Tricylcle racing

We almost lost the house in that flood. During the night storm, water surged through the streets, broke our cellar windows, burst the downstairs door, churned through our basement as the water rose and rose and pulled down the drop ceiling.

In the basement I waded in waist-high water and watched the dryer and washer bob and jerk against their corded leashes, still plugged into the wall and still running. The tide followed me up the staircase and I screamed at God to stop the damn water and the water abated at the top stair and rippled. Then we evacuated.

After a day, the sump pump emptied the underground pool of water and then the sump pump died.

We were left a mold garden. We lost all our books, all our art, lost five computers, lost all my clothes.

I emailed all my friends for help in the middle of a work day and all my friends came to our house. We tore down the drywall, tore down the paneling, tore up the soggy carpets and rugs. We wore mask bandanas and hauled out the furniture, threw away books and toys and desks and clothes from the laundry room. Sewage and paint and neighborhood filth slid down our walls and puddled on the bare, tile floor.

Dwight found a dead cat. “That’s not my cat,” I said.

My wife ran the projects upstairs and outside: Getting a new electrical board, calling the county, finding a dumpster company. She chased an electrician out of the house because he doubled his quote.

“Hey,” my wife called downstairs, “County says we can’t throw out any asbestos.” Rick told me, “We just filled the dumpster with asbestos and drop ceiling. We should empty that dumpster right now.”

And we did.

The dumpster company took it away and brought it back empty at dawn. We filled and emptied three dumpsters that week.

By the third day, we were down to cinder blocks and columns and no one got hurt. We concocted a mixture of poison and bleach and clorox and started scrubbing the walls and floors. We wore goggles and old shirts and hats and tried to be careful. When we were done, the room was soaking wet and a toxic dump no more and no spores were living or growing, not even mold. So turned on each other and had a bleach spray gun fight, laughing like idiots.

All the women at the top of the stairs looked down and shouted, “Idiots.”

Rom flung his shirt atop the trash pile. “I’m never wearing that again,” he said. I picked it up. This was now the only shirt I owned. Peter said, “I can’t imagine what you’re going through.” I was drinking bourbon from his bottle. “Yes, you can,” I said.

After everyone left I sat on the basement floor crisscross applesauce. The basement was empty, desolate, cold, and dark, with three bare hanging light bulbs and one bare toilet and no basement walls. My kids were wearing other kids’ clothes. My wife was feeding the family out of cardboard boxes. I had failed as a husband, father, landowner. We had saved the house but I did not hold back the tide.

Dad arrived the next day. He parked his LeSabre in front of our house and we reviewed the damage. Front lawn, washed away. Trailer tracks gouged into the lawn by dumpsters. Three days of torrential rain turned the property into a soggy sponge.

“Where’s your car,” Dad asked. “Gone,” I said. The Pathfinder was marooned in the driveway and filled with water halfway up the steering wheel.

At a fire, Pop would run a command center in the middle of everything. He could lead, he could act, he could solve. But now he had nothing to do.

So Dad gave me his car keys. “Take my car. I’ll buy another one in New York,” he said. “You give me a ride to the train station when I leave.” Because that’s what dads do. 
And just like that, I had some hope. 

We wouldn’t have cash for many paychecks, but I wasn’t getting a car loan at Carmax. 

Dad bought some good pizza, and we all sat in the front yard on benches and beach chairs, our feet sinking into the lawn, folding the slices like you should. Dad said to the kids, “Let’s go bike riding.” I picked up Keith’s tricycle and Pop picked up Grace’s tricycle and we all went into the basement.

Dad saw the dark and dank floor and a stink only your eyes can smell and said, “We now have the best indoor racetrack on the block.” And we did. The kids were 3 and 2 years old and they saw the Daytona Raceway at night under three bare light bulbs. 

And so they started, pumping pudgy legs on their tricycles on the tile oval, shrieking and laughing. They cornered the far turn in the dark and burst out of the shadows under that one light.

After four laps, Dad pulled over Grace. She was a sweatball. He pulled out his little notebook, and with his foot on her front tire, started writing. “Wot’s that,” asked Grace. At 2 years old, she was nearly deaf and she spoke words the way she heard them. “It’s a speeding ticket,” Dad said and handed her the paper. “Slow down.”

This was Grace’s first speeding ticket and she frowned, confused. She looked at Dad and Dad put on his sunglasses and leaned down at her. She wriggled, then she grinned, threw the ticket in the air, laughed at Dad, and peeled away.

Keith was already laughing when Dad pulled him over. His knees were above the handlebars. It wasn’t his bike. “These fines are going to just keep going up,” Dad said. Keith tore up the ticket, let his head fall back, tossed the shreds over his page boy haircut, and laughed and laughed. And he was gone again.

And the women at the top of the stairs shouted down, “Don’t hurt the kids.”

And for the next hour, my kids were besotted horsesweat in musty cotton clothes. The kids fell sometimes and sometimes they rode in the wrong directions. And Dad kept writing tickets. 

All I had were singles and I gave my dad a dollar each time he wrote a ticket, and he’d put them in his shirt pocket. I would not see that money again, but Dad had given me purpose. That’s what dads do; pay the bills and help when they can.

After school the next day, six kids were at our front door with their tricycles. “That’s OK,” Dad said, “I have another notebook.” 

I went to find my wallet.