Growing up in the Sixties

One of the pieces of custom jewelry worn by pre-teen and teenagers alike, in the sixties, was known as”Dog Tags”.They were manufactured to look identical to the government issue identification that all military members wore. They were made out of aluminum , stamped with your name and address, and hung on a chain around your neck. This was quite the fad in the early sixties and everyone I knew had a set. If desired your religious preference could be added as well as your blood type, just like the military wore.

It wasn’t long before a curious custom began to take shape at my elementary school. If you and a young lady felt that it was time to commit to a monogamous relationship, in other words, go steady, then you exchanged dog tags. This led to half the population of the school wearing identification that tagged the bearer with completely incorrect statistics. It did lead to many humorous moments during recess when the guys discovered that their buddy who, here to for, was known as Mike was now wearing an identification tag identifying him as Jane. To avoid the inevitable teasing, most guys wore the dog tags under their t- shirt  out of plain sight. Girls on the other hand liked to display their  boy friend’s identification where everyone could see it, especially the other girls. This was a seemingly harmless exercise in fashion, unless in case of emergency the correct identification was needed and the tag provided the wrong information. In my case it almost led me to very serious consequences. 

It was Wednesday afternoon after school and my little brother (LB1) and I were riding our bikes to our normal destination on Wednesday afternoons. I was riding a little ahead of him and within a block of the Church. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a lady in a white uniform open her front door to come out to her car. When she did her dog escaped and headed straight toward me barking and snarling. Within seconds the dog had my right pant leg in his teeth. All my attention was directed at the dog and diverted from the parked car toward which I was hurling. In a split second I looked up to see the tail lights of a very large car. Apparently I opened my mouth to scream and when I hit the tail light, my teeth clamped down on my extended tongue. The next thing I knew I was laying in the street with part of my tongue laying next to me. The lady wearing the white uniform , who owned dog, was immediately upon the scene and knew exactly what to do, she was a nurse. She scooped up the piece of my tongue, put it back in my mouth, and covered my face in a towel to try to stop the bleeding. By this time LB1 was there and not sure what to do. It was obvious that I could not speak and time was of the essence, so the nurse took one look at the dog tag and put me in her car and took me straight to my girlfriend Janie’s house. LB1 was left trying to recover my mangled bicycle. All he knew was that an unknown lady just drove off with his brother and he assumed she was heading to our home. So he turned around and pedaled as fast as he could go for our house, which about 10 blocks away.

In the mean time Janie’s mother who was working out in the front yard when we pulled up, assured the Nurse that I was not Janie and directed her to my home a few blocks away. When we arrived  at our house Mom was on the front step and in her typical fashion, ready to take charge. LB1 had made it there before us and clued her in as to the situation. As It turned out she had been through almost this exact situation with my Dad’s little brother, 20 years before. She knew, as did the nurse,  that tongues could be reattached but time was not on our side. Into our car I was transferred and on to our Doctor’s office we went. When we arrived the Doctor decided to do the surgery there to save time. I was given a sedative and with my Mom holding my hand about thirty stiches were used to reattach the missing piece of my tongue.  My Dad arrived during the procedure and attempted to take charge of the room, as was his fashion, until he got a look at my mouth and promptly passed out.  Afterward, the Nurse came in to see how I was doing and explained to my Mom why it took so long to get to the house. She also explained that she had served as an Army nurse during WWII and had seen this type of procedure done before. During the conversation the Doctor reappeared and confirmed that he had also done this type of surgery during the war and knew what to do from experience.

After a strong dose of smelling salts was administered to my Dad, he recovered and drove us all home. Because I could not talk, LB1 explained what had happened, to the family. After I recovered I was instructed to recover my dog tags and not let them out of my sight again. By the time I got back to school I was the subject of quite a bit of speculation. The question that everyone wanted answered was why we went to Janie’s house first. The answer bought a howl of laughter every time the story was told. After a few months of recuperation, the swelling went down and everything returned to near normal. I recovered my ability to speak and tried to blend in as much as possible.  Too much notoriety when you are eleven years old is not all it is cranked up to be.

In later years when my mind returns to that speed bump on the road of life, I have had occasion to ponder how things could have turned out differently. What if the dog’s owner had not been a world war two Nurse? What if my Mom or the Doctor had not had prior experience with this type of injury? What if no one was home at Janie’s house? What if LB1 had not been there to relate what happened? The sequence of events happened like a lot of other things in my life. I have always known that someone was watching over me, and I thank God regularly that he was on duty that day.

 

It is important to note that the generation that was first raised on TV dinners gave up 57,000 of its finest during the Vietnam War. The irony is not lost on the underlying fact that we were taught to trust. The hoax that the “TV Dinner” was nutritious and a excellent replacement for the home cooked meal was perpetuated by an advertising agency. Trust the teacher, the priest, the policeman, the President of the United States and your parents to mention a few. Our parents had been raised, by and large, with one President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, during two of the worst times in American history. FDR was elected at the beginning of the Great Depression and died at the end of World War II. His message during his four terms in office was always the same, trust me. So they did, and they passed that trust on to the man that had won WW II as the Commanding Officer, Dwight D. Eisenhower, when he was elected at the beginning of the Fifties. After all, he was elderly and statesman like and he seemed to know what he was doing.

It was in this atmosphere of trust that our parents began to have children. They trusted so we trusted. Ever so often that trust was breached by an errant educator or crooked cop but we were raised to believe that there is good in everyone and inherently our role models were doing the right thing. Then along comes Elvis Presley and all bets were off. Not one parent in America thought that he was trustworthy. Whether he deserved that distrust is up for debate, but no parent anywhere trusted him around their daughter. Those same daughters would give anything for just a look in their direction from the Memphis musician. And so the cultural chasm begins. The parents don’t trust Elvis and the teenage children don’t know why. As he began to become a cultural icon there is evidence that he was aware of his influence and he made some P.R. moves in the media. It was not effective, the kids , especially the girls were already not trusting their parents opinions about other things. This was especially true when it came to the use of cosmetic make up and hairstyles. For them more was better, the polar opposite of most conservative, depression raised, parents. The seeds of distrust had been sown, and were beginning to take root in many places in sixties culture.

The plain truth was that we were no longer taking our parents attitude of trust at face value. It had long been a rite of passage, when children become teenagers, to question parental values. But mostly, they trusted their opinions and defaulted to their experience. Then along comes the Beatles and an entire generation put parental opinion and experience on a slow boat to China. Music would never again be the same, nor would men’s hairstyles, or clothing fashions for either sex. Most parents didn’t go down with out a fight. They had the power of the pocketbook. Allowances were terminated and record purchases were restricted, but to no avail.

The horse was out of the barn, never to return. Trusting parents with blind obedience was no longer the norm. It was just a short hop to civil disobedience and this created a split in the generational chasm. Some teenagers developed an inherent distrust of all authority, while others tried to pick and choose where their trust should lie.

Then the Vietnam War appeared on the horizon and the stakes were now life and death. When the war began in August of 1964, the so called “baby boomers” were graduating their first high school class. The draft was a reality and most young men considered it their duty, as did their fathers and grandfathers. When the chips were down the teenagers trusted their government to do the right thing. In reality, they had little choice. It was the law and to avoid it meant time in jail. So off we went, trusting our government to protect us. In the end, when it was all on the line, we trusted our government to do their best by us. That old inner voice rose up within and our parental training won out over fear. We answered the draft call and went to Vietnam. 57,000 men died in Vietnam and countless others are walking dead because of it. Our instincts were right. We should not have trusted our government and we never will again. Our entire generation learned a our lesson, trust is not something that we will ever take for granted again.

 

Our first television was delivered to our house when I was about ten years old. We were one of the first families to get one and immediately my popularity in the neighborhood moved up a couple of notches. The brand was Dumont and it was mounted in a cabinet that was the size of small ice box. By the very nature of it’s size and considering its popularity, the living room was rearranged to accommodate it as the focal point. All chairs faced the screen so that when it offered its programming we were readily available to watch.

In the beginning, I only remember three channels being available. Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), National Broadcasting System (NBC) and American Broadcasting System (ABC). Sporadic programming on alternate channels was the norm. There was some morning programing available in 15 or 30 minute increments. In between availability, the screen displayed a constant showing of the television test pattern.

The one I remember the most was a drawing of an Indian Chief with a full headdress. The idea behind this was to be able to focus your antenna for clarity. The antenna was a goofy looking device with two extendable arms that rotated in a base and were capable of moving in different directions to capture the TV signals in the air. Because the device constantly stood on top of the TV stand and its arms extended straight up parallel to each other, we were all soon calling it “rabbit ears”. And because television signals came from different towers located in different directions, the rabbit ears were constantly being moved about to focus the screen. This is why the test pattern first came into being, it was to help in clearing up the reception on the screen. It didn’t take long for someone to realize that if a receiving device were to be mounted on the roof better reception could be achieved. Thus the aluminum rooftop television antenna was born. Originally, because everyone had a chimney, the antenna was strapped to it’s base. It was a simple device on an aluminum pole the had horizontal slats, not unlike miniature wings, attached to it. In the beginning it significantly improved the reception and focus. By connecting a specially coated wire to it’s frame it could be directed down the side of the house and into the closest window to be connected to the TV. The problem with its location was that it was not easy to get to for adjusting and it was subject to frequent wind gusts or rain storms. Soon the idea was hatched to put the receiving antenna on a pole attached to the side of the house so that if it needed to be adjusted, a quick twist of the pole was all that was needed. Shortly after that, someone improved the whole thing by inventing a motor for the receiver that had a control inside, next to the television. Now it was not necessary to have half the family involved to adjust the antenna. Before the installation of the motor, someone had to be stationed at the TV to yell to someone at the window to yell to someone adjusting the pole. This exercise went on every night all over America for years. It was as common a practice as dumping the dishwater out the back door. The biggest issue that arose in this process was the inherent danger in the adjusting during bad weather. More than one individual was severely shocked when lightening found the pole as it’s conduit.

