Ah, the backyard. The personal wonderland of suburban kids everywhere. A place of curiosity and imagination.
A minefield of ant hills and lost Hot Wheels. A peaceful refuge, where the greatest childhood memories are made. [Glass breaking] MAMA PARHAM: Girls!
REBECCA AND RACHEL: She did it! Hello my geeks and peeps, my explainers and entertainers, my little oo-de-lallies! Rebecca Parham here.
Backyards are great! They have grass and trees and fences. To a kid, they could be the plains of Africa, the jungles of Papua New Guinea, the great wilderness of Alaska, or the perfect place for a treehouse!
Can I just go on record to say that I freaking LOVE treehouses? ? I mean, look at these!
They're mystical, and woodsy, and full of character, and away from people. Look at this one! I want to live there!
I want to hook it up with Wi-Fi and a sauna! I want all the local kids to call me the “Witch of the Woods” and tell stories about how I'll steal your toes if you get too close to my house! I WANT TO BE A GHOST STORY!
Wait! We're off topic! Backyards!
A staple of suburban living. I lived in suburbia as a kid with all the trimmings: neighborhood kids to play with, nearby woods to explore, a school I could walk to and from, and you can't forget your standard-issue bully that lives up the street. My bully kid was named Ja— aaai— Ja— Jaco.
Jaco. Now Jaco wasn't your run-of-the-mill bully kid. You know, the big, thundering monsters that you stay away from at all costs, like a Kanker sister or a Flats the Flounder.
No no no, Jaco was more like Buford from Phineas and Ferb. Still a bully, but one that got involved in the adventures, and you invited over for a game of baseball sometimes. He was a weird one for sure.
One time, we were over at his house in his backyard, and he needed to, uh. . .
…release the hounds. But instead of going inside and doing his business, like a NORMAL person, he popped a squat right there in the grass and . .
. made fertilizer. And then his dog ate it!
He also once found a lighter in our backyard and decided that he wanted to make a campfire. And my sister and I were just like, “Yeah, sure, sounds fun. ” At some point during our tomfoolery of gathering things to incinerate in our campfire, Jaco wanted to act all tough, so he pointed the lighter at me and my sister and lit it.
Just so happens at that moment, my mom looked up from doing the dishes and saw that through the kitchen window and she ran out screaming at us. Unsurprisingly, Jaco had to go home. Glad she caught us, too, because we weren't even messing around at that point.
We were gonna light a freaking pyre! Give the hellfire and brimstone preacher something to talk about, if you know what I mean. (Southern accent) Lord save us from the unholy demons known as the Parham children!
Thank you, Jesus. (normally) Actually, my dad did call me a firebug sometimes when I was a kid because I tended to like fire and still kinda do. Hey, it's warm and pretty and gets rid of evidence!
Everything you want in a boyfriend! But the big story that I remember about Jaco was the "Tree Incident". One day, my sister and I were playing baseball with Jaco in our backyard when one of us hit the ball over the fence into the neighbor's yard.
Our neighbor wasn't home and their backyard gate was locked, so Jaco came up with a bright idea. He began climbing our giant oak tree, so he could SWING over to the neighbor's tree, climb down, and retrieve the ball. And Rachel and I just stood there, watching him climb, periodically going, “You're gonna fall!
We're gonna have to call the fire department to get you down! ” Which I think only strengthened his resolve to make his brilliant plan work, because he just kept climbing. Now strap in for this one, explainers, it gets good.
When he got close to the neighbor's tree and was about 15 feet off the ground, He grabbed a pencil-thin branch in his hands and actually tried *clap* to *clap* swing *clap* to *clap* the *clap* neighbor's *clap* tree like *clap* he *clap* was *clap* freaking *clap* TARZAN! Apparently, Jaco has never seen a Wylie Coyote cartoon, because then he would have known better. Who says cartoons rot your brain?
Guess what! The branch snapped. [snap] [Drm roll, slide whistle] [Crashing] [Jaco yells] REBECCA AND RACHEL (yelling): MOM!
Jaco had not only fallen—no no no—he had CRASHED through the neighbor's wet bar, which my sources tell me is a bar or counter equipped with running water and a sink for serving alcoholic beverages in a home environment. Hmm. And Jaco had completely obliterated this thing.
