SUMMER 1966, Back in NYC....: At the end of my first school year in York my father never could find a real job in York so my mother decided to quit her job at the Bob-Ton and return to Astoria. That was a terrible shock. I had thought I was gone from NYC forever. Now I was back for the Summer and may have to return to LICHS in the Fall!!! But first I had to take a Summer School class in PHYSICS and I aced it so unbelievably easy, including some sort of a national test, that the teacher commented on it for decades afterwards. But during the class period I went over to my Aunts house with Jim and he was playing the guitar for my rotten girl cousin and then suggested we all go over to the push-carousel. I had shorts on. He then started pushing the damn thing like mad with her on it and me only partway on it and I flew off and really tore up my knee on the concrete and glass. Every damn time I make the mistake of trustion ANYONE they stab me in the back either by stupidity or just to be evil. ( I have always RARELY bothered with other people and I'll bet that if one divided the numer of times I got hurt in some way by other people by how few times I bothered with other people the percentage would be huge. Only my COLLEGE buddies didnt do it to me. My non-college friends and family sure did it regularly) I had to go to a doctor and I had to use a crutch and I still have a big circular scar on my knee. Dales parents came up then to go to Lancaster and the father kidded me about favoring the wrong knee but they both hurt. I believe that this was the Summer Dale was still in Astoria and he had been into bodybuilding for a while to prepare to join the Marines. He and I would walk all over NYC at night, even along the worst docks and under the Manhattan side of the major bridges. Noone bothered us. We also went to Staten Island on the feery. He knew he was going to Vietnam in a year or so. (Wait, the Staten Island thing may have been in Summer 1967 because I was wearing my gold initial ring and he said he couldnt get used to me in jewelry) I also found that my father had been lending much of my stuff out to the other kids on the block without telling me and I realized I still could not trust my own parents. I rode the subways alone alot, just waiting to return to York. And we probably did go back for visits to the old house. I think my mother went back to MACYS in LIC to work. I became a METS USHER along with my father. It was great money. Almost all tips. But it all totalled about $20-$25 a game and a dollar was worth seven times as much. Maybe this was the Summer that I bought that huge 'portable' tape recorder that I lugged to college in 1967. I learned the guys had started playing 'strikebox' under the Triboro Bridge which was basically homerun or nothing. BATMAN was really big. I think this is when I saw my first modern-type Fast Food place. I was back in Astoria and I was told about this thing and I walked down 21st St to the Astoria Square to see it. It was what is now the typical Fast Food place with the mostly glass bldg with way back from the sidewalk with a parking lot in front and to the side of it. Like the one McDonalds we knew of was out on Long Island. Of course, in those days one couldnt sit inside. And that was the first time I saw people sell something called "shakes". In NYC they were always MALTEDS in the 5&10s. And the burgers were something like 17c. It was weird to see it there in the city and the fact that they tore down all those Square bldgs for its parking lot seemed weird. I forget its name. I went one night to a teenage party at some middle class home way out in Queens where the homes were nicer. I didnt know anyone and I mostly sat on the steps. That was the first time I really drank beer. I had ten cans and for some reason it had no effect. When I drank at 21 two cans made me very high. A couple was making out in the bathtub so I had to walk a couple blocks to a schoolyard to urinate. Then, when I went back there later, there was another couple on the ground right near where I went. The girls called me Superboy for my beer consumption. Twister was also played. Girls liked me then but after so many years of being the 'lowest' guy in the class I couldnt get used to my new status. While ushering at SHEA STADIUM the Beatles came to play. So I was paid to see them live in a full house. They put me and other young ushers on the field to be their innermost guard. Guys trying to get down to field level were waving big bills at me to sneak them in but I didnt want to lose my job. So I had to stand in a line while the Beatles came out and ran to the stand. Then I had to stand just below them as a guard. One guy jumped the fence and tried punching his way through to the Beatles. He got past the older ushers and came at me. I stood next to a huge guy with big muscles. I was skinny so the guy swung at me. I grabbed his arm and turned him to the bigger guy. The bigger guy grabbed him and smashed his head into the police barrier wooden 'horse'. Then he staggered back and fell over the fence. It was so noisy I could barely hear them play and I was right next to them. After the game I was about to get into my fathers car and some girl came running up to hand me something. "Whats this?", I asked. "Goodies", she answered. It was the first computer card for computer dating I had ever seen. Bouncing back and forth between NYC and York was so weird. Like between Hell and Heaven. Theres some quote that is something like, "One does not go between (some bad place) and (some magnificent place) without fainting". NYC was so dirty and cruel and poor and violent and York was the opposite.