However the method of receiving the signal waves,  Saturday nights at our house were  what we called neighbor night. Folding chairs were assembled in rows in front of the television. Before everyone got their own television, it was expected that you had the responsibility to share your good fortune with the neighbors. Popcorn was popped and soda was on ice as everyone settled in to watch whatever was available that particular evening. In the beginning the signal ceased to broadcast at 9:00 at night so after the TV was turned off the kids went outside to chase lighting bugs and the adults fell into discussions of the day.

It was a unique time in American History. Neighbors shared what they had and kids were not afraid to be out after dark. It was a wonderfully simple existence. The Television did not come on before 9:00 am and did not broadcast after 9:00 at night. News was still delivered to our living rooms by newspaper and radio. Television was for entertainment and not yet the vehicle to dictate our lifestyles. Sunday was the day that TV was least watched and in some homes was never turned on during that day. It was an exciting time for a kid, to be in the middle of such rapidly changing technology. My grandfather used to say that we would soon see a time when television would be on all night and we would stop communicating as a family.                           If only his prophecy had not come true.

I entered the decade of the sixties , 10 years of age, living with my parents on an idyllic street in a Norman Rockwell type town. I left the sixties, 21 years old, a husband a father and in the US Army in Vietnam. Somewhere along the way, I had managed to attend college, learn how to make pizza professionally and sing in garage band. It was a crazy decade. 

When we started the sixties in the United States, Our President was Dwight D. Eisenhower, a grandfatherly figure, who had won World War II as the grand poohbah in charge. Just about everyone trusted him. At the end of the decade the man running the country was Richard Milhous Nixon. No one would have mistaken him for having a grandfatherly image, and no one was exactly sure what he had ever accomplished, to earn the right to be President of the United States. Trust was not a characteristic that was readily assigned to him. So here we were , not sure how the country got into this mess or how we were going to get out.

For certain, being in the Army, half a world away, rendered my participation, moot. So I did the next best thing,  I tried to drink as much beer as I could whenever and wherever possible. Being in a war zone, most generally accepted rules of etiquette are pushed to the wayside. Beer for breakfast is possible and considering the circumstances understood. You see, it’s brutally hot in Vietnam and refrigeration is non-existent, so about the only time an acceptable temperature of my desired liquid beverage could be attained, is after midnight.  So, the first thing in the morning was as close as I could get to a “cold one”. Breakfast was most often fruit out of a can, so beer went reasonably well with it. It is a acquired taste, much the same as scotch. You just keep drinking it until one day it doesn’t taste awful anymore.

My days in Vietnam were very much the same. Sleep in the jungle at night, get up, strap on an 85 pound pack, walk for most of the day and tomorrow, do it all over again. It is helpful if bad guys don’t try to walk the same trails you are on. That’s when the game gets serious, they want to go one way and you want to go the other. Shooting generally erupts and often someone gets hurt. After this little interruption, everyone runs off to their corner of the jungle to hide. This is when beer is very helpful. Not only are you very thirsty when things calm down, you are also in need of something to bring you back from the edge of insanity.

It is helpful that every three days while you are in the jungle, resupply helicopters bring you more beer. If you are lucky, mail from home will arrive as well. Sometimes those letters do not bring good news. Things like your old high school is being torn down or your girlfriend is now dating your cousin, make you want to reach for a newly arrived fresh beer. However, most resupplies were routine and carried out with amazing efficiency. C-rations, ammunition, water and beer were among the things that we could not live without. They are also some of the heaviest things on earth if you are going to be carrying them in a rucksack strapped on your back. So you might as well start lightening the load by popping a beer. It is important to note that with temperatures routinely at 115 degrees by mid day, it helps to delineate the affect of any alcohol that enterers your system. Sweat is the bodies way of expelling toxins and in the jungle there is a lot of toxin expelling  going on.

After thirty to forty days of wandering around the jungle trying not to get into trouble, we were picked up by helicopters and brought back to a Fire Support Base for a couple of days of R&R (rest and recuperation). It was our favorite place on earth because they had generators, therefore they had electricity, therefore they had cold beer. War tends to reduce everything in one’s mind to simple choices. It also introduces the concept that tomorrow may never come, so live for today. Hot showers, cold beer, and a latrine were the most important things to us during that time. So after availing ourselves of all three of these luxuries and getting a full nights sleep, without being interrupted to pull security, we were rejuvenated and returned to the triple canopy for more fun.

When a person is twenty-one years old and given a lot of time to think, elaborate  plans are hatched .When you are in Vietnam, these are always thoughts of what you will do upon returning home. What’s first thing you will do when you see your kid. What your first meal will be. What will your Mom look like. Also, you make plans for things that you never do again. In  my mind one thing was for certain, I was never going to drink another warm beer, ever.

As my kids are fond of reminding me, I was born in the first half of the last century. Truly, the world was a different place than it is today. The difference was not in materialism, although today, that is much more of a priority. The difference was in attitude. World War II was over and America had won. However, the victory dance was short lived. In the mid-fifties, Russia was on everyone’s mind. As six year old first graders, we had air raid drills and were taught to hide under our desks in case the Russians bombed us. Fear of another war was always there. Then came the 60’s during which, the kids born in the 40’s and 50’s said, to hell with it. If we are all going to die, lets have some fun, and the party was on.  

My parents who were born in the 20’s didn’t see the party coming in the beginning. Although they were only 20 years older than me, they had been raised during the Great Depression and graduated High School during World War II. Doing without or “making due” was how they were raised. To a certain degree they had been raised to not dream. To accept the way things were, was the universally accepted way of existing. If their bicycle became broken or the tire on their old car wore out, they were parked. Replacement parts were not available or were being rationed. Clothes were homemade and worn until they could no longer be patched. Shoes were in short supply and going barefooted was an accepted practice.     

As a youngster growing up in the fifties my life was very much the same although not as austere. I had two pairs of shoes, one for church and one for school. Tennis shoes as we called them were only available for the guys that played on the basketball team and were issued by the school. Therefore, they were kept in the gym closet under lock and key. Some of my clothes were home made but increasingly they were purchased at his new place called the department store.    

 The really big changes came in the way we ate. It was a common practice in our family, for my grandmother to kill a chicken from her back yard for our Sunday dinner. Almost everything on the table was home grown or baked from scratch in our kitchen. The vegetables came from our garden and the bread was baked every morning and set out to cool for the day. About the only thing we didn’t self process was our meat. It came from the butcher store that we visited daily. However, as the decade of the fifties came to a close we began to buy more and more from the grocery store. Pre-baked and sliced bread was first on Mom’s list. Although, it didn’t taste as good, it sure freed up a big part of her time in the morning. We did less home canning and bought more things like jelly or fruit in a tin can.     As a kid this was a big deal. With less reliance on the garden, my “chores” burden was beginning to loosen up. Gardening is a lot of work and always seems to have something that needs attending. This freed me up for my favorite past time, day-dreaming.     

 For as long as I can remember, I have had trouble keeping my mind going in one direction. It seems to wonder off of it’s own free will. This is especially true if I have a lot of free time. My Dad had a favorite saying, “put that out of your mind, son. It’s not going to happen”. For him that kind of thinking was a reflection of the time in which he grew up. For me, it was impossible not to try to figure out how to make something better. I spent countless hours organizing and reorganizing in my mind some of the most senseless things. I had already worked out a much better route for the milk man or had a better place to put the hymnals at church. While riding my bicycle delivering papers in the morning, my mind was constantly working out a better way for the city buses to run or how to make the trash collectors  more quiet. 

 Day dreaming was a luxury afforded to my generation by our parents who were working hard to make our life easier. They had never had the opportunity to hope, things just had to be accepted as they were. Not us, we had the audacity to dream of how things could be better. It was presumptuous of our generation but it was overdue. For things to change someone had to dream of a better way. To have time to dream, we needed less drudgery and more incentive. All of this came to fruition as the sixties came roaring to life. Our parents had higher disposable incomes as well as more leisure time due to the innovations largely invented during World War II. As a member of the sixties generation I stood to inherit more technology and greater free time than any generation before. Although I wasn’t aware of it then we were the first generation that had time to dream. Growing up in the sixties was going to be less work and more fun and I was standing right in the front of the line because I had already been given the luxury of time to dream, thanks to my parents.

We are all a victim or beneficiary of the environment that we grew up in. The habits that make you who you are, mostly began during your childhood. They define your personality and set you apart from others around you. A lot of these practices came from our parents. We acquired them over a period of years and they became deeply ingrained.

My Dad dipped his eggs.  Breakfast eggs only came one way at our house, fried and sunny-side up. They were served with toast or biscuits which was buttered and used as an instrument to dip the yolk out of the egg. Dipping, becomes a work of art. It is done is such a fashion so that the yolk disappears before the white is eaten. At our house the egg came to you salted, peppered and with the yolk starring right at you. If you are a dipper, it’s how the meal begins. Once armed with your choice of bread, as a dipper, it is your responsibility to destroy the yolk with the bread by sopping it up while eating. Many were the days, I would get to my desk at school only to notice egg yolk on my finger nails.

The art of dipping one’s fried eggs falls into the category of participatory dining. Once the bread is picked up, all bets are off in the etiquette department. It comes very close to eating a meal without utensils. If you happen to be in the company of someone who has never seen a fried egg consumed in this manner, it is amusing to watch their reaction. Some people handle the situation by ignoring the act. Others watch in amazement, while others feel it necessary to comment. The comments most generally are of the nature of an inquiry of the habit. Things like “that is  interesting, where did you learn to do that?”

