1970 Colonial High-part 2

I was sitting in the school parking lot as the rest of the car drivers pull in, and at Colonial it was an odd assortment of vehicles. There were Simca’s, Saabs, and all kinds of funny looking old cars. I’m fuzzy with names, but Jon had a beat up VW bug, covered with spray paint, looking like a moving piece of graffiti art, loud tuned muffler and no brakes, if I remember right. Scott had some funny-looking little sedan with tail fins and something on the rear windows that made them look like stained glass.

There was a girl I went out with for a while, and she had a really nice Camaro, light yellow, with a black vinyl top and the cool automatic stick in the middle. She let me drive it once and it was a dream. I must have inherited at least one gene from my dad, because he always wanted to drive everybody’s car. Cars meant a lot to me back then, and I can’t lie, they still do. A car equals freedom, and someday when they take my keys away, I’ll know what it means more than anybody.

As I looked around the parking lot, I didn’t think about who could afford a nice new car, but I did think about who could really fix something up. Somebody had a really nice van. Back then, a van wasn’t something easy to have. What a kid could have, is a worn out Ford Econoline from the Post Office. One kid had one that was painted perfectly and it had shiny chrome wheels, looking like a hot rod in a magazine. Another kid had a beat up van that he had fixed up with stuff from around the house and the junkyard….and I liked that one too.

And this is where my story gets strange. I started off with Ralph, the red 1961 corvair. I’d show up loaded with kids and full of pride that I made something cool out of an old junker car. Ralph did not make if far in my life, and my mom threw in the towel of making her oldest son learn about paying cash for everything…after Ralph got towed 6 times in 6 months. Ralph got traded in a a brand new AMC Gremlin X, electric blue with a big racing stripe, and mags and big fat white-lettered Goodyear tires. The little car had 3 on the floor and a giant 6 cylinder engine, with way more power than it needed. Suddenly, I had all the flash I could ever want. I didn’t think much about how well-made this car was, but it sure loved going to the beach, full of surfing buddies, or as my brother Paul would say “kids that were will to pay gas money”..

The new Gremlin was an amazing car, but some things fell apart quickly and were never fixed correctly, like the fancy new all glass tailgate. Ralph Nader never wrote about this car to my knowledge, but it did have one little dangerous feature for a young driver: hydroplaning. You take a very light car, give it a powerful engine, and really wide tires, and some summer Florida highway with puddles from afternoon rain, and your little Gremlin could go ice skating down the road. That is what we did one summer afternoon, heading west on Highway 50 out in Bithlo, near one of the Salvage yards. I was going the Speedlimit, or too fast for conditions, depending on who’s telling the story, and suddenly we were spinning and went off the road sideways. We came to a stop about 3 feet short of T-boning a telephone pole. I can still remember one kid praying in the back seat….if I remember correctly, he became a preacher later on.

~

i told you the story would get stranger…the deal with the Gremlin X, was that I had to SHARE the car with my brothers and sister. Nobody else had a drivers license, so I didn’t really listen to that part of the deal, but when the time rolled around that Paul got his license, I knew I was going to have a problem. Okay, I had a few quirks, but mostly I was the nicest guy you knew, at least that’s what they wrote in my yearbook. Sharing was not my forte, and my wife will easily tell anyone that will listen that if we were out to dinner somewhere and she wanted a French fry from my plate, I might growl. I mean, I wasn’t going to bite, it’s just an involuntary reflex. And I sure don’t like sharing a car.

I found a solution that still informs me to this day. No matter how fuzzy my memory may get about what I liked or things we did, on the day Paul got his license, I bought my neighbors 1965 Impala convertible. I realize that right now, if I could get one in perfect condition it would be worth a small fortune, but Les Gerol was not the person that loved a car the way I do. There was not a 1 foot section of the car that didn’t have a dent. It had a 283 V8 that could sorta pull that big old car around. It was wine-red color with a used-to-be white convertible top and used-to-be-white interior. I looked at this whale of a car, and decided all it needed was glass packs and an 8 track deck and I’d be in business. That car never made it to the beach that I remember. What I do have burned into my mind, is me cruising with the top down, heading to J. Harley Wadworth Volvo. heading down Curryford to Orange Blossom Trail, with the new Deep Purple tape, Machine Head, blasting about me being a highway star. I don’t need a photo…I can see it all.

