When I was in kindergarten I lived in Dorchester, yeah I know, NOT QUINCY, and was invited to my friend Christopher’s home for birthday party. Christopher lived down the street from me, in the house right next door to Danny Wood’s family. If you don’t know who Danny Wood is, he was the New Kid On The Block that was not Joey McIntyre or Jordan Knight. This was in the early 90’s, and NKOTB was all the rage. Psychotic girls used to wait outside the Woods’ house with posters, even though I’m sure Danny probably was off half-heartedly dancing somewhere that was not at his parent’s house. I was a big fan of New Kids in that I copied everything my big sister liked, and also had the NKOTB bedsheets and sleeping bag. So yeah, big fan.
All in all the party was your average shitty birthday party. And by “average shitty birthday party” I mean I had a pretty solid time at this party from what I remember. Pin the tail on the donkey and pinata’ing probably occurred. When Christopher’s parents ran out of shit for us to do, we just kind of sat awkwardly in the backyard giggling about farts and Bart Simpson, probably. Christopher – whose whereabouts I wonder about often, or if he still goes by Christopher and not Chris- had the idea to jump the fence into the Woods’ backyard. I guess I was kind of a nightmare of a child and loved getting turnt up off of danger, so I complied and jumped the fence first. Once on the other side of the fence I taunted the boys to jump over with me or be deemed a pussy forever. Christopher and some random jumped the fence and once they were in the yard, we turned to see if there was anything we could steal, as the rest of the partygoers watched on from Christopher’s yard. Kids are evil. I was only like 6 years old or something, but I knew that I could steal something from NKOTB and sell it on an internet platform called “Ebay” that did not yet exist. I just knew. But we weren’t hardened criminals at the tender age of 6, so we opted for a free can of Coke from a vending machine. That’s how you knew you had “made it” back in the 90’s: a vending machine in the back yard that wasn’t just Uncle Sam’s Cola, or Dr. Thunder. I’m talking a vending machine that dispensed Coke. And by “Coke” I mean A-Cola. Not cocaine. We were children in Dorchester and at least 7 years away from substance abuse. Anyways, we stole the Coke from the machine. I pressed the button, which I remember was super important to me: that I be the one who pressed the button. I often psychoanalyze myself for this fact: was a power hungry bitch? Or did I have daddy issues? My dad was always pretty cool, so I guess I was power hungry. So, Christopher grabbed the Coke from my hand, and just as we were turning around to head back to the fence, some guy’s abdomen was right in our faces. Don’t worry, it wasn’t a man’s abdomen in out faces in a creepy way, we were just short because we were in kindergarten so we weren’t eye level. I don’t remember what he said to us, but I think it was something along the lines of a stern “Ahem!”, and he motioned for us to put the can of Coke in his hand. Christopher looked like he shat his Superman tighty whities (irony, ha), and with a shaky hand put the Coke in the dude’s hand. At this point I assumed that it was Danny Wood’s father and that he was being kind of a dick. But I don’t know. We were stealing from him, so I guess “dick” is kind of a strong word. I just felt like, you know, hey, we are 5 or 6, let us trespass as we please and keep the can of soda.
I’m not sure why I wrote this blog. I just felt it had been long enough to admit that I stole from the New Kids on the Block. And I was also kind of hoping that this would reach Danny Wood, and he would send me an autographed picture of him holding a can of Coke so I can sell it on Ebay for $5. But I guess that’s wishful thinking.
