An embarrassing story and special moment

In July 1969 I suffered the most embarrassing incident of my adolescent life. I was 12 years old and just two months from turning 13 years of age. I was leaving elementary school and about to enter Jr. High School. It was a time of change for me. I grew 8 inches during my sixth grade year and went from a kind of squatty kid to a full blown teenager. I was at that point in my life that you never ever want to look bad in front of the girls. Oh was this was going to be bad night.

There may have been other people there that night but I really only recall the principal players. My best friend Jimmy Cox and I were up at the McCullough girls house playing records. That's what we did in those days. We sat around, played records, and sang our hearts out. The girls would get up and dance but we just watched them dance. Wanda and Mary Nell McCullough were there and so was Kathy Roche. Kathy's presence was of particular importance. For years the older guys were going steady with the older girls but Kathy and I, being the youngest of the bunch, were kind of on the sidelines watching the game. There was a effort, I believe engineered by Mary Nell, to make Kathy and I boyfriend/girlfriend. It almost happened but never really did. This very night may have had a lot to do with that. But I certainly did not want to do anything stupid in front of Kathy. Again, this was going to be a bad night.

In one of the few moments of silence that night, a sound slipped out from my body. I wish I could say it was a good part of my body that it came from but that is not the case. It was very faint and would have been ignored if not for good ole Jimmy Cox. Jimmy let loose with the loudest and most over exaggerated "What was that?" I have ever heard. I stammered for a second and all I could muster was a sickly, feeble "Excuse me". Jimmy howled with laughter. Forever. He doubled over. He cried he was laughing so hard. Seconds became minutes, the minutes seemed to become hours. The girls were polite and tried not to laugh but Jimmy's uncontrollable shrieks were just too much. They were all about to split with laughter and I understand this now but at that moment I just needed to get out of that room. So I did something I had never done in that house and walked to the back den where the McCollough's parents were. They asked me what everyone was laughing about and I just mumbled "nothing". I'm sure that by my beet red face and general attitude they knew that whatever the joke was I was the brunt of it and that I needed shelter.They told me I should stay in there for a few minutes because something special was about to happen. They pointed to their TV and I turned to hear "One small step for man..." .

I wasn't the coolest kid in the house that night. I was, once again, the goofball of the bunch. But I was the only one of the kids that were in the house that night that saw Neil Armstrong, live and as it happened, step on the moon.

I'm off and peddling for now.