...I think this is as good a time as ever, to get to meet some of my little buddies, growing up, my dear, sweet, nieces & nephews...Really, the first wave of the bunch, only range 6-12 years younger than me and we pretty much had a complete ball...growing up together...
...Of course, we have to go way back to 1970 when the whole kiddie train express began rolling thru the O'Leary depot...Boom...!!!...Right out of the box...Young Charlie, Eddie, Colleen, Mike, Michelle, Thomas, Carrie, Pat, Kate, Patrick & Petey & Bridget...all came screaming into the world...Every single one of them...a pure joy to be around...
(Really, we should include Jimmy & Johnny & Katie Fitz...too...because they were not too far behind...and equally enjoyed the chaos...and let's just throw in Joey & Sean & Kevin & Kelly & Danny & Shea who would rock into this world...sometime down the line in the 1980's & beyond)
...There was never, ever anything less than an endless amount of laughter and good times as we played all kinds of games...together...growing up...Oh gosh, back then...I'd pick them up & toss them around...and give them all piggy-back rides...until I'd collapse...from exhaustion...And at that point, they would all be yelling...Do it again...!!!...Do it again...!!!...
...It was such a precious time, almost a golden era, itself, seeing these little tykes, chewing on their pacifiers, running around in their diapers, always full of fun...Of course, our times we shared together up in Lake Geneva...are just permanently imbedded in all our minds...
It is just unmistakable, not to recall, chasing each other around the blue/green shag carpeted living room...My Mom had this funky GREEN SHAG BALL...and it was huge & heavy...and we'd roll it back at each other...or run into the back bedroom and make some neat forts out of the bunk beds...
...Those old bunk beds...when transformed into forts...were just about the coolest thing in the world to these young kids...draping a blanket from the upper bed, over the lower bed...creating a hidden oasis...for those huddling inside...giggling & giggling away...almost never wanting to leave...those forts...because it was like no other place they could imagine...
...Also, out in the kitchen, in those olden days, we had these swivel bar stools around the tall, circular kitchen table...It truly was unique...and I don't know how many times, these tykes came close to falling off the bar stools, because they all loved to spin & spin...around & around, until they were out of their minds...dizzy...
We celebrated a ton of birthday parties out at that table, all the kids gathered around a burning candle-lit cake, spinning & spinning...Just having a good time, amidst their Mom's & Gramma scurrying about to fill their plates with ice cream & cake, trying to get things all pulled off, without someone crying or making too big of a mess...
...Of course, bed time up at the LAKE HOUSE was immense fun...because all the kids were winding down from a day of complete joy...piling into the pink & green alcove genie bed, or somewhere nearby...once again...giggling away...as me or Gramma or their Mom's would read them a bed time story...all of us caught up in the moment...gently folding page after page...with the kiddies eyes...nodding off...every now and then...
...then daybreak would come and the kids were off to the pier or off to the beach or out onto the Granny Franny for a delightful adventure ride...We'd always be counting off the life preservers we'd need for this huge assemblence of kids...
God, some of them, absolutely hated wearing a life preserver....and who could blame them...they got awfully hot to wear with the sun, beating down on them...and they were so bulky & heavy...and their clasps had to be adjusted constantly because these kids were quite a handful...
...It wasn't uncommon for the kids to jump up next to Gramma who always sat in the back of the boat, feeling the sprays from the waves coming aboard and drenching them, with water and with laughter...Gramma always had extra beach towels...aboard...to cover the kiddies...when they got drenched or needed away to hide from the sun...that seemed to blaze down from the sky...
...Just some amazing, amazing memories...out on the Granny Franny...with all the kiddies...Sometimes, I really think my Mom & Dad had every intention of buying the boat for us 8 older kids...but it soon became obvious...all the tiny grandchildren just loved every minute aboard the Granny Franny...even more...You just can't buy that much fun...these days...because they were much simpler times...and things were so much more relaxed back then...
...Today...parents huddle over their kids...every single second..expecting the worst...from their children's every tiny little movement...But back then...we all didn't mind a little danger...Grampa was nearby...or someone like Grampa...who could easily just swoop down...if need be...and we were all quite lucky...because none of us...ever fell overboard...or ever had any kind of stressful moment...
...Of course...Gramma always loved to pick up toys from Schultz's or Ben Franklin...They could be squirt guns or rubber balls or little balsa wood airplanes...or frisbees...and on and on and on...
...Playing frisbee or tag or the unforgettable baseball games in our backyard at the Lake House, are also etched permanently in our brains...I'd love to make our whiffle ball--baseball games as realistic as possible...even though we were only using plastic FAT ALBERT bats...that would belt endless homers...up...and over...the roof...
...What an incredible display...of popping one...way up high...or way out into Barney & Grace's yard next door...We all just had a knack for easily manage jumping from our yard into a 3 foot drop into Barney's yard to quickly retrieve the ball as someone was scampering around the bases in glee...just glowing they had just parked one out on their Uncle Jim...
...And sometimes...the plastic whiffle ball would get lost in the huge density of shrubs and foliage that lined the perimeter of the Yellow House...It would stop our games...and we'd all gather sifting through the shrubs...with someone always shouting triumphantly of finding the ball...
...Also...our neighbor to the right...Bev...would sometimes...keep our ball..if we hit it out onto her deck...where she liked to relax and look out at the water, drinking a beer, listening to a ball game on a transistor radio...We'd almsot form a SWAT SQUAD mentality, if we knew we were gonna have to form a search & rescue team...to sneak onto Bev's deck and scavenger back the ball...
...You really could go on & on...the horse rides, the go cart rides...going to PLAYLAND or the RIVIERA in Lake Geneva to play old video & pinball games...some of those...which still remain there...to this very day...
...And we always had a gaggle of good times back on 86th Street for holidays or an occaisional visit...All the kids were just happening at such a rapid succession, that it seemed our good times woulde never, ever end...and even as the children grew...they all had such a big smile, recalling those precious moments...with Gramma...with Grampa...with their brothers & sisters...with their cousins...with their Mom's & Dad's...and Aunts & Uncles...
...All moments...steeped deeply into their very fabric...of who they were and who they are now...for the traditions of good times...and love and laughter...were truly unique & special in every which way...
...I'd love to pull out some especially great moments that occured from each of my nieces & nephews, perspective, of the impact they had upon my life...individually...but we are talking 21 kids...and such a wide array of stories and I'd hate to put more emphasis on one story rather than another...
Basically, they all know, those were some of the best times, we ever had...and there really is never, ever gonna be a shortage of time...to bring back those memories, together, whenever we still...get the chance to talk or visit...
...Many of my nieces & nephews have their own kids...these days...and the joy they share with their children almost reflects the spirit of good times...they had as children...way back then...long, long ago...back in the 1970's...just a heartbeat away...to many of us...even to this very day...
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Thursday, December 11, 2008
STM: Sister Brenda & Sister Elvira
Indeed...aghast washes over many the faces...who read the title of this installment...for we are about to delve into the twisted, kooky world...of two helplessly, bizarre nuns...who graced many of our lives at Saint Thomas More...back in the 4th & 5th Grade...
Sister Brenda & Sister Elvira...hold the distinction of being the most feared nuns at Saint Thomas More...during the time of their glorious reign...back in the bustling early/mid 70's...When you ever-presently think back to, back then, our flat-out, overwhelming sentiments of us kooky kids were "Ohh...please, please, please God...just don't let me end up with either, Sister Brenda or Sister Elvira for homeroom. I will clean my room, I will eat my peas and I'll even play the big-ass tuba or the silly little flute , in the school band, gosh darnit, if you let me slide, this one, one time...Please God...I'm just telling you...I'm too young to die..."...Undoubtedly, this mantra echoed thru every school child's incredibly intense, almost sobbing, out-of-control, prayers, at mass every Sunday morning...
Let's see...Hmmmm...who should we go with first...Flip a coin...Pick your poison...Ohh hell, just get it over with...like ripping off that nasty scab on your knee...or getting vaccinated with that giant stinging needle...back then...
Oh yes, here we go...why not...Sister Brenda...Why not...indeed...
Sister Brenda...just showed up one unforgettable day, out of the clear blue, and sucked the life out of every single kid's life she came in contact with...She was in her 60's...wildly, witch-like, white hair...just ferociously ugly...and her screaming and ranting voice pierced your very trembling little soul...as she taught us back in the 4th Grade...when we were still more like meek, lost impressionable lambs...more than anything...else...
Her demeanor was almost demonic...not that she was THE DEVIL...but awfully damn, close...
And unfortunately, for my classmate, Danny Hahn, her wrath became totally fixated on him mostly, and his long, long blonde hair....We all had the BIG SCARY HAIRY HAIR...back then...but Danny's hair was almost as long & as pretty as a girl's hair...And for this...he would be punished extremely beyond his small, slim body could fathom and rather harrowingly way beyond his harmlessly, naiave comprehension...too...
Sister Brenda, would wretchedly grab ahold of Danny's golden locks and just unmercellesly pull it as hard as she could, flinging Danny, all about, like a rag doll, just leaving the kid, almost in a delerium of sorts...We did call Danny, affectionately, CHONGO, back then, because that was the name of a wild jungle kid...on The Banana Splits show...
See. the Banana Splits, was THE TOP KID's SHOW back then and our Chongo did like to duplicate/make the crazy "Monkey Noises" that the real Chongo made, making us laugh and laugh and laugh...Danny Hahn definitely was alot wilder, than your average kid...
