Reply #9: My mother and her five brothers ... [View All]

... grew up in Brooklyn, NY. The five boys used to play stickball in the street with the other neighborhood kids - the fire hydrant was first base, Mrs. Sommers' stoop was second base, and so on.

The guy who owned the candy store on the corner got tired of all the noise outside his establishment, and posted a big tin sign on the side of his building that said Positively NO ball playing allowed.

It was immediately decided that hitting the sign dead-on constituted a home run.

After a while, the sign got so bent from being hit with balls, it started to make a loud clanging noise that reverberated inside the candy store every time it was struck. This sent the irate owner out of his store and around the corner, where he would berate the local hooligans for disturbing his customers.

It didn't take long for the kids to realize that a home run paid off big time. While the owner was busy lecturing everyone around the corner, there was plenty of time for a few of the players to slip into his store, fill their pockets with loads of penny candy, and escape without detection.

My grandparents lived in that same Brooklyn apartment long after my uncles were married men with kids of their own - and they never took any of their own kids to that candy store without pointing to the beat-up tin sign and telling that story.

And now I've told it to you. Hope it gave you a smile on a lonely evening.