Being a dipper since I met my first egg, I was not aware there was another way to eat breakfast. I don’t think I had the opportunity to exhibit my egg eating skills in public,  until my first year at Church Camp. While standing in line, we were presented with the choice of eggs prepared in different ways. Naturally , sunny-side up was my selection. Once seated at the park bench like tables, I began my meal consumption by dipping. Seated directly across the table from me was a young lady from another Church in our district. It became readily apparent that dipping was not in fashion at her house. As matter of fact, I don’t think dipping was a practice in her whole town. After my second pass at my egg yolks, I noticed that she appeared to quit breathing and was turning red. Concerned for her safety, I inquired as to her well being. She grunted something alluding to my crude behavior, grabbed her breakfast tray, and disappeared to the other side of the dining room. Barely aware that dipping my eggs was a spectacle to her, I resumed breakfast. Only later did I realize her flashpoint was when my buddy exclaimed “I ain’t never seen anybody eat an egg like that, it was cool”. I was not sure if I should be proud or embarrassed. Every one in my family ate their eggs like that. This did not cause a problem with the young lady and I any longer,  because she kept her distance from me for the rest of the week.

On the long bus ride home I had time to ponder my breakfast performance. I was twelve years old and starting to get out in the world. I had always been particular about my appearance and my public presentation. This interaction with members of the opposite sex was not going to be easy. If I was going to have to worry how I ate my breakfast in public, it was going to be a harder  process than I thought. It occurred to me that I was going to have to decide if some inherent traits were going to have to be discarded. After several weeks of inner reflection and  the pull of years of practice, I decided to remain a dipper. And after having the responsibility of raising my own children, I am proud to report, they are dippers too.

 

Autumn on my street in the early sixties was a time that has forever lingered in my mind. The smell of burning leaves, Friday night football games and coal being delivered to heat our home are some of the most prominent memories. 

After the leaves on the trees had changed colors and fallen to ground it was my job to rake them up for disposal.  In our neighborhood we raked everything that had fallen, into the street and lit them on fire.  During the months of October and November piles of burning leaves emitted a pungent aroma all over the city. Once the smell becomes committed to your memory,  it never seems to leave.  Just one whiff and your mind races back to those days of simplicity. The burning piles were to be attended by the owner until they turned to ash. We were often on guard with a garden hose and shovel in the event a sudden wind delivered a little mischief to the yard next door.

The ritual of leaf disposal often took place on the weekends, sometimes with the neighbors offering each other a beverage like hot coffee or cocoa with which to pass the time.  Conversation was casual as the embers glowed and the younger kids played. Sometimes before we lighted the fires ,we raked the leaves into large piles and played in them. Running and jumping into a large pile of leaves and burying yourself underneath was a wonderfully simplistic experience. This process was repeated many times during the collection process. Once the fires had burned out and the leaves were gone , we soon returned to the warmth of our homes hoping that there would be more leaves falling next week.  These simple experiences that the whole family enjoyed together have been lost to civic regulations and favorite television shows and have become a reason to remain inside during those long cool evenings. 

If you were fifteen and it was Friday night, your destination was generally the High School Football game. Being too young to drive, meeting your girlfriend at the game was the accepted practice. It took me an hour to get ready for this date every week. Looking just right was important and the dresser mirror was not always your friend. No self respecting 15 year old male was going on a date without his hair being perfect. This trick was accomplished with a product called Vitalis.  It was hair oil for men.  With the right amount of this invention a guy could be outside all night without ever having a hair out of place. Once satisfied that the perfect look was achieved, it was time to get to the game. It was preferable to hook a ride with someone your age that had a diver’s license. That was cool. What was not cool was to have your Mom drop you off. If this became your last resort for transportation, she was instructed to drop you off a few blocks away so no one would see you. Once connected with your date at the prearranged meeting spot,  the rest of the evening was a mix of pop corn, hand-holding, walking around to be seen and very little conversation. The only thing that was less observed than meaningful conversation, was the football game. The game was the reason to get together, not the entertainment. The satisfaction for the evening was being in the company of a pretty girl. The were no rules but, there were high hopes.  Chiefly among these, being the opportunity to walk the young lady home. If that wish was granted, then the next  step in the hope department was to get to hold her hand. This was generally accomplished at about the halfway point of the trip.   If it happened, this is where conversation seemed to lag.   Hand holding and heart palpitations seemed to coincide. If general conversation were attempted it often would come out of the throat in a sound that was akin to a frog talking. So it was best to enjoy the intimacy and minimize communication. 

Once arriving at her house, the ritual of saying goodbye commenced. The goal was to solicit a good night kiss but many things could foil this attempt. First she had to signal that it was ok. This was accomplished by a smile and a turn in your direction. This sounds simple enough, but all kinds of things generally went wrong. If you didn’t step on her toes, or knock her off the porch, there was always the inconvenient timing of her Dad turning on the porch light.  However, once in a while the stars lined up and lips would touch for just a quick moment. After that it was time to go, because it was entirely possible that the palpitations could turn into a full blown heart attack.  I challenge anyone who has ever been the recipient of their first front porch kiss, to recall a time when they were ever more excited.  It didn’t take long to get home, no matter how far away it was.  

It is now the Autumn of my life and my thoughts often return to that season of the year that leaves fall from the trees.             Front porches and football games are indelibly etched on the windows of my mind. I will be forever grateful to my parents for the opportunity to grow up in a small town in Indiana in 1960’s.    And when I am thinking about my most important childhood milestones,  I always remember the night of that first front porch kiss.

 

Our Mom was a country girl. Her upbringing included horses and country music. As with a lot of people of that generation, she passed down to us kids superstitions and idiosyncrasies of her genealogy. I once spent an entire 6 months walking to school avoiding cracks in the sidewalks, because she shared with us  ” to step on a crack, you break your mother’s back”.     My brother LB1 (little brother one) and I had discussed this possible misfortune and decided that we would not be able to take up the slack if this happened. Another strange tradition was to throw a pinch of salt over your shoulder if someone spilled the shaker. We were told it had something to do with luck, or lack there of. Black cats and broken mirrors were something to be avoided at all costs around our house. Also, if one us had an itchy nose, it was a foregone conclusion that unannounced company was on the way. As we got older we began to question the validity of these practices but to this day I would never walk under an out stretched ladder or open an umbrella inside.

Mom had simple tastes and  one of them was Country & Western music and the Grand Ole Opry. The biggest stumbling block in her enjoyment of this venue was our Dad,  he couldn’t stand either. As such, Mom was not allowed to play that type of stuff on our radio in the kitchen. In her usual simplistic logic, that actually meant he didn’t want to hear it. By logical deduction, what he couldn’t hear, wouldn’t hurt him. So, after he left for work, the radio instantly began sharing with us and the neighbors, the latest Hank Williams ballads. Looking back on this time, I think she was the happiest. She was in complete charge of her domain as she sang along with the radio and washed the daily dishes. LB1 and I were not exactly sworn to secrecy but we were bribed a lot. Favorite pies and cookies seemed to appear mysteriously about the time Dad was due home for work. It really didn’t matter to us that the radio dial had to be returned to its strategic placement on his favorite station before 5:00 in the evening, but it was amusing to watch the ploy at work. 

Another idiosyncrasy that became my personal nemesis, was her occasional use of the letter” a “when an “o”was appropriate.  For example, for supper we might be having “carn” with our mashed potatoes or Roy Rogers “harse” was named Trigger. I don’t know why that bothered me so much, but as the oldest child I deemed it my duty to correct her every time she did it.       It never seemed to rankle Dad, and my little brothers appeared  oblivious to the problem. To her credit, when corrected, she would smile at me, pronounce it correctly and offer me a bowl of ice cream. I would give anything  today to hear her tell me that carn on the cob was on the menu for dinner.

Aside from the occasional fracturing of the English language and her seemingly unending quest to get me to 300 pounds by feeding me every dessert possible, our Mom, took seriously, her responsibility of raising us kids right. We had our mouth washed out with soap when caught uttering an occasional curse word. We also were made to swallow Vicks Menthol-Rub at the first sign of a chest cold. However, the all time most annoying practice, was to be made to go outside to a bush and break off a switch to be whacked with. This was not a common practice but was awarded after all other punishment was rendered useless. To be sent to get a switch was as much mental as it was physical in it’s intention. While walking outside to find a small tree the perpetrator was given time to think about his dastardly deed. Upon return without a branch of acceptable size, the trip would have to be repeated. Once Mom approved of the acceptability of the instrument, a couple of quick whacks were applied on the behind of our blue jeans. It never really hurt much but what came next was the coup d’ e tat. We had to go to bed with out supper.  How come it never happened on ham & beans night?  It always seemed to work out on fried chicken and mashed potato night. A few evenings of missing mom’s fried chicken was successful at making me even want to kiss LB2, just to show I could get along with everyone.

Perhaps the most distinguishing thing about Mom’s appearance was her smile. When it showed up on her face a dimple appeared on her right cheek. The broader the smile the deeper the dimple. Mom’s gone now, but she left behind some enduring memories. Her straight forward desire to do what was right no matter the cost and her dedication to her children and their welfare, became her legacy. But, the thing I treasure the most , happens when I look in the mirror and smile and my mom’s dimple appears on my right cheek.

The prospect of getting drafted and being sent to Vietnam hung over the mid sixties like a smog that wouldn’t disipate. The National Guard and Reserve enlistments were at an all time high. There were waiting lists to gain entry. College enrollment by 1966 was a must for any 18 year old male who wanted nothing to do with the military. As long as full time status was achieved on campus, a 1-S deferment was assigned to the student. This allowed all young men of draft age to avoid military service until graduating from College. By prolonging enlistment it was hoped that the mess in Vietnam would be over. Surprise, it lasted for ten years and the guys that completed their studies and then were drafted, most often, were given leadership positions. The irony in this maneuver was that they became more desirable targets for the enemy once in combat.