It was like a dinosaur had stepped on it, just went [blows a raspberry]. Jaco was screaming so loud that his dad, who was working in their front yard up the street, heard it, came running, and kicked in the neighbor's gate to get to him. He ended up having a broken arm, which I'm still surprised to this day that that's ALL that happened.
From the damage that I saw to this wet bar, I'm surprised he's not dead! There should have been some fractured ribs, or brain damage, or something. Well, I guess if you're meant to hang, you won't drown.
He also had to pay the neighbor back for the wet bar, just to add insult to injury. Rolling on with a theme of breaking things, my sister and I actually did the childhood cliché of breaking a window with a baseball. You thought that opening skit was just a witty farce, huh?
No, actually happened. My sister and I were in the backyard playing baseball with the neighborhood kids. Big surprise there.
I was pitching, she was batting, I tossed her the ball, she hit it, it veered off to the right, and crashed right through my parents’ bedroom window. Everyone in that backyard, except Rachel, hit the deck. My parents came racing outside and found my sister standing there with bat in hand, completely flustered.
Both of my parents were mad, but my mom told Rachel to go get her piggy bank because she was gonna pay for it. But Dad jumped in and said, "Hey, that's not fair. It was an accident.
Every kid gets to break one window with a baseball. " Yeah, that was my dad for you. He never forgot what it was like to be a kid, so he wanted the most fulfilling childhood for us.
Including all of the classic mistakes like breaking a window with a baseball. So now I gotta tell one on me— 'bout time, I suppose. When I was about nine and should have known better, I had sometimes passed the time in the backyard by taking an old fence post, laying it over the side of our raised garden beds, and jumping on the end of it, launching an array of different materials into the air: rocks, pebbles, grass, sticks, anything.
This is what we did before we had the internet, kids. One day I really wanted to launch a ball off of my makeshift catapult, but there was a problem. The ball would roll off of the fence post before I could launch it.
Physics. Who knew? And in order to complete my little experiment, I needed an assistant.
YOUNG REBECCA [sing-song]: Oh David~! REBECCA: My little brother David was about three at the time and was very susceptible to suggestion, which worked out perfectly for me, not so perfectly for him. I told him on the count of three, he was going to put the ball on the fence post, so I could quickly jump on the other end before it rolled off.
Simple enough, wouldn't you say? But when I counted to three to commence our experiment, he did something. .
. a little unforeseen. He leaned down directly over the fence post to very carefully place the ball.
And by the time I looked over and saw him doing that. . .
. . .
it was too late. [smack] My entire weight came down and the fence post smacked him right in the face . .
. Well, I'm dead. I bequeath everything to my Teddy Ruxpin.
David rightfully screamed at the top of his lungs, and ran inside to mom and dad, who were not happy at all. David's whole face swelled up, and there was a puncture wound on his cheek that was maybe an inch away from his eye. And he still has a scar there to this day.
I got in a lot of trouble, and my parents yelled at me that I could have blinded him. [talking between teeth] Even though it was an accident, and he wasn't supposed to put his face over the catapult. But I felt really bad, to the point where I still felt bad years later into adulthood when someone would bring up this story.
But now, I've animated it! And shown it to a million people! So it holds no more power over me anymore.
Animation! My anti. .
Depressant. So yeah, backyards! Imagination, magic, wonder, childhood trauma, you get the idea.
But seriously, guys, go spend some time outside. Get some sunshine and fresh air—it builds character. It's also really good for your mental health.
Anyways, thank you so much for tuning in, but— --Wait a minute! Editor Becca here. I've got some things to tell you before we officially tune out.
I'm gonna be at Pax South again January 18th through the 20th in San Antonio, Texas. I'll just be walking around, so come up and say, “Hi! ” I'm also gonna be a featured creator at VidCon London, February 14th through the 17th.
Really excited about that one! It's gonna be my first time in Europe, and they have me doing a lot of cool stuff for the convention, so I hope you can make it! Also also, for those of you who like my singing, I recently did a cover of “How Far I'll Go” from Moana with Jordan Sweeto and a rock cover of “Defying Gravity” with Caleb Hyles.
It was so much fun to sing those songs I never get a chance to really sing on this channel. So I got to sing on other people's channels, I guess. I'll put the links in the description below.
Please go check ‘em out. Anyways, I think that's it, Explainers and Entertainers. Thank you so much for tuning in, but now I gotta tune out.
Bye!