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Colonial High 1970

It’s 10am on a fall day, and I’m feeling pretty good about this, because it’s one of a very few days I can wear this wool Letter-sweater. Yes, it was for the high school band, not for a sport, so it’s not as cool as it could be, but it proved I did something. I’m sitting in a classroom with the smart kids. I can remember the exact feeling, somebody decided that I was supposed to be smart, so here I was. Math was not my thing, and little did I know that later in life, my job would depend on things I did not pay enough attention to right now. Instead I was looking down at my chukka boots and wishing I had a pair of real Levi’s instead of the wanna-be’s I was wearing. I was in the uniform of the crowd I wanted to be associated with, the surfers. I had on a cotton surf t-shirt, 100% certain that it did not say Ron Jon’s on it. Wearing a Ron Jon shirt was the main way to tell everybody you were a tourist and not really a surfer. The t-shirt was tucked in and I had a really cool leather belt from the Canterbury shop at the Mall. Styles came in slow motion to Orlando. Whatever we were doing was what they were doing last year in California. Surfers were wearing cut-off jeans unless somebody in the family could sew, and then you got real baggies to surf in. Boardshorts hadn’t made their way to the stores in Orlando yet.

It was also the time of the mini-skirt, so my mind was rarely on the blackboard, and what our teacher had to say. To be fair, he was young and no matter what I thought of math, I liked his taste in cars. Right outside those giant crank-out windows of our classroom was his new gold-colored Corvette. That wasn’t a color I would have picked, but that was the coolest car in the whole world at that moment. Even the two-piece hub caps looked cool, and this was a time when having hubcaps meant you weren’t serious about your car. He’s asking some math question and quickly Revonda raises her hand and has the answer. Something is seriously wrong in how God handed stuff out when you get to be a cheerleader AND smart at math. All I heard was “wonk wonk wonk…hypotenuse” and the teacher congratulating her while she smiles and the other girls all high-five her….just kidding….the high-five had not been invented yet.

just like every high school, we had crowds. And just like every person that ever wrote a story, my point of view was that I was on the edge of everything, watching more than enjoying. That is some kind of lifelong thing, seeing life as if I myself am the drone flying overhead, recording everything. Some kind of dream until the bell rings and we head to lunch.

Colonial High School, was not brand new or even close to that in 1970. It was not air-conditioned, except for the band room and the administration offices. I never thought about the teachers and how they had to dress up and go sweat in a room with us every day. But, like us, they may have been living somewhere without air conditioning. Back then, an air-,conditioned place was like walking into the diary room at Costco is now, you went from slightly sweaty to freezing in one moment. Our lunch break was spent outside in the center of the hub of this spread-out open concept school. Coming from Spokane, the whole thing about Florida schools was still interesting to me. It must halve been the lastest craze in the 1950’s, because Howard Junior high, a really old school, was more like what I was used to, a 2 story brick building with staircases that every kid had to climb. Colonial had the empty space in the middle of a wheel, spoked with covered sidewalks that were almost dry if it was raining.

The surf crew was there, sitting on top of the concrete picnic tables, talking about what we always talked about, where we would be surfing this weekend. Most likely, it would be Picnic Tables at Cocoa Beach. I would do my best to be there. That was where I wanted to be, but a couple of things could get in the way…work and church. 16 years old, and the biggest waste of my life was Sunday School, where I sat at a round table with 4 other kids and talked about saving ourselves for marriage, and finding a nice Christian Science Girl…harder to remember the days when dating somebody that didn’t go to your church was disallowed….i paid more attention in math class than I did there. But, the guys were making plans for the weekend, and the girls would be there in their bikinis, ‘Laying out’. Now if any girl wants to say she was a Gidget in 1970, I’d need to see photographic proof. I’m certain there were girls that could have done it, but it was guys, and young guys only…..except for one old teacher at Colonial.

