Wednesday, November 24, 2010

My life, things I remember, Part 1

Connecticut, I think:
I was very young. There was a tree in the neighbor’s yard that I would climb all the time.  My mom would tell me not to because I would fall.  Of course I didn’t listen to her. Well one day I climbed it to the top. Which probably wasn’t too high, since I was about four or five years old.  I sat on one of the outer branches and all I remember after that is my butt hitting every branch on the way down as I fell through the branches.  Actually that was a good thing as it broke my fall all the way down

There was a store across the lot from our house where the tree was. It was kinda of like a longs drug store would be today.  I remember my mom buying me a Mr. Peanut toy that was almost as big as me, I loved it.

When I got a little older, I remember my dad had giving me 5 dollars because of paying me for helping him with something, I can’t remember what it was.  My Mom had to probably goad him into doing it. But I wanted to get a toy, I had so much money.  At the time that it was like a kid today with 20.00. I looked around and bought a toy periscope.  I could look over walls and around corners and not be seen, or so I thought.


Japan:  My Dad was stationed in Itazuke Japan. It is on the island south of the main island.

Ukulele on TV
I was eight or nine and in the second grade. Someone came to class and told us about grass skirts, ukuleles and harmonicas.  To get a ukulele was not cheap.  My dad said to get a harmonica as they didn’t cost much. But I wanted the ukulele so I ordered it instead.  My dad was mad, but my mom calmed him down and let me keep it. We practiced a lot, with a few of the girls now in grass skirts and were learning a hula dance. I don’t remember how long they taught us, but I went on TV with two or three other ukulele players and about six or seven hula dancers and played a song.

Kidney Disease:
When I was in the second grade, I came home one day and my bladder hurt.  I had to pee pretty bad, but in a funny way. I finally went to the bathroom and started peeing and it came out a very dark red and it hurt to pee.  My mom saw it and took me to the hospital. They did tests and found out I had nephritis, an inflammation of the kidneys due to toxins or auto-immune issues.  I was in the hospital for, two months if I remember correctly.  They would take blood every day. The Doctor would come in and always ask me, “Did anyone take blood today?” I would always say no, but finally I said yes because I was tired of getting stuck with a needle. They interrogated me for a few minutes and finally I heard the doctor tell my nurse that she won’t need to take blood.  I was tired and had been poked enough. One or two less won’t hurt anything.

Another time I had to get a vaccination shot.
The doc took the needle, filled it with whatever it was.  It had a longer than normal needle on it.  He wiped my arm off with alcohol and jabbed the needle in.  I was nervous for some reason and I tightened up my muscle in my arm. The needle only went in very little and it bent in a snake like shape.  The doc looked at it and laughed and stuck me with a new needled and told me to quite being superman for just a minute.

Japan
When we were kids in Japan, we had a Japanese helper that my mom and dad paid for. She would watch us when my mom was gone and would do housework. She had just had a baby and her breasts were filled with milk. She would grab a boob and push it in so that milk would squirt out and chase us squirting us.  We would go ewwwww, but loved her having fun with us.  Don’t know if my mom and dad liked it much.  Maybe my dad as he would get a free shot of a set of boobs.

In Japan, we lived just outside of the base.  The housing was a small lot with, I think, about 6 houses fenced off. There was a dirt roads that went east to west. In front of the house was a Japanese village, just like what you would see in old movies. All the poppsan’s would gather around the hibachi and cook stuff while the women and the young men went to work. I would go over there every once in a while and play with the Japanese kids.  One time the old men coaxed me over and gave me some food off the hibachi.  I didn’t know what it was, but it smelled good, so I ate it.  Then my mouth started to explode. It was super hot pepper of some kind.  I had to run home to get water.  My mom was pissed, but the old guys were laughing their butts off as I ran off.

There was a long dirt road on the north end of the house that went into the town of Itazuke. It was about ¼ mile and they had farm land. Every so often they would have a huge cone shaped hole in the ground covered by cement.  In that whole they would put animal and even human waste and then take it to the fields and pour it on the crops.
We had a dog, I think it might have been a small lab.  One day our dog fell into the pit or “Honey Bucket” as they were called.  My dad had to go pull him out and wash him off.  He was pissed.  One time my dad got pretty drunk and walked home from the bus that stopped at the end of the road. Well he fell in, was able to pull himself out.  My mom was pissed. She had to wash him off.