But for our CHONGO, the laughter of hopping all about, making funny faces, joking all around, quickly disappeared...as Sister Brenda, put the hammer down, ruthlessly, slapping Danny's face, Smmmaaaackkk, grabbing his hair, and endlessly telling all the children,
Hahn, you look like a girl....Just look at this hair...It's a girls...When are you gonna get it cut...???
Brenda also absolutely had a genuine obsession with finding alot of kids with big, puffy-wuffy cheeks...and squeezing them ever so tightly and twisting them, mangling them, turning them red & blue...until it ungodly hurt...
Chalk up the extra chubby cheeks of big guys, Joe Just & Mike Mulligan, primarily, followed by the punk patrol...Slim Farrell & John Fitz. I know Slim & Fitz took quite a few slugs from Sister B...Hey, just about anyone could fall under her clenching claws...at any given moment...so for God's sake...watch out...!!!...
Then we get a little sordid and strange...Why...??? How should I throw this out? Another little shocker about the dubiously demented Sister Brenda...was she definitely sadistically enjoyed to get all the young boys lined up at the urinals, in the bathroom, in quick, little impromtu sessions....
There she was, in the boys bathroom, walking very slowly and almost the entire time, leering wickedly at us, hovering right up behind us, brushing her long nun's habit up against all of us...screaming at the top of her lungs...in unholy terror...
....GET THE POISON OUT, BOYS...!!!...GET THAT POISON OUT...!!!
Something tells me, dear, dear Sister Brenda had a slight bit of a psychological imbalance, Oh gosh...we really hated the idea of entering the bathroom with Sister Brenda baring down on us from behind...Damn...Talk about a total nightmare...hahaha....Sure, now we can laugh...
But hey...those were our times...and we had to, no doubt, roll with the punches...
Onto...the equally ominous and unaminously feared...Sister Elvira...She, herself, was almost a curmudgeonly midget of sorts...but don't let that fool you...she packed a wicked wallop...in her devilishly dynamic heart, that shifted from serene to psycho...in 2 seconds flat...
And if there was one distinct flaw I had to share about Elvira that sets her apart...(and believe me...there are many...dozens and dozens...and dozens..)...it would be her unwavering usage of Lysol Spray as a weapon of destruction...
Sister Elvira sprayed Lysol on everything...nothing was out of bounds...including you peanut and jelly sandwich...at lunch...Sure....she was the ultimate germaphobe's germaphobe...rendering all of us choking for dear life...as the nauseating mist...waffled about in a dense fog...across the entire classroom...all the time...
And I do know Fitz got half a can sprayed on his ass for farting...Oh well, Fitz, you shoulda seen that coming and not eaten so many beans...that day...my friend...
My brother Danny always gets a chuckle speaking of her sneak attacks with Lysol, while he had her, 5 years before, pouncing on unsuspeting kids, like a poor young fool, who dared to dawdle his loose toes, circling his warm, unsuspecting shoe...to and fro...
Booooom...!!!...Elvira, like a hyper kinetic cat, sharply descended upon him in a lightning, hellish fury...kicking the lad's shoe clearly across the floor...sending it spinning...then spraying an entire can...into the shoe...which took about 2 whole minutes...soaking, soaking and soaking, every conceivable germ out of that shoe's life...and then some...for sure...And who doesn't think back, now, scratching their head, saying...I wonder how "one shoe Willie" walked home that day...???
I, myself, can recall, one day, back then, being let go, to go to the bathroom, from my homeroom, down the hall...and slowly, gingerly wandering by...down the quiet corridor of an empty school hall...in a hush...past Elvira's classroom door, peering in at my dear school chums, caught in her elusive grip of terror...
There, I saw my good buddy, John Feely, a tall, curly-haired, amiable kid, if there ever was one...next to Slim & Fitz, almost frozen in a spooky, frightful stare...just following Elvira's erratic path...past him....as she mumbled past his desk...where he probably expected a wooden ruler across the hands or a cheap shot upside the head or maybe the the funky-fumigating Lysol...would make a special appearance...
I kid you not...I absolutely kid you not...And poor, poor, John Armata...just a rummy-dummy kid, just a fragile target, who endlessly struggled along...Imagine this tiny, Elvira, bashing away at this smiley, large, man-child, day in...and day out...I can still feel Armata's hopelessness now, wondering why he, such a happy soul, must endure such insanity...
We all, of course, no doubt, gained a tremendous respect for all our other teachers, who were not hell-bent on blending their ferociously chaotic, sinister spells...with their rabble-grabble mixture of pious, religious whaling & endless babbling of incoherent instructions...
I, myself, as I'm sure others, do too...feel so sorry for all those good, sweet nun's we knew, beautiful people...who incredibly shaped our young lives so much...in so many good ways...Those good & gracious nuns were amazing individuals whose loyalty to God & ability to emit God's love towards us, will always ring true...
But unfortunately, we instead, choose to focus on the two undeniably, dispicable, whackos, from some dark planet, in our solar system, or beyond...(...hell...???)
Surely...This perplexing paradox was not a pretty sight...to behold...our fate back then, but it did truly make us mighty, mighty tougher...for the realities of the real world...because as bad as your crummy job got, later on down the line, or how far your college grades slid...at least there was no turning back the clock...to you know what...and you know when...and you especially know, to you know who...
Sister Brenda...Sister Elvira...the twisted sisters...the tormenting twin terrors...the nasty, ghastly, one-of-a-kind nuns...Surely, our distinctive memories of them make us shyly shudder & shake...but inevitably, they make us laugh...a deep, deep, uproarious belly laugh......
Because the level of horrific absurdity...that reigned down on us...gave us a good measure of strength to overcome our fears...and leave us reminding each other...of our gallantry, to make it thru...to another day...in another time...in another splendid dimension...truly unique...to us Tommy More gang...back in the day...
Sister Brenda & Sister Elvira...hold the distinction of being the most feared nuns at Saint Thomas More...during the time of their glorious reign...back in the bustling early/mid 70's...When you ever-presently think back to, back then, our flat-out, overwhelming sentiments of us kooky kids were "Ohh...please, please, please God...just don't let me end up with either, Sister Brenda or Sister Elvira for homeroom. I will clean my room, I will eat my peas and I'll even play the big-ass tuba or the silly little flute , in the school band, gosh darnit, if you let me slide, this one, one time...Please God...I'm just telling you...I'm too young to die..."...Undoubtedly, this mantra echoed thru every school child's incredibly intense, almost sobbing, out-of-control, prayers, at mass every Sunday morning...
Let's see...Hmmmm...who should we go with first...Flip a coin...Pick your poison...Ohh hell, just get it over with...like ripping off that nasty scab on your knee...or getting vaccinated with that giant stinging needle...back then...
Oh yes, here we go...why not...Sister Brenda...Why not...indeed...
Sister Brenda...just showed up one unforgettable day, out of the clear blue, and sucked the life out of every single kid's life she came in contact with...She was in her 60's...wildly, witch-like, white hair...just ferociously ugly...and her screaming and ranting voice pierced your very trembling little soul...as she taught us back in the 4th Grade...when we were still more like meek, lost impressionable lambs...more than anything...else...
Her demeanor was almost demonic...not that she was THE DEVIL...but awfully damn, close...
And unfortunately, for my classmate, Danny Hahn, her wrath became totally fixated on him mostly, and his long, long blonde hair....We all had the BIG SCARY HAIRY HAIR...back then...but Danny's hair was almost as long & as pretty as a girl's hair...And for this...he would be punished extremely beyond his small, slim body could fathom and rather harrowingly way beyond his harmlessly, naiave comprehension...too...
Sister Brenda, would wretchedly grab ahold of Danny's golden locks and just unmercellesly pull it as hard as she could, flinging Danny, all about, like a rag doll, just leaving the kid, almost in a delerium of sorts...We did call Danny, affectionately, CHONGO, back then, because that was the name of a wild jungle kid...on The Banana Splits show...
See. the Banana Splits, was THE TOP KID's SHOW back then and our Chongo did like to duplicate/make the crazy "Monkey Noises" that the real Chongo made, making us laugh and laugh and laugh...Danny Hahn definitely was alot wilder, than your average kid...
But for our CHONGO, the laughter of hopping all about, making funny faces, joking all around, quickly disappeared...as Sister Brenda, put the hammer down, ruthlessly, slapping Danny's face, Smmmaaaackkk, grabbing his hair, and endlessly telling all the children,
Hahn, you look like a girl....Just look at this hair...It's a girls...When are you gonna get it cut...???
Brenda also absolutely had a genuine obsession with finding alot of kids with big, puffy-wuffy cheeks...and squeezing them ever so tightly and twisting them, mangling them, turning them red & blue...until it ungodly hurt...
Chalk up the extra chubby cheeks of big guys, Joe Just & Mike Mulligan, primarily, followed by the punk patrol...Slim Farrell & John Fitz. I know Slim & Fitz took quite a few slugs from Sister B...Hey, just about anyone could fall under her clenching claws...at any given moment...so for God's sake...watch out...!!!...
Then we get a little sordid and strange...Why...??? How should I throw this out? Another little shocker about the dubiously demented Sister Brenda...was she definitely sadistically enjoyed to get all the young boys lined up at the urinals, in the bathroom, in quick, little impromtu sessions....
There she was, in the boys bathroom, walking very slowly and almost the entire time, leering wickedly at us, hovering right up behind us, brushing her long nun's habit up against all of us...screaming at the top of her lungs...in unholy terror...
....GET THE POISON OUT, BOYS...!!!...GET THAT POISON OUT...!!!