Surfing is kind of like fishing, if all you like is the thrill of pulling it off perfectly, you’re not going to stick around, because most of the time it is “you shoulda been here yesterday!’ In 1970, gas wasn’t expensive compared to years later, but it was still a big expense for most kids to drive there and back…especially if there turned out to be no waves. We had the Ron Jon surf report you could call on the phone, but to that dumb place, the surf was always decent. The local news didn’t even know what surfing was. Surfing was a kid sport and we were often down to the only accurate means of determining the surf forecast was the “thumbs-up/thumbs-down” sign. I don’t know where this originated, maybe Hawaii, but how it worked was like this: you are driving in your car, full of kids and boards on the roof. You spot a car coming towards you with boards on the roof. If it’s before 10am, you are crestfallen, because nobody would go home that early if the surf was good, but you stick your arm out the window, make a fist with the thumb sticking out and waggle it up and down. Every surfer in The Whole world knows what that means..”tell me! Is is any good?’ If they stick their arm out the window and hold their fist thumb pointing upward, a cheer would go up in your car, and everyone would start seeing visions of 6 foot glassy waves…for the next 40 minutes of the ride. OR, a thumb down meant “do we just turn around and go home?’ Come to think of it, we put a lot of faith in strangers!

it was Sunday, and maybe I only did this once, but the Gremlin was sitting in the parking lot behind the Christian Science Church on Roasalind ave in downtown Orlando. I would be leaving for the beach much later than I ever wanted, but it was going to happen. Paul and I ran out as fast as we could when Sunday school was over and we raced to Picnic Tables. That place is still there. I don’t surf that spot anymore, since I found that is a wonderful spot for bad people to break into your car.

on this particular Sunday, we just wanted to get our boards wet and see the girls…we get their just in time to see the wind getting on it, while the guys stand around, telling the girls about their best rides, while smoking the obligatory cigarette. Of course, Revonda was in the middle of the group of girls!

As my minds eye drifted overhead, capturing the moment, I knew even then that someday soon we would be old, driving to work everyday, raising kids and certainly be something less than cool, and there was no way we would be allowed in the water. The next group of kids would shove us aside,, and we better start learning Shuffleboard, Bridge, and Golf. It’s pretty bad, when you’re 16 and worrying about being old!

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Where Would We Be?

That whole Marvel Comics idea of the multiverse, well it didn’t really start there for me. With me, the kid with the reading problem, it started with Philip K. Dick. If you were a kid that liked to read a lot when I was coming up, you were quickly into adult novels. Sure, I read what passed for young adult books, before they really had that. I can still remember getting excited about Edward Eager’s books about a group of kids finding magic stuff. Looking back, it was kind of like the Disney shows on Sunday night, that featured some wholesome kids, maybe one or two a little older and starting to think that girls and boys might be more interesting than they were the year before. However, once I ran out of those books, it was straight into adult science fiction, where sex, and thoughts about the world and our culture were tossed about. I figured early on that Mr. Dick probably was experimenting with hallucinogens, like those hippies out in California, but I was fascinated by his ideas. How do we know what is real and what is just a dream?

How did I know that this life, the one where everybody was looking at me as the kid whose dad was in POW camp, was the real life? Most science fiction wasn’t all that awesome, and anything made into a movie in those days, was pretty much a drive-in movie. I just now realized that you may not know what a drive-in movie is. They were mediocre movies that were made to show while you were busy walking around the parking lot, getting popcorn, hanging out with friends, or making out in the back seat of the car. Yes, we did sneak people in by hiding them in the trunk…I think everybody did that at least once. This doesn’t mean drive-in movies weren’t watchable, in fact I was probably scarred for life by mom and dad taking me to the drive-in when they showed the island of Dr. Moreau. They told me to lay down in the back of the station wagon and not to look when they warned me. The part where they slowly turned people into animals still haunts my dreams to this day…and then there was the bride of Dracula…just has to get you at just the right age and you’re toast.

Mr. Dick’s science fiction was not like that, and truthfully, I thought he was my secret author and nobody would ever know about him, unless they were a hardcore reader. I had no idea that there were a lot of nerds like me and some would grow up and make big movies. They saw what I saw, if you can’t trust what you see and hear, well that opens up a big can of worms. My favorite book of his was UBIK and I think the movie Vanilla Sky with Tom Cruise is pretty much that book.

The idea that has me hooked is one random event begins a path that is radically different than what supposed to happen.

