School Time

For the umpteenth time we were in another school. You never got used to being the new kid in town. It wasn’t easy having to fit in. Everyone else had best friends already, longtime friends or a circle of friends. It wasn’t easy and downright uncomfortable at times to be an outsider trying so earnestly to be one of the gang. It was embarrassing to be hauled in front of the class to be introduced, and asked, “Mike tell us a little bit about yourself.” Like a good navy kid I gave my name rank and serial number and promptly headed for the nearest empty seat. Or, you’d be pointed out in the back of the class as “The Newcomer” and asked to stand up while everyone gawked at you suspiciously as though you were a spy or from another planet. Man, I hated that, but did my best to look cool as I flicked my bangs to the side and waved casual-like at my new classmates.

Girls were always much easier for me to make friends with at first. If they thought you were cute they were very friendly. Although I was extremely skinny, I had my aforementioned Beatle bangs and could flash my dimples on command. There were times then and later when I found myself in trouble for that. Other boys didn’t think it was so cute and I was threatened for looking at someone’s girl friend or talking to his girl. I didn’t even care about having a girlfriend at the time, I just liked being liked, and that’s all. Inevitably in a few weeks at the most, you’d get over that painful hump if you managed to keep your cool, acted agreeable and helped your team win at kickball. Once they got used to you, you made friends with kids you had something in common with.

My brothers, sisters and I liked our new elementary school. For one, it was just across the way and even better; we didn’t have to wear a uniform. We only had to dress up on Sundays now. Public school was considerably more fun and in a California way, much more laid back. The school buildings were one story and spread out in rows with small courtyards between them, each connected by canopy-covered sidewalks. The schoolyard was a huge sandy lot with playing fields partitioned with chalked lines maintained by the janitorial staff. At lunchtime, there could be as many as four kickball games going on at the same time. At the north end was an assortment of monkey bars, a domed jungle gym and swing sets complete with pull up bars and a set of rings.

It rarely rained in San Diego so the windows and doors were open most of the time. I liked that. There were outdoor benches and you could eat your lunch outside if you could get a seat. I enjoyed lunchtime and sampled some interesting food that I swapped for. Kids are finicky and didn’t care for everything in their lunches, so we traded sandwiches and desserts everyday. My mom usually made us peanut butter and jelly or baloney sandwiches. I hated peanut butter and jelly so I always had a baloney sandwich of one kind or another- with mustard, mayo and lettuce, sometimes with cheese, or a combo with all of the above or the classic baloney and ketchup. Sometimes, I swapped for some interesting fare including egg salad, tuna, tongue and Underwood Deviled-Ham sandwiches. I always liked canned meat and there’s nothing more satisfying than a fried spam sandwich. Anyway, some kids had fashionable lunch boxes decorated with popular icons of the time like Popeye, Barbee or the Munsters. One lucky bastard had a Beatles lunchbox. I on the other hand had a simple but functional brown paper lunch bag. That meant my wax paper-wrapped sandwich was mashed into interesting shapes when I pulled it out. They still tasted good. Many of the kids with lunchboxes had a thermos filled with iced soda or still-warm chicken noodle soup. I usually had an orange or an apple or a few crumbled cookies with my sandwich but was usually unsuccessful trading those for a more desirable dessert like a devil dog or slice of cake.

I think I did just fine in school and enjoyed it, especially art class where I could shine. There wasn’t the stiff competition like I had back in Maryland. Not many budding artists in the group except for one kid who was pretty good at drawing Rat Fink driving various hot rods. In December that year my art teacher asked me to paint the three kings on the back wall. She rolled out a six-foot long sheet of heavy paper and pinned it to the bulletin board. I painted the kings on camels framed by tall palm trees and the Star of David glowing brightly in a starry sky.
One of my teachers, Miss Vaughn, was a twenty-something bombshell. She wore tighter, shorter skirts than the other teachers and was stacked. Funny, I don’t seem to recall her face. My friend, Kevin Ferring, and I dropped a lot of pencils to sneak a look at her legs when she sat in thoughtful repose at her desk. I drew lurid drawings of her with our heads lodged between her ample jugs or having one of our eyes poked out by one of them as she passed. Inevitably things would go awry. As it did that afternoon when she noticed a commotion in the back of the room. The drawing was passed around one too many times and she confiscated it. She looked at it without saying a word. She pulled the kid to the side and spoke softly to him. I saw her ask, “WHO?” That panicked little weasel fingered me. I was mortified when she marched over, crumpled the drawing in front of my face and bounced it off my forehead. She bent down to whisper in my ear, “You wish!” Then she spoke out loud, “Now pick it up and throw it in the trash where it belongs! If I find another one of these, we’ll pay a visit to the principle — Got that Mr. Adams?”

