Do you remember the first time you saw the movie Helter Skelter? I do. If you know the subject matter and violence of that movie, you will understand why at 14, my parents told me I couldn’t watch it, but thanks to my “baby” brother Keith……..I saw it anyway.
It was 1976, I was in the 8th grade and had a babysitting job for the summer for some family I barely knew and 2 little kids I don’t really remember. What I do remember is calling my mother at work one summer day and someone who was not my mother answering the phone telling me my mother left early because of a family emergency. She didn’t know anything more.
As the story goes, Keith, Tony Benassi, Jimmy Hardy and a another friend had decided that they were going to “scare” Grandma Caranni . Grandma Caranni lived at the end of Windsor Road and had THE BIGGEST yard (the size of a football field) on our entire street. Lots of neighborhood kids used to wander down the street to play in her front yard. Apparently, for the boys, she stopped letting them play football in her front yard as they were tearing it up, so they had decided to take revenge. Along the right side of the long driveway near the detached garage was a huge weeping willow tree. Here is where the “scare” was to take place. The boys had fashioned a clothesline from a high spot in the tree and had a skeleton on a hook and were going to let it down the line just as Grandma Caranni drove into the driveway.
Keith and Jimmy were up in the tree with the others hiding behind its huge trunk. Just as Grandma Caranni pulled into the driveway, they let the skeleton go. It didn’t work as expected and Grandma Caranni drove right by without any notice of the boys. After the failed opportunity, Keith and Jimmy had to get out of the tree and the best method to do so was to swing off a branch below them and jump down to the ground. Keith went first. As he leaned forward to grab the branch and swing down, the branch broke and Keith went head first about 20 feet down to the ground.
Keith hit the ground, limbs bent in unusual directions and lay on the ground in shock. As you can imagine, the boys FREAKED. My Nana lived next door, so they ran over to her house, got her to call an ambulance and Keith was carted away to Highland Park Hospital. 1 Surgery, 2 compound fractures and a week in the hospital with his arms hanging above his head to reduce the swelling later, both Keith and his friends were feeling a bit silly about their effort to scare poor Grandma Caranni.
But back to Helter Skelter……All of the “scare” happened early afternoon. My mom was at work and after my Nana got the ambulance and they carted Keith off to the hospital, she called my Mom who went up to the hospital to be with Keith. Since he had to have surgery, she was there most all evening, not getting home until after 11pm. There were no cell phones in 1976 and I never heard from my mother, so I went over to my backyard-neighbors house – Vera Ballan. Vera and I had been friends for years, she was a year ahead of me in school, but we spent all kinds of time together in grade school and middle school. Vera’s family was from Yugoslavia and I could never understand what her parents were saying to her, but they were nice to me, fed me that night and I hung out there until it started to get dark. I still hadn’t heard anything from my mom, so I had Vera come back over to my house to hang around with me until they got home.
What should 2 girls do with no parents around and undoubtedly one of the scariest movies ever coming on TV that night?? Duh……WATCH THE MOVIE of course! We made popcorn, watched the movie and she went home about 10pm when it was over. I was left home alone and TERRIFIED after watching that movie! I understood why my mother didn’t want me watching it, but it was too late by then. I went to my room, locked the door and waited there until my mom got home. I still get shivers when I remember how scared that movie left me.
As for Keith and his broken bones….He was a star catcher on the baseball team for Deerfield HS. He worked his tail off after he got his casts off, throwing a ball against the wall of TOPPS department store and catching it in an effort to strengthen his arms and be ready for spring season. I was still in 8th grade at Shephard Jr. High and not a day went by that some girl whom I didn’t know at school asked me “How’s Keith Doing? giggle giggle, giggle…..” and I just wanted to slap them.
Sadly, that continued even to my 30 year High School Reunion, which will forever be my LAST High School Reunion
