the straight scoop on blacky

But first, views from the tyke:

Used to be, we all attacked the flies, crickets and other invaders in our home with gusto. But the tyke has now learned that they are all God's creatures. Now the preferred method is to shoo them out the door alive.
Yesterday I got a question from the back seat "Grandpa, who made the road?". "The city... well maybe it was the county."
"No, Jesus. He did a lot of stuff."


I was surprised to hear that 'Blacky' is still alive in the old Garrett neighborhood. This is how it started. I had an early morning paper route. The papers were dropped off in a green wooden box in front of the house, usually around 3 AM. My friend Mark and I would occasionally sleep on the front porch, and get up early to deliver the papers.

It was a quiet night a week or so before Halloween. We got up around 3:30 am to do the route, but the papers had not yet arrived. As we waited for the newspapers, we took a stroll down the street. We were about three houses from the bottom of the street when Mark suddenly stopped, and motioned me to do the same. He pointed, and quietly asked me "Do you see that?". I looked where he was pointing and saw a shadow hovering approximately thirteen feet above the manhole cover on the sewer.

As you may recall, Garrett Ave sloped downward forming a decent hill. At the bottom Garret formed a tee with Hudson Ave. There was a field on the other side of Hudson. The sewer protruded from the ground about a foot or so, and was situated in the field a couple feet from the curb and in line with the center of Garrett. More than once, a late night driver relocated that sewer when they ran out of road. Whether anyone perished in these accidents I do not know, but I sure wondered about it that night.

We looked intently at the dark figure, trying to determine if it was indeed a shadow. We decided that surely it must be, so we cautiously advanced. When we began moving forward, the dark figure seemed to fly upward and backward, out of sight. We then backed up to our original position, whereupon it reappeared. We repeated this experiment several times, with the same result. Thoroughly spooked, we returned home, and awaited our papers in the safe confines of the porch. We were extra watchful as we delivered the papers that morning at the break of day.

We told our friends and neighbors about the incident that day. Most people laughed it off, and by evening, the mysterious shadow had aquired it's name - Blacky. Kids ran wild in the neighborhood that night supposedly looking for Blacky. I was turned off by the revelry, because for Mark and me this thing was the real deal.

We returned on subsequent nights to the same spot, but never saw this apparition again. I don't know what forms this story has evolved into, but this is how it began.

The chestnut tree lady