Gulp. “Got it!”

In fifth and sixth grade we had Spanish classes. I was called Miguelito… “little Michael” because there was another Michael, a bigger kid in the class, who was called Miguel. Yeah, he was big, a big jerk! I sat near Juan, Bonita, Catalina and Estephan, as we were forced to call each other. Between Hola and Adios, I didn’t retain much. I never had the chance to practice with anyone outside of class. I don’t think I ever met a real Mexican during our stay in San Diego. That was ironic because we were a stone’s throw away from the border. Outside of class the only Spanish we spoke were curse words we picked up out in the schoolyard. If you had the misfortune of getting a ball kicked into your groin, you screamed, “Mierda—Me las bolas!” (Shit —My balls!) Then called the kid who kicked the ball, “Cara de culo!”(Ass face) I also learned another nickname for my penis, El pipi, and one for Mrs. Vaughn’s rack- grande chichi’s.

Sometimes, you did something stupid but not realize it until after the fact. Part One

Joe and I smuggled my dad’s golf bag into the back yard, dug a hole in the top tier of the backyard and marked it with a rag tied to a dowel rod. We practiced pitching up the grade and putting through the long grass into the hole. As always happened when we played, the competition became fierce as challenges flew back and forth. Closest shot to the hole, longest putt, longest shot without going over the neighbor’s fence or best left handed shot with your eyes closed, standing on one foot, stuff like that.

We weren’t very skilled except for shanking the ball, and lost a few as they sliced over the fences or over the roof. Joe smacked a hard hit ball into the patio sliding glass door, shattering it. The ball landed neatly on top of my dad’s favorite chair.

“Oh No, Oh God, Noooo!” Joe moaned.

“Uh-oh, you’re dead!” I sniveled as I fled the scene of the crime.

My mom and the rest of the Adams clan stood in the newly air-conditioned living room, staring out in silence at the reckless soon to be deceased young golfer in the backyard. Glass was swept up and the golf clubs put back in the garage. Joe didn’t snitch on me for being an accomplice and solemnly accepted his fate. He sat alone in our bedroom for the rest of the day and awaited the inevitable. There wasn’t a priest available to perform the last sacraments for him and he turned down a last meal. He would face his punishment like a man- like a very fat man.

We stood stiffly in the foyer, behind the kitchen counter or posed like mannequins by the furniture when my dad walked in. I silently prayed for Joe.

“Bob, now don’t get upset, but Joe…” My mom said, and pointed to the patio door.

“GODDAMN IT!” my father roared. “Where is he? —Joe, get your ass down here, NOW!”

My dad’s hand went immediately to the buckle of his belt. I knew any second he’d whip it off and snap it like a bullwhip. Instead, he waited; we all waited for Joe to show his sorry mug. I figured I’d probably see a dead body finally, just never figured it would be my brother’s.

Click

The bedroom door opened at the end of the hall. A dark shape—a big dark shape, shuffled down the hall as we held our breath. Joe had swollen up like a blimp. The lower half of his body was enormous. The legs of his pants were stuffed with a couple magazines each and a few more protected his rear end, along with a pillow. He looked like the Michelin Man. He waddled down the steps and stopped, looking at the floor. One of my sisters laughed; then we all laughed, including my dad.

“Don’t worry Joe, we have insurance,” Dad said.

Joe, realizing his reprieve, looked up smirking and shrugged.

That was a close one. Thank God, my dad had a sense of humor that day and we had insurance. I don’t think Joe ever golfed again.

1965

The mid sixties were pretty bitchin. Besides skateboards and Schwinn Sting-Rays, muscle cars like the Mustang and the GTO rumbled through the streets. For the maturing baby boomers, Miniskirts, pantyhose, turtlenecks, big curlers and Diet-Pepsi were in vogue. So were Barbie and Ken dolls, Trolls and Superballs. We drank Hi-C, ate TV Dinners, listened to the top forty on AM on our transistor radios and if you were really hip, you had a lava lamp in your house. It was a fun time but there was serious shit happening beyond the perceived safety of the suburbs.