Something tells me, dear, dear Sister Brenda had a slight bit of a psychological imbalance, Oh gosh...we really hated the idea of entering the bathroom with Sister Brenda baring down on us from behind...Damn...Talk about a total nightmare...hahaha....Sure, now we can laugh...
But hey...those were our times...and we had to, no doubt, roll with the punches...
Onto...the equally ominous and unaminously feared...Sister Elvira...She, herself, was almost a curmudgeonly midget of sorts...but don't let that fool you...she packed a wicked wallop...in her devilishly dynamic heart, that shifted from serene to psycho...in 2 seconds flat...
And if there was one distinct flaw I had to share about Elvira that sets her apart...(and believe me...there are many...dozens and dozens...and dozens..)...it would be her unwavering usage of Lysol Spray as a weapon of destruction...
Sister Elvira sprayed Lysol on everything...nothing was out of bounds...including you peanut and jelly sandwich...at lunch...Sure....she was the ultimate germaphobe's germaphobe...rendering all of us choking for dear life...as the nauseating mist...waffled about in a dense fog...across the entire classroom...all the time...
And I do know Fitz got half a can sprayed on his ass for farting...Oh well, Fitz, you shoulda seen that coming and not eaten so many beans...that day...my friend...
My brother Danny always gets a chuckle speaking of her sneak attacks with Lysol, while he had her, 5 years before, pouncing on unsuspeting kids, like a poor young fool, who dared to dawdle his loose toes, circling his warm, unsuspecting shoe...to and fro...
Booooom...!!!...Elvira, like a hyper kinetic cat, sharply descended upon him in a lightning, hellish fury...kicking the lad's shoe clearly across the floor...sending it spinning...then spraying an entire can...into the shoe...which took about 2 whole minutes...soaking, soaking and soaking, every conceivable germ out of that shoe's life...and then some...for sure...And who doesn't think back, now, scratching their head, saying...I wonder how "one shoe Willie" walked home that day...???
I, myself, can recall, one day, back then, being let go, to go to the bathroom, from my homeroom, down the hall...and slowly, gingerly wandering by...down the quiet corridor of an empty school hall...in a hush...past Elvira's classroom door, peering in at my dear school chums, caught in her elusive grip of terror...
There, I saw my good buddy, John Feely, a tall, curly-haired, amiable kid, if there ever was one...next to Slim & Fitz, almost frozen in a spooky, frightful stare...just following Elvira's erratic path...past him....as she mumbled past his desk...where he probably expected a wooden ruler across the hands or a cheap shot upside the head or maybe the the funky-fumigating Lysol...would make a special appearance...
I kid you not...I absolutely kid you not...And poor, poor, John Armata...just a rummy-dummy kid, just a fragile target, who endlessly struggled along...Imagine this tiny, Elvira, bashing away at this smiley, large, man-child, day in...and day out...I can still feel Armata's hopelessness now, wondering why he, such a happy soul, must endure such insanity...
We all, of course, no doubt, gained a tremendous respect for all our other teachers, who were not hell-bent on blending their ferociously chaotic, sinister spells...with their rabble-grabble mixture of pious, religious whaling & endless babbling of incoherent instructions...
I, myself, as I'm sure others, do too...feel so sorry for all those good, sweet nun's we knew, beautiful people...who incredibly shaped our young lives so much...in so many good ways...Those good & gracious nuns were amazing individuals whose loyalty to God & ability to emit God's love towards us, will always ring true...
But unfortunately, we instead, choose to focus on the two undeniably, dispicable, whackos, from some dark planet, in our solar system, or beyond...(...hell...???)
Surely...This perplexing paradox was not a pretty sight...to behold...our fate back then, but it did truly make us mighty, mighty tougher...for the realities of the real world...because as bad as your crummy job got, later on down the line, or how far your college grades slid...at least there was no turning back the clock...to you know what...and you know when...and you especially know, to you know who...
Sister Brenda...Sister Elvira...the twisted sisters...the tormenting twin terrors...the nasty, ghastly, one-of-a-kind nuns...Surely, our distinctive memories of them make us shyly shudder & shake...but inevitably, they make us laugh...a deep, deep, uproarious belly laugh......
Because the level of horrific absurdity...that reigned down on us...gave us a good measure of strength to overcome our fears...and leave us reminding each other...of our gallantry, to make it thru...to another day...in another time...in another splendid dimension...truly unique...to us Tommy More gang...back in the day...
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Danny O's
Without further adieu...it's time to roll back to the hey-dey of my family's version of Michael Jordan...The young sports phenom known around the hood as O's...my brother Dan...
Danny could do it all, in basically every phase of every sport, with a flair, a quickness, and a determination, that just left people in awe...I'd go watch him play shortstop for the Indians in Little League up at the park...and was amazed how effortless he made every ball look that came bashing his way...
He could stab it, he could scoot it...And when he got up to the plate...He could crack that ball to any field, then scamper for extra bases...I was kinda shocked he was my brother, because he never displayed his full abilities when horsing around the house...with us...
Of course, he had excellent, excellent, first class speed that served him well, playing basketball, which would be a life-long passion....There he would go, blistering by the opposition...quickly down the court. And he had such a natural stroke, from outside...
Just money...a sweet swish...many a time...It was his element, his time, his moment to shine...almost taking over the court, with his swarming defense...and his instincts for the ball...always coming to the forefront...
If you had O's on your team...you pretty much knew he was going to unleash an intensity, that was going to make a difference...Time and time, again, he just knew what to do, without any coaching...Just a formidable talent, who took it to the limit...
And then there was football...where he would go down as a legend, in Tommy More lore...In one single game, Danny scored 5 touchdowns...count em...5...!!!...On that day, as well as others, Dan just had it all, cooking on all burners...
He was an all-star running back, who could dash and dart, fake and roll, even bowl you over...if it was down on the goal line...The day after the game, on Monday, they declared it DANNY O'LEARY DAY...at Saint Thomas More...to honor this great achievement...
Danny never cared about the medals or awards, the trophies or accolades bestowed upon him...He just loved to, flat-out, compete...Plain and simple...And as he left the halls of St. Thomas More to go on to Brother Rice...he had gained a confidence and a discipline that always served him well...throughout his life...always...even up to this very day...
See, his fiery, never-say-die, determination will never leave him...It's always been apparent that he would be successful in everything he'd do...that he set his mind to...And even though he never mentions anything about his past...You can just tell, the little kid in him...would just like to regain that strength, that speed and that agility...one more time.....
He's always going to have that competitive edge...that cannot be denied...and one of his greatest moments, that I witnessed, was up at the old Carrol Park fieldhouse, for the Field Hockey championship...when he was 16 years old...
See, in our neighborhood, field hockey, was your true measure, of being incredibly tough...When you got out onto that gymnasium floor, it was a mayhem of grim brutality...Just a vicious, all-out war, that caused alot of blood to spill and alot of heart...to be put to the test...
On this one fearless Saturday Afternoon, Danny's team, the Rico Stiffs, took on the older and much tougher guys, a year older than them...The Rico Stiffs were big underdogs that day...but all of those guys, were having nothing, with anything short of victory...
That crazy bunch of kids playing for the Rico Stiffs...included Danny Moody, Chico, Luke Bailey, John Bar, Brady, Viv, Pat Collins, Terry Moore, Bob Howser, Tommy Walsh and Paulie Collins in the nets...Just a collection of cocky, knock-em, drag-em-out, rag-a-muffins, who could all smell victory in the air...after spending years & years in torment from their older foes...
You couldn't tell these Rico Stiff guys, nothing...They just oozed confidence, despite the other team, just loaded with much bigger & much stronger guys...It was shaping up to be a killer showdown, that the whole neighborhood was excited about...Man, talk about a battle royale...
The honorable Rich, our Park Instructor and referee...knew he had alot to handle for this match-up, but hell, he always liked to see things, just play out...fast & hard...and let the fellas tear it up...
And, of course...on that day...They stuck my brother Dan, on the most fearsome, dirty player, in the league. The most hated bully in the neighborhood...A monstrous dude named Thad, who wore a red bandana and had a huge, handle-bar mustache...
This thug, Thad, really was a splitting image of a more menacing Hulk Hogan.
This Norweigian strongman's whole deal was to plant himself, in front of the opponents net, and just dominate every aspect of anything happening in that vicinity...And Thad, incidentally, was a key, to his teams success...who usually just ferociously crushed opponents, into submission, left and right.
There they were, Dan & Thad, planted firmly in front of the net...an all-out war of position, as Thad just hacked away at every square inch of Danny's body, with his stick...over and over, again...
And each time, Thad would hack away, Danny just would grimace and fight back even stronger, just pummeling Thad, out of the way...even though Thad was twice as big as anyone, in the league.
Danny just got meaner and meaner, even though the welts and bruises were mounting and mounting...as a throng of hundreds screamed at all of the wild action, from just yards away. Bodies were flying, everywhere, as the intensity of this game, just grew and grew and grew...
Just a thunderous roar, of screaming and excitement, ripped thru the air, as Bob Howser of the Stiffs, went top-shelf, with a fleeting, wicked wrister, into the nets, giving them the lead, 1-0, on a penalty shot...after Thad had broken his stick across Dan's back, sending him flying...
That penalty shot score pissed off Thad, twice as much, with only 10 minutes left in the game, now frantically, bashing and bashing Danny, constantly, desperately trying to gain some advantage...but there would be no advantage that day...for Thad...
There, amidst the hazy, dark amber hue, of the fading gym lights above, on this cloudy Winter day, everybody inside was going crazy, absolutely bananas, banging against the metal doors and pounding on the wooden floors that surrounded the gym area...