Another way to obtain a permanent deferment was to become a Father. It had long been tradition for high school sweethearts  to get married in the summer after high school graduation. These were still the days when women stayed home to raise children and guys went to work. There were a lot of manufacturing  jobs in our town to be had.  Most were associated with General Motors in some way. A lot of guys had jobs waiting for them the day they graduated. Their father’s were able to make that happen due to their employment in those factories.  A good job with benefits, a new wife and the prospect of going to Vietnam got a lot of families off to an early start.

Another alternative deferment was known universally by its classification, 4-F. This little achievement was permanent and generally awarded due to a physical abnormality. Having fallen arches was one of the most common. It became known as “flat feet”. There many ways that a heretofore non disclosed aliment became an asset to these eighteen year old males. Deformed toes, being too short, poor eyesight, one leg longer than the other and being too skinny are to name a few. These are all legitimate genetic hindrances that often qualified for 4-F status. As the war continued to drag on, more creative ways to avoid service began to crop up. The one that seemed to make the most sense to the perpetrator, but the least sense to everyone else, was to chop off one’s trigger finger.  Many people had been known to lead normal productive lives with nine and one half fingers. While the logic of the action had a certain sense to it, it more often than not, called the sanity of the individual in to question. Either way, it usually accomplished its intention of obtaining a permanent deferment.

In my case, going for the student deferment seemed to make the most sense. It was 1967 and if I was lucky it would be 1972 before it became a priority for me. So off to college I went, high school sweetheart in tow. We both enrolled on the same campus, she on a scholarship and me working , to pay my way. We both lived at home and settled into a head in the sand type of existence whenever Vietnam was mentioned. We married during the following winter and I dropped out for Spring Quarter to work full time. With a baby on the way my 1-S deferment seemed of little consequence. When the baby I arrived I would slip into a permanent deferment as a Father. My plans were working out just fine.

 It was 1968 and the “North Vietnamese Tet Offensive” had just occurred in February of that year. This military attack had caught the US military temporarily off guard. The resulting decision was to ratchet up enlistments for the nineteen year males in the United States. Things were going to be OK for me because we now had a beautiful baby girl to lavish our attention upon. In fact I introduced her to friends as my little deferment so often they thought that was her name. Unbeknownst to us the deferment laws were being rewritten to disallow a second deferment without a legal petition to the draft board. Oblivious to this nugget of knowledge, I continued with plans for my wife to stay in school and I continued to work full time. 

It was a beautiful April day when a phone call came for me at work. It was my wife informing me that in the morning mail I had received a letter from the US Government.  It was my draft notice and I was to report for induction in 90 days. There was to be no more evading this elephant in the room. The Vietnam War had just knocked on my door. The rest of that year is a blur concluding with my arrival in Bien Hoa, Vietnam on December 9th,  1969. I was a newly minted Private First Class in the United States Army. This began a new chapter in my life’s saga.  It was also the beginning of an experience that changed me forever. For the rest of my life, my experience in Viet Nam was never more than a few seconds away in my thoughts. For better or worse I lived through it.

As I look back almost fifty years, I try to remember mostly the good things about living in the sixties. And when people mention the Summer of 1968 and all the turmoil of that summer, I tell them about that beautiful baby girl that was ” My little Deferment”.

I was proud of the street I lived on. It was a main through fare. The city bus route had three different stops on it. It was the dividing line between two school districts. The kids that lived across  the street went to a different Jr High School than we did. If you continued driving west on our street for a few blocks you were soon in the country.  At the beginning of the street sat a Service Station across from our neighborhood grocery store.

Service Stations in the sixties were places of amazing activity for teenage boys. This was a place where everything automobile happened. There were gas pumps manned by attendants that filled your gas tank, checked your oil level and washed your windows while you were waiting in your car. Inside the building were service bays where repairs were done or tires were fixed. Patching tires was a hold over habit from the forties when rubber was rationed for the war effort. Many tires at the time were not sealed on the rim as they are today. The air was held in a rubber balloon inside the tire and was subject to patching when something punctured the outside casing. When tire manufacturing became more commercially acceptable as to price, Service Stations became the local dealers. This was where a lot of young men got part time jobs after school. It was a good place to work and in the slow time they could work on their jalopies. 

There were still not a great deal of used cars available in our town in the early sixties, so young guys built their own. Out at the edge of most towns were these magnificent piles of steel and iron known as junk yards. They had parts of old cars everywhere. Most of this junk was from the 1920’s and 1930’s and parts were no longer available. During World War II automobile manufacturing plants were converted to making stuff for the War. No automobiles were manufactured in the US from 1942 until 1946 for public consumption. So by the time everyone got a chance to buy a new car it was well into the fifties before there was any availability. In the mean time, folks just kept patching up the older cars. When they quit running, there wasn’t much left of them so it was off to the junk yard for the final resting place. This virtually eliminated any cheap used cars for 16 year old kids with very little or no capitol.

Necessity, being the Mother of Invention gave these young men an idea. Why not take the pieces of several cars and modify them to make these old pieces of  junk run again? Thus the Jalopy was born. No one is quite sure where the term originates but there were sure a lot of them around when I was growing up. Virtually every backyard or garage on my street had one under construction. The mechanics at Service Stations became the experts at these conversions. Many of these  men had learned how to make things last while service in the Army.  Safety laws pertaining to home made motor vehicles were non-existent. From these crude inventions came the next logical step, Hot-Rods.  Big engines and tires with light weight bodies and no restrictions gave birth to drag racing. From there it was just a matter of time before local ordinances started to pop up. However, for a while in that brief shining moment known as the early sixties, Jalopies ruled the school yards and country roads. Cars made from Junk that no one wanted.  Leave it up to American teenage ingenuity to spawn a whole new cottage industry.

Being a new kid in school is tough. Moving from a big city school to a small country school is tougher. Becoming a Freshman in High School and being both was a challenge.

In the summer of my eighth grade year after my sister was born, my parents needed a bigger house for four kids. I found one two streets over but it seems a brand new house was in the plans. I never dreamed that my whole life was about to change. The house that they purchased was to be built in a new school district, in the country.

From my standpoint, this was completely unnecessary. There were lots of perfectly good, bigger houses in our neighborhood. I was on the Jr High Basketball team and was sure I would play in the ninth grade. My Girlfriend lived only six blocks away. Our Church was over three streets and up 5 blocks. My part time job at Pizza King was on the same street as my house. My best friend lived up the alley and over one street. My fish bowl existence was about to spring a leak.

My arguments fell on deaf ears, we were moving. That August we packed up and moved about 5 miles straight west into a County school district. As far as I was concerned it was like moving to Siberia. What made matters worse was I had to start a new school in three weeks as a Freshman in High School.  On top of all the other insults, I was going to have  to ride a School Bus to get there and it was yellow!  Being cool had two chances, Slim and None and Slim just left town.

The first day was a blur of introductions and stares. I was staring at them and they were staring at me. On the second day I realized that a cute blond girl in the front row went to school with me in elementary school. She approached me after class with a smile and an observation. “You will like it here, it doesn’t take long”. That was easy for her to say, she was already here and besides, girls grouped together and protected each other. Then I found out that I was one of only four new kids in the Freshman class.  Great I was in the minority of the minority.

Days became weeks and the thaw in human relations had begun. The first inroads were on the School Bus, it was actually kind of fun. The bus driver played current music on the radio while we sang along and it seemed to be the catalyst for a good mood while riding to school.

It helped that we were generally seated in our classes alphabetically. As I arrived to each new class,  the same two girls were there, smiling and waiting to be my bookends. There was some kind of security in that, one or the other of them always had an extra pencil to replace the one that I had forgotten. We became friends and they helped me navigate the social waters of a new school. After the first month, the teachers began to pronounce my name correctly, finally, which helped to abate the snickers and giggles that inevitably came when my name was pronounced. Not only was I new, a Freshman, a boy,  from a city school;  my name was hard to pronounce.  My Mom was sensitive to my plight when I returned home from school and tried to assuage my suffering with brownies and cake. She assured me that I would fit in soon.

I’m not sure when soon arrived but it did eventually. I tried out for the Freshman basketball team and became a member. In Indiana that’s tantamount to winning the lottery. My bookends, introduced me around and vouched for my likability. The guys invited me to hang out after school. The girls  began to become even more attractive than the city girls. Most of all, the school population was more friendly as a whole. It was still true that  a lot of kids in my class had gone to school together since first grade but that only created a sense of security for them. It was out of that security that they were not apprehensive to accept new ideas and people. It was not long before I was one of the group and dating the Chemistry teacher’s daughter.

As I look back on that experience from over fifty years ago, I am so thankful that my Mom & Dad built that new house where they did. Those friendships continue to last to this day,   and I eventually married the chemistry teacher’s daughter.

It has been written so many times over the years that the 1960’s were a much more simple time. I beg to differ. Consider the History changing events than occurred.

The assassinations of John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King certainly are at the top of the list. The Vietnam War began in 1964 and lasted into the next decade. The Beatles as a group, began and ended during the sixties. Protests in the streets as well as the burning of bras and draft cards sprang up with the Hippie movement. Culturally, we came in to the sixties looking like a clone of our parents and left the decade with radically different views. We began with Pat Boone as our top selling musical artist and exited listening to The Grateful Dead. Teenage guys in 1960  were wearing pegged pants and girls were wearing Poodle skirts. In 1969 guys were wearing bell bottoms and girls were wearing mini skirts. Our literature was upended with the readings from Mao and Orwell. Playboy magazine became mainstream.  Babies born out of wedlock became an acceptable practice.  Marijuana was in, moonshine was out. In short, our parents lost control of our upbringing. 

