Reflection

Recently I had the chance to spend time with two high-school (50 years ago) classmates. It was great to reminisce, question, uncover, reveal, different bits and pieces of our shared history.  With one friend, our association then was completely in passing---a hello-goodbye relationship (as I recall). The other was someone who was in my life, a sister cheerleader.  Hers was an absolute Father Knows Best family, unlike anything I knew (save for TV).  And I was lucky enough, also, to work for her father.  A real job, cleaning his office and once a week, in addition to a paycheck, I had access to a real father and that was a gift to me.

It struck me that they shared/remembered/had many more memories than I did. 

Had we not participated in the same sphere of events? OR had I not felt those experiences because I was working so hard to appear "normal." 

For me, life was far from normal.

The High School Reunion

I've inserted many links to earlier posts because if you want the truth (I won't say "the whole truth and nothing but the truth" because there's always more than one truth), if you want to understand my truth, then you need the backstory.
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High School graduation was 44 years ago...

What a LONG time.  The last reunion I attended was the 33rd (our class doesn't do things the usual way).  I don't remember much of that reunion — except that it was nice, but felt unsettling to me.  I suppose if you asked, people from my class would always say I belonged, I was a cheerleader, held class office, and was in the Girls' Varsity Club.  But for me, high school was like being an outsider living on the fringes.  Outside because I was one way at school and then another at home.  There I lived a totally different reality — a hidden reality until my brother did something that shamefully splashed our family's name all over the newspapers.  Though I gave a speech at graduation ("Maybe I'm not an individual but only think I am…") and won an award for citizenship, I really didn't feel as if I was part of any life I saw my classmates living.

Going to a reunion I suppose many of us worry about the things that always worried us. For me it was my weight. I'd always struggled with weight and was certainly heavier now. While I knew some of those attending would look as they did back in the day, when I looked in the mirror I didn't see the old me — nor would they.  

The reunion was full of surprises.

Yes, I and others were heavier, but for the most part people were the same.  Certainly older, changed hair (beards!), more wrinkled, but still, much as they were almost half a century before.  I was surprised that I spent more time talking with classmates I barely knew back then.  I was surprised that most of the women were still coloring their hair (darker or lighter) but I don't remember any other female who'd let their hair go gray, as I did.  Our creative writing teacher had married one of our classmates!  Turns out he was only seven years older than we were!  How is that possible?  I was astonished that we were there from all over — California, Montana, Florida — they'd all come together despite the time and the miles.  Why?  What we we looking for?  What were the hopes?    

My motivation was to reconnect with my past.  To see if I could get perspective on where I came from and who I was back then.

I had to say this "look back" was a driving force the past six months — tracking down old boyfriends to say something I hadn't said. Visiting old homes to see what they looked like now.  Trying to find a missing recipe, a photograph that captured something now gone.  I wanted to square my past; I wanted people to know who I really was then and not who I often pretended to be.. "Little Mary Sunshine". 

Surrounded by my classmates, I started to see who they were. Like sweet S who had cared for her ailing, aging parents, found her calling, decided to go back to school and became a nurse.  Or vivacious D who was traveling the states successfully running her own media business. Ju, N, L, S, H, and J, looked as if they'd just stepped out of high school.  Forty-plus years later, J & S were the same couple they'd always been and there was comfort in that for me.    The high school sweethearts who'd been living separate lives for decades and came together recently and married because R said, "I thought about when I was happiest in my life and it was when I was with C."  Having twins myself, I was curious about the three sets of twins in our class, and sadly two sets are estranged.  Everyone had stories to tell: loving J with an alcoholic parent, the divorce that left perky M a single mom raising four little ones on her own; H who surprisingly only learned after her mother passed that she was Jewish and survived the Holocaust.