Just a huge, almost deafening, commotion, not only because they could sense an upset...in the air...but because everyone hated Thad's guts...and loved every minute of him...meeting his match...that day...
As the clock slowly ran down...into the very last few seconds, Thad gave Danny one more brutal cheap shot that sent him sprawling to the ground...
Danny just struggled back up, and stared Thad down...It was a stare... of vindication...it was the stare of kicking his ass, despite the onslaught, he took upon himself, that day,...to withstand...
And as the buzzer sounded, the fans and the players of Rico Stiff's went wild, jubilantly jumping up and down...except for Dan...who just gingerly made his way off the gym floor, taking off his shirt, ever slowly, in quite a bit of pain, to reveal, just an ungodly amount of punishment, covered in red, red welts and dark blue bruises...he had to endure that day...
Anyone there that day witnessed one of the most intensively gruesome Field Hockey games ever held, anywhere, especially there at Carrol Park...
And anyone who got to wear that Carolina Blue, Rico Stiff's, Ashburn Park Field Hockey Champs jacket, got to wear it with a great deal of pride and complete satisfaction, that they would go down as truly one of the best teams to ever, ever play...the game...
Way to go...O's...!!!...You always got the job done...!!!
(as a foot-note...Paulie Collins would like to add that he played Defense mostly, but played Goalie in the Championship Game...and my brother Danny O's would like to add that he remembers shockingly that Paulie never wore his Carolina Blue--Rico Stiffs Champions Jacket...instead, putting it into a protective covering...preserving it, in its pristine condition...You figure, these days, that Jacket would provide quite a nostalgic link back at that heady era...when those, rock em', sock em' dudes, the Rico Stiffs, ruled the neighborhood, and commanded the respect, of all those who would follow...so rapidly unfolding, yonder back....in those unforgettable mid-1970's...)
Danny could do it all, in basically every phase of every sport, with a flair, a quickness, and a determination, that just left people in awe...I'd go watch him play shortstop for the Indians in Little League up at the park...and was amazed how effortless he made every ball look that came bashing his way...
He could stab it, he could scoot it...And when he got up to the plate...He could crack that ball to any field, then scamper for extra bases...I was kinda shocked he was my brother, because he never displayed his full abilities when horsing around the house...with us...
Of course, he had excellent, excellent, first class speed that served him well, playing basketball, which would be a life-long passion....There he would go, blistering by the opposition...quickly down the court. And he had such a natural stroke, from outside...
Just money...a sweet swish...many a time...It was his element, his time, his moment to shine...almost taking over the court, with his swarming defense...and his instincts for the ball...always coming to the forefront...
If you had O's on your team...you pretty much knew he was going to unleash an intensity, that was going to make a difference...Time and time, again, he just knew what to do, without any coaching...Just a formidable talent, who took it to the limit...
And then there was football...where he would go down as a legend, in Tommy More lore...In one single game, Danny scored 5 touchdowns...count em...5...!!!...On that day, as well as others, Dan just had it all, cooking on all burners...
He was an all-star running back, who could dash and dart, fake and roll, even bowl you over...if it was down on the goal line...The day after the game, on Monday, they declared it DANNY O'LEARY DAY...at Saint Thomas More...to honor this great achievement...
Danny never cared about the medals or awards, the trophies or accolades bestowed upon him...He just loved to, flat-out, compete...Plain and simple...And as he left the halls of St. Thomas More to go on to Brother Rice...he had gained a confidence and a discipline that always served him well...throughout his life...always...even up to this very day...
See, his fiery, never-say-die, determination will never leave him...It's always been apparent that he would be successful in everything he'd do...that he set his mind to...And even though he never mentions anything about his past...You can just tell, the little kid in him...would just like to regain that strength, that speed and that agility...one more time.....
He's always going to have that competitive edge...that cannot be denied...and one of his greatest moments, that I witnessed, was up at the old Carrol Park fieldhouse, for the Field Hockey championship...when he was 16 years old...
See, in our neighborhood, field hockey, was your true measure, of being incredibly tough...When you got out onto that gymnasium floor, it was a mayhem of grim brutality...Just a vicious, all-out war, that caused alot of blood to spill and alot of heart...to be put to the test...
On this one fearless Saturday Afternoon, Danny's team, the Rico Stiffs, took on the older and much tougher guys, a year older than them...The Rico Stiffs were big underdogs that day...but all of those guys, were having nothing, with anything short of victory...
That crazy bunch of kids playing for the Rico Stiffs...included Danny Moody, Chico, Luke Bailey, John Bar, Brady, Viv, Pat Collins, Terry Moore, Bob Howser, Tommy Walsh and Paulie Collins in the nets...Just a collection of cocky, knock-em, drag-em-out, rag-a-muffins, who could all smell victory in the air...after spending years & years in torment from their older foes...
You couldn't tell these Rico Stiff guys, nothing...They just oozed confidence, despite the other team, just loaded with much bigger & much stronger guys...It was shaping up to be a killer showdown, that the whole neighborhood was excited about...Man, talk about a battle royale...
The honorable Rich, our Park Instructor and referee...knew he had alot to handle for this match-up, but hell, he always liked to see things, just play out...fast & hard...and let the fellas tear it up...
And, of course...on that day...They stuck my brother Dan, on the most fearsome, dirty player, in the league. The most hated bully in the neighborhood...A monstrous dude named Thad, who wore a red bandana and had a huge, handle-bar mustache...
This thug, Thad, really was a splitting image of a more menacing Hulk Hogan.
This Norweigian strongman's whole deal was to plant himself, in front of the opponents net, and just dominate every aspect of anything happening in that vicinity...And Thad, incidentally, was a key, to his teams success...who usually just ferociously crushed opponents, into submission, left and right.
There they were, Dan & Thad, planted firmly in front of the net...an all-out war of position, as Thad just hacked away at every square inch of Danny's body, with his stick...over and over, again...
And each time, Thad would hack away, Danny just would grimace and fight back even stronger, just pummeling Thad, out of the way...even though Thad was twice as big as anyone, in the league.
Danny just got meaner and meaner, even though the welts and bruises were mounting and mounting...as a throng of hundreds screamed at all of the wild action, from just yards away. Bodies were flying, everywhere, as the intensity of this game, just grew and grew and grew...
Just a thunderous roar, of screaming and excitement, ripped thru the air, as Bob Howser of the Stiffs, went top-shelf, with a fleeting, wicked wrister, into the nets, giving them the lead, 1-0, on a penalty shot...after Thad had broken his stick across Dan's back, sending him flying...
That penalty shot score pissed off Thad, twice as much, with only 10 minutes left in the game, now frantically, bashing and bashing Danny, constantly, desperately trying to gain some advantage...but there would be no advantage that day...for Thad...
There, amidst the hazy, dark amber hue, of the fading gym lights above, on this cloudy Winter day, everybody inside was going crazy, absolutely bananas, banging against the metal doors and pounding on the wooden floors that surrounded the gym area...
Just a huge, almost deafening, commotion, not only because they could sense an upset...in the air...but because everyone hated Thad's guts...and loved every minute of him...meeting his match...that day...
As the clock slowly ran down...into the very last few seconds, Thad gave Danny one more brutal cheap shot that sent him sprawling to the ground...
Danny just struggled back up, and stared Thad down...It was a stare... of vindication...it was the stare of kicking his ass, despite the onslaught, he took upon himself, that day,...to withstand...
And as the buzzer sounded, the fans and the players of Rico Stiff's went wild, jubilantly jumping up and down...except for Dan...who just gingerly made his way off the gym floor, taking off his shirt, ever slowly, in quite a bit of pain, to reveal, just an ungodly amount of punishment, covered in red, red welts and dark blue bruises...he had to endure that day...
Anyone there that day witnessed one of the most intensively gruesome Field Hockey games ever held, anywhere, especially there at Carrol Park...
And anyone who got to wear that Carolina Blue, Rico Stiff's, Ashburn Park Field Hockey Champs jacket, got to wear it with a great deal of pride and complete satisfaction, that they would go down as truly one of the best teams to ever, ever play...the game...
Way to go...O's...!!!...You always got the job done...!!!
(as a foot-note...Paulie Collins would like to add that he played Defense mostly, but played Goalie in the Championship Game...and my brother Danny O's would like to add that he remembers shockingly that Paulie never wore his Carolina Blue--Rico Stiffs Champions Jacket...instead, putting it into a protective covering...preserving it, in its pristine condition...You figure, these days, that Jacket would provide quite a nostalgic link back at that heady era...when those, rock em', sock em' dudes, the Rico Stiffs, ruled the neighborhood, and commanded the respect, of all those who would follow...so rapidly unfolding, yonder back....in those unforgettable mid-1970's...)
Friday, December 5, 2008
4th Grade & Eddie Bar & Co.
...Back to my olden school days at Saint Thomas More...I pretty much flew thru 3rd Grade unscathed except for my first introduction to Science...In as much, every other subject was a cake walk for me...the wonderful world of Science just baffled me to no end...and would be my consummate enemy...from the get-go...
I can recall, my first Science teacher, Mrs. Reidy, burning a sugar cube, in front of her young, doleful pupils...all aghast as the tiny white sugar cube...turned black & burnt...She glowingly pointed it out, that this was some chemical change releasing carbon dioxide into the air...and on & on & on...It blew all our minds...for about 10 seconds...Then we all grabbed a handful of sugar cubes and chowed them down...releasing our own, endless sugar buzz, into the air...