It wasn’t their fault, who could have forecast the change? Our folks had been born in the twenties and thirties and had seen wide spread Depression and  two Wars. Their attitude by and large, was not to rock the boat. If the boat leaked, patch it.  If it was too small, make due. Those of us growing up in the 1960’s did not experience the phenomena of “doing with out”. Our entire life was an exercise of our parents making a better life for us. They, collectively wanted more for us than they had. Consequently when we rejected the values that they had instilled, a cataclysmic cultural split opened up. Some families were never able to bridge the gap.  For me personally, my father never understood the need for me to get the answer to the question , why? It was because he said so and no further explanation was ever forthcoming. It was pretty apparent by the time I was sixteen that going to Vietnam was a real possibility. I really wanted an answer to the question, why?

Being caught off guard by your children is not an uncommon experience. But, being blindsided by culture must have been an over whelming experience. It seemed that every where one looked in the mid-sixties things were changing. Parenting practices that worked for our Grandparents were ineffective. To a certain degree, we as a generation began to raise ourselves.

This is when the generational train went off the tracks.  At 16 years old we were not equipped with enough maturity to make life changing decisions. However, in some cases it was the only alternative, because some parents gave up. My parents did not and to their credit they kept trying. Since I was the oldest, I think my Parents knew they were in for the long haul. There were a lot of shouting matches and I got grounded a lot, but I always knew they loved me. Other kids I knew were not as lucky as I was and they became part of this alternative generation that began to drift away. Like an Iceberg that has broken away from its base, these kids got lost. Drug use got some of them, the hippie culture took some, early parenthood snagged some, but most of them drifted for the rest of the decade. Living from job to job, home to home and paycheck to paycheck became their existence. You can still recognize some of them today fifty years later. 

So, the next time you hear the sixties were a much simpler time. Take pause and offer up the thought, ” I beg to differ, I was growing up then”.

Belonging to a Church meant a lot more than just regular attendance in our family. As a young teenager, I had three mandatory appearances that my Mom expected me to attend. We began our week with Sunday Morning Service and Sunday Evening Youth Group and stopped by after school on Wednesday for mid week kids activities. Monday night Boy Scout meetings were also held  there. I was at Church more often during the week than some kids had gone to school. In those days our Church is where a lot of adult meetings were held,  such as civic service groups and neighborhood fund-raiser planning sessions. The building was a busy place, with activity some times, until late in the evening. Just being near this activity made me feel plugged in. Besides the School building,  there was no busier place than our Church. We didn’t have to have meetings and spend money on outreach programs. The community was coming to us. It was the feeling of our congregation that the more the building was  available during the week , the more comfortable folks would feel when coming on Sunday Mornings. They were right.

Sunday Morning Service was my link to the past. The wooden pews we gathered in had welcomed families for generations. The pine planked floor creaked when we walked on it  and sunlight streamed through the hundred year old stained glass windows as we were seated  by the ushers.  Hymnals  showed their wear, after the funeral home routinely replaced the cardboard fans next to them.  The Bibles we used were embossed with gold lettering remembering deceased members and their families. My world outside was moving faster every day, but here in this cocoon of spirituality everything stopped for an hour. I didn’t know it then, but my foundation and my core, were being formed in this place. Here sitting with my family, praying, singing and listening I was being molded by God. 

However, as a typical teenager, while God was at work, my mind would sometimes wander. Occasionally, during the service, we were directed to stand to sing. I would often still be seated  while my mind was focused on the Saturday night sock hop. My Dad would pop me on the back of the head to return me to reality. Upon returning to awareness, it seemed that the entire congregation would be staring at me. Once on my feet my  brothers would giggle, my Mom would grin and my Dad would act like he didn’t know me. When you are a teenager, being cool is the first thing you think about in the morning.  However, achieving cool was really hard to accomplish some days.

Sunday Evening Youth Group meetings were co-educational and that was the only benefit I needed, to achieve perfect attendance. Our Youth Leaders were aware of the possibly of hormonal volatility at  such a gathering and were ever vigilant for the occasional hand-holding. This was an exercise that was forbidden. So, like many inventive ideas that were born out of necessity, we had to be creative.  Long table cloths helped during the dinner meal. The positioning of one’s coat over a lap was a good old stand-by.  Best of all, sitting in the last row during  lesson time was the most desirable seat so as to escape detection.  All of this creative positioning was probably obvious to the Youth leaders but the increase in attendance was enough to loosen the enforcement of some of the rules. 

Church participation was in our family DNA. My Dad served at different times as Sunday School Superintendent, Usher, as Chairman of the Finance Committee, was on the Building Committee and acted as Scoutmaster. My Mom was in the Methodist Women’s club, on the  Bereavement Committee, in the Welcome Club, was a Sunday School Teacher, and helped keep up the attendance pads. I was in the Choir, President of the Youth Group, on the Building Committee, and gave an occasional Youth Perspective sermon. Little Brother number one was as active as I was and was even a Janitor for a while. We literally grew up serving in the Church. While I was not aware of it then, we were learning that, the more your serve, the more you are served. That is a life lesson that not everyone learns. I was very fortunate to have parents that took me along on the ride of a Life Well Lived.           Thanks , Mom & Dad

I first heard them on my transistor radio. The Disc Jockey announced them as the “Latest Singing Sensation from England”. I was fourteen years old and music was my constant companion. If I wasn’t listening to it, I was singing it. It was constantly playing and replaying in head. The name of the musical group was The Beatles.

I had heard a few other English groups but this sound was different. It was hard to pinpoint why. The harmony was good but that wasn’t all of it. The drummer was strong but there was more. The two lead signers sang an octave apart into the same microphone which was different but not unique. Then I watched them on the Ed Sullivan Show on television. They were incredible. They were the whole entertainment package for a teenager. The first thing you noticed was their hair, it was so long, and it was styled. The next impression was the way they were dressed, all alike, in suits and ties and boots.  They were wearing “Beatle Boots”, which had heels, a zipper on the side and were covering their ankle part way up the leg. Most importantly they were having a great time on stage. The music was good but not great, but it was delivered in such a fashion that you wanted to hear more.

A cultural change unlike anything since Elvis Presley was about to unfold, and I wanted to be right in the middle of it. I wanted it all, the hair, the boots, and the cool clothes. There was a problem standing in the way. America was stuck in the middle of a 1950’s hangover. I still dressed like my Dad did when he was growing up and got my haircut in a Flat-top like I did when I was ten. More over, America was not ready for change and my Dad was firmly at the head of that list. To make matters worse, school administrators were on that list as well.

Almost immediately, Beatle wigs became available and were quickly outlawed at school. Beatle Boots sprang up at shoe stores with the hard to attain price of $60.00. (In some places you could buy a car for that.) Beatle Jackets were all the rage and showing up everywhere. Barbers were caught off guard. Most young men under the age of 16 were not getting their regular bi-monthly haircut. Things were changing fast and the magazines of the day were fanning the flames. Look and Life carried dozens of photo-shoots of John, Paul, George & Ringo. The “Lads from Liverpool” were almost everywhere overnight. Teenagers from all over the country, deluged record stores for anything from the Beatles. Their first Album “Introducing the Beatles” was Number One on the American Billboard charts before it was released.

All of a sudden, a cultural  wall became apparent between parents and their children. Most parents were sure that this “fad” would soon pass. Most kids were afraid that they were getting left out of being on the cutting edge of cool. My Dad was not sure how he had gotten caught up in this tidal wave of change and he didn’t like it. First of all, I was told if I wanted Beatle Boots I had to buy them myself. So I got a job at a shoe store and bought them. Then I was told that if I wanted to wear a Beatle wig , it had to be approved by the school. It wasn’t, so I wore the wig on the weekends everywhere I went. If I wanted a Beatle Jacket, all of my allowance money would be put toward its purchase. So I forfeited my allowance.  It is hard to explain how exciting this phenomena was for a fourteen year music fanatic. I went to sleep every night listening to the radio and dreaming of becoming a singer.

As the months turned onto years The Beatles grew up and so did I. They experimented with drugs , I did not. They took years off between recordings, I went to college. They lived on their laurels, I went  to work to support a family. Unbeknownst to the world, change was waiting for a vehicle to arrive in. The 1950’s were over and needed to be put to bed. The Beatles tucked that decade in and let the 1960’s horse out of the barn. For those of us who were there for the ride, we will never forget the exhilaration.

 

During 1962 and 1963, I delivered both the morning and evening newspaper  in our neighborhood. As such, I was out on the streets at different times of day. I always enjoyed watching our part of the city wake up.  In the morning I was out between    5 :00 and 7:00 every day. I became familiar with the routines of most of my neighbors. In those days, the City Bus was the preferred mode of travel for the early risers. It stopped at the corner of our street every 30 minutes. While I was not aware of where most fathers worked, I was cognizant that almost every one carried a lunch box with them, accompanied by a thermos jug. Also most men carried the morning newspaper under their arm, to read on the bus on the way to work. This behooved me to get the delivery to these gentlemen before they left. It was not always the easiest route and in some cases necessitated doubling back down some alleys to get it there on time. If I was late occasionally to these destinations, I heard about it when I made my weekly collection stop on Friday evening. It was my responsibility and I was never offended at the requests. Other Dad’s drove the family car to work or participated in a Car Pool. Almost everyone, picked one or more co workers up on the way , in exchange for participation in the cost of gasoline. I do not remember anyone on my route having more than one car per family.

