I thought of this today. Click here to see what will make me remember it forever...well, at least until my ever turns into a 4 ever ... that's not enough for me...I want a6 ever!
Silliness aside, I did think of these things today and along with that thought, came the legend of the Great Top Thrower, the Paul Bunyon of Toppists[?]
I must tell you that I do not have a clear memory of what age I had attained when I was introduced to the toys pictured here. All I know is that it took me a long time to master the art of getting them to perform well for me. EFR Dion was of very little, if any help in this area. All he eveer accomplished in frnt of me was to fail. In our language it was "T'a encore fait pétaque." My maternal Grandfather was the key to the training, but his dominant hand had been taken from him in an industrial accident many years prior. I don't remember who had given me the toy. All I remember is that the learning curve that led to the degree of proficiency that I finally acquired was not very steep. It was a very gentle upward slope full of frustration and infantile cuss words. My grandfather had one good hand and the stump of his dominant muscle mass to teach me. I would go to his apartment [his and my grandmother's apartment, I mean] for lunch and between hugs, and eating and story telling [Bible stories] he would spend some time trying to get me to make the top work. Slowly but surely I arrived at a low level of ability and took it from there.
I never got to the point of the control that is illustrated in this YouTube video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbG2OI1OOzA&feature=related
My grandfather's favorite story was about the child in his neighborhood who was the ace top thrower/spinner of the region. His claim to fame was that when the children would stand around throwing their tops, this fellow would wait until one was "resting" and throw his right on top of it with such force that the "resting" top would split and his top would take its place on the spot where the split top had been. Needless to say, we believed him, I most of all. I believed him so deeply that I was dismayed that EFR Dion winced in skepticism at hearing the story.
I never succeeded in being an excellent top spinner/thrower. I must admit that I did have a lot of happy hours with this toy. Nowhere near as many hours as I did with my jack knife, but that is a story that I have already told and which you can read here.
The cap to this thought is that during the day today I stumbled across an antique wooden spinning top on Ebay selling for a mere $ 135.00 I ran out there immediately to get it for you all. You remember it from the beginning of this post.
I'm sure that you will all be impressed. Hey, don't laugh. It happens to be in better than excellent condition. So, there!
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