After the 3rd Grade, came 4th Grade of course...and one of my most influential teachers I ever had, Mrs. Deters...came along...Nobody in their right mind, would say something like this, because she was a very difficult teacher who shook our very soul, trying to push us to our absolute limits...There seemed to be endless pop quizes...and endless homework assignments...Heck, we were turning into quite the disciplined bunch, facing her onslaught of difficult challenges...
And oh my God...How she would torment my new school chum, Eddie Barkowski, to no end...Eddie was the class clown and the most down-to-Earth kid in class...But Mrs. Deters, had this odd fetish, of grabbing Eddie, and shoving him, under her desk, anytime he acted up...Of course, you can imagine Eddie, underneath the desk, listening to the chuckles of classmates, as he was forced to linger there for 5 or 10 minutes...at least once a week...for sure...
I got to know Eddie, alot better, as I ventured off of my block and rode my bike 3 blocks North to his humble domain on 84th Street...There, there was quite a crew of young enthusiastic boys, all of them, who liked to play alot of touch football in the middle of the street...There was Tommy Kelly, the Sheahan brothers, Maggie and Eddie's 2 younger brothers, Neil & Mark...
And then you'd throw the wild Murphy brothers, John & Mike....and my good, good chum, Slim Farrell, into the mix...from a block away...and it was a great, great time...These guys had some skills, throwing themselves all about...They had a passion to compete...and several of these kids would go on to become stellar athletes growing up...
I'll throw this old flashback at you...Eddie Bar is quarterback...it is the last play of the game, and we faced insurmountable odds, because all we could do was throw a "Hail Mary" all the way down about 50-60 yards down...way, way down the block...and hope someone could catch it...Well, as you would expect, Eddie B, hurled a rope, way, way deep...just floating and fluttering into the sky as dusk was ascending upon us...at dinnertime...
There we were, sprinting down to the end zone, one last time, under the hue of the blueish glow of the streetlights that had just flickered on. All the kids came to a cluster, in the imaginary end zone...at the other end of the block, fighting for position to get at the ball, about 6 to 8 kids, grappling, shoving, screaming...as the football reached closer and closer and closer...
Suddenly, a bunch of kids collapsed to the ground...and I was there, all alone, the only one still standing there, as the warbling spiral just plopped into my hands, stinging them, quite severely. I kinda had to wrestle with the football but somehow, it just stuck in my hands like glue.
Everyone on the ground looked up in awe and disbelief...as I caught the ball, and then held it high, a victory had been sealed on this final play...Of course, Eddie B, some 55 yards away, came scampering up, jumping up and down, laughing with delight...elated with throwing his illustrious gem, and having it count as the winning touchdown...
There were alot of moments like this...for all of us kids back then...Just stuff, that sticks in our minds, for eons and eons...as impossible moments that remarkably transpire before your eyes...
It was a nice change of pace, to ride my bike, past 84th Street, from time to time...to see who was hanging out...Just running into Slim or the Murphs or Eddie B was always cool...These guys would become life-long friends, who remain some of my closest buddies, to this very day...It's funny, how none of us fore-saw any of this coming...
Back to the classroom...Mrs, Deters amidst her inescapable reign, really tried to get us to think outside the box...and have us write something different...We all kind of scratched our heads, because we didn't know what she meant...but I took up the challenge and cranked out my first writing masterpiece....MY MOM IS A CHOC-O-HOLIC...
Just the title alone, had Mrs. Deters in stitches...and it was quite a funny piece about my Mom's endless love of anything chocolate...I was introducing a new word to the English vocabulary, also, that haven't even been invented yet...CHOC-O-HOLIC...
It was quite a hoot for my Mom & Dad to read this story...too...From there on, Mrs. Deters always challenged me to write some more stuff out of the box...I think I may have also used one of my other creations, DRIVER GERM, a reference to me always getting sick and staying home from school, where I'd play with my Hot Wheels cars...just was a hoot...for lots and lots of laughs...
It was a sensational rush...to try to come up with some new words...just imagining all the possibilities out there...I loved it so much...I knew I had such a knack for it...This little spark that came out of Mrs. Deters influence upon me...would last forever...I can't thank her enough for raising my level of awareness beyond the ordinary hum-drum school work....
Even some of her pupils, still possess somewhere up in their attic...MY POETRY NOTEBOOK...a gathering of poems we were forced to create and combine into a 10 page lay-out that was then, posted into a nice cellophane cover...to make it look like it was our first little book...our very first novel, of sorts, that captured our mind-set...of the ways and days...of our 9 year old hearts...
Even to this day...most of my friends just cringe at the thought of Mrs. Deters, especially Eddie B, but this relentless taskmaster, had a little penchant for elevating our abilities to heights none of us could have ever expected...I really do appreciate that...her intensive skill and insightfulness...that almost everybody overlooks...except me...
Oh...don't go away...the heroic adventures of the great Slim & Eddie B & the Murphs & the crazy little kid from 86th Street are just getting started...as a bunch of new kids would join our gang and turn the neighborhood, completely upside-down...for many years to come...
(p.s....as a footnote...Eddie B, still remembers that pass, also, vividly...and estimated it was more like 50-60 yards...I counted it off and it was about 5 or 6 houses long...quite a long, long way...With all of Eddie's athletic accomplishments, I thought for sure, he had forgotten...His response...Not a chance...It was still up in his brain...just waiting there...)
I can recall, my first Science teacher, Mrs. Reidy, burning a sugar cube, in front of her young, doleful pupils...all aghast as the tiny white sugar cube...turned black & burnt...She glowingly pointed it out, that this was some chemical change releasing carbon dioxide into the air...and on & on & on...It blew all our minds...for about 10 seconds...Then we all grabbed a handful of sugar cubes and chowed them down...releasing our own, endless sugar buzz, into the air...
After the 3rd Grade, came 4th Grade of course...and one of my most influential teachers I ever had, Mrs. Deters...came along...Nobody in their right mind, would say something like this, because she was a very difficult teacher who shook our very soul, trying to push us to our absolute limits...There seemed to be endless pop quizes...and endless homework assignments...Heck, we were turning into quite the disciplined bunch, facing her onslaught of difficult challenges...
And oh my God...How she would torment my new school chum, Eddie Barkowski, to no end...Eddie was the class clown and the most down-to-Earth kid in class...But Mrs. Deters, had this odd fetish, of grabbing Eddie, and shoving him, under her desk, anytime he acted up...Of course, you can imagine Eddie, underneath the desk, listening to the chuckles of classmates, as he was forced to linger there for 5 or 10 minutes...at least once a week...for sure...
I got to know Eddie, alot better, as I ventured off of my block and rode my bike 3 blocks North to his humble domain on 84th Street...There, there was quite a crew of young enthusiastic boys, all of them, who liked to play alot of touch football in the middle of the street...There was Tommy Kelly, the Sheahan brothers, Maggie and Eddie's 2 younger brothers, Neil & Mark...
And then you'd throw the wild Murphy brothers, John & Mike....and my good, good chum, Slim Farrell, into the mix...from a block away...and it was a great, great time...These guys had some skills, throwing themselves all about...They had a passion to compete...and several of these kids would go on to become stellar athletes growing up...
I'll throw this old flashback at you...Eddie Bar is quarterback...it is the last play of the game, and we faced insurmountable odds, because all we could do was throw a "Hail Mary" all the way down about 50-60 yards down...way, way down the block...and hope someone could catch it...Well, as you would expect, Eddie B, hurled a rope, way, way deep...just floating and fluttering into the sky as dusk was ascending upon us...at dinnertime...
There we were, sprinting down to the end zone, one last time, under the hue of the blueish glow of the streetlights that had just flickered on. All the kids came to a cluster, in the imaginary end zone...at the other end of the block, fighting for position to get at the ball, about 6 to 8 kids, grappling, shoving, screaming...as the football reached closer and closer and closer...
Suddenly, a bunch of kids collapsed to the ground...and I was there, all alone, the only one still standing there, as the warbling spiral just plopped into my hands, stinging them, quite severely. I kinda had to wrestle with the football but somehow, it just stuck in my hands like glue.
Everyone on the ground looked up in awe and disbelief...as I caught the ball, and then held it high, a victory had been sealed on this final play...Of course, Eddie B, some 55 yards away, came scampering up, jumping up and down, laughing with delight...elated with throwing his illustrious gem, and having it count as the winning touchdown...
There were alot of moments like this...for all of us kids back then...Just stuff, that sticks in our minds, for eons and eons...as impossible moments that remarkably transpire before your eyes...
It was a nice change of pace, to ride my bike, past 84th Street, from time to time...to see who was hanging out...Just running into Slim or the Murphs or Eddie B was always cool...These guys would become life-long friends, who remain some of my closest buddies, to this very day...It's funny, how none of us fore-saw any of this coming...
Back to the classroom...Mrs, Deters amidst her inescapable reign, really tried to get us to think outside the box...and have us write something different...We all kind of scratched our heads, because we didn't know what she meant...but I took up the challenge and cranked out my first writing masterpiece....MY MOM IS A CHOC-O-HOLIC...
Just the title alone, had Mrs. Deters in stitches...and it was quite a funny piece about my Mom's endless love of anything chocolate...I was introducing a new word to the English vocabulary, also, that haven't even been invented yet...CHOC-O-HOLIC...
It was quite a hoot for my Mom & Dad to read this story...too...From there on, Mrs. Deters always challenged me to write some more stuff out of the box...I think I may have also used one of my other creations, DRIVER GERM, a reference to me always getting sick and staying home from school, where I'd play with my Hot Wheels cars...just was a hoot...for lots and lots of laughs...