Sometimes our Mom “kept the car” for the day and Dad caught a ride with friends. Truth be told, our Mom was not a very good driver. In her defense, the shifter on the steering column was a three speed manual shift. She also had, on most occasions , at least three kids in the car, that were not secured with seat belts. Any passive restraint ideas for children were still on the drawing boards of automobile design engineers. So most of the time any kids in the back seat usually stood up, holding on to the front seat. This certainly was not the safest method of travel but at least we could see out the windows. In the event of an unexpected quick stop, many children got a bump on the head or a black eye, bouncing off the dashboard or back seat. We did however, get were we were going without too many bruises, because the speed of the car rarely exceeded 30 miles per hour.

During my afternoon deliveries I would watch as the men return home, almost to the minute at the same time every day.  Routine was  the rule  of the early sixties.  Most families welcomed the routine. There was security in routine. A great number of these men had participated in World War II as well as the Korean War.  It had now been ten years since America had been involved in any widespread conflict and daily routine was a welcome agenda. We were beginning to prosper as a nation and many of the Veterans were glad to be a part of it. We were able to dream about our individual futures again.

I certainly did my fair share of dreaming. I had lots of time to dream while riding my bike during the pre-dawn hours.  I watched these families on my route participate in the American Dream of raising a family and owning a home. I watched men get up every morning, before sunrise, to earn a living. I watched them come home in the evening to participate as  Scout Masters and Coaches and Sunday School Teachers. I knew not then ,about their sacrifice or combat experiences, but almost all of them had their own special story. The uniqueness of the working man of the fifties and sixties was the solitude and dignity by which they led their lives. They were not loud or demanding. They were thankful that they had a chance to do their part.  At eleven years old I was not aware of it, but I was rubbing shoulders with greatness. As I became a Father, I was always  thankful for the role models in my neighborhood, when I was growing up in the sixties.

It was about 1:00 on Friday afternoon and we had just returned to class from our Lunch break. Math class was just beginning when the public address system in the front of the room came to life. It was broadcasting a radio newscast of some sort. Most of the students began to giggle and look around assuming the Principal had inadvertently hit the wrong switch in his office. Very quickly it was apparent this was not a joke. President John Kennedy had been shot while riding in a motorcade in Dallas Texas. The broadcast was reporting that he was being rushed to the hospital in very serious condition. The classroom suddenly became very still. Not certain of the protocol in this situation, the teacher headed for the Principal’s office for instructions. The silence began to be broken by sobbing and small talk. The speaker interrupted our thoughts again, The President was dead. Although we were not aware of it, our world, at fourteen years old, would never again be the same. School was dismissed and everyone headed for home.

Television came of age in the next few days. Up to this point, we watched it mostly for entertainment. There was a 15 minute news broadcast in the evening, but that was not of much interest to teenagers. Now we watched it for every bit of news we could find. Walter Cronkite from CBS News had been the voice announcing President Kennedy’s death. Now the world tuned in to get his guidance. All programing on the three available channels were constant news broadcasts. The world seemed to come to a standstill. No one new what to do. Churches opened their doors, 24 hours a day for impromptu worship. Neighbors gathered on front porches and in each others living rooms. Everyone was always within earshot of TV or Radio broadcasts. Slowly, the story was revealed. The President had been assassinated. Numerous conspiracy theories began to become public. It was repulsive news , but it was so compelling that you dare not miss a word being broadcast. 

At fourteen years of age and a high school freshman my unquestioned sense of security was now in jeopardy. Our country had been so proud of the Kennedy’s and their message of hope and determination. Some of us had been prompted by the Inaugural address a couple of years before, to look into becoming an Astronaut in the new Space Program. Everyone knew someone who was planning to join the Peace Corps when they finished High School. Government service was now something at the top of many Guidance Counselors agendas. Now what? Who would  carry the touch of hope now for the younger generation?

It was during this time of uncertainty that my family drew it’s strength from each other and our unspoken belief in God. My Grandma and Grandpa drove up from Evansville, phone calls were made to all of the relatives and we began to pray. Our Mom and Dad gathered my brothers and I in our living room and asked us to pray for the United States and for John-John and Caroline Kennedy. So with one eye on the Television and the other on each other we stayed close together that terrible weekend and we realized that we had more strength when we were one.

In the following months we began to heal as a nation, but it was never again going to be the same. There were now questions where before assumptions had been. There was distrust where security had once flourished. My family became stronger through this process. We now seemed more appreciative of each others presence.

In just a couple of years I was going to have to declare a college major. At his point the Peace Corps was now getting serious consideration. One thing was certain, what ever I did as an Adult,  John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s  example was never far from my mind.

 

My only source of transportation to school was the Shoe Leather express. Our school was 32 blocks away. My pathway was a series of shortcuts that would wind it’s way through alleys, across parking lots and along city streets. Weather was a constant factor for which to be prepared. My Dad drove the family car to work and was usually gone by the time we left for school. On a few occasions when the weather was too adverse for travel, he would be late leaving and drop us off. I don’t recall that happening very often. 

To add to the issue I was a member of the Safety Patrol and had the responsibility of getting to my post before other kids started using that crossing. Safety Patrol Boys, (girls did not yet have equal rights, or want them in this endeavor) had the responsibility of maning high traffic intersections near the schools and directing traffic  for both students and automobiles. A Safety Patrol Boy wore a badge and a white canvas web sash/belt over their coat. Their job was to move to the middle of the intersection when a group of students began to accumulate on the far side of the street. The method was to hold up their hand in a stop type gesture and their motive was to make motorists stop from going through the intersections until every student had cleared the street. Today this position is handled by elderly folks called Crossing Guards.

Safety Patrol Boys had complete authority to stop vehicles or students as they saw fit. Occasionally a motorist would disobey a directive from the Safety Patrol and try to slide through the intersection. The recourse was swift and sure. The license number of the offender was turned in to the Principal and he notified the local neighborhood police. Generally a warning letter was issued, however if repeat offenses  occurred, a traffic ticket was possible.  Safety Patrol Boys had unique authority over student and vehicular traffic during their duty time every morning and afternoon. They were to be obeyed without question.  Like everything else in post-war America, positions of rank were assigned  to this corps  of boys. The center of the badge worn indicated the rank. Patrolman badges had silver centers, Lieutenants were red and the Captain’s center was blue. Depending on the size of the school there were about three Lieutenants but only one Captain. The higher ranks did not have permanent street assignments but were generally floaters that filled in as  vacancies  popped up due to illness. The Captain’s job was to make sure every post was covered every day. For an elementary school sixth grader to achieve the rank of Captain was an honor and a lot of responsibility.  I achieved that rank in the fall of my sixth grade year but abdicated the position when I found out it was constantly  making me late to the Friday afternoon Sock Hops. Certain priorities win out over everything when your hormones rule the day.

My walk to school took about 45 minutes every day. It was not dangerous or laborious, it was by necessity. Unaware of it at the time, we were watched over by a cadre of caring parents, neighbors and grandparents along the way. Many times a full report of a shenanigan that I had pulled on my journey, was waiting to be discussed by my Mom, upon arriving home. Our neighborhood was connected by folks who attended our Church , the guys at the local Barber Shop, Mom’s Home Economics Club,  the Firemen on duty at the Fire Station and many more community watchful eyes.   These anonymous people were annoying to  most eleven year olds but served their purpose in keeping us safe and out of trouble.  In those days neighbors took care of neighbors and watched out for children because they considered it their civic responsibility.

 

I couldn’t wait to be old enough to enter fifth grade. This was the grade level in which admission to the Friday afternoon Sock Hop was granted. They were held immediately after school  in the gymnasium. They officially were known as Record Hops because a teacher seated on stage was tasked with playing 45 rpm records on a RCA record player. The typical trappings of this highly anticipated weekly event were a cardboard table for the music player and crape paper taped on the walls in school colors. The event was nicknamed “Sock Hop” because it was necessary to remove our shoes upon entry onto the gym’s wooden floors. This was, after all, Indiana and not so much as a scuff was allowed on the Basketball floor.

Upon entry, shoes were immediately removed and lined up on opposite sides of the room. Thus, the boys lined up on one side and the girls lined up on the other. These were days of Poodle Skirts for the girls and pegged pants for the guys.  Admission at our school began at 3:15 and the music began promptly at 3:30. Generally, things began very slowly. Mostly girls danced with girls and the boys leaned against the wall trying their best to look like James Dean. Then after about 5 songs the first “Ladies Choice” of the day was announced. This challenge allowed the girls to walk across the floor to pick the guy of their choice. He was then obligated to dance with her for the “slow song” that was playing. Many a boy began his association with high blood pressure while the girl of his choice was heading across that floor. By the time it was apparent he was going to be picked, his pulse was off the charts. Of course, being cool during the acceptance was paramount to the process. The cooler the girl was, the longer the acceptance took. It may have been  only the fifth grade but boys had playground reputations to uphold. It didn’t matter that most boys did not know how to dance, this was as close as most of them had ever been to a girl, except for their sister , which didn’t count. Most 45 rpm songs were about 3 minutes in duration, so after this involved process most dancing was virtually non-existent. From the guys viewpoint, this was a good day. You got singled out and you got to put your arm around the opposite sex. For the boys who got a little too close, one of the many teacher chaperones moved in to make sure there was daylight between the now smiling couple. Rarely did a guy venture in the opposite direction  to pick a girl for participation. However when he did, there were several others who followed suit so as not to be outdone.

All of this high octane activity came to a halt promptly at 5:00. Most of us had to be home to a  nightly family supper serving at 5:30 or 6:00. During the process of recovering our shoes we tried to keep an eye on the afore mentioned dance partner. If they were leaving alone that was a signal , if their parents weren’t waiting to pick them up, there was a chance to walk them home. If a guy scored a dance and a walk home all in the same day, sleep would not come easily that night.