In December 1972, PBS aired a Bill Moyer’s Journal episode about my family, mostly about my mom and her group of MIA and POW wives. They were activists, and the camera crew followed us around for about a week, I think. What still sits heavy with me until this day, is the interview they had me give. They interviewed all of us at separate times, and I vowed to myself, I would not spill my guts on TV like some idiot. I knew the lady in charge was smart, very good at her job, and would be looking for some good stuff…but not getting it from me!

I knew my turn was coming and finally they had to do it at 8am. At this time I was working the night shift at the Tenneco gas station. The one on 436 that was where you turned to go to good old Stonewall Jackson Junior High….now called Roberto Clemente Middle. I think somebody thought that with the population shift, it was kinda odd to have a school named after a Civil War General where 99.9% of the population was from Puerto Rico. But, back then, we didn’t think too hard about the names, not saying we shouldn’t have! I was at that Tenneco, doing one of the most useless jobs there was. I pumped your gas for you. There wasn’t a lot of people getting gas at one am in the morning, so falling asleep on the job in the little kiosk by the gas pump was a large probability. And that what finally ended my career at Tenneco one night when a guy pulled up and said “Do You Know Who I Am!” I didn’t know he was the regional manager, and I was too tired for a witty response, if such a thing existed at that time of day.

So I found myself, sleepless, at 8am in a little roadside park on Lake Underhill, down by where all my schoolmates lived in Azaela Park. I was getting peppered with innocent questions about life as a POW kid, when she came up with, what would you think about your dad coming home and seeing your long hair?

Right that moment, I realized I was in some version of reality. The reality that was supposed to be was I was raised on a military base, saluted the flag every morning, got up and did exercises, and dreamed of being an officer that could bring further glory to the family. Instead, reality was I spent my teen years without a father, living with the civilians, and seeing the military as helpless to bring my dad back home. I felt free, and a life of surfing, living at the beach, and working whatever job could allow me to take off whenever the waves were good. How did I feel about my dad coming home? I was a little bit worried. But, he’d been gone seven years, and nobody was doing anything. Nixon getting on TV talking about carpet bombing Vietnam, but the peace talks had gone nowhere and they were just leaving him there to rot.

Yeah, I told her way too much about how I really felt.

This would be about 1/3 as memorable, except that 2 months later he DID come home and get to see that show…..I was truly in a different universe

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The Clowns Of The Information War

 Of couple of things happened recently that 'woke' me...and yes, the fact that I put quotes around that tells you how much the world has changed.

Something that has always interested me: Can people tell that the world around them has seriously changed? Folks reading this today would probably think I am writing to complain about 'wokeness', but what I'm really about is that I think we have a hard time remembering anything correctly.

An example was seeing the video "Send In The Clowns" today from a friend. All of a sudden I had a flashback to working at the public library in the 1970's and having to do some serious research for a patron to find out what that song really meant. I never forgot that it really meant 'stick a fork in our relationship now...because it's not happening'...and really the clowns were meant to mean the drama has failed so we resort to comedy. But...now you could know that as quickly as I can, you could listen to every recording ever made of the song, how Sondheim wanted it sung, why he wrote it as questions...everything. I was foretold of this in college that someday wars would be fought over data instead of with guns, that you could get any book instantly...I didn't really believe it, but with all of the ransomware stuff going on, I think my professor, Dr. Burton Wright had a pretty accurate crystal ball.

I don't know that all of this has made us smarter, maybe we offloaded our brains onto our phones, the same way we forgot how to use a sliderule when they invented the  electronic calculator. I can still remember that my father-in-law could do large sums in his head, figuring sales tax, and mainly blowing my mind with his mathematical ability...I don't know anybody that can do that now.

