One of my favorite memories of growing up in Brooklyn NY was my two friends that lived next door to me; I called them my partners in crime. Arthur was a year younger and his brother John was a year older, I was maybe seven at the time. Arthur was a character, however none of the neighborhood kids called him by his given name, they called him Arson Artie. Arson Artie was fascinated with fire, the kid would light a match and gaze at it with a stare on his face as if he just found the gold at the end of the Rainbow. If there were an actual fire in the neighborhood, Artie would be there to watch the flames. This kid was so fascinated with watching fire, he took it upon himself to gather a bunch of wooden clothespins and paper, put it in his bathtub and decided to cook at hotdog. However, in the process of cooking the perfect hotdog, the shower curtain went up in flames. Arson Artie sure was lucky he did not burn down his house that day.

His brother John was more of a serious fella. He was super smart and was a fantastic artist; he could draw just about anything. I remember he drew the face of Cherry Nose, who was the police officer who patrolled are neighborhood. He was a big Irish man with a huge red nose, which is how he got his nickname. Every time we saw Cherry Nose, keeping a far enough distance, we would chant, “Brass buttons, blue coat couldn’t catch a nanny goat” then run like hell, laughing our heads off, hoping he was not trailing behind us.

One day the three of us decided we were going to make wine and have a big party. All we needed were grapes. Lucky for us, Mr. Fritz, an elderly German immigrant who grew his own grapes in his backyard only lived two house from us. The grapes were hanging from a trellis attached to his shed, so we waited until it got dark before we went to snip the grapes. In order to get to Mr. Fritz’s home, we would have to balance across a picket fence attached to the house in between ours. Two by fours attached this fence, and our little boy imaginations thought this would be a breeze, or so we thought.

We made it across and the three of us were on top of Mr. Fritz’s shed. Since Author was the smallest, he crawled out onto the trellis, harvest the grapes and pass them back to us. Just to show you how well we planned our little venture, we forgot to bring something to hold the grapes, so we had to stuff the grapes down our shirts. All was going well until the light on Mr. Fritz’s porch went on! Mr. Fritz yelled, “Who’s with the grapes?” and the three of us froze. He replied again, “What’s going on out there, get away from my grapes?” We stood silent until Arthur cried out, “Meow”. It worked and Mr. Fritz went back into his house. Well look at us, we did it!

Once we had enough grapes we headed back to my house. As for Arthur and John, they had no problem crossing the fence heading home. However, I was not so lucky. I had so many grapes stuffed in my shirt that I couldn’t see my feet, I lost my balance and fell. As I went down, one of the pickets hit just under my last rib knocking all the air out of my lungs. I remember laying on the ground, trying to catch my breath, thinking I was dying. As I was gasping for air, I imagined this is how a fish must have felt out of water. I laid on the ground, praying to the Lord to please don’t let me die, if you let me live I promise never to steal another grape as long as I live! The Lord heard my prayer and let me live. Funny thing is, all these years later, any time I was at the supermarket and tasted a grape or two; I still remember my plea for life and the Lord is looking down on me shaking his head.

I was able to get my wind back and we head back to my house to begin the process of making wine. Of course, we had no clue how to make wine; in fact, we had never even tasted wine. There was an old icebox in my parents shed that we were going to use to store the wine. John brought a large ceramic crock that we placed the grapes into. We all loved sugar so we all agreed this would be an important ingredient to add. Lucky enough my mom had a five-pound bag in the cupboard. We dumped the entire bag of sugar into the crock then carried it over and placed in the icebox. We had no idea how long it would need to sit in the ice box, so we just picked two weeks, that sounds like enough time.

During the next two weeks, all we did is talk about our wine party. We talked about inviting some of the other fellas in the neighborhood, but decided against it. John suggested we invite a few girls, but Arthur and I quickly voted against that. Two weeks finally passed and D-day had arrived. We knew the wine had to be ready by now. We elected Arthur to be the first wine tester since he was the one who took the most risks in life and because he was the youngest. Since the three of us had never tasted wine before, we had no idea what to expect. As we opened the door to the icebox, the smell that came out would have gagged a maggot, the three of us had the look of disgust on our faces. Still, since we had no idea what wine smelled like, we continued to take the crock out of the icebox, and placed it on the lawn. The three of us stared down into the crock and all we could see was a huge nasty mess. This couldn’t be what wine should look like?

The look of disappointment was on all three of our young faces. What did we do wrong? What about our wine party? John, being the eldest of us three, said aloud “I have an idea!” He marched into his house and came back about five minutes later with a half‐filled bottle of whisky. We will still have our party; we will just replace the wine with whisky. How bad could it be?

Each of us came equipped to the wine party with our own cup. Arthur had a grape jelly jarthat his Mom was going to throw out.. John had a cup his Mom dropped and the handle had broken off. I had a regular glass I took from mom’s cupboard. None of us had ever taken a sip of liquor and I am not sure why we felt this was something we must do, maybe some kind of boyhood initiation. Whatever the reason, John filled our cups. Arthur drank his right down in one sip and by his reaction; it didn’t seem to taste so good. I took one sip, it was so hot, and the whisky burnt my throat all the way down to my stomach! John drank his effortlessly which might have been because he was the eldest and we all know the eldest is always the coolest. Not wanting John to think I was a wimp, I drank the rest of the whisky left in my glass, and then John refilled it. Not a good move.

I felt the world start to spin as I staggered into my house. Mom was sitting on the front stoop with all the neighborhood moms, sharing the latest gossip as they often did. I had no way of getting into the house without passing them. One look and Mom knew something was wrong. She asked me if I were okay, however all I could do is focus on not falling to the ground. Mr. Kelly, the man who rented a room in our home, arrived from his day at work. Mom looked at him and said something is wrong with Robert. Mr. Kelly looked at mom and said, “Nothing is wrong, he is just drunk”.

Mom was not pleased with me at all. She put me in bed, seemed like I had slept for two days. When I finally woke up, I felt pain I had never imagined. My head felt like it was going to explode, my stomach ached something awful and my mouth was so dry, I could have drank up an entire ocean.

I laid there in my bed and started to talk to God. I promised Him I would never take a drink of whisky for the rest of my life. Just like the promise of the grapes, this was another promise I was unable to keep. Lucky for all of us, God is full of grace.

As the years went by, I often wondered about my partners in crime. John went on to be a detective with the New York City Police Department. I heard that Arthur joined a motorcycle gang and disappeared. Me, I have lived a long life filled with many more stories like this. I have learned many things in my life, like how not to make wine.

God has given me the gift of storytelling and the love of writing. I sure hope you enjoyed this story.