The father: aerobics star undone by the leg, then Acme Novelties 'N Notions

texture · UNDATED (Green's early childhood, Waltham MA, B.S. era)

• When: UNDATED (Green's early childhood; before the fatal Xmas of event 2; B.S. era, Waltham MA)
• What: Green's father, Mr. Green, had been "one of New England's most influential aerobics instructors," even co-starring in the Buns of Steel home-video series, until in his late twenties one leg either grew or the other retracted until one was nearly six inches longer, forcing him into a clunky black orthopedic boot "90% sole" resembling an asphalt-spreader's boot (a detail the narration mirrors in Green's own adult asphalt-spreader's boots). Aerobically washed up, he career-changed to a Waltham novelty concern, Acme Novelties 'N Notions, designing sadistic practical-joke supplies — the Jolly Jolt Hand Buzzer and Blammo Cigar lines — demoralizing, character-twisting work; Green's one unrepressed visual memory of the man is of "a man who progressively and perilously leaned as he hobbled from specialist to specialist," pacing the living room nightly with a Falstaff tallboy.