 Delaware:
We lived in Dover Delaware twice, once on base but twice on water street in town
I can’t remember the number of the first place, but the second one was 455 E. Water Street. It was up about one block from the original place. There was a baseball Diamond with fence and such. I was the pitcher.  The batter hit the ball hard straight up and I was running toward it to catch it, the catcher was doing the same. We didn’t know we were each going after it. We smacked hard into each other and I remember “almost” passing out.  I was dizzy for a long time as I sat on the ground.

Delivering TV. Guides.
I didn’t have a newspaper route; I had a route of delivering the T.V. Guide magazine. It was like a tabloid size back then. I think I got a nickel for everyone that paid their monthly dues.  T.V. Guide was only mail order back then.

Blackberries: Delaware
We lived about 2 blocks from the river.  Our street headed toward the river and then stopped. There was about 25 yards of river sand and wild trees and such.  One of the bushes was wild blueberries. So my sister Angie and I went and picked two large jars full of berries and while we picked them we would eat a few. After we had our fill of blueberries we headed home.  Mother took the blueberries and dropped them in a glass gallon container full of water. We asked my mom why she dunked them in water. She said to get the worms out.  My sister and my eyes popped out of our head as we looked and sure enough there were about 20 tiny, tiny worms wiggling in the water.  We both YUUCCKKKEED and I think Angie threw up, but not sure.  My mom made blueberry cookies out of them. Angie had none, I had my fill :)

The first time we lived on “455 E. Water Street” in Delaware
It was a very cold winter.  One morning I got up, got ready for school. Got my lunch box, my jacket and gloves.  My sister Angie opened the door to head outside and screamed.  I ran to the door and jumped back.  There was a snake there, probably the garden variety, it was curled up in a circle and its head was sticking up about a foot above his body almost looking like it was ready to strike. The thing about it was it didn’t move. It turned out that the snake was frozen.  My dad said he thought the snake felt the warmth of the house and was trying to figure out a way to get in and it finally died from the cold.  It was frozen in that position.  I finally picked it up and played with it for a while, but I had to leave it as I had to go to school.  When I got home, my mom must have thrown it away.

Again it was winter. We had moved back to Delaware from Japan. At this time we had a small dog, a beagle I think. Anyway, it snowed all day and all night. Our steps outside of the front door were about four feet high.  The snow had covered the yard and street so that it was exactly even with the porch step just as you walk into the house. Our dog had not gone to the bathroom all night and had to go really bad.  He was sitting at the front door barking, scratching etc.  My mom told me to get a jacket on and let the dog out to go pee or poop. As I opened the door the bright sunlight almost blinded me.  Angie was standing right next to me.  Because of the flash of bright light from the reflection off the snow I was blinded for a minute.  Angie was laughing. It turned out the dog had to go so bad, it ran and jumped off the porch step and fell into the snow that was about three feet deep.  The dog left a hole in the snow that looked like something from the roadrunner and coyote cartoon when the coyote would fall from the high ledge and into the ground and leave a whole. The dog never looked out of the whole as we had expected it to. Next thing we saw was steam coming up out of the hole in the snow. It kept steaming and steaming and steaming for what seemed like five minutes.  Finally the dog popped its head up and bounced back into the house. Angie and I were laughing in tears it was so funny.

One night, same house.
 My Parents went to a friend’s house for some reason and Angie and I were designated official babysitters to my younger brother and sister.  As you came in the front door, immediately to the right was a step and a landing that turned left upstairs.  Almost all the way up was a flat banister that could be slide down very easily. After the siblings were put to bed, Angie and I slide down the banister again and again, having a blast. At the bottom of the stairs, just below the banister was an end table with a ceramic light on it.  Angie slide down the banister and instead of dropping off on the landing, she fell sideways and right on the light. She pretty much sat on top of the light. Well needless to say  the light broke and it cut the backside of her thigh very deep. I don’t know why it didn’t bleed as much as I thought it would, but you could see the fat deposits sticking out of the wound. I don’t remember the rest I think I called Mom and she came right over and took Angie to the hospital.  She still had the scar for as long as I could remember.

