When I was little we used to go to the old Mesa Theater on 2nd South Street to watch double features on Saturdays. At noon Mom would drop Keith and Phillip and me and Linda off in front of the theater, then go home to do her chores, picking us up later in the afternoon. It only cost a quarter to see both movies, so it was pretty cheap entertainment. Sometimes we would meet our cousins at the theater and walk to Grandma Johnson's house afterwards, she only lived a few blocks west. We could walk on back streets to Country Club Road, but it was a big, main street, so we had to hold hands and be careful crossing there.
Later in the evening I would tell mom about the movies we saw. I always thought she really wanted to hear about them, but perhaps she was just being nice. I loved Walt Disney pictures and adventure movies, but if they were complicated I wanted Linda to sit by someone else because she would ask questions the whole time. I always told her to just be quiet and listen, I didn't know what was going on any better than she did, and if I was answering her questions I couldn't hear what was happening, but she still kept on asking.
One day we saw the movie, "Island of the Blue Dolphins." The story really played with my imagination, and for months after I pretended that I was left alone on an island with just my little brother and wild dogs to keep me company.
We had moved to a new house dad built for us on East 3rd Place, in a subdivision behind Stapley and University. Ours was one of the first houses built on the street, so there were wonderful vacant lots all around us to play on. As houses were built construction crews piled big mounds of dirt on the empty lots which made perfect islands for me to play cast-away. Our dog, Duke, became my special watch dog, although he didn't follow me around and obey my commands like I thought he ought too, and Phillip was a ready built little brother, but he also didn't obey me very well. I had fun, though.
Keith thought he was too old to play kid games, so he and his buddies made their own fun, but sometimes we all hung out together. I can remember the afternoon we decided to let life imitate art, the day after we watched a Gilligan's Island episode where Gilligan became invisible.
It must have been late fall or winter because I remember the grass in the front yard being yellow and brittle. Keith and Phillip and I were playing, and mom told us we had to keep an eye on Linda, too. She was probably three or four, and was being such a pain. She would follow us around wherever we went, asking questions and never leaving us alone. Finally in frustration I told Keith I wished Linda would turn invisible, like Gilligan, so she wouldn't bug us so much.
Keith laughed and said maybe she would. Phillip laughed and said she probably already was. I laughed and told Linda we couldn't see her, and suddenly we were playing the funnest game, pretending we couldn't see Linda even though she was standing right there in front of us. She got so upset! She cried and pouted and shouted, "You can see me! You can see me!" but we walked around like we were blind, looking right at her and declaring she was invisible and we didn't know where she was.
Poor Linda, she really believed us. She chased us around the front yard, trying to make us see her for half an hour before she finally gave up and sat down on the front walkway, crying. I guess mom heard her, because she came out and we got a lecture about being nice to our little sister and not making her feel bad. But it sure was fun.
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