For me, it was a chance to revisit what was true for me then, especially two stand-out incidents: In Mister Burson Wasn't a Nice Person I wrote of my indignance when my geometry teacher called me "stupid" but at the reunion was infuriated to learn that (in a different class) he'd called fun-loving M a "dum-dum."  She told me she hadn't been able to walk out but his negative words left their impact.  When she shared this parallel insult it confirmed for me what I thought about Mr. Burson back then as a sophomore — he was an awful teacher and should have been FIRED.  

And a big thanks to B who remembered being in class when dear Father Ryan lost his temper with me.  B validated the mortification I felt that day and the humbling pall that fell over the class at Mr. Ryan's uncharacteristic action.

Despite my trepidations I was warmed when Bl's first words to me were "Hello Denise…" and I was pleased when after the reunion C emailed , "Man, you are some dancer, you got the whole crowd going! "  and despite the fact that after partying too hard when I sat down to talk to Br  I fell off my chair (thank you for being so chivalrous about it), I was struck by an unmistakable fact.  Out of about 250 kids, sixty of us from the Class of '70 came together to greet one another, catch up, share our memories, drink, laugh, dance, and be one again.  It was pretty damn great.

Still there were things I wanted to say, questions I wanted to ask, people I missed, people I didn't get to talk to.   

Guess I'll have to show up again — for the 50th.  

Maybe, just maybe, I belonged more than I knew.

The Rest of This Story

This post continues the story in Things Change
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There was a lot that led up to my father's departure.  

He had had a hard life long before I was born.  I never knew his parents and I only learned bits and pieces of his past much later when I was older.   His mother had a first marriage that produced two children but that husband died.  Later she remarried and had another son, my dad.  His father ran out on the family — but not before my father experienced the shame of his father beating his mother and the pain of his father beating him.  With his father gone and his mother unable to support them doing her beadwork, he dropped out of school after eighth grade and worked on a truck delivering bread. He got to take the day-old bread home which was helpful to them.  He told me that during the Depression his mother (maybe with him along) scavenged in the garbage cans behind grocery stores for food that was thrown away — she'd make soup from the vegetables, jam from the rotten fruit she found.  He became the sole support for his mom, which is why he never went to war like almost everyone else in his generation.

There was never an easiness between us.  He and my sister had a bond.  She was his first.  When my sister was five and my mother was pregnant with my brother, she left my father and moved back home with her parents.  My grampa wasn't sympathetic.  "You chose him now you have to stay with him."  Unhappy with her options, my mother was trying to figure out what to do when she was out walking when my sister tugged on her hand and cried out, "That man!  That man! I think that man is my DADDY!" pointing with her finger and dragging my mother to cross the street.   My mother told me she felt she couldn't keep my father from her.  And so she went back.  My sister stayed fiercely loyal to my father and he to her.  Maybe he felt she was always on his side.

My father identified with my brother. Of course he was the first son and they were both males.  But more than that their mindsets were compatible.  They both wanted to get rich quick and were constantly concocting schemes to achieve that goal and here's where they differed.  My brother's schemes were usually illegal, generally succeeded, until he got caught. My father's escapades were always legal (as far as I know) and always failed.  So in some way, my father admired my brother's successes and turned a blind eye to how it was accomplished.  He relished the money and what it bought — the fancy car, the ski house, the beautiful girls, the trips overseas.  And when my brother did get caught and faced juvenile detention, jail, and eventually, prison my father was always there to bail him out.

By the time I came along, there were no slots left.  Not the first-anything and the youngest in the bunch, in all the chaos no one paid me any attention.  I didn't understand the commotion, the outbursts, the rage.  I didn't understand why our family wasn't like the ones I saw on TV.  I wasn't "Princess" or "Kitten" to my father.