As we got older and Sock Hops moved into the evening hours on Saturday nights, the traditions didn’t change much. The music was more sophisticated, the rooms were darker, the dances were more intimate, and the chaperones were less visible but the highlight of the night was still the “Ladies’ Choice”.  To watch that lovely creature come across the gymnasium floor and bestow upon you the honor of being picked as desirable in front of your peers, well it doesn’t get any better than that, no matter how long you live.

 

 

In the Autumn  of my 15th year , Mom came home from a Doctor’s appointment with a smile on her face.  All she said was that we were going to get an addition  to the family. I knew it, we were finally going to get a dog. That night at the Supper table Dad announced that “we” were going to have a baby. A baby? I thought we were getting a dog. My 2nd little brother was already going to school  and we were finally getting him house broken. A baby, what were we going to do with another brother? The last one kept getting in the way and had this annoying habit of wanting to go everywhere I went. 

As Winter turned to Spring,  Mom became really ill and really big. One evening my Dad took me and little brother 1 to the Garage for a discussion. The one car Garage was detached from the house and had a gravel floor, it was  where all manly discussions occurred. His instructions to us were two fold. One, Mom was sick and going to be confined to her bed or the sofa for the next couple of months. This meant that we , Lb1 and I, were going to have to take over  the chores of taking care of the house. This meant washing and drying the dishes, three times a day, using the electric sweeper, doing the laundry twice a week and finally  making sure that the ironing in the ironing basket got done.  While we were pondering this unexpected plum, we were also told that we were going to have to buy a new house. Boom, that little nugget hit me like a lightening bolt.  I wasn’t sure which was going to crimp my social life more, word getting out that I was doing the ironing or that we were going to move. As we walked out of the” car house”, as my dimwitted youngest brother called it, I swore little brother 1 to secrecy about the housekeeping stuff.

As It turned out taking care of the housekeeping  wasn’t so tough because women from the Church kept dropping by to help out. Ironing though was one thing they didn’t touch, maybe it was too personal. My Dad wore a suit to work everyday and his white shirts and handkerchiefs had to be ironed just so.  Lb1 had to stand on a box to reach the ironing board so mostly that chore became mine. Ironing the white shirts made sense, but the handkerchiefs?  I didn’t understand , it was just going to be folded up in his pocket. Nonetheless, the chore  was done and probably has  something to do with my lifelong aversion to cloth handkerchiefs.

One evening my Dad got us all together and gave each a slip of paper. He then announced that the baby was going to be a girl and were each getting a chance to name her. We were to write our vote down and he would put them in a hat. The first name drawn was to be her first name and the second was to be her middle one. Timeout, a girl, what were we going to  do with a little sister?  I was totally not prepared for this bombshell. A girl and we were going to name her by drawing names out of a hat? He must of had too many sips of the Holiday Sherry bottle from the back of the refrigerator. After several minutes  the drawing was done, with a minor delay when Lb2 couldn’t figure out how to spell his choice. I looked around the room, everything was calm and Mom and Dad were smiling at the choice of names. Was I the only sane one in this family? I didn’t know how I got my name but now I was afraid to ask. Surely they didn’t stop some stranger and ask for a suggestion. That would be the only thing more weird than this. 

Several days later Dad took Mom to the hospital and brought us home a Baby sister. I don’t remember all this fuss when Lb2 was born eight years ago. He came home from the hospital at the same time we were getting a new washer and dryer delivered and I just thought he came with the package. Now, everything in the house was turning pink and Mom was the happiest I think, that I had ever seen her. Plans were moving forward for a new house and Lb2 had all these dumb questions about where babies came from. It was a good thing I had my trusty bicycle to escape all the madness. I would take long rides to ponder my life and wonder where I fit in to the whole scheme. All of this trouble and uproar over an 8 pound ball of pink. I still think it would have been a lot more fun and a lot less expensive if we would have just found a dog.

 

I was a Boy Scout from the age of six until I was eighteen. It all began with my Mom as the Den Mother of our Cub Scout Pack. We met weekly at our house and had a monthly meeting at the School. In those days a complete and proper uniform, including the blue cap, was the order of the day. We began every meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance to the United States of America, during which we gave a two fingered salute to the Flag. Most meetings were attempts to complete ongoing craft projects. After snacks we read from the Cub Scout Manual and were finally dismissed  with CSA benediction. The day of the meeting we were allowed to wear our uniform to school. In those days belonging to a Scout group carried with it a sense of pride that was evident when walking down the school hallways.

When I was 10 years old I transitioned into the Boy Scout Troop that held meetings at the Church on Monday evenings. The Random House College Dictionary lists the definition of Boy Scouts as ” an organization of boys having as its purpose the development of character and self-reliance”. I’d say that explanation was pretty close. Except, we ten to sixteen year olds weren’t clued in on that goal. We came together so we could have fun with knives, go camping on the week-ends and wear cool uniforms to school. Our Scout  troop was mostly run by men who were World War II veterans. As such, we were run as a para-military organization. After the Pledge of Allegiance began the meeting, with our now grown-up three fingered salute, we were called to attention and made to dress right dress. This was a military technique to get us ready for inspection. Inspected we were , every unbuttoned pocket was a demerit. Un-shined shoes were two demerits. Pity the kid with uncombed hair, he might be sent home for the night. We did not look forward to inspections but secretly had a certain sense of pride if we passed without demerit. 

Camping trips is where the real fun began. We would load up our enclosed wooden trailer about every six weeks and go to the woods, regardless of the weather. Some of my most fond memories are of camping in the snow. On these adventures we learned how to use hatchets, carving knives, bow and arrows and first aid kits. On one of these trips, my little brother missed the log he was chopping on and sunk the axe into his knee about three inches. While the Scout leaders were applying a tourniquet and drawing straws as to who was going to take him to the hospital for stiches, I decided it was a good time to work on my Hiking merit badge. It was my fear that I was going to have to accompany him and lose my weekend in the woods. When I returned later to the campsite I was assured that he as going to be fine and not to worry. The only thing I was worried about was if I had missed Supper. As it turned out he had missed all the major arteries but retained a pretty nasty scar. That scar became the subject of stories than became more outrageous every year. By the time he got to college he had obtained it by fighting off a Bear at a Boy Scout outing.

All of the equipment we used was WW II Army surplus as was evidenced by the U.S. Army stamped on it. We had the ubiquitous green wall tents, as well as metal canteens and water canisters know as “jerry cans”. If a casual observer were to happen by , we appeared to be miniature Army clones on weekend training. At the time I did not realize it but we were receiving some of the most valuable training that could be given. These hardened combat veterans had learned things in Europe and the Pacific during the War  and it was their mission to prepare us for that inevitability.

The goal of every serious Boy Scout was to advance to the rank of Eagle Scout. The award was a source of pride for the whole troop if the rank was achieved. It was awarded at a Court of Honor meeting in which your Parents and siblings were allowed to attend. I achieved Eagle Scout in the Spring of my 15th year. My Mom cried and my Dad shook my hand and had a picture taken with me. It was one of the proudest moments of my young life. My picture appeared in the newspaper and I was popular at school for about a week. My brother balanced everything out that night before we fell asleep. He mentioned that I would probably, eventually, lose the silver Eagle that was hanging on a red, white and blue ribbon on my bulletin board. He however, would always have his famous scar. He was wrong, I still have it on my desk at home and am still just as proud of it. 

A little over four years later I was assigned to a Recon Unit in the First Cavalry Division  of the U.S. Army operating near the Cambodian border. It was here , I realized that  the training I had received from my Scout Leaders was the marrow that would get me through the catastrophe called the Vietnam War.

Our milk was delivered to our home every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning. We had an insulated milk box on the front porch in which Mom would leave her order if we were not at home. However, if we were there, it was not uncommon for us to be eating breakfast and the delivery man to enter through the back door to put our order in the refrigerator. The milkman was a pseudo-family member and was occasionally offered a piece of toast or slab of bacon on his way out the door. This seamless intrusion into our daily lives was as normal as letting the dog out at night. The Milkman also delivered ice cream and he knew that with all us in attendance, breakfast the perfect time to promote the newest flavor. It wasn’t a tough sell, our Mom loved ice cream and was still getting it delivered weekly when she passed away. Home milk delivery faded away by the mid sixties and with its demise left our daily weather report and major source for neighborhood gossip. To a certain extent, so did  our sense of community trust. It would still be a long time before Mom and Dad locked the doors to our house, even at night, but that security measure was on the horizon. Our milkman was a trusted member of our extended family and we counted on him for much more than milk delivery. If we had the sniffles, he had the home remedy, if our dog was lost, he kept watch for him. When we were on vacation he also checked on the house. It has been said that the times in the sixties were much more simple.  This is true, however we were much more connected to the outside world by this one kind delivery man than any electronic device could ever duplicate.

Dads may have looked like they were in charge, but as anyone who grew up in the early sixties can attest, Moms were the rock upon which the family stood. My Mom was busy, so the instructions for the day were given out at the breakfast table every morning and being late was not an option, ever. Little brother number two had a bad habit of falling back asleep after Mom’s initial morning wake-up call. Breakfast was not going to be served cold by our Mom and she was only going to dish out the daily briefing once, with everyone in attendance. This presented a problem occasionally when lb2 was not in his chair. As the oldest I was dispatched to remind him of his family obligation. Merely pulling off the blanket to expose his eyelids to sunlight ceased its effectiveness after the initial try. It was apparent this kid could sleep through a fire drill. A hard yank on the ankles would land him on the floor and me in hot water because his head would hit with a thud. So, I developed the medium yank which left him dangling off the bed with his feet touching the carpet. This maneuver rendered him upright and me headed back downstairs heading for pancakes. He confided in me years later after returning from Air Force basic training, that his drill sergeant had perfected the same trick and wondered if we had any communication.

