Clam Chair

by

Rick Brown

I wouldn’t say I was a “cool kid” in high school. But I did have a knack for making my classmates laugh. That can be very important as a teenager. I know it got me out of more than a couple fights. So I’ve always been grateful for my comic sensibilities.
    
I did get invited to parties once in a while. In 8th grade … when everyone was too young to drive a car … let alone own one … I had a girlfriend. It only lasted maybe 9 months. But when you’re 14 years old that seems like 3 years. So the junior high social events were mostly “couples only”. These soirees began innocently enough … guys on one side of the room (or garage) … girls on the other. But as soon as the sun went down and the “Best of Bobby Vinton” hit the turntable … couples coupled up to slooooooow dance. (Only the girls faaaaast danced because boys thought it made them look like idiots … which it did.)
    
Invariably by Mr. Vinton’s third number … most likely “Blue Velvet” (It seemed as if every one of his hits included the word “blue”) everyone had abandoned the dance floor for a dark area. And that’s when the “party” became “make out derby”. My mother caught wind of this and was more than indignant. Me? I took it in stride … as a valuable “Blue on Blue” learning experience. And as far as I knew it probably had been quite some time since my Mom and Dad made out. I figured she was jealous.
    
By high school the party dynamic had shifted. Couples could make out in the privacy of a car. So parties had more stag and a lot less sucking face … and NO Bobby Vinton! Such extravaganzas were more about acting cool, listening to music and waiting to see if a carload of greasers would show up drunk and puke on something … or some one. Also, this is when the realization that my “mingling” talents were null and void. ZERO! Mangling conversations was more my forte apparently.
    
While I did have a car at the age of 16 the girlfriend was non-existent. I went out with girls but never more than a time or two. And for the most part that was fine with me. I could not have handled the “hang around her locker, carry her books, drive her home” lifestyle most couples seemed to embrace. That … and my maturity level at 17 years old was somewhere around … oh … 11.
    
Did I tell you I was funny?

So the summer of 1969 rolls around … the summer before my class takes our place as SENIORS! And I get invited to a BIG PARTY being thrown by a real, honest to God CHEERLEADER!! She was a cute, sweet sparkplug of a girl named Teri. Her parents would be chaperoning the backyard affair too. This made my mother very happy … not that I had a make out option at the time anyway.

Teri’s family had a large yard … a lot of us did growing up on the outskirts of Olmsted Falls, Ohio. At the time the village was just that … mostly outskirts. There was to be volleyball! Music! Fast dancing (for the girls)! Food! It all sounded like a perfect “summer before senior year” blowout!!

I was excited … AND very nervous. I came fashionably late hoping somehow the “mingling” might work out better if I did. But there were 30 or more of my classmates there. The crowd looked to me to be in the hundreds. I decided to bank on my humor talents to get myself through the evening.
    
Still, in a group this large how could I rely on my rapier wit alone? I sat down to ponder this for a minute when the chair I plopped down in bounced playfully. Maybe I could come up with something hilarious using the chair? I wasn’t above sight gags then and I’m not now. After all, I did own a rubber chicken.
    
The chair itself was one of those 1950-60s steel patio chairs. The back looked like a shell with tubular armrests that attached to the seat and curled underneath to make the legs and base. Some call them Clam Chairs. I had no idea what they were called at the tender age of 17 … going on 12.
    
Now I’ve researched the “Clam Chair” extensively and you know what? Just about ANYTHING can be called a “Clam Chair”! You’ve got ice fishing Clam Chairs! Chairs that actually look like a CLAM! Modernistic Salvador Dali surreal Clam Chairs!! Camping CLAM CHAIRS!! I’m betting that if you ate a plate of steamed clams while sitting in a beanbag chair THAT would also be a CLAM CHAIR!!
    
Regardless … for the sake of efficiency and storytelling clarity I’m calling what I was sitting in a CLAM CHAIR!
    
I realized soon enough that if I pushed my weight back in the Clam Chair slightly, lifted one leg and began bouncing I could actually HOP around the PARTY like some Krazed Kangaroo Klam Chair!! So there I am … smiling … waving … one leg kicking like a Radio City Rockette … the other bouncing feverishly … weaving my way though the throngs of mingling partiers!! Hoppity HOP! HOP! through the volleyball game!! Bounce! Bounce! around the Frisbees! And believe me … these people were laughing enthusiastically … cheering really … and egging me on at the same time. I was really enjoying my mobility and whacky approach to “mingling” for sure.
    
Then I saw Teri’s parents sitting on the patio watching over the entire range of festivities … Frisbee … volleyball. I mean … can you imagine trying to keep an eye on 30 or so teenagers? Picture it as a movie frame of a party … and here comes a guy bouncing his way across from the right side of your yard to the left … waving like the British Queen …  leg kicking like a Rockette … and flashing a shit eating grin on his face? If they were aghast I certainly didn’t see it. So I milked it as long as I could … which seemed like an hour … even though in real time it was probably 20 minutes.
    
Eventually the joke wore thin … not to mention the integrity of the Clam Chair’s steel tubes. Eventually, I sunk lower and lower in the clam chair until it was bent beyond repair. It became an un-bounce-able Clam Chair. So I hid the wreckage behind a tree.
    
I mean … I felt guilty … still do really. But what could I say? In some weird 17 year old with the maturity of 11 sort of way I made Teri’s party memorable. At the time I figured a successful “summer before senior year” party would mean more to Teri … and possibly her parents … than a Clam Chair.
    
I certainly hope so. Otherwise … regardless of WHICH kind of Clam Chair I’d choose … at today’s prices … I owe Teri’s family about $300.
    
Did I tell you I’m funny?

And I still can’t mingle … mangle yes … mingle? No way.