YORK HIGH, YORK,PA 1966-1967....: I recall that we drove the 200 miles from NYC to York a few times that Summer and in August we were at my Cousin Richard's home. He was about ten years older than I, if that. My father was trying to talk him into putting me up for my Senior Year. So my father wound up supporting the NYC home, York,Pa home and now was paying Richard money each week to put me up. I dont know how much money my mother made when she returned to MACYS NYC but I dont think she got her great paying job back. So I moved into a room at the top of the stairs in Richards house. His personality was a lot like mine. He was also tall and skinny and just didnt want to be bothered even though he came from a big family he was basically a loner. Now I lived on the far end of town diagonally from our house which was now empty and locke dup and just a couple blocks from my aunts house where I stayed in 1964. At first I just stayed by myself. My friend Jim W. disappeared. He had been by once while we were in NYC the neighbors said. I never did find out what happened to him. I went to his old house but they were gone. I was told that he went to jail for 'stealing' his grandmothers car somehow. I have no idea if thats true. I'd go downtown every Wed and Fri night like all the other teens but mainly hang by myself. I was too intellectual for most teens especially as I had no interest in the things they did. And the smart kids were obnoxious nerds. Richard didnt care if I stayed out late. He wa smuch wilder than I as a teen. But I rarely came home late. I knew I had school the next morning and wanted to go to college. I was always up before the family and I'd make myself eggs in an empty kitchen while all of them slept and I'd listen to the small town radio ads that went "SUNDAY!! At Lincoln Highway Speedway! Funny cars! " and a whole bunch of other teen references I had no clue about. In the beginning Id walk to school the two miles or wait for a bus a couple blocks away. Batman was still big and PEANUTS was reaching its height. All Id hear about referring to college was 'Hippies". My fathers sister and her daughter werent as nice to me as they were when they didnt know Id be moving up and theyd have my father to use against my mother and me. Almost each Thursday I'd walk alone in the dark from Richards house with a big suitcase and lug it all the way to the Greyhound Depot which was also the train station. I'd put it in the locker. There would always be a guy working there late at night and there might be one or two people there. The next day Id leave York High at 315 and RUN to get there at 325 to get the bus to NYC which took 5 or 6 hours. Then Id come home from NYC on Sunday night. I rode a lot in the dark on Greyhounds on Friday nights while doing my homework when other guys in York were dating and saving their money for cars and getting married. Their parents had more money than mine. I would have awful problems getting money for college. I'd sometimes visit my 1965-66 house on cottage which was deserted and sometimes Id bring a friend. I still hated gym class although it wasnt as bad as in NYC. But I knew how to climb ropes quickly. Once I was so worried about a bunch of things including my future that I spat up horribly tasting green stomach bile. That may have been when I was beginning my ulcer when I couldnt figure out how to be all the things people expected me to be and do all the things everybody always expected me to do without any help and with a naturally shy, unaggressive personality. The guy living right next door to Richard was Kenny Raffensberger who won the 1944 ALL STAR game. At that time I bought an All-Star mag every year and I wanted him to sign it. But I had sent all mine to NYC and forgot to bring one back. I never did get that autograph. UNDER CONSTRUCTION. FRIDAY MAY 5, 2000 I TOOK A WEEK OFF FROM THIS. I HAVE ALL THE NOTES AND WILL BE BACK NEXT WEEK.... Tuesday May 16, 2000: Father in hospital for days and Ive been up to other things... Tues May 23,2000 still resting...