As a child in Beavercreek, I recall the excitement of stumbling upon a garage sale where a table top air hockey table was up for grabs for a mere $10.
The prospect of owning it ignited a frenzy between me and a friend who was with me at the time. What followed was a mad dash by a couple of 10-year-olds, trying to get home as fast as possible to raid their piggy banks. I remember ditching my bike in the front yard of my house, racing inside and up the stairs, and prying open my Frisch’s Big Boy bank with a butter knife to scrounge up the loot I needed.
With my pockets filled with crumpled dollar bills and loose change (and disregarding mother’s irritation with the racket I was causing in the house), I hopped backed on my bike and started peddling as fast as I could to beat my friend back to the garage sale to buy the coveted air hockey table.
At this point in the story, my memory of this event nearly 45-years-ago becomes blurry. I honestly don’t recall if my friend showed up with $10 or if he even returned to the garage sale at all. Regardless, in the end, I became the proud owner of the air hockey table. The other memory that’s a blur is how I managed to transport the table home on my bike. Maybe someone at the garage sale took pity on me and helped me carry it home.
I don’t know for sure how I got the table home, but for several weeks during the summer of 1980, my bedroom transformed into the neighborhood’s unofficial arcade. Along with the air hockey, I featured a tabletop pinball machine, mini Skee-Ball, and a Nerf basketball hoop on the back of my bedroom door.
This nostalgic memory is my way of sharing the news that soon, at Dave & Buster’s arcade centers nationwide, you’ll soon be able to place $5 wagers on over 40 their arcade games of skill--including air hockey, Hot Shots basketball, and Skee-Ball competitions. If they had pinball, I’m sure you’d be able to bet on that, too.
Like many childhood fascinations, the novelty of my bedroom arcade eventually wore off, leading to the decision to sell the air hockey table and the other items at our own garage sale the following year. Looking back, it was an opportunity missed. Had I been a shrewder, I could’ve launched a chain of bedroom arcades throughout my neighborhood and made a bundle accepting wagers on air hockey and Skee-Ball.