Breakfast was always hot and no requests were granted. One ate what was in front of you, all of it, every time. In later years Mom softened her stance on requests when the two youngest which were girls convinced her that they had to watch their weight. However, when the boys were growing up, most mornings, it was fried eggs cooked in the same skillet as the bacon, with toast and fried mush or oatmeal covered in butter and served with syrup or sugar. Weekends were reserved for Pancakes or French Toast covered in sugar or jelly. All of this was washed down with a big glass of cold milk.

With the chores assigned, lunch money dispersed and a kiss on the cheek, we were pointed in the direction of school. We set out secure in the knowledge that we were loved and that a snack would be waiting upon our return.  Most afternoons we arrived home to a warm slice of cake or fresh baked cookies. The theory of watching one’s caloric intake had not yet taken hold and we had many  friends walking us home.  Everyone of them was welcome at Mom’s kitchen table.

 

Summer was an exciting time. Each day offered up endless possibilities for exploration and enjoyment. One day when I was 14 a couple buddies and I decided to publish a neighborhood weekly newspaper. It was to cover some of the neighborhood news that was not being shared in the daily city newspaper. We talked the Church out of an old mimeograph machine that was waiting further assignments in a supply closet. We then bought three   8×10 yellow legal pads, found three ball pens that were donated by a local funeral home and we were off to find the next news scoop in the neighborhood.

A lost cat, a story about mysteriously over turned trash cans and an undercover story about the local barber were our lead items  for our first edition. The cat wandered home and the 7 year old perpetrator of the trash can mystery was caught before the initial printing hit the street. However we were not deterred. We printed 25 three page additions selling for 15 cents and available for reading at your leisure. In a matter of no time we were sold out, thanks in part to sympathetic parents and grandparents. Also, the undercover story about Gentlemen’s magazines being available for viewing at the local barber shop was starting to get some traction. It seems that the tradition of having magazines to read while waiting one’s turn for the bi-monthly trim was considerably enhanced by the availability of Playboy and other relevant magazines of the sort. These magazines were ostensibly available only to adult customers while they waited. If you were 14 , the trick to gain access to the off limits literature was a matter of positioning. Upon entering the shop it was necessary to position yourself next to a man enjoying the pictures while passing the time. When his turn was announced, most often the magazine was left laying in the seat that he had just vacated. It was then time to casually cover the adult periodical with the current issue of Life magazine and slowly pick both up without being noticed. With practice this trick could give  you many moments of exhilaration until your name was called for the next haircut. Unfortunately our story made it’s way , second-handed ,to the Methodist pastor who got his flat-top trimmed at our barber shop. A timely discussion with the Barber ended our foray into the world of adult literature for the time being, much to the chagrin of my buddies. My excuse at the Monday night Scout Meeting was that the story was an exercise in investigative journalism. I found out very quickly that the expression of a free press does not make one as popular as I had imagined in my dreams.

I was lucky to have good parents, but unlucky to be born first. There was no handbook for parenting and by and large my parents were not prepared for my personality.
They certainly were not prepared for the cultural changes that growing up in the sixties brought along. My father was the quintessential Dad. He was my coach, mentor, and role model but he was never my friend. We didn’t have long talks about life or how it was going to work out. He was busy moving up the corporate ladder and trying to pay the bills for an ever expanding family which eventually included five kids. At Church he was an usher, which meant he seldom sat with the family. In Boy Scouts, he was the Scout Master which meant individual attention was out of the question. At home, he was usually asleep on the sofa, most nights by 9:00 pm.

From the time I was eleven, I found things to do that kept me away from home. First, it was a morning newspaper route, seven days a week. I was up and out of the house by 4:30 every morning, home for breakfast by 6:30 and off to school by 7:00. After school was athletics. Football, Basketball, and Track, every season was covered. On the weekends were Sock Hops. Boy, did I look forward those, even though I didn’t know how to dance, neither did anyone else. During the summers, after breakfast, I would mount my bicycle and head out for the day, returning only to attend to obligatory chores around the house. Toting out the clinkers from the coal furnace in the basement in the winter, mowing grass in the summer, and carrying out the trash to the alley were some of the mundane tasks that were my responsibilities. Some of my friends did not have daily responsibilities, but then, they were not the recipients of a weekly allowance. This stipend was a source of hot debate occasionally, when it was withheld, due to non-performance of a certain task.

Looking back, the responsibility of daily tasks and the weight of disappointment that non-performance carried with it, has stuck with me my whole life. If I did not perform my assigned role, my parents would be disappointed and be there to hold me accountable. Accountability is now one of my strongest character traits. If I didn’t get up to deliver the newspaper, no one else would be there to perform the task. There was no option to neglect to perform your duty. According to my Dad, I signed up and it was my responsibility, period. He was right, and I have never regretted accepting responsibility. The sixties turned out to be pretty strict, but it was nothing like growing up in the Depression like my parents did.

What fun it was growing up in our neighborhood. There was always someone hanging out on their front porch looking for something to do. Like a game of marbles.

Shooting marbles was a talent that most 10 year old boys took a great deal of pride in. Most marble collections were kept in a draw string bag and hug at the ready from the handle bars of your bike. These collections would generally consist of a couple of shooters. These were the ones that were usually chipped and occasionally made of steel. These were known logically as , Steelies. The rest of the bag contained the most beautiful ones, known as “cat’s eyes”. So known because the center section of the clear glass resembled the eye of the family pet feline. They came in varying sizes and colors and had generally been won by the owner in previous matches. These beauties were the object of much affection and were coveted by opposing players.

 Generally, Girls did not participate in shooting marbles. It must of had something to do with lowering themselves to the boys level to participate in what usually took place in the dirt. That was the only place to draw a ring with which to determine a boundary. The object was simple, each player took turns using his shooter to attempt to knock the opposing players marbles out of the ring with one shot. Once accomplished, the marble then belonged to the player who had performed the feat. Many argumenta and an occasional fist fight would arise as to the validity of one’s shot. Mostly though, it was, “to the victor goes the spoils” type of arrangement, with promises for a rematch in the days to come. A game of marbles could break out at any time and the least likely of places. I once saw an impromptu session at an outdoor wedding. All that was needed was some ground, two bags of marbles and preferably some spectators to attest to your skill at the game. It could last for one round or go on long into the afternoon. It was helpful to arrive at the rules of longevity at the outset of the game so as not to be labeled a quitter. This rule was especially applicable when you were the recipient of a few new precious cat’s eyes. Once the opposing player was wiped out of marbles there was a moment of triumph as the winner counted out his new acquisitions. Humility was the best option here because tomorrow you could very well be on the losing end. Sore losers could easily find themselves without a rematch. Many an evening was passed washing and polishing one’s marbles for the prospect of another acquisition for the following day. It has never occurred to me until now but I assume this is where the term meaning going wacky was known as “Losing your Marbles”.

My little brother was born when I was 20 months old and I never again had a room alone to sleep in. I guess that was the beginning of one of life’s greatest lessons, sharing. To give up one’s privacy at such an early age had it’s benefits. As we got older Mom would always ask us things like , “who broke the lamp or who left the butter out?”. Looking back on those days growing up, I remember how convenient it was to have someone to blame things on. This was especially handy when my little brother was just beginning to walk but not yet in full command of the English language. It also helped that he was born with this eternally perplexed look on his face. It was hard to tell if his features belied a look of guilt, or amazement that I had just let him take the fall for the broken lamp. Nonetheless, he was handy to have around on occasion.

With the addition of another brother, 5 years later, it became readily apparent that we were going to be stuck with each other for the duration, so we kind of accepted our fate. Besides, he never did have a choice, he was stuck in the middle forever. His privacy was forfeited at birth as admission into the family. He became my scapegoat, and I became his protector. Bicycles were our portal to the adventures of the day and for many years to come.

As far back as I can remember, I was fascinated and a little scared of girls, It was more than a little fascination, I liked being around them. Fortunately I grew tall quickly and I paid close attention to my hair. I found these two things an attribute when attempting to get close to a cute girl.  Unlike guys, who tended to hang out with only one other buddy, girls moved about in gaggles or clumps. This was often  an insurmountable roadblock  in getting through to one’s desired target. With the benefit of age, I realized this was by design, but when you are fourteen and unable to control your hormones or verbal acuity, it was terribly frustrating. So, as often was the case, I was left alone on my bike with my thoughts and desires.

Wednesday night Church was a great help in learning how to navigate co-educational waters. I don’t remember much about weekly  lessons, but I learned quickly that grabbing a seat next to the girl of my choice, was accomplished easier, by showing up early for the meeting. I think this is where my life long affinity for always being on time , began.

Getting the seat and getting the attention proved , many times, to be two separate tasks. Cologne seemed to help, or at least it didn’t hurt, and I still use it every day. Mostly, I didn’t want to talk, I just wanted to touch. Mostly, the girls just wanted to talk and did not want to be touched. So , this was my dilemma, how to get past talking  so we could get on to touching. 

For sure, it was not going to happen at Wednesday Night Church. However, it might happen if I could muster up the courage to ask the one question that was sure to illicit a negative response, “can I walk you home?” It took weeks of practice in front of the mirror in my bedroom to perfect this seemingly off the cuff inquiry. When the stars finally lined up and the question came out in what sounded like a succession of burps, the intended recipient just starred at me for about two minutes and then ran to the safety of her gaggle. Having been prepared for a negative response, I had not factored in any preparation for no response. The whole situation was not assuaged by my best buddy as we were walking home. “Boy did you look stupid” he assured me. I hardly heard him, I was thinking ahead to school in the morning. How was I going to handle that? As it turned out, my reputation got to school before I did. The guys thought I was cool and the girls, well, they just thought I was tall with nice hair.

Growing up in the early sixties was not going to be easy, but I was not going to give up.