My father had had his share of bad luck.  He wanted his own business.  He knew drycleaning from working at a commercial cleaners.  When I was young my parents borrowed, sold their insurance policies, scraped together the money, and bought a drycleaners.  He went out to solicit new business.  Was going door-to-door to give people flyers.  One home he went to had a six-foot chain link fence.  He went in. Somehow the gate locked behind him.  Guard dogs raced out and attacked him.  He struggled to climb up the fence backwards while the dogs were biting at his legs.  He managed t throw himself over the fence.  He broke his ankle and who knows what else was wrong.  I was little.  I didn't know what was going on except that all of a sudden my father wasn't around any more, my mother went to work very early and came home very late.  My sister, maybe she was thirteen had to run the household.  My brother and I tagged along.  On Sundays when someone drove us all to the hospital to visit my dad, I was too little to be allowed in.  My brother could sneak in but some relative would stay outside with me and throw stones at the window to see if we could get my father to look out the window and wave.  It was grim.

Months after, my father came home to recuperate.  My mom didn't drive so she took public transportation and her day was long and hard and more than any one person should have had to bear.  She was worried about keeping the business going, paying the bills, putting food in the frig.  We three kids were extra baggage she just couldn't carry at the time.

My father got better and began going back to work.  His doctor recommended he bowl for exercise to help his ankle.  He was coming home from bowling one night driving the VW van that was the delivery truck for the cleaners.  Back then people referred to VWs as driving a "tin can."  While he was driving home a 17 yr-old drunk driver with a suspended license ran a stop sign at a perpendicular side street and plowed into the passenger side of the VW.  The force of the impact (he was in a big car) blew my father out of the van, up in the air, and he skidded 40 feet along the railroad tracks parallel to the road before his body came to a stop.  Years later my mother told me that when she got to the hospital there was so much gravel imbedded in his face she didn't recognize him.  

He was a mess.  Now that repaired ankle was shattered.  So shattered that they thought they'd have to amputate.  I was told that a surgeon was found who was willing to try and save the leg but even if he succeeded, he'd always walk with a limp.  My mother was grateful for that.  He was back in the hospital for a long haul.  My mother was back to doing everything on her own.  They would be plunged again into crushing debt.  

This is a compressed story of what transpired in my father's life.  I can't remember the actual dates, the full facts, the other points of view.  I only know that for me, this is what imprinted from the turmoil and  tumult that was our family life.  It was years of hard times, bitterness, fighting, never enough money, and for me and my siblings, never enough parental supervision.  

My father...at a benign moment...

My sister got married soon after high school and my brother was locked up someplace, my mother was working and that left my father home alone while I was in high school trying to avoid coming home at all costs.  It was that behavior that made him angrier than ever.  He wanted control over something and the only something around was me.

I remember it was winter because when I got to the house it was dark outside.  I went in to the kitchen and my father limped in close behind me.  I did what I always did — made myself small, stayed quiet, hoped my mom would walk in the door soon. He was yelling.  He was mad I was late.  He was mad I wasn't looking at him.  He was mad at the world.

When I looked up from setting the table while trying to shut out my father, I saw his beet red face and his voice shouting at me, sputtering about how we were all no good, nothing but bums and in his hand he was brandishing a large kitchen knife.

On some level I knew he wouldn't use it against me but on another level I was just plain scared of him and his rage and what might happen.  So I ran out of the house and up the long road to my friend Susan's house and told her I had to spend the night.  I waited and later called my house, got my mom who was frantically asking me where was I?  What happened ??  I only said I wasn't coming home and I was staying at Susan's.  I remember staying there three days.  When I came home I stayed clear of my father and tried to lay low.  A few days later I came home and found him gone. 

I've written a lot about my father: Father Didn't Know Best, Thrift — the very first post of Tales From Denise James is about my dad.  To the outside world he was a jovial, fun-loving life-of-the-party jokester — but this is the side of him that sticks with me.

I didn't blame my mother if she blamed me — even if I knew better, know better — it always felt like his leaving was my fault.