Invisible grasshopper:
            Living in Delaware on base, my sister had a bathing suit on during the summer.  It was a one piece and the top tied around the neck.  Mom had tied it in a bow and the strings of the rest of the bow laid against Angie’s back.  I saw a grasshopper and told Angie about it, she didn’t like bugs at all.  The grasshopper jumped and disappeared.  Angie spun around looking for it and didn’t see it. I thought I would be funny and a little bit of a rascal and told her that the grasshopper had landed on her back. Angie, in a panic, spun around and as she did the strings on her top bounced on her back.  She thought it was the grasshopper jumping in her back a screamed as she would bounce around trying to shake it off.  It only lasted for about 30 seconds if that much, but I laughed so hard I was in tears and my stomach hurt. Angie didn’t find it so amusing until later in life.

Dead chicks:
Every Easter, when we were kids, we would get a real live baby chick that we could keep and watch grow. Well 90% of the time, they would die from lack of what they needed to live.  Anyway, My sister gets a food colored deep purple bacy chick. She holds it everywhere she goes.  I had a yellow one. We made a three story house out of cardboard with the top layer of the cardboard ripped off to make stairs. It was stupid, the chickens never went up wor down. If we put them up in the condo, they would just jump to the ground.  Not quite as smart as a hamster.
My dad told us to make sure we keep the chicks in the basement at night and we said yea, yea.  I did, but Angie decided to take her chick to bed and keep it comfy.
I got up early that Saturday or Sunday and when Angie got up we herad her crying.
We ran up and she was holding her purple chick that was as flat as a pancake.
She had taken it to bed and then rolled on top of it during the night as crushed it.
It looked so funny, that dead stiff flat chick in her arms that I busted out laughing. My mom got pissed.  I shouldn’t have and I apologized to angie many years later, when I told her the story, she thought for a while, then remembered and started busting a gut too, because of the flat chicken.

Painting Athos, Porthos and Aramis:
            I made or rather put together the three models of each of the three musketeers.
There was a girl I liked in the neighborhood and I was painting the last musketeer “Porthos”.  I saw her coming so I got the model and held it up to the afternoon light. She walked up to the sliding glass door and knocked on it. I looked at her and smiled and kept paining right in front of her, trying to impress her with my face painting skills. Then I realized that I stood there for almost 2 minutes. She kinda looked at me like I was nuts when she walked in.

A wasp on my lips after eating peanut butter and jelly
            I had just gotten finished eating a peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich.
There was a set of swings in the back yard, I stood on the seat and was ready to swing, when a yellow jacket wasp landed on my lips.  My dad said if a wasp lands on you, don’t brush it off. Stand still until it flies off you and then run. The wasp landed on my lower lip and I had my mouth partly open. It was attracted by the jelly and peanut butter. It popped it’s head into my mouth just past my teeth and then flew off for a minute.  I almost moved when he quickly landed on my lip again. But I had time to close my lips this time. The wasp looked around for a minute, flew off again and this time he was just far enough away that I was able to jump down from the swing and run my little butt off before he came back.

The refrigerator cardboard boxes.
            Missouri, Whiteman AFB.
We just moved into the new housing from the town we were in. (Knob Noster).
Dad would be at work and mom would be unpacking and such. A friend of mine and I went to the lot where they had just finished building the new housing complex.
We noticed a lot of HUGE boxes.  We went over to them and they were boxes that refrigerators were shipped in.  Every house got one so we had about twenty to thirty boxes.  Man we grabbed those by the dozen, dragged them to an empty field and then put them together on their side and made a huge maze out of them.  A few we cuts windows in and a few had doors. They were so big we could just sit in them for hours and play.  Eventually, either the rain ruined them or they were taken by the trash guys and taken to the dump. We really missed them.


