Mike

The lot next to our house was vacant in May 1963 when we moved to Littleton. It held all the earth that was dug from our lot and dumped when our house was built. Johnny Robinson and I used the dirt piles as hills the Indians came over to attack the cavalry or to roll rocks down creating landslides like those we imagined happened in the canyons in the Rockies. Grass and weeds grew sporadically on the mounds and rain created ravines, gullies, and wadis everywhere. ### Then in August a construction crew showed up to build what became the Sheehan’s house. I was the shortest kid in fourth grade. Johnny wasn’t much bigger. To us, these construction guys were giants with broad chests, big guts, big hands and big feet. They all carried metal toolboxes, and lunchpails and thermoses, and smoked liked crazy. In two months they turned our Rocky Mountains into a plain old suburban landscape.### Every day after they left, Johnny and I snuck into the house under construction, looked out the windows, rummaged through the extra bricks and shingles, cigarette butts, and bits of discarded wood to find make-believe weaponry and loot. We threw rocks out the windows and defended the outpost from imagined German and Japanese attacks, as if we were our dads during the war. When the house was done and they installed the door locks, the war ended and the Sheehans moved in. ### My family moved away when I went to college and I didn’t go back until my tenth high school reunion. That was 1983. After the dance, a lot of us went to the lake. Some guys brought beer. Jimmy Sheehan (he now went by Jim) brought screwdrivers in a red and white thermos with the Marlboro logo on the side. He found it in his parents’ basement. It was the same one used by the fattest carpenter in the crew that built their house. Johnny and I couldn’t believe it. God, that brought back memories.