Things Change

By the time cheerleading practice was over, I rode the sports bus and walked the rest of the way home after my drop-off — it was dark.  The house was empty.  Usually my father was home, sulking, simmering — I never knew if he would stay silent or if he would explode.  I used my key, crept into the darkened house and turned on every light — even though I risked his wrath at "wasting electricity" because I always felt scared to be in the house alone.

In the kitchen, I opened the frig to see what we could have for dinner, and there on the kitchen table was a small tape recorder and a yellow legal pad the long lines filled with my father's almost-illegible scribble.  Though it was addressed to my mother, I read through the first few sentences before I heard the door open, looked up and saw my mother, worn and tired, come into the room.

"Where's Daddy?" she asked.

"He's gone," I said in a small, unemotional voice.  I looked at her carefully to see if she would react, understand what it all meant.  "I think he left a tape for you," I added, pointing to the small machine plugged in to the wall socket.

Without a word, my mother — still in her coat — sat down in one of the heavy, clunky, dark wooden Captain's chairs that crowded around the small round kitchen table. 

"How does this thing work?"

I hit the button to play and out came my father's voice — issuing instructions and commands about where to find this, what to expect or how and when to do that.  It went on and on but the only thing that registered in my ears was his last line:

"You're all better off without me."

My mother shrugged off her coat, read through what he'd written out in his awful scrawl, put down the pad, let out a sigh, went over to the telephone and called my sister — crying.  

I felt bad for my mother and as I tried to quiet the roar of thoughts exploding in my brain — in the pit of my stomach I knew she blamed me.  I heard the muffled sounds of my mother crying and talking in the background — but in my head, all I clearly heard was his voice saying — "You're all better off without me."

It may have been the first time I agreed with anything my father said. 

A Blind Date with The Stones

It was an odd situation.  I was headed out on a blind date arranged by my ex-boyfriend Jack.  

Though Jack and I were no longer dating, we'd remained friends and I trusted that Jack had my best interests at heart.  Still, a blind date?


"He's a really nice guy and he's Armenian!" was his pitch, so I said the guy could call me and when he did, he was so, so excited to tell me he had tickets to see the Rolling Stones at the recently renovated Madison Square Garden in New York. 

Being a Beatles girl, I wasn't so enthused.  Plus, it was on Thanksgiving, he'd have to pick me up from my Aunt Maddy & Uncle Johnny's house, and — it was a blind date.




"So this guy, this blind date, he's taking me to see The Rolling Stones," I complained to my friends as I slammed my locker door the next morning at school.  

              "WHAT?"

                              "The Stones?  Are you kidding me?"

                   

                            "GEEZ, you're COMPLAINING?  A blind date that's taking you to the Stones?!"

"I don't like the Rolling Stones," I continued to complain, "and it's on Thanksgiving night.  This guy is gonna have to pick me up from my Aunt's house and I'm gonna have to meet him with about 30 relatives looking on — isn't that AWFUL?" I complained hoping for sympathy.




"You better stop whining," cautioned one of my friends looking at me as if I were a complete lunatic — "YOU are getting to see THE ROLLING STONES!  Are you CRAZY?  You are SO LUCKY!"




Though I still felt cranky, I guessed I could bear it.

After a gargantuan Thanksgiving meal, I was upstairs getting ready for the big date with help from my sister and my cousin Linda.  Before he even rang the doorbell, I already felt sorry for Bob.  As far as the family was concerned, he was walking in the door with two strikes against him:

     1.  What kind of an Armenian was he?  His family name had been shortened so that it didn't have the signature "ian" at the end of it that signaled it was Armenian ("ian" means "son of"...son of the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker).

     2.  It was Thanksgiving.  What was he doing leaving HIS family?  What kind of an Armenian was he?  

I tried to hurry along but was having trouble with my hair. Downstairs I could faintly hear this poor guy being grilled: Where was he from? What did his father do?  What was he studying in college?  Then I heard my uncle ask if he'd ever gotten a traffic ticket. I figured next he'd be asking if he ever used drugs, so I thought I better break up the interrogation.