My hamster being eaten by a cat.
            Missouri, Whiteman AFB: my dad didn’t want any of us to have any pets except a dog. My mom and I went to town and while we were there, we saw hamsters in one of the stores. (Probably Woolworths).  The hamster was put into a shoe box and some holes punched in it.  My mom said to keep the hamster in the front yard while she talked to my dad. While I was waiting a friend of mine came over and sat down next to me in the grass and asked what I was doing. I showed him the hamster and put it on the grass.  It moved around a little and I kept bringing it back to me.  I was pretty proud of my new pet.  What I didn’t know was there was a cat about three or four feet away and was watching the hamster.
The Hamster moved away from me further than it had been. Before I could grab it, the cat jumped on it and bit it’s head. The cat was choking the hamster and I finally grabbed the cat and held the cat by its throat and squeezed it really hard.  The cat was choking more and more as I saw red and wanted to kill the cat.  Finally I squeezed hard enough that the cat let go.  But the hamster was dead.  I cried for about an hour.  Although I didn’t intend to use the hamster’s death for sympathy, my dad said I could get a new one.  From that day on I had about one a year.

My sister passes out.
My sister Sharon had a problem when she was about 7 or 8 give or take a year.  We were at the breakfast table eating a large Saturday breakfast and my mom looked over at Sharon and she kinda looked up and then passed out with her face in her plate.  Of course my mom got terrified and finally after about 30 seconds, she would wake up and not remember a thing that happened. She had a huge array of tests along with spinal fluid taps which, she says were excruciating. For the next few years she would pass out from time to time and the doctors never did figure out what it was. She eventually quit passing out.

In early Lompoc:
I had a couple of hamsters.  They both got out and we could not find them.
We searched for three days and not a trace, so we figured they must have gotten away. I dropped a pencil behind my dresser and as I pulled the dresser from the wall to get the pencil, I saw the first hamster dead.  It tried to slide down the back of the dresser to the floor and got caught and died. The other hamster we could not find, for another week or two.  One day my dad turned on his huge RCA radio and record player.  The left channel was not working.  The stereo was build in three parts,  the left speaker that had a twelve inch speaker and it’s own amplifier as did the right one, on top of the right speaker laid the phonograph and the radio.  My dad tried everything to get the left speaker to work but could not. Finally he pulled the left speaker and opened it up and there in the cabinet was my hamster. It had made a nest out of the pink fiberglass baffle material and had chewed through the wires.  Needless to say my dad was pissed.

Kathy’s skirt up after the restroom at Denny’s
            My Daughters mother (Kathy) and I went to a seminar at Cuesta College with a friend who was giving the seminar.  On the way back from the college we stopped at Denny’s just below San Luis Obispo and had an evening meal. We got done and the speaker and I paid the bill and went out front waiting for Kathy to come out of the restaurant.
I noticed Kathy come out, but she didn’t meet us right away.  She went to the tables and handed out Christian flyers. Kathy then came out and greeted us and we talked for a few minutes.  Kathy was facing both of us at the time and she was wearing a turquoise chiffon flowing skirt. As we turned to go to the car Kathy’s backside became visible and her skirt was pulled up and tucked into her pantyhose so that it created an opening and you could see her panties through her pantyhose. She got really embarrassed and pulled her skirt back down.  Here she had gone to almost all the tables that were occupied and not a single person told her, her skirt was open in the back.  We laughed later on the way home.

Embarrassing moments:
Some friends of ours had a band that he and his wife used to play in.  It was a gospel band and they would play various small and some large churches.  His wife was the lead singer and would stand in front of the group.  This particular time, they were playing in front of a pretty large congregation and his wife was wearing an empire waist dress that went to the floor and had a low cut top to it, but nothing revealing. She was small breasted and at that time didn’t wear a bra as she was perky and really didn’t need one. When they all left the stage her husband was walking directly behind her and as she went down the steps, the back of her skirt laid on the top step behind her and her husband unknowingly stepped on her dress. He stopped for a second to say something to the drummer as she continued to go down the steps.
As she went down the rest of the steps her dress in the front was pulled down almost to her waist, (those dresses were stretch material).  Her breasts were exposed to the whole congregation.  She finally realized what happened but could not grab the top of her dress in time.  The rest is embarrassing history.


Funny small things in life:

            Once Ruth referred to the pirate attraction at Disneyland:  “I want to go back on the parrots of the carrot beans.”

