whose collection I no longer recall how many marbles were put in the
production notes that set the stage. of marbles was so large that on non-competition days center for the break. The King took at least half of them
On my dead-end street each house had a front yard, others went to his house to ogle them. Marbles, again on the first roll. I had a harder time because unless well
a back yard, and at least one tree that grew in Brooklyn. like baseball cards were traded both for uniqueness and “thumbed” pee-wee would get lost in the dust, stopped
Between the house and the street were two things. One for advantage. Some marbles made better shooters than by a ripple in the dirt. Flicked too hard it would take off,
was the sidewalk, used as previously described, for a lot others. “Nonsense,” you say? flying over the very marbles it was to hit. By and by though
more than walking. The other was a rectangle of space “See previous paragraph,” I retort. two were left in the dust ready to be battled with.
roughly the length of the houses’ front yards. These held In my neighborhood it was King George. King George For a while it was a dust-up. King George kept
the aforementioned tree and grass. That is except for a had a five gallon tin trash can brimming with marbles. missing my pee-wee and in returning fire, my pee-wee
house across the street. He also had large, strong fingers. When he deigned to kept drawing more dust than marble. Then it happened.
Number 23 didn’t look like most all the other Victorian play, which wasn’t often, he was near invincible. Until The King had a near miss leaving me with a “can’t miss.”
style homes. It had an enclosed front room added to it. he wasn’t. David again triumphs!
And it had no grass in that space that had no name. Instead The set was the OK Corral of marbles. King George had
of grass it had dirt--dry, dusty, fine silt dirt. Mud when it called for a round-robin winner take all. Near the end of Losing Your Marbles on page 13
was wet but when dry, it made for a perfect place to shoot
marbles. Marbles?
Here is a game that has gone the way of many that take
time, strategy, and patience to play. The game pieces were, Community Association Meetings Monthly Schedule
well, marbles. Back in the day kids collected marbles.
Didn’t you? They were so popular you could buy them at (All meetings held via Zoom.)
the candy store—that ubiquitous neighborhood institution
that sold a zillion more things than candy. They came in
plastic packs and cost about a quarter. These round pieces All meetings will be held electronically via Zoom. The following is our regular schedule of monthly meetings, however,
of glass came in solid colors, clear, and swirling patterns. sometimes meetings are cancelled or schedules are revised due to holidays, etc. If you would like to attend, please call
Like baseball cards, they were usually not bought for the BPCA office, (561) 395-7551, the day before the meeting to request the Zoom link be emailed to you.
quantity, but for the hopes of finding the unusual, the
odd, or the rare. Most prized were cat’s eyes but more Access Control & Safety Committee 2nd Thursday of each month at 9:30 a.m.
than those were those that had a thin line that ran straight
through the middle. They had a name—like many things Architectural Control Site Committee 1st Friday of each month at 9:30 a.m.
it is long gone from the memory bank.
The game itself was a ground-level cross between Board of Directors 3rd Tuesday of each month at 9:30 a.m.
shuffle board, poker and pool. The table was this dry,
silt covered rectangle. Instead of six pockets there was Budget & Finance Committee The Friday before the third Tuesday of
one “pot,” a concave space at one end of the field. The each month at 9:15 a.m.
balls were the marbles. Replacing the cues or sticks were
one’s thumb and fore-finger. The object? Hitting one’s
opponents’ marbles on the way to sinking one’s own
marble into the pot. At the end, it was winner take all, a
game of strategy to place your marble where it couldn’t be For only
hit but in a place where it might be more likely to be used
to hit the other. The winner “took the pot.” That meant pennies a day,
winning all the marbles from the other guy—and for some
reason it was always a guy. The girls, even then, weren’t Link+ is a
often about to kneel down in the dust and then compound
the idiocy by putting their hands into it. life preserver

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