It was a sensational rush...to try to come up with some new words...just imagining all the possibilities out there...I loved it so much...I knew I had such a knack for it...This little spark that came out of Mrs. Deters influence upon me...would last forever...I can't thank her enough for raising my level of awareness beyond the ordinary hum-drum school work....
Even some of her pupils, still possess somewhere up in their attic...MY POETRY NOTEBOOK...a gathering of poems we were forced to create and combine into a 10 page lay-out that was then, posted into a nice cellophane cover...to make it look like it was our first little book...our very first novel, of sorts, that captured our mind-set...of the ways and days...of our 9 year old hearts...
Even to this day...most of my friends just cringe at the thought of Mrs. Deters, especially Eddie B, but this relentless taskmaster, had a little penchant for elevating our abilities to heights none of us could have ever expected...I really do appreciate that...her intensive skill and insightfulness...that almost everybody overlooks...except me...
Oh...don't go away...the heroic adventures of the great Slim & Eddie B & the Murphs & the crazy little kid from 86th Street are just getting started...as a bunch of new kids would join our gang and turn the neighborhood, completely upside-down...for many years to come...
(p.s....as a footnote...Eddie B, still remembers that pass, also, vividly...and estimated it was more like 50-60 yards...I counted it off and it was about 5 or 6 houses long...quite a long, long way...With all of Eddie's athletic accomplishments, I thought for sure, he had forgotten...His response...Not a chance...It was still up in his brain...just waiting there...)
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving...a gathering...like no other...a tradition that bonds one another...bringing us all to the table...for a bountiful feast...and just a little bit of pumpkin pie with whip cream on top, if you still have room...of course...
When I think of Thanksgiving, I especially think of my Mom...Sure, this was her sure-fire way to kick it up a notch in the kitchen...but she always, always managed to throw together such a vast array of hidden little talents...into action...starting around mid-November...
See, my Mom, Frances, was notorious for making up a knock-down, drag-em-out, your-not-going-anywhere-til-you-get-this-done, Things-To-Do-List, that had to be reckoned with, before even thinking of throwing the bird in the oven...Just think of it as a Spring clean-up, meets odd jobs only a dispicable mind could conceive, with the additional measure of whipping up a collosoll feast, for a huge, huge crowd of at least 35-40 people, year in and year out...
It was the time of the year, where she hauled out the good china, where she got somebody to polish the silverware, and made every square inch of the house, sparkle and shine, in a radiant glow...Well, maybe that radiant glow came in after we sprayed some funky stuff on the dining room chandelier, that made it glisten, in a transluscent rainbow of colors...
That damn list had to be 6 pages long and some of the things on the list, even were written in my Mom's shorthand, a bunch of un-readable Chinese scribble that held some secretive matter, no one except my Mom could take on...You are getting it right, a downright, unfathomable, set of tasks, just for this single holiday...a list that seemed endless to us kids, holding our breath. as my Mom would rattle off a chore, and all of us ducking, to avoid, one of the more dubious tasks...
But eventually, one by one, my Mom would cross another thing off that list, and the 6 page list, became the 3 page list, then dwindling down to 1 page...And as we hit that last page, my Mom and sisters would hit high gear, in the kitchen, making up cherished holiday goodies, which were way beyond, mouth-watering...My Mom loved to dazzle everyone with her infinite knowledge of every single recipe...whether it was the special toll house chocolate chip cookies, or her complex stuffing recipe...the intricate madness of bammm!!!...going from one dish to another, so quickly, so effortlessly, was mind-boggling...
I'll just throw this out there as I remember it...My Mom's famous stuffing recipie...First, you poured out, about 6 packages of Brownberry bread crumbs, into 2 very large pans, next she would pour on the crumbs, a good measure of College Inn Chicken Broth...followed by some melted butter...Then we had to chop into tiny little specs, about 3 cups of white onions and about 3-4 cups of very fresh, very crisp, celery...Then with her own hands, my Mom would knead this concoction. mashing it all together, all the time, generating a rather sweet, pungent smell, of all of the ingredients combined...Finally, my Mom would dash a bunch of fresh crushed sage leaves, thyme, and a little poultry seasoning, all about...The stuffing, then, was good-to-go...Of course, it smelled so irresistable, even in its raw form, that everyone tried to grab a handful...My Mom, would have to slap our hands away from the stuffing pan because once you had a little, you wanted to have alot.
And all the wild recipes, were rather long, multi-layered, inventions, only she could come up with, that would propel an ordinary recipie, into something, spectacular, out of this world. My sisters would all stand around in amazement, as my Mom, could catch each of them, on the verge of messing up a step, quickly stepping in, and making things just right...
And then came the turkey...I always felt bad for the big, 22 pound, pinkish Turkey, all aglow, after someone had washed it down, after it thawed out under the running water in the kitchen sink, then someone would pull out all of the innards...At that moment, you kinda realized, you were eating something that was alive, just a few weeks ago...My Mom would rub lard all over it...so that the skin would become a crisp, orange hue, as it roasted in the oven, for 3 or 4 hours, the next day...We'd throw the bird back onto the top shelf of the refrigerator, late around midnight, having finally accomplished almost 90% of the LIST at that point...
It was such a sense of overwhelmingness, that all you could do is collapse on a yellow chair in the kitchen, at that point and draw a huge sigh of relief...Off to bedtime, because the big day was only a few hours away from hitting the final phase of preperations...Where was my Dad while all this was going on...Well, he was usually the one, who carried in the huge bird and of course, he got to unleash his carving skills on the Sunbeam electric carving knife...just minutes away, from the actual meal...It really was my Mom's big holiday to shine, so he stepped out of her way...
I can remember laying out some layers of newspapers, out on the floor in the basement and peeling a huge bunch of white Idaho potatoes, as I watched the Macy's Parade...I remember I'd have to switch over every 10 minutes to CBS, to check if it was the segment of the live Thanksgiving Parade from Honolulu, Hawaii...At that point, my Mom would scurry down to watch the 10 minute segment, as the floats gently preceeded along amidst palm trees swaying and hula girls, all about...It was kinda ironic to us, that these Hawaiians could actually be celebrating a Thanksgiving feast without the cold & the snow...like we had, outside our house, in Chicago...Sort of freaky, for us...I must admit...
Another delightful dish made at the last moment was my Mom's super-duper cranberry relish. It basically was Ocean Spray whole berry relish...then my Mom would add freshly squeezed orange pulp, a little lemon juice, and a bunch of finely chopped Washington MacIntosh apples...Wow...it all just came together and was totally awesome...All of my Mom's little funky recipes were just so good and we just were so psyched because we knew we only had one moment to get a chance at enjoying these delightful dishes, only this once, this special time of year...
Then the people would come...and come and come...filling up the whole house, top to bottom. There would be a big contingent in the basement all about...even at the bar...which we never used except for maybe, Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays...I can remember my brother Joe whipping up some Tequila Sunrises, a new Tequila and orange juice and grenadine concoction, with some crushed ice, added out of our new, funky little olive green, ice crusher, to boot...Another, hip 70's drink was Harvey Wallbangers which I think had a little bit of this Italian liquor called Galliano...Of course, I'd be amazed at my brother's agility to whip up all these drinks to perfection, but he was damn good ...The bar was in full gear as my brother-in-laws and brothers all would talk about just about everything, patiently waiting for the call upstairs to the dining room...
Then there were all the kiddies...Gosh, just a flood of kids, jumping all about, down in the basement, chasing deliriously after each other...some of them falling down hard, crying, then jumping back up, and running away, forgetting what happened because there was just pure chaos with so many little ones, all in a frenzy...There was Maureen's kids...Charlie, Michelle, Thomas & Patrick...my sister Kathy's kids...Eddie, Mike and Pat...my sister Patsy's kids...Colleen, Carrie and Kate...my sister Joan's kids...Bridget & Johnny...my sister Karen's kids...Pete, Jimmy & Katie...my brother Joe's kids...Joey, Kevin and Sean...Me & my brother Danny were still teenagers at the time, but as you could see...the house was a rockin', don't bother knockin'...
Finally the moment would arrive, my Dad had been summoned to carve up the bird and we all kind of slowly streamed up to the dining room, one by one...almost all of us drooling with delight. After all, as good as some other Thanksgiving's go...my Mom put on a show-stopping event with every square inch of the dining room table meticulously displayed with her fine china and all the fixings of the meal, landing all about the table, hot, ready to be devoured...
It was a very transfixing moment as someone would say grace and then in only a matter of seconds, mayhem of people all grabbing at all the food...loading up their plates, as high as they would go...My Mom's special Turkey gravy, poured over the mashed potatoes, was a big hit, as well as the bird, which usually was quite hot, moist & juicy...The cranberries also were a big hit that people always seemed to forget about until half-way thru their meal because there was so much...But the sure-fire hit was my Mom's unique, tantalizing, stuffing...there just was never enough...it was a hot commodity that went fast...You had to get ahold of that stuffing bowl and just pile it onto your plate, never looking back, at all the ungodly amount of food you were about to be stuffing into your belly...
As the meal winded down...some of the kids would wander up from the basement, down where all kinds of card tables were flung together for the kiddie feast...They all were pretty oblivious to the special food prepared that day...They were just panting and panting away, trying to get their second wind, before resuming their onslaught of terror...only seconds away...
The times, themselves, just pure magic...All these people were in their prime, for the most part, and the unique gathering bestowed us all with some wonderful memories of unforgettable food and unforgettable fun...all clinging magically together...on 2724 W. 86th Street...almost 20-30 some years ago...
