Kicker by Default

Because I was a weird kid, I used to bring my football and my kicking tee to the playground that was across the street from Coconut Grove Elementary School. The walk was no more than one long block from my house at 3180 Oak Avenue. That must have been around 1956. I was 10. 

Back then no one I knew wanted to be a kicker. Yes, there were some famous professional football kickers but no one I knew wanted to be the next Lou Groza. We all wanted to be star Heisman Trophy running backs like Hopalong Cassady of Ohio State and the Detroit Lions. I had no pretense of being a great player so I spent a lot of hours in that playground kicking the ball against the wire fence that protected the windows of the dining hall at the school. Kick -- get the ball -- set it up -- kick again. As I said, I was a weird kid. 

As a result of all that, I became a kicker. The truth is that even with all that practice I was not a really great kicker. Since most kids were not weird and most kids did not want to be a kicker, it fell on my toe by default because I was not worse than the other kids. I was very lucky because I played on a high school team with "There is No Defense for Larry Rentz" and we won all but our last regular season game. That put us into the playoffs and we won the Florida state championship. Yes we won by my last minute field goal but even that kick was not especially long or interesting. Larry Rentz was the holder. 

At 76 years old, it is fun for me to bore you with some of my personal history. It's also fun to think about how different things were a half a century ago. For example, Dwight D. Eisenhower was president in 1956 and Richard Nixon was his VEEP. My parents wore campaign buttons that said "I like Ike'. No one I knew liked Nixon. He was not a very likable character. He goofed up at the Watergate Hotel and was pretty much a disgrace. 

Today we hear endless stories about Covid and Russia. Back then we heard endless stories about Nixon and the Soviet Union. In Miami we were 90 miles from Cuba and we were sure the Soviets were going to use Cuba as a place to attack the US. Some of my richer friends built bomb shelters in their backyards and the rest of us walked around on pins and needles waiting to be blown into smithereens. 

Back then some girls wore poodle skirts. They also wore something called Bobby-socks. We went to events called sock hops where we danced to 1950s rocknroll songs in the school gym. My high school was in the richest part of Miami -- Coral Gables. I did not live there but I could either attend Coral Gables (CGHS) or Miami High. I had the choice. My parents thought CGHS was a better school so that's where I went.  

Going to school with the richest kids in Miami was an eye-opener. They shopped in the best stores and wore the coolest clothing. I wanted to look like them so I spent a lot of my youth earning money mowing yards and painting houses and I spent it all on clothes. One very peculiar thing about our high school was the social life. Those rich kids really liked to party. We even had fraternities and sororities. The coolest kids were in a frat named Ching Tang. I was in something called Wheel Club. Sometimes the boys in those Frats would get in fights. I recall when Larry Rentz decided to join Wheel instead of Ching Tang. The Chinks came to our next Wheel party and we had a sort of gang war. Ouch.

I believe I have hit my limit for childhood boredom. I promise to get back to macroecon next week.