A Wild Ride

Part 1

(Circa 1985-1999)

…and after a long hiatus (resulting from a serious case of writers’ block and just plain laziness) I’m back writing my blog. I hope you enjoy it.

How can two children be so very opposite: one sweet and calm (albeit, stubborn); the other mischievous, inventive and, well, frankly a little wild – but oh, so funny! This blog post will focus on the wild one.

Luke’s entire life, from even before his conception (see blog post “Be It Unto Me”, 10/18/2020) until now has been a miracle. I always thought that if he lived to be 18 (he is soon to be 45) it would be a miracle. I will attempt to present my adorable Luke and his craziness in the following vignettes…

Ice “Follies”

Just after we moved to Flagstaff Luke and Shannon were introduced to ice skating at the city rink. They loved ice skating and being season pass holders, they became fixtures at the ice rink. Luke was even hired as an ice guard when he was 14 years old and eventually became one of the managers. And, of course, ice hockey became the love of his life and the focus of our family life. Shannon was even on a hockey team (one of two girls on a boys’ team).

Luke’s first fearless steps onto the ice was at 8 years old and was unfazed at his numerous falls. And when he couldn’t figure out how to stop, he would just slam himself, full force, into the boards, pick himself up and do it all over again. Eventually he learned the art of hockey stops and became an expert at spraying ice at anyone within 15 feet. (He was once banished from an ice rink in Colorado Springs – not for misbehaving but for skating too fast and spraying too far.)

One cold winter day we found him digging a huge, wide, shallow hole in the back yard, packing dirt to form a rim around the entire thing. That evening when the temperature dipped into the teens, he filled the hole with water and in the morning, voila! There was an ice rink – a mecca for the neighborhood kids.

Eventually he became one of the ice rink managers. That position came with certain unique duties, one of which was operating a Zamboni. In the eyes of the other skaters, that elevated him into celebrity status and evoked a sense of awe in each one. Watching him drive that huge machine around and around the ice rink, resurfacing the ice, was mesmerizing and conjured up in every “rink rat’s” heart the famous Zamboni song, “I Want to Drive the Zamboni”.

Late one night after he was finished clearing the ice he drove the Zamboni outside to dump out the shaved ice, just as he always did. However, some ice was stuck in the auger. So he shoved his hand into the auger to clear it out. However, there was a problem: the auger was still on and began to chew up his hand and arm. Thankfully, he got it turned it off before it could totally destroy his limb but it did result in a trip to the emergency room. He arrived home early the next morning sporting a huge white bandage covering a multitude of stitches.

The ice rink in Flagstaff was only open in the wintertime. When spring came they would melt the ice and the rink would be transformed into a roller rink for the summer. The dreaded day came when it was time to melt the ice. Luke and all of his hockey friends were in mourning. So they all decided to have one last skate before the ice was completely gone. However, it was on a school day. So Luke called Flagstaff High School, disguising his voice, vainly trying to sound like his father to excuse himself from school that day because he was “sick”. He and his friends proceeded to gather at the rink, remove their clothes, and skate one last time in their underwear.

The school, not being fooled by Luke’s impersonation, called Bill to see if he had, indeed, excused Luke for the day. Ummm, no. Luke was busted and was sentenced to in-house detention for the rest of the week. So, instead of being in class, Luke spent his days in the school office. Being his charming self, however, the secretaries fell in love with him. They brought him homemade cookies and let him work on their cars all week. (Some punishment!)

Every fall the staff would transform the summer roller rink back into an ice rink. Laying ice was quite a process, which included laying down the lines and face-off circles for hockey. The face-off circles were just about the same size as a large pizza. And so for the next season, unbeknownst to unsuspecting hockey players, beneath one of the face-off circles there lay a large, frozen pepperoni pizza.

As I mentioned before, hockey became Luke’s focus in life. He loved the sport and our family life revolved around practices, games and tournaments. Weekends would often take us traveling to different locations for games: Albuquerque, Tucson, Phoenix, Las Vegas and several locations in California. Luke had a reputation for being the “enforcer”. He was a powerful skater and could skate so fast he could hit the puck and skate fast enough to pass it to himself. And when players on the opposing team saw Luke coming they quickly learned, the hard way, that they had better get out of his way.

Roller Blading

When winter was over Luke was, sadly, forced to put his ice skates away. But, out came his roller blades. His roller blades were not only confined to the rink, they took him all over town too. The steps of the Flagstaff City Hall were one of his favorite venues (much to the chagrin of the police). He was never arrested but did get a few warnings.

One day he and his friends decided to rollerblade down Snowbowl Road. Snowbowl Road climbs from 7,500 ft. to 9,200 ft. – over 2,000 feet in 6.6 miles. It is very steep and very curvy. Luke had a 4-wheel drive, 1978 Chevy Blazer, which they drove up to the top of Snowbowl Road. Luke and 3 of his friends donned their hockey gear and roller blades and prepared their descent down the road. Their 14-year old friend got behind the wheel of the Blazer to drive it. His 12-year old brother got into the back of the Blazer, opened the back window and prepared to videotape the adventure.

