Some people succeed the first time
First times for me were usually fraught with perils.
We published a story recently about the opening of the Dawson Grange Community Fair. It stirred memories for me, since we used to attend when I was a kid. We lived a few miles away from the fairgrounds on what was commonly called the Scottdale-Dawson Stretch (Route 819).
I think I was 4 or 5 years old and excited about the prospect of visiting the fair for the first time, especially getting on some of the rides that my older brother described to me.
Upon arrival, I bugged my father to ride the Ferris wheel. Now, this was a local carnival/fair so we aren’t talking about a ride that was huge or moved with undulations, swayed or bounced. The wheel did nothing more than turn while riders sat in swiveling seats.
Climbing into the night sky, the wheel carried us (my dad was in the seat with me) higher and higher until we reached the uppermost position. It was then I learned that I don’t really do well on amusement park rides.
As the wheel began its second churn – I mean turn – I became sick as a dog. Dad held onto me as I wretched over the side of the seat, my stomach spinning faster and faster.
Mom was on the ground and informed the ride attendant that he needed to halt the wheel so I could get off. Ignoring my mother, the fellow just looked the other way. That is until the seat we were in came near enough to the ground that my dad forcefully told the man to stop the ride. He listened to dad and I stumbled from the Ferris wheel like a drunk.
So much for that first time.
On my first day of school, I got whacked in the side of the head when a student threw a piece of wood down an embankment. I was standing too close to his back swing and went home with a nasty bruise and black eye.
Then there was the time I was supposed to go see my first live high school football game. Dad was taking me and my brother to see the Scottdale Scotties. However, I came down with some kind of flu that left me feverish and in bed.
My mother, an artistic person who at the time was creating an oil painting of some landscape, sat with me as I slept. She left me for a few moments and when she returned, found that I had gotten out of bed and smeared oil paint all over myself.
I have to take her word for it because I don’t remember anything about the incident other than my father, brother and mother standing over the bed looking at me like I had two heads. At that moment, without any idea of what I had done to deserve such attention, I realized I was in another pair of pajamas and felt like I had been thoroughly scrubbed. I suppose the fever made me delirious and erased all memory of my escapade.
I also remember the first date I had with a girl. I was so frightened I hardly spoke two words to her. It was the last date I had with her.
And, there was that first time riding a bicycle when my brother dared me to race, I crashed and he promptly ran over me.
There were a lot of other firsts in my lifetime that didn’t turn out so well, but I won’t go into that now.
Let’s just say that for the things that really mattered, I tried again, and in cases, again and again until I got it right and wasn’t hospitalized.
But don’t ask me to do anything that I’ve never done before. I’ve survived enough firsts in my life. I’m just happy with the seconds.
Have a good day.
James Pletcher Jr. is HeraldStandard.com business editor. He can be reached at 724-439-7571 or by email at jpletcher@heraldstandard.com.