These days there are You Tube and the Internet. In the days when I was a kid which was l---o---n---g (well may not that long, more like l-o-n-g), before the Internet, we used to play with inner tubes. In those days, we had My Tube. Sigh, these

are just one more thing you don't see anymore in these modern days of tubeless tires.

 

The main summer thing we used to do with inner tubes was to take them swimming with us. No self-respecting swimmer in those days would ever go swimming with out an inner tube to play around with. At the beginning of the summer swimming season, we would go to Heckleman's Sohio Station up the road and bum some old inner tubes. Some of the time, the ones they gave us had "high pressure leaks" and thus were not safe to use in vehicle tires. Usually they would give us old ones that had been replaced in some one's vehicle. If one had a hole in it, they would patch it for us free. I guess they figured that they were kids once too. Since we didn't have a pond at our place, all of our real swimming was in the lake. (Lake Erie for all of you out of state readers; of which there are many).

 

Most of the time we would get inner tubes from passenger autos, but once and a while Heckleman's would give us a big truck tire inner tube. These were preferred and were highly prized and sought after. I shall explain the reason for this a little bit later.

 

Every summer my maternal grandparents, Arlie and Gus Sommers would rent a cottage at Hayes Marina (Now Cranberry Creek Marina) where they docked their boat. We always looked forward to going there because we could swim in the lake as long as we wanted to. Now, the reason we desired the big truck tire inner tubes is that we could get inside of them and roll down the hill into the lake. The hill seemed very long, then. I'm sure now if I would stop to take a look at it now, it will seem very short. It was really fun to spin around inside the inner tube as it rolled down the hill. The main things we had to be carful about was checking to make sure there were no sunbathers asleep in our path. The other thing was to try to aim for the straightest route to the water and not risk veering off to the right and hitting the concrete pier. I must say, if any of you have never rolled down a hill inside of an inner tube, you missed out on a lot of fun indeed! If our inner tube roll was successful, once we reached the water, it would roll into the water, spray a big "V", and finally roll over on its side. We would get out of the center and rejoice that we had made it into the water and had not run over anyone or hit the concrete pier.

 

Once in the water, we could lay on it and leisurely float around or after swimming, we could rest awhile on it. One of the dangers of resting on the inner tube was that one of us would usually sneak up under water and tip the inner tube over causing the restee to plunge into the water. Among other things, I liked to go under water and come up through the center of the inner tube. Another cool thing we did was to go on shore to the water's edge and see how far we could roll our inner tubes across the water surface. In other non-innocent uses for this action, we would try and time where and when someone came up from under water, then roll the inner tube at them and try to hit them in the head with it just as they came up. This was very hard to do and we rarely were successful, but it was fun to keep trying. The one thing to avoid was the inner tube air stem. Car tubes were especially dangerous because they stuck straight out at an angle and could cause a scratch. Another reason big truck inner tubes were prized was that their air stem curved around and were less likely to cause scratches if we hit them the wrong way. One time we saw some kids with a huge tractor tire inner tube. Now that was the ultimate inner tube to own! We never had one that big, but it didn't matter because we had plenty of fun with the ones we did have.

 

Our uses for old inner tubes were not limited to just summer swimming. They also came in handy to use as sleds in the winter. Just like rolling down the hill at Hayes Marina in the summer, an inner tube sled had to be headed in the right direction since there was no way to steer it once you started down the snow covered hill. Sometimes it would veer off the sled path and run into people and objects. But then again, when you are a kid, that's part of the fun.

 

I have read various Blogs and articles wondering why you rarely see kids outside playing anymore. They say it is because they are all inside playing video games. Heck, we had a lot more fun doing things outside with simple things that were free then we would have had playing some goofy expensive video game inside. Besides, in those days our parents would never have bought us expensive things like that even if they were available. We didn't need them anyway because we had more fun with things that didn't cost anything. We made our own fun. Unfortunately, I can't go back to the past in body, but I can in mind with fond memories, and those I have an unlimited supply of as my 338 stories attest. Just when I think I have run out of memories to write about, something I see will suddenly bring up a memory and I head for the keyboard! That's a "win win" situation for both you readers and I!