Jennie had to take a bath, I got the water ready and told her it was time to take her bath.  She said, “I don’t like the baths you make”.  I said why? She said it was too hot. I said no it’s not, it’s just right.  She looked at me and said; “well sometimes your hot is not my hot.” (She is still the same to this day - Very wise, that girl.) 

My sister Sharon was very young. We were at the dinner table and she made some kind of noise.  My Dad said, “Sharon where are your manners?”  She said, “In the refrigerator next to the apples.”

I stuck a string bean up my nose more than once, but once it got stuck. And my dad hasd to remove it with tweezers little by little.

We went to this lake once that had a little swap part to it, not bad though and the fishing was good, or my dad said so.  All he would ever catch is “crappie”, which had 300 times the bones of other fish, so we never ate any.  I remember coming home and getting out of my wet pants and began to take my underwear off. When I looked down my testicles had a leech on it and so did my abdomen right above my penis.  I was frozen and my mom made me go to the kitchen and pull my underwear off so she could remove them, she had to pull them off as she added salt to them, on my scrotum.  That was sooooo embarrassing. I could not stop turning red, I was blushing so much.


Small things that changed phases of my life.
Yes some are personal, so read no further if your gonna go ewweeeeee!!!!.

First time I ever felt a woman’s breast, was Judith Donohue, who became my first wife.
We had been out on a few dates but never went more than a kiss.  We went to Disneyland for my graduation night.  I brought Judie along as my date.  We went all over Disneyland, took on all the rides. We kissed a lot.  It was getting late and we took the train around the park and it stopped at the New Orleans section. We got off and there was no one around and the train left.  While we waited for the next train, we sat in the station bench and kissed. She had on a sleeveless white dress that was short and tight. As we kissed I finally got up the courage to run my hand up her hips and then grabbed her boob.  She didn’t stop me and pushed her boob against my hand. She wouldn’t let it go further than that. I was so excited, I’m a guy and you can imagine the rest.  We didn’t go any further and the train came back around, but that was the first time too first base for me. As we dated we would stay in my bedroom at my parents and listen to Three Dog Night and Blood Seat and Tears. And make out. We would dry hump and such, but Judie was adamant about not giving it away till she was married. And she kept that vow,  ( as Nancy did later), When we got married, against her parents wishes.  They didn’t like me much. Anyway, her dad paid for our honeymoon in Carmel and both of us were virgins.  No exaggerations. It was a tough wedding night because I didn’t know what to do right or wrong and neither did she. But we made it through.

I remember sitting in the cottage that her dad had rented us for a week. It was one of the most amazing times of my life. A week with my very first real love and now my wife and we loved each other a lot. Walking hand in hand down the streets of Carmel. Every time I go there, it brings back such vivid memories. Watching the première of M*A*S*H the movie. Sitting at the breakfast table, covered with lace, candles and fine china. Looking out the cottage window and yes it was a real cottage, listening to James Taylor sing “Sweet Baby James” and “Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon” on a turntable. In the living room. God, if I had known what my life would be, I might have worked hard to keep it on track, but I got heavy into drugs and except for one other major thing, that changed me as a person more than anything.  But that is for the section above this or it’s own section.

Not so funny, but life changing

Calling a black man a “nigger” when I was a kid.
My mom and dad both used the word ( At that time, Back folks were called “Colored People”, even though white people change more colors than black people do, so it's looks like, we are the colored people.
I was about 5 or 6 years old I think.  Anyway, this black gentleman was walking down the sidewalk and passed by the front gate.  I looked up at him and said, “Hi Nigger” it was a real honest helllo, with no mal or racist intent. Honestly and this whole document is pure honesty as much as I can remember. Well, I said it because I honestly thought that was what you called black people.  My Mom heard me and about had a cow. Pulled me inside by my ear and yelled at me, said why did I call that man a “Nigger”.  I said because that’s what you and dad call the colored people.  My Mom got really, really quiet for a long time and said. “Tony, please don’t ever use that word again just because someone is black.” And they never did again from that day forward.  As I got in my late teens my dad would use the word with his buddies once or twice, but it was more in fun that in hating the race.  Still, not good. With few exceptions, I don’t use it either.