A telling point today, was when somebody was waxing sentimental about the good old days of vinyl records...those were good old days for people that had expensive stereos..and my recollection was that those people would not let you touch their stereo or their records...however, I do remember sitting with one such friend while he played "In The Beginning" By The Moody Blues. As kids, we got to hear the few songs they would play over and over on the local Rock radio station, never something as awesome as this....a song that foretold this future

So....as you watch the video about the Clowns...thinking it is about Trump or Biden...realize it was made long ago.....and listen to this while wondering: If I think, then I am, I think?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AukFsBv2oDY

 

Never Going Back

I just realized that I haven't written here in a very long time. That is for several reasons, one of which is that I have been writing other places. I've been working remote for Wells Fargo almost a year now and the job is sweet. In fact, I cannot imagine setting foot inside a cubicle environment ever again. The work I'm doing now has removed almost every single thing I ever disliked about work. 
1) Does your boss like the work you're doing?  - I don't need no stinking annual review. He doesn't like me, I'm gone the same day.
2) Annoying coworkers? nope
3) Office Politics? pretty difficult without seeing the people all day.

The only thing that is very different is that WF is super business structured, including Scrum meetings, tickets, an online form that must be filled out for anything and everything....but it is so worth it.

Now, if your social life depended on friends at work, or if you can't stand being home with your spouse even one more minute than necessary, this is not for you.

I meet with my friends for lunch and probably the biggest obstacle right now is staying in shape. My running has been on hold pretty much since September because of a knee injury and it's hard keeping the weight off by walking.

My Mom finally passed in January, and those last two months were months I hope to soon forget. There was a lot of suffering and a lot of people behaving badly. The good news was the tea in her honor was a great thing and I learned more about the many people that were in her life besides her family.

Wells Fargo is almost over, or perhaps they will find a way to extend the project, but there is some kind of rule in place now that a company can only keep a contract worker for 18 months. My contract is a year, and I'm good either way. I started Social Security last year and now have to give all of that money back...so, I have to pay 10 grand for working...ouch. 

The projects around the house are backing up, the yard is missing it's yardman, and the women in my family are hard at work on Claywerx, the family art business. They keep me going all weekend, setting up the farmer's markets and I'm now in 2 bands...not bored at all.

Seems like I'm always admiring a simpler life from a distance, and then making absolutely sure I will have no part of it....

After The Fork In The Road...Then What?

Well, I thought it could not be done, but 2016 is working on being the craziest year for me ever, workwise that is. I started the new remote job and found out just what it is like to work project to project, working as my own company, getting money and then saving it for the times when there is no work. It was great, working in shorts and t-shirt in my home office. The local wild animals outside my windows were my new co-workers and my wife got to see more of me than ever before. Lunchtimes were a walk in the local park and the morning evil commute was no longer.
Work was great, I knew how to do the job and the client had needs that I was able to take care of. No stress at all....until project #2 came along. Suddenly, the money was great, the hours were long, and no matter how hard I worked, it wasn't quite enough. I had images of the movie, Swordfish, with a gun to my head while coding, and then images of a cow hooked up to a milking machine. I did some of what I am sure is the best work I have ever done, and I'm not 100% sure that they loved it. I spent a pre-planned vacation at the beach, working 60 hours remotely on my laptop, watching the sunrises on the beach with the beginnings of the stress in my temple before the day had really begun. The best part of that week was that the ocean was totally flat, so there were no missed surfing opportunities.
The project is now over, and I have no immediate work in front of me....how do I feel about that? I forgot to mention that the last two weeks of the project were spent commuting to Tampa to the point that I now know there is probably no time after 6am in the morning that you can expect to get there from my house in less than 2 1/2 hours...in spite of the fact that google maps lists it as a hour and 50 minute commute.

I'm coming off the stress, taking way too many naps and making lists of things that need to be done around here...will I ever just relax? That remains to be seen.....

Another Big Fork In The Road

I knew that I was bad at predicting the future, at least my future. Here I am, I just gave notice on my job. What could I possibly be thinking? The best paying job I've ever had. Good boss, nice environment, friends, what else could I ask for?
And, that was the thing...I needed something big to do. I wanted to create, deliver and support. I wanted to make things that helped people do their jobs.
Instead, my job was trying to make something happen that didn't look like it was going to fly. Perhaps, someday in the future, my project will take off, but when another company offered everything I didn't have right now, it was tough to say no, and in the end, I didn't say no.
I have no idea in the world how I will feel about this 6 months from now, but at this moment, the day I gave notice, it feels like the only smart thing to do.
Clinging on to what I have, is not the way I want to live anymore. I want to reach out, take some chances, make some bold moves.
I am ready.