The descent began. The Blazer drove in front of the roller-bladers, with the intent that if they went too fast, they could slow themselves down with the car. And they did go fast – fast enough that the bearings on the skates got so hot, they melted the wheels! And one trip down Snowbowl Road apparently wasn’t enough. They did it several times that day.

It was over a year before the boys got up enough nerve to tell us parents of their adventure and show us the video. We were horrified at what they had done and unsuccessfully tried to explain how dangerous that was! Their response? “But we had our hockey gear on.” It’s a miracle they survived – and a miracle that we still have our sanity (but of course, that’s questionable…? Warning: kids will challenge your sanity.)

Airborne!

Luke had a curious affinity for flying. There were two times that his picture appeared on the front page of our local newspaper. The first time it was when he was riding on his friend’s snowmobile. They were racing over the snow-covered field near our house, jumping over a high berm. That’s when the newspaper photographer snapped the picture, just as they were mid-air.

His next appearance on the front page was when he was playing hockey. Skating full-force down the ice, trying to save the puck from going into the net, suddenly he realized he was skating directly toward his goalie. He made a flying leap to avoid colliding with him. The newspaper photographer, again, caught him mid-air.

And I never knew exactly what I might witness when I looked out our windows. But it wasn’t uncommon to see my son flying through the air in one form or another.

Our back yard held an attraction for all the neighborhood kids: a big trampoline. It was so much fun to watch them jumping and laughing. Sometimes on warm summer days, they would turn on a sprinkler under the trampoline to keep them cool as they jumped. Luke, however, wasn’t content to simply jump on it. Oh no! He just had to take it to another level, climbing up onto the roof. From there he would take a flying leap and catapult himself higher than ever.

Sometimes when I looked out the front window, I would see bicycles flying through the air. Luke, using Bill’s shop equipment and wood scraps, built several ramps that he would drag out into the street. He and his friends would race their bicycles as fast as they could, hit the ramps and fly through the air, hopefully landing with their wheels safely on the ground.

And on windy days, Luke would take our giant parachute out of the garage. He would hang tightly to the cords and catch the wind. There he was again, airborne!

One weekend Luke, his friend and his friend’s father took their boat and went to Lake Powell. We sternly ordered him to NOT jump off the rocks into the lake. It was fine to go boating and swimming and have a great time but DO NOT jump off the rocks! They had a great time and returned Sunday evening, safe and sound, recounting the fun they had. But they didn’t share too many details. Several months later on Luke’s birthday we had a party for him. Luke’s friend presented a very special gift to him. It was a poster-sized photograph of Luke, mid-air, jumping off a 50 foot rock into the waters of Lake Powell! (So much for our orders.)

We had an old queen size air mattress that had popped its baffles and became one giant air pillow. However it had a hole in it and couldn’t hold air for very long. We also had an air compressor with a very long air hose. One summer day all the neighborhood kids congregated in Luke’s upstairs bedroom. Luke had run the air hose from the garage up through his bedroom window and attached it to the air mattress, keeping it inflated. All day long he and the other kids jumped off his top bunk bed onto the mattress below and all day the compressor was getting the workout of its life. And all day long the infectious laughter of the kids kept me laughing too.

A Parent’s Heart

As a parent, your intrinsic instincts are to protect your children – both psychologically and physically. Their joys are your joys; their hurts are your hurts. Yet you know that they need to have many varied experiences of life and if you protect them too much you are robbing them of valuable lessons that they will need to flourish in adulthood.

In Luke’s case, trying to protect him from injury was like trying to catch a cloud in my hand. It was impossible. My mother’s heart winced when he was knocked out during a hockey game and feared for his life whenever he would fall. Yes, he did hurt himself, but he learned from it – and by the grace of God, survived.

And all throughout his life I remembered that he wasn’t mine. God had given him to me as a gift and I had given him back as my gift to God. Whenever my heart feared for Luke’s safety, I just prayed that God would guard this precious gift – that he would hold Luke in his loving, protective hands. (But I knew that God had his hands full and he would have to send a whole lot of guardian angels to protect this livewire.)

One day when Luke was about 19 years old I drove into the driveway after a long day’s work. Luke had climbed halfway up a ladder and when he turned around to see me, he fell off the ladder. My mother’s heart did its all-to familiar fearful flip-flop when I saw him fall. But he picked himself up, brushed off the dirt and greeted me, unfazed, with a big smile.

I realized something very profound that day: he knew the right way to fall without hurting himself. And how had he learned to fall? Because he had done it so many times. He had become an expert – but my hair did turn just a little bit grayer that day.

…But wait! There’s more! Stay tuned …