PUSHERS AND BANGERS

Brother Bud THE PUSHER! (Wonder what I'm about to eat?)

My brother Bud was a pusher with sound effects. He remained that way his entire life. I was and still am a banger. Everyone knows that God only makes two kinds of boys. Pushers and bangers. A pusher is a boy that plays with any thing with wheels, wings, runs on a track, or has spokes, and moves up or down and may have a motor to imitate with verooms of cars and trucks, and roars like an airplane. Bud spent hours pushing toy cars around the house or flying airplanes by holding them in his hand and running through out the house and yard diving the plane down low and up as high as he could reach. Every now and then he had two planes, one in each hand. Then he had two motors to make. He was gifted. Everyone knew he was gifted. I tried to keep up but being younger and no talents as a pusher I was a total failure. I had no talent being a motor. Bud talked and slept cars, airplanes, trucks, busses, and wagons, even roller-skates and bicycles.

Christmas Eve Dad would set up the train platform that he made. It was about 4 by 7 foot with two track loops with painted roads and a lake. We had a mountain tunnel on a curve on the back right corner then onto the bridge over a lake on the back center. Then left turn to the left side over a switch to the round house in the middle center of the board. The outer loop had a Depot for passengers and a ramp for loading and unloading milk cans from an automatic milk boxcar. Dad made the buildings, tunnel, bridge and the roundhouse. He decorated the whole board with little houses that lit up to look like a village. It was beautiful and Bud spent hours running the train. He was the sound and could choo-choo and whistle with the best. I only wanted to operate the train when he was doing it. That sounds like a normal younger brother. When it was my turn I would take it apart to see how it worked and put it back together. Bud was a pusher to the end. He went into the Navy V-5 program at 17 and one half years with parent's signature. Learned to fly Navy fighters on and off Aircraft Carriers day and at night. When he would explain a maneuver with his hand as the airplane here came the noise of the motor. He was a very gifted pusher the best I have ever known.

I was a banger with sound effects. Bangers bang and shoot Indians, or robbers, and during the war the Germans, known as Krauts, and the Japanese were Japs. I am sure we bangers on our block shortened the war by years. Bud was a pusher and never got involved with bangers. We bangers had forts, trenches, foxholes and all types of defenses in the vacant lots on our street.

I had a white handled six-shooter cap pistol with a leather holster; a real bent barreled .22cal. lever action rifle without a bolt. If it could have been shot, the shooter would have been shot in the ear due to the bend of the barrel. But it was a REAL rifle. The other bangers had homemade rifles made from a wooden board.

There were more bangers than pushers in those day and it was a good thing if you look back and check the statistics you will see how safe the streets were, all because we bangers had our six shooters strapped on and were not afraid to protect girls, women, small children, and any old person over 20.

Theirs no wonder in today’s America, that half of the boys are in danger of becoming extinct. We have stifled a generations of bangers. If a boy banger is not allowed to develop his natural gifts, then this country will become even more lawless than it is now. Today's boys are forced to be politically correct PCc). The removal of cap pistols from the hands of little boys have made our streets unsafe for all of us over 20, not to mention the girls, women, and small children. Its no wonder so many boys are on Ritalin. The PCers have turned the bangers from defenders into druggies.

Bud could tell you how the motor in a car worked. How the gears worked. How the drive train worked. But I could take them apart and repair what he talked about. I was very valuable when Bud's bicycle needed repair. Little brothers are worth a lot sometimes.