The day was long and hot in the thick of
summer, 1988. I was ten, and fooling around with some mini-
particle accelerators I swiped out of our neighbor's trash.
There wasn't much for a kid like me to do, back in those days, except watch
loony tunes,
code, and bug my sister. I picked up my power from the power lines running through my back yard. They were the big tall power lines about 100 feet up in the air, so I had to sneak up there when my mom wasn't looking. I hooked up the power, and played around with a few switches here and there, and before
Magnum, P.I. came on at 10:30, I had my very own
wormhole.
I remember it like it was yesterday... well, maybe more like last Tuesday around 8 PM. But just the same I remember it. I wasn't sure where the
wormhole would lead, so I took my cat spike and tossed him in. To my utter lack of surprise he disappeared like a good kitty and never came back. I called my sister out to the back yard. Maybe it would send her to
China and I wouldn't have to see her ever again.
But before I could convince her to see where it went my mom came out to see what was going on and to get me into bed. Before I could close the wormhole, mom started screaming like crazy "Hey! What's that worm hole doing in my back yard??" She wasn't a dumb lady and she'd know the difference between a wormhole and just a hole in
space/time.
I had to plead and pout and cry to get her to let me keep it. It was just like that one time in
Toy's R Us, when I whined until she bought me that
GI Joe boat, with the little plastic missiles on it. Except this time, I was actually whining for a good reason. I never ever ended up playing with that stupid boat. I just wanted to see if I could get it.
Mom eventually told me I could keep it but I'd have to close it for the night and go to bed. The very next morning, after captain crunch and
Punky Brewster, I went out back to go play with my wormhole. Dad was out back moving the lawn, as he tends to do when the grass grows an eighth of an inch. I cranked up the accelerator and my
wormhole popped right up. Dad didn't even notice.
Just then I got a phone call from my friend Danny who lived down the street. I used to ride my
NightRider big wheel down to his house every day during the summers and we would write programs all day in
BASIC. He sounded like he had a cold. We talked a bit and eventually he told me that he found my cat in his basement last night. Danny was really allergic to cats so that explained his stuffy sounding voice. I was glad to hear spike was okay and that he didn't explode in the
vacuum of space, like I thought he did last night. I told him I'd be over in 20 seconds and hung up the phone.
Running back outside, I asked my dad if I could go to Dan's house and he said that's fine but be back for lunch because he wanted to ask me where pants were (Dad had a habit of being a little weird). So I skipped towards the wormhole and was instantly transported through the wormhole to Danny's basement.
He was so surprised to see that
snot flew out of his nose and all over his face. After he cleaned himself up a bit we went back to my house on foot and I showed him my new toy. We played with it all day long, and figured out a way to come back through the same hole, and change where it would come out. From time to time we had to help Dad find his pants, but we mostly played with the wormhole. It was getting dark out and Danny had to go home.
After a while i got bored with it and now all of the equipment is sitting in my closet in my apartment. But from time to time I still think of all the fun we had with it. I never did get to send my sister off to
China.