Grandpa Jobe's handcart

I don't know why our Grandpa had this thing. I never saw him use it. It stood in the corner of the added on back-porch of their house in Platte near the pullring for the cellar door. It was metal and had two wheels on one end and a curved handle at the other. It was about a foot and a half wide and four feet long. We had been given no specific instructions about this handcart, so it seemed fair game.
I had seen my Dad use a similar thingee at his clothing store and I knew that it worked by the wheels overcoming friction and the handle to lay back the bed of it and one could thus move a larger weight than one could by carrying. Grandpa's was previously blue, but rust had nearly removed all of its paint leaving it a dull, flakey red-brown.
One day, Mikey, Diane, and I decided to see if we could work that ol' handcart to push each other around Grandpa's yard. As the oldest, I got to be first. This meant I got to be the pusher and show off my boyhood manliness before the others. Diane was a girl and, therefore a special case and will be discussed later. (Note the word discussed is made up of TWO words, "DIS" and "CUSSED").
Since Mike was the youngest of us all by two years and the lightest, I got him to step on the metal plate welded near the wheels. I tipped the cart backwards to a 45 degree angle and began pushing. I know now, that the Co-efficient of Friction and so on came into play, but we just PLAYED not thinking of all that stuff. He held on with his arms down near his knees and his butt tucked nicely between the iron pipes of the sides. Even then, I knew this handcart was a good thing and worthy of a boy's interest. Diane ran along side as I pushed and we got up a good head of steam (a word we all knew from the local train station).
At first it was nothing but fun>>>run>>>push>>>>>run faster>>>push faster>>> turn>>> try not to tip the cargo out (Mickey). He seemed to be having as much fun as Diane and I judging from his laughter.
Since Platte was on the flat South Dakota prairie, there was little to stop our progress. I ran as fast as a chubby kid could and Diane kept up easily. She was then, very svelt (skinny) and stayed the same even after 7 Mormon kids. Pretending to be a racecar driver, I made a rather strange assortment of roaring and grinding gear shifting sounds. This was SO much fun I forgot to pay attention and ran into the street. Now, the word street in a tiny town like Platte is sort of a misnomer. There were only about a thousand people in the whole place and of these, there were only about 300 families and of these, only about 250 owned cars and of these, only about a fourth would be driving around in town during a weekday (which this was). Also, there were only about ten streets anyhow..So----there was ONLY about 60 or so cars that COULD have been on our street at the time I am discussing. There were other mitigating circumstances, such as the time of day, and so on and so on, but what ten year old thinks of this stuff???
Anyhoo, I pushed Mike on the handcart out into the street with Diane running alongside behind right into the path of the worst person there could have been driving at the time. Yep!!! It was the ONE AND ONLY CONSTABLE (Small town policeman) in his black and white "COPCAR"!!! He slammed on his brakes and the sound was horrible---kind of like a pig being slaughtered.
Diane screamed the sort of high-pitched scream only a pre-pubesent girl can do which tends to peel the skin off anyone's eardrums. Mike inhaled so hard it seemed he was trying to imitate a bagpipe. I was so scared, I dropped the handle of the cart and peed my pants right there in the middle of the street. Micky fell off and both he and Diane started crying and I peed some more. Fear is a powerful diuretic!! I knew it was a BAD thing to run in front of a car. Grandpa gave me a stingbat again; the final one in the series of two and sincerely desired that I "Quit getting into trouble, whatever you do!" I promised I would try, but these things just sort of happen. He DID realize in his wisdom, that I was really a good boy and never looked for trouble---it just seemed to sort of find me. The constable was nice though, he put an itchy wool blanket around me to cover up the pee marks then he kicked dirt from the street onto the damp spot. That was nice.