For a while, it was just me and my older brother, Frank. My younger brother didn’t come around until a few years later and even then it took a few years before he was up to speed to be able to hang out with us.

It was the mid-1960s and we were all living in my grandparent’s house at the time in South River, NJ. We were right in the heart of this small blue-collar town where the houses were packed in pretty tight. In our neighborhood you took care of your lawn with a reel mower-the old ones where you push the mower, and the blades would rotate. Anything more than that was overkill.

At that time, the streets were lined with trees. We had chestnut trees along our street at the Division Street side of the house and maple trees on the Stanton Street side.

One day while playing I noticed that someone had nailed a roofing nail (aluminum with a wide flat head) into the tree in front of our house. I was trying to pull it out with my fingers, but it wasn’t budging. Frank came over and asked what I was doing, and I told him I was trying to pull the nail out of the tree.

He got this look of fear on his face said, “No, don’t do that!”

“Why?,” I asked.

“Because if you do all the sap will run out of the tree, it will flood the earth, and we’ll all drown and die.”

My fingers immediately stopped and then backed away from the nail. I think I might have even given it a push back in (that did nothing) to make sure it wouldn’t accidentally pop out.

Now, I know it sounds silly. But look at how old you are as you’re reading this. I was in my low single digits. I might not have even started kindergarten yet. My classroom was the outdoors and Saturday morning cartoons-and some strange shit happened in those cartoons. So, while I was still wondering how the sap of one single tree could come rushing out and flood the entire earth to a point that would rival Noah’s high sea adventure, I wasn’t taking any chances. I mean, I had a lot of life to live. I’ve never kissed a girl at that point or even driven a car, and both were on my bucket list.

Move forward a couple of weeks. We’re out in front of the house playing baseball in the street. We didn’t have much car traffic running through town back then and only had to stop occasionally for a passing car. As we wrapped up the game and our friends went home Frank went over to the tree and when he saw me coming over he started playing with the nail.

“What are you doing?” I asked with fear in my voice.

“I’m gonna take the nail out,” he replied.

“No! Don’t do it. You’re gonna flood the earth and we’re all gonna die!”

“I don’t care. I’m ready to die.” he said.

I shot back, “Well, I’m not.” I went to push him away with all the strength I had. Being two years younger, I only managed to budge him a little. He went back and started fiddling with the nail. A sick, demonic smile spread across his face.

I pleaded with him to stop. I begged. I cried.

He looked over at me and stopped. For the rest of the day I made sure that we didn’t go anywhere near that tree. I suggested taking our bikes and going to see our cousin Stevie who lived on Kamm Ave, pretty much the south edge of town.

That summer was hellish. From time to time we’d wind up playing in front of the house and when the muse hit, Frank would go to the tree to watch me squirm.

It wasn’t until weeks later, when I had to good sense to ask an adult if what my brother had told me about the sap rushing out of the tree and drowning the world was true. I remember laughter, a swig of beer they had been holding, following by a decisive, “NO.”

And then it all made sense. My instincts were right. There was no way a tree can hold that much sap to drown the entire earth. Sap was also thick and sticky – thicker than pancake syrup. There was no way that it was going to come rushing out before someone could go over and plug it back up if it did indeed have the potential to flood the earth and kill everyone.

Sometime later, we were playing out front and my brother starting taunting me with the nail again. He laughed as I ran into the house. A few minutes later I emerged with the hammer from the kid’s tool set that we received for Christmas the previous year. I walked to the tree and using the claw side of the hammer, yanked the nail right out of the tree.

As you can see, since you’re reading this, the world did not get flooded with a sudden rush of tree sap. Humanity did not perish. But something did die; Frank’s demented hold on me. I still love him though. He is my brother after all.