As I came down the stairs, immediately I thought — strike three.   Bob had long hair, cut in a Beatles-bob shag with very long bangs.  Oh boy, he didn't stand a chance in this crowd.  Still, he was nice looking, in an Armenian-way, but he was squirming uncomfortably.   Every male relative in the room was staring in wait for Bob's answers to the endless stream of questions my cousin Bobby continued shooting at him.  Seeing the sweat beading down my date's face, I took pity and hustled us out of there and into the safe haven of his car.    

Madison Square Garden had unveiled its new look just a year before...the tiered brightly color-coded-by-level seating could accommodate close to 20,000 people.  We were on the side of the first tier...not bad seats compared to the rows and rows and rows above us.  It was a massive place.  As we took our seats, I was surprised that everyone around us was smoking.  Soon I realized it wasn't all tobacco.

The first act was someone I'd never heard of, Terry Reid, but he got the night off to a good start.  Next up, BB King.  Yes, BB KIng was a warm-up act for the Stones and to put it mildly, he was incredible — seated on his chair pulled close to the front of the stage with his cheek on his guitar he sang his blues and got people clapping and tapping their feet.  I was really starting to feel the music.

Then BB exited stage left and filling the stage with their pulsating "hard-driving, funked-up hybrid of soul and rock" came Ike and Tina Turner.  I kid you not.  As they skyrocketed into their set, the audience of thousands were jumpin', dancing and rockin' with a joy that soon escalated into a frenzy.  And just when you couldn't imagine it could get any better, out from somewhere in the seats down on the floor runs someone to join Tina Turner on stage and — ladies and gentlemen get ready — it is none other than in the flesh — Janis Joplin! 

Handed a mike, Janis and Tina burst into "Combination of the Two" (♪"Who-o-o-a, whoa, whoa, whoa-yeah! Whoa-yeah! WHOA-yeah!"♪) which brought everyone to their feet.  I hadn't smoked nor had Bob, but there was so much smoke all around us, you couldn't help but inhale the fumes.  I realized I was experiencing what people called a "contact high."  After the high energy rendition of that song, Janis and Tina slid into "Piece of My Heart," a heart-breaking ballad of pain (♪"Didn't I make you feel like you were the only man - yeah!  An' didn't I give you nearly everything that a woman possibly can ? I want you to come on, come on, come on, come on and take it, take another little piece a' my heart now baby..."♪) that every female in the audience identified with.  THEY were unreal — the date was unreal — and we hadn't even gotten to the Stones!

This is the generic poster from their 1969 tour, the bottom would be filled in with venue details.  
Somewhere buried in my attic is the program from the November 27 concert I attended on my blind date.

When the Stones finally came on stage, everyone in the arena was on their feet.  Madison Square Garden was a writhing mass of humanity.  To be honest, I don't remember much about what they sang or even how they sounded.  What I do remember is Mick Jagger shirtless, strutting around the stage like a preening peacock who was being showered by screaming adoring girls (lots of girls) throwing their bras on stage — literally.   As a pretty naive 11th-grader who hid in the corner of the locker room to change clothes when it was time for gym, this act of sheer abandon, coupled with the communal consumption of dope, were startling to me.

Bob Brooke may not have lasted long in my dating life, but the impact of that date sure did.  From that exhilarating, mind-blowing-first-rock-concert-ever, came a passion for live music and — from that night on — a singular focus on saving every penny I worked for to buy tickets to Fillmore East and other music venues in Manhattan for the rest of my high school days. I would see, among others, Jethro Tull (3 times!), John Mayall, Ten Years After, BB King, The Doors, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.

So here's a shout-out to "Telephone-Jack" (as my uncles used to call him because our communication was largely via pay phones) for introducing me to my ticket to a slam-bang unbelievable night that rocked me into rock music — and was the rock concert of an era.