1965 was a transitional year of turbulence that shook the nation. The Civil-Rights Movement was peaking and Vietnam was becoming a quagmire. The Reverend Martin Luther King won the Pulitzer Prize and was declared “Man of the Year” by Time Magazine the year before. In March he organized a protest march from Selma to the state capitol building in Montgomery, Alabama. Police broke up the march in sadistic fashion with teargas and clubs. It was broadcast across the country and shocked everyone including the president, Lyndon Johnson. He proposed a bill that eliminated barriers blocking the Southern Blacks’ right to vote. Congress quickly approved the bill that became the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The war in Vietnam escalated with massive bombings in North Vietnam and 3,500 combat troops landed in South Vietnam, joining 23,000 American military advisers already there.

That summer riots exploded in Watts, a black community in Los Angeles after California Highway Patrol officers brutally beat a black motorist suspected of drunken driving. Hmm, I don’t think that guy said, “Can’t we all just get along?” Six days of riots and looting ensued and was brought to a halt with the help of 20,000 National Guardsmen. South-central Los Angeles was virtually in ruins. Thirty-four people were killed, over two thousand rioters and bystanders were arrested, and 857 left injured.

“There’s a battle outside
And it is ragin’.
It’ll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin.’

Bob Dylan

I was ten years old and never experienced racism, poverty or knew much about war, but I was worried about it some. You couldn’t help but cringe at the terrible images on television. I understood enough to know it was tragic. You could see fear in the people’s faces or terrible anger and feel a sense of dread about what was going on and what was to come.
The only fear I faced was getting a good spanking from my dad. We all got our share of spanking and would have faced the belt more had he not been away so much. It was absolutely legal, ordained in fact, that discipline could be meted out at the discretion of the parent, teacher, Nun, or baseball coach. Cops could beat up on poor black people and get away with it. If someone felt you had it coming, you were gonna get it. I knew about that. At our house, punishment was doled out for a variety of childish crimes including talking back, not paying attention, being a smart-aleck, spilling your milk or getting in trouble at school, fighting with your siblings, breaking something or just being stupid. You could be in the wrong place at the wrong time and be falsely accused. Retribution found you in a variety of painful and embarrassing methods… A swift kick in the ass, a cuff to the back of your head, a swift sharp slap across the face, a body throttle or the dreaded belt. Just as painful was being called stupid or put down like you were an idiot.

Sometimes, you did something stupid but not realize it until after the fact, which was usually the case. My brother Joe got himself into a couple of those predicaments during our stay in San Diego. Before I get into a golf-related story about Joe, we need a little background.

My dad liked sports and was a very good tennis player. He was a competitive college player and had been the champ at a few of the bases we lived at. He was also a bowler. I wondered if he was as good as Fred Flinstone, that was the only bowling I ever watched. Come to think about it, Fred bowled and played golf! He also smoked and drank beer — So did my dad. My father golfed every now and then and kept his bag of clubs in the garage. On weekends he enjoyed watching football games, baseball occasionally, tennis, bowling and golf.

On a folding tray next to his chair sat an ashtray, a cold beer and a huge bowl of freshly popped of popcorn. Popcorn gave him gas, bad gas, the kind that hung like a deadly noxious cloud, usually within a few paces directly behind him. If you happen to walk through it you faced a life or death struggle. You grimaced and your knees buckled as your arms thrashed through the thick of it like a drowning victim struggling to get to the surface for a gulp of precious clean air. That wasn’t the only reason not to go into the room when a game was on. You better not talk and disturb him or walk in front of the TV, that wasn’t looked on favorably. You’d get yelled at or chased away with a threatening glare. Once, I accidentally knocked his beer over and set him off. I was about to get belt until my mom stepped in that one time to save my butt.

When my father was into a game he took his frustration out on the athletes and coaches on TV. Apparently many of them were stupid, morons or idiots, that’s what he shouted anyway, usually followed by a loud “Goddamn it!” I have to admit I do the exact thing myself when I watch the Phillies, Eagles or Flyers … Like father, like son.

How someone could sit through hours of golf on television was a mystery to me. It looked absolutely boring in comparison to the action of football and baseball. No running, facing down a pitcher’s ball, no body contact, getting dirty, tackling or making a game winning play as the clock ran out. Golf announcers whispered as a crucial putt was attempted. … As if the golfer might turn around at any second and chastise them for inappropriate loudness. Polite crowds clapped and the announcers gasped, almost voiding their bowls after a good bunker shot. That year the big three of golf, Jack Nicholas, Arnold Palmer and Gary Player ruled the greens. To me, they didn’t look like athletes, but rather, rich white guys dressed in sporty sweaters and crisp pleated pants. What was the big deal about golf?