Same house in Connecticut or Rhode Island.

we lived in a two story house, the upstairs was an older lady that used to listen in on all our conversation on the "Party line" back then you could pay extra to have a private phone line, if not, then you had a party line with up to 4 or 5 people haveing the same number and you could listen in.
I remember we had a fireplace in the living room and it had a plastic top material on top laied against the opening to keep the cold air out.  My mom was making stuff in the kitchen and I decided to make a fire.  so I got a bunch of old newpapers and threw them in the fireplave and then lit them and put the table bak up against the opening. well I went outside to play and about 15 minutes later if not sooner my mom screamed, I came running in and saw a the table on fire and the flames running up the wall. she called the fire department and they put it out. man talk about a scolding. 

My mom told me when I was about 2, I had diapers on and I grabbed her keys and decided to put them into an electrical socket.  my diaper was wet a little and just as I put the keys in the two slots, she just happened to walk around the corner. she said the sparks flied out of the opening and my legs which were pushed up against the wall, suddenly extended and I flew backward across the entire room about a foot off the ground and ended up on the other wall. she thought I had died, but she said I shook myself off got up, fell down, got up fell down and for the next 5 minutes walked in circles and laughed my butt off giggling.

My Dog in a stolen boat.

I had taken my dog down to the river to have some fun and pirate adventures in the woods.  I got to a part of the river and I found a boat pulled up on shore.  I thought, COOL! I put my dog in the boat and tied him to the front of the bow, pretty tight.  I thought, it would be so cool to paddle down river and back.  I pushed the boat off the shore and put my foot in the boat and the other was still on land.  The boat pulled away from the shore way faster than I thought it would and I was doing the splits. Next thing I know I am laying on the shore as the dog and the boat were floating backwards into the river.  I wanted to walk out into the river to get the boat, but I thought the bottom of the river was full of mud that would suck you down till you drowned and if not there were large crawdad’s that would bite your toes.  I was in a panic.  Here was my doggie going down the river with the current and me not able to do anything.  I was hoping the dog would not try and jump out the the boat as his leash was so short he would have hung himself over the edge of the boat.  The boat kept going downstream till it finally hit a bunch of branches off of a fallen tree and the boat got stuck there.  I ran upstream where there was a large water pipe that ran across the river, big enough around that I didn’t have to worry too much about falling off.  We would always cross that instead of using the street.  I ran downstream and fortunately the dog and boat were still stuck in some branches as the boat laid against the shore.  I was able to get into the boat and then I paddled it a little more downstream until I hit the other bank. Got me and my dog out. I ended on leaving the boat there. I bet the guy who owned the boat was wondering how his boat got where it was.
(This is true, the names have been changed to protect the innocent.)
There is a lot more, but my fingers are sore.

My dog on the river: Delaware

            I had taken my dog down to the river to have some fun and pirate adventures in the woods.  I got to a part of the river and I found a boat pulled up on shore.  I thought, COOL! I put my dog in the boat and tied him to the front of the bow, pretty tight.  I thought, it would be so cool to paddle down river and back.  I pushed the boat off the shore and put my foot in the boat and the other was still on land.  The boat pulled away from the shore way faster than I thought it would and I was doing the splits. Next thing I know I am laying on the shore as the dog and the boat were floating backwards into the river.  I wanted to walk out into the river to get the boat, but I thought the bottom of the river was full of mud that would suck you down till you drowned and if not there were large crawdad’s that would bite your toes.  I was in a panic.  Here was my doggie going down the river with the current and me not able to do anything.  I was hoping the dog would not try and jump out the the boat as his leash was so short he would have hung himself over the edge of the boat.  The boat kept going downstream till it finally hit a bunch of branches off of a fallen tree and the boat got stuck there.  I ran upstream where there was a large water pipe that ran across the river, big enough around that I didn’t have to worry too much about falling off.  We would always cross that instead of using the street.  I ran downstream and fortunately the dog and boat were still stuck in some branches as the boat laid against the shore.  I was able to get into the boat and then I paddled it a little more downstream until I hit the other bank. Got me and my dog out. I ended on leaving the boat there. I bet the guy who owned the boat was wondering how his boat got where it was.
(This is true, the names have been changed to protect the innocent.)

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