Hats off, especially to my Mom, who never took a bow...never took a break...never really thought about anything but throwing the best darn Thanksgiving feast, she possibly could imagine...It was year in, year out, like clock work, every single year...Just suddenly here...then suddenly gone...Just a blip of time that seemed to fly by...way, way, way too quickly...
But I do remember those times rather vividly...and rather thankfully...because they were some of the best times...anybody could possibly have...
HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE...
...(especially to my dear Mom & Dad)...
When I think of Thanksgiving, I especially think of my Mom...Sure, this was her sure-fire way to kick it up a notch in the kitchen...but she always, always managed to throw together such a vast array of hidden little talents...into action...starting around mid-November...
See, my Mom, Frances, was notorious for making up a knock-down, drag-em-out, your-not-going-anywhere-til-you-get-this-done, Things-To-Do-List, that had to be reckoned with, before even thinking of throwing the bird in the oven...Just think of it as a Spring clean-up, meets odd jobs only a dispicable mind could conceive, with the additional measure of whipping up a collosoll feast, for a huge, huge crowd of at least 35-40 people, year in and year out...
It was the time of the year, where she hauled out the good china, where she got somebody to polish the silverware, and made every square inch of the house, sparkle and shine, in a radiant glow...Well, maybe that radiant glow came in after we sprayed some funky stuff on the dining room chandelier, that made it glisten, in a transluscent rainbow of colors...
That damn list had to be 6 pages long and some of the things on the list, even were written in my Mom's shorthand, a bunch of un-readable Chinese scribble that held some secretive matter, no one except my Mom could take on...You are getting it right, a downright, unfathomable, set of tasks, just for this single holiday...a list that seemed endless to us kids, holding our breath. as my Mom would rattle off a chore, and all of us ducking, to avoid, one of the more dubious tasks...
But eventually, one by one, my Mom would cross another thing off that list, and the 6 page list, became the 3 page list, then dwindling down to 1 page...And as we hit that last page, my Mom and sisters would hit high gear, in the kitchen, making up cherished holiday goodies, which were way beyond, mouth-watering...My Mom loved to dazzle everyone with her infinite knowledge of every single recipe...whether it was the special toll house chocolate chip cookies, or her complex stuffing recipe...the intricate madness of bammm!!!...going from one dish to another, so quickly, so effortlessly, was mind-boggling...
I'll just throw this out there as I remember it...My Mom's famous stuffing recipie...First, you poured out, about 6 packages of Brownberry bread crumbs, into 2 very large pans, next she would pour on the crumbs, a good measure of College Inn Chicken Broth...followed by some melted butter...Then we had to chop into tiny little specs, about 3 cups of white onions and about 3-4 cups of very fresh, very crisp, celery...Then with her own hands, my Mom would knead this concoction. mashing it all together, all the time, generating a rather sweet, pungent smell, of all of the ingredients combined...Finally, my Mom would dash a bunch of fresh crushed sage leaves, thyme, and a little poultry seasoning, all about...The stuffing, then, was good-to-go...Of course, it smelled so irresistable, even in its raw form, that everyone tried to grab a handful...My Mom, would have to slap our hands away from the stuffing pan because once you had a little, you wanted to have alot.
And all the wild recipes, were rather long, multi-layered, inventions, only she could come up with, that would propel an ordinary recipie, into something, spectacular, out of this world. My sisters would all stand around in amazement, as my Mom, could catch each of them, on the verge of messing up a step, quickly stepping in, and making things just right...
And then came the turkey...I always felt bad for the big, 22 pound, pinkish Turkey, all aglow, after someone had washed it down, after it thawed out under the running water in the kitchen sink, then someone would pull out all of the innards...At that moment, you kinda realized, you were eating something that was alive, just a few weeks ago...My Mom would rub lard all over it...so that the skin would become a crisp, orange hue, as it roasted in the oven, for 3 or 4 hours, the next day...We'd throw the bird back onto the top shelf of the refrigerator, late around midnight, having finally accomplished almost 90% of the LIST at that point...
It was such a sense of overwhelmingness, that all you could do is collapse on a yellow chair in the kitchen, at that point and draw a huge sigh of relief...Off to bedtime, because the big day was only a few hours away from hitting the final phase of preperations...Where was my Dad while all this was going on...Well, he was usually the one, who carried in the huge bird and of course, he got to unleash his carving skills on the Sunbeam electric carving knife...just minutes away, from the actual meal...It really was my Mom's big holiday to shine, so he stepped out of her way...
I can remember laying out some layers of newspapers, out on the floor in the basement and peeling a huge bunch of white Idaho potatoes, as I watched the Macy's Parade...I remember I'd have to switch over every 10 minutes to CBS, to check if it was the segment of the live Thanksgiving Parade from Honolulu, Hawaii...At that point, my Mom would scurry down to watch the 10 minute segment, as the floats gently preceeded along amidst palm trees swaying and hula girls, all about...It was kinda ironic to us, that these Hawaiians could actually be celebrating a Thanksgiving feast without the cold & the snow...like we had, outside our house, in Chicago...Sort of freaky, for us...I must admit...
Another delightful dish made at the last moment was my Mom's super-duper cranberry relish. It basically was Ocean Spray whole berry relish...then my Mom would add freshly squeezed orange pulp, a little lemon juice, and a bunch of finely chopped Washington MacIntosh apples...Wow...it all just came together and was totally awesome...All of my Mom's little funky recipes were just so good and we just were so psyched because we knew we only had one moment to get a chance at enjoying these delightful dishes, only this once, this special time of year...
Then the people would come...and come and come...filling up the whole house, top to bottom. There would be a big contingent in the basement all about...even at the bar...which we never used except for maybe, Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays...I can remember my brother Joe whipping up some Tequila Sunrises, a new Tequila and orange juice and grenadine concoction, with some crushed ice, added out of our new, funky little olive green, ice crusher, to boot...Another, hip 70's drink was Harvey Wallbangers which I think had a little bit of this Italian liquor called Galliano...Of course, I'd be amazed at my brother's agility to whip up all these drinks to perfection, but he was damn good ...The bar was in full gear as my brother-in-laws and brothers all would talk about just about everything, patiently waiting for the call upstairs to the dining room...
Then there were all the kiddies...Gosh, just a flood of kids, jumping all about, down in the basement, chasing deliriously after each other...some of them falling down hard, crying, then jumping back up, and running away, forgetting what happened because there was just pure chaos with so many little ones, all in a frenzy...There was Maureen's kids...Charlie, Michelle, Thomas & Patrick...my sister Kathy's kids...Eddie, Mike and Pat...my sister Patsy's kids...Colleen, Carrie and Kate...my sister Joan's kids...Bridget & Johnny...my sister Karen's kids...Pete, Jimmy & Katie...my brother Joe's kids...Joey, Kevin and Sean...Me & my brother Danny were still teenagers at the time, but as you could see...the house was a rockin', don't bother knockin'...
Finally the moment would arrive, my Dad had been summoned to carve up the bird and we all kind of slowly streamed up to the dining room, one by one...almost all of us drooling with delight. After all, as good as some other Thanksgiving's go...my Mom put on a show-stopping event with every square inch of the dining room table meticulously displayed with her fine china and all the fixings of the meal, landing all about the table, hot, ready to be devoured...
It was a very transfixing moment as someone would say grace and then in only a matter of seconds, mayhem of people all grabbing at all the food...loading up their plates, as high as they would go...My Mom's special Turkey gravy, poured over the mashed potatoes, was a big hit, as well as the bird, which usually was quite hot, moist & juicy...The cranberries also were a big hit that people always seemed to forget about until half-way thru their meal because there was so much...But the sure-fire hit was my Mom's unique, tantalizing, stuffing...there just was never enough...it was a hot commodity that went fast...You had to get ahold of that stuffing bowl and just pile it onto your plate, never looking back, at all the ungodly amount of food you were about to be stuffing into your belly...
As the meal winded down...some of the kids would wander up from the basement, down where all kinds of card tables were flung together for the kiddie feast...They all were pretty oblivious to the special food prepared that day...They were just panting and panting away, trying to get their second wind, before resuming their onslaught of terror...only seconds away...
The times, themselves, just pure magic...All these people were in their prime, for the most part, and the unique gathering bestowed us all with some wonderful memories of unforgettable food and unforgettable fun...all clinging magically together...on 2724 W. 86th Street...almost 20-30 some years ago...
Hats off, especially to my Mom, who never took a bow...never took a break...never really thought about anything but throwing the best darn Thanksgiving feast, she possibly could imagine...It was year in, year out, like clock work, every single year...Just suddenly here...then suddenly gone...Just a blip of time that seemed to fly by...way, way, way too quickly...
But I do remember those times rather vividly...and rather thankfully...because they were some of the best times...anybody could possibly have...
HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE...
...(especially to my dear Mom & Dad)...
Sunday, November 23, 2008
86th Street--The Howland Boys
...as the 1970's began to settle in...on 86th Street, a new group of kids, ascended onto the block, and basically, took it over...
Mike, John & Tommy Howland moved in back when I was about 8 years old...They lived across the street, about 3 doors down, to the right...really only a stone's throw away...
I first noticed them...as they were playing street hockey wildly, out in the middle of the block, on a wintry, cold February or March day...Who were these new guys...???
See, there was a huge influx of kids, who moved in and out, on our block, back then. I'd say I hung around as many as 10-15 kids on our block, during my early years, as bizarre as it may seem...There were the Jarrell kids, Keith & Kevin, directly across the street...the 3 Howlands a little further down, and then me...who anchored all the action, that went down, on our block...for a good portion, of the early to mid 70's...
Together, we really had an amazing amount of fun...Really, you couldn't have asked for a more memorable childhood era...than the one we had...way back then...so, long, long ago...
Whether we were riding our bikes all over the place, playing ghosts-in-the-graveyard(similar to hide-n-seek), going up to our own private, deluxe baseball diamond, at the end of our block, or playing hoops on the Howlands low-hanging basketball net, which Johhny Howland would rattle and rattle, time and again, just elevating enough, to be able to dunk, like he was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar...I could certainly go on and on...and surely, I most certainly will, too...
I can remember how we would go up to this place called "THE B" a little beyond the end of the block, where there literally was a densely, wild, wilderness area, with a giant dirt hill, that rose ever so high, it had to be the highest vantage point, within our entire neighborhood...It was quite the challenge to ride your bike up and down that giant hill, following a make-shift bike path, that transversed throughout the entire "B" area...a dirt biker's ultimate dream world...of course...
Going down that killer hill was quite treacherous, but the Howland Boys were almost giddy, repeatedly, going up and down this huge hill as quickly as possible...Those were the days of famous stunt motorcycle rider, Evil Kneival, and we sure did our absolute darn best, to make our perilous plunge, down the hill, at break-neck speed, truly a thing of breath-taking, death-defying, beauty, just somehow, finding a way, to skid to a stop, tossing up a huge cloud of dust, laughing and laughing and laughing...before wiping out at the bottom of the hill...
And, "The B" was almost always like a treasure trove, of mysterious things you would find, as you made your way through the density of bamboo shoots and tall, tall grass...We'd come across wild rabbits, old tires, broken bottles, ripped-up, rain-soaked, Playboy magazines, and every now and then, we'd hit the jackpot and come across a full can of beer or many, many cans of BEER...
See, this was back in the day when Beer Cans, still had no pop-top...You'd have to use a can opener to get it open, and get at a chance to guzzle down the suds...and since none of us ever had a can opener...we'd resort to primatave measures to get that sucker open...We'd scavenger about looking for a giant rock with a severed edge, to puncture a hole somehow, in the can. and then, after getting a small puncture hole going, we'd furiously pass around the spraying can of suds, before it all seeped quickly, into the ground...
I guess this may be the reason I always had a fondness, for heavy, bitter beers, down the road because we'd always be finding some incredibly warm cans of Schlitz or Budweiser or Meister Brau which were just lethally heavy beers, back then, that had been left to cook underneath the intense, hot-hot summer heat...It didn't matter at all, to us...We'd just guzzle them down as quickly as we could, and then resumed looking through the high weeds for more...and often, we did find more...Because alot of older teenagers hung out there, during the night...
Another great thing about "THE B" was that it was nestled up against the railroad tracks, which really isolated itself, from everywhere else...You could go up and down along the railroad tracks, throwing an endless amount of rocks, at trains passing by, sometimes coming across some neat little forts that other kids had carved out, all along the tracks, most of the time, against the security fence of the Beverly Country Club...in a bunker-of-sorts...
FORTS were HUGE back then...There was still quite a bit of building of houses near the unsettled areas by the railroad tracks...and we'd grab some big sheets of wood from construction sites, when nobody was looking and haul it down the street, out into unknown domains, where we would, work like fiends, assembling fort after fort...And we just got better and better at it...as time went by...Some of them were really, really cool...
I can remember one fort...where we dug out an enormous hole, shovel by shovel, about 6 foot deep, about 12 feet wide...in a densely, high grassy plot at about 86th & Washtenaw...Then we placed a layer of sheets of wood, on top, then placed a thick layer of dirt and grass to camaflauge our new neat, humble hideout...
Then we'd hairy-scary, ride up to the White Hen Pantry where we would stock up on all kinds of soda pop and Ho-Ho's and Taco-flavored Doritos, which had just come on the market with great results and last but not least, every conceivable kind of candy, too...Then we would quickly ride, ride, ride back like little ferocious madmen, back to our new fort and hang out there, totally oblivious from the world around us...as if it were the most coolest, coolest place on Earth...
I believe Mike Howland even tried to install a chimney on this specific fort and even tried to cook a tin of some Jiffy-Pop popcorn, in this bizarre little hole he had carved out for this ridiculous purpose...Of course...As the fire grew bigger and bigger inside this little cavernous pit, the smoke also billowed out like a gusher, sending all of us, Tommy, John and me, scrambling out of the fort, except for Mike, who was gonna stay beneath, inside there, popping that popcorn as if it was the last thing he would ever do...
He did somehow manage to get the popcorn popped, as he coughed and coughed and coughed, resurfacing almost drenched in sweat and soot, emerging from the underground fort, triumphant...but alas, the popcorn was pretty wretched looking and badly burnt...But it was considered a great, great success as we passed it around, this severely burnt, mangled, Jiffy Pop tin as each took a huge handful of this awful creation...
Also...another thing that stands out is...Our baseball games were absolutely legendary...We'd probably be up at our very own dirt and grass baseball diamond we had constructed, a block away at 10AM and play way, way, way until Sundown, sometimes...It was a crazy set up, because there was a huge security fence, situated between 1st Base and 2nd Base...up against "THE B"...which meant Right Field was closed, completely. All of us somehow eventually managed to correct our swing so that we would only hit towards left field...which may seem a little unusual, but it didn't even phase us...
I do remember I had this very light, bright, shiny red aluminum bat...because...I couldn't handle the heavier bats...and that loud, ringing ping! sound, of ripping a baseball, down the line, out into the outfield, was as good as it gets...rounding the bases so quickly, at a chaotic, stutter-step pace, trying to dementedly watch our ball all the way, as we tried hastily to scramble to 2nd or 3rd Base...
I'm pretty sure, Mike and Johnny Howland, would get a hold of one, from time to time, and just sizzle one out, far, far beyond where anyone could come close to reaching...Sometimes even hitting a window of a house residing right next to the field...but amazingly, they never, ever broke any windows...
We also used the baseball field as a football field of sorts, too, when Autumn would come about...Touch football was really huge, back then, also, and our touch football games were relentlessly paced, just kids pouring their whole heart & soul, into getting open for a pass, totally out of breath, only to realize the quarterback had been already sacked, that play...
I can remember one special time...we had the ball on the goal-line, with only one play left...Keith Jarrell who was the oldest kid, and rarely hung around with us, lined up all our receivers on the right side, except for me...Of course, the play was designed to catch the other team off-guard and throw it to me, on the opposite side...wide-open, in the end zone...It played out just as Keith had drawn up in the huddle...The guy defending me, broke loose and tried to run after the mess of people in the middle of the end zone, screaming like crazy for the ball...
Here I was, standing all alone, wide-open, as I'd ever be...Keith just stepped back and lobbed this wildly high pass my way...It surely was beyond my grasp but I kept back-peddling further and further back, into the end zone and managed to come down with the ball...as I fell backwards, onto the ground, somehow able to hold tight, clutching onto the ball, despite getting the wind knocked out of me...to win the game...
There's just so, so much ground to cover...All the good times...as we grew up and up and up and then suddenly, we all kinda, shockingly, poof, disappeared off of the block, one at a time, for good...finding new friends...our own age...basically leaving it all behind...as if it never, ever, even occurred...
But I do remember the good, good times, especially, like seeing the movie TOMMY with the Howlands, way back when, when it first came out, back around 1972...I think they even had the poster from that movie, too...And they'd also sometimes buy the latest top 40 hits, up at the Evergreen Plaza Mall, that were oddly on these little, funky 45 vinyl records you'd buy for only 45 cents...I definitely remember Tommy Howland pulling out the new, latest Paul McCartney/Wings hit, Band On The Run, playing it over and over and over...
There were so many old stories and old times to recall, whether it was walking all the way up to 95th & California in a blizzard to go snow sledding, and freezing half to death...or just laughing it up, tearing things up, in the spring or summer, on our old Schwinn bikes, with the ever-so-cool, banana seats or the latest 10-speeds...
And surely, if we did come across a nerdy kid who had one of those giant, obnoxious orange flags sticking out of the back of their bike, Johnny Howland, would make it a point, to make them feel like a fool for having such a stupid, stupid, ridiculous thing, hanging off the back of their bikes...
At times, its true, we were treacherous little slugs, but for the most part, it was mostly, all good clean fun. I think the only time, one of the neighbors would yell at us, was when we'd accidentally throw a ball of some sorts, out onto the crabby neighbors, the NIPPONS, precious front yard...They'd come out angry as hell and go completely ballistic as if our tiny, little footprints were going to completely alter the look of their nice, perfectly-manicured, grassy lawn...
86th Street, unfortunately, took a huge hit when we all did, finally go our separate ways...It had been almost like a perfectly isolated, peaceful sanctuary, amidst the far south-eastern corner of Saint Thomas More Parish in Chicago. A very, serene, hazy, dazy, Huck Finn/Tom Sawyer existence, to some extent, really just a pandora's box of adventure, we'd open, day, after day, after day...
And, believe me, we utilized every square inch, of territory, we could come across, barreling it into the ground...because we were filled with an endless amount of energy, having an endless amount of fun and creating an endless amount of good times...
All the laughter and all the screaming at each other, all the rough-housing, or just showing up at each others door, at the start of the day, and yelling for each other, to come out and play...We never, ever, used the door buzzer, back then, we'd just let loose with a loud, penetrating roar, that instantly got the others attention inside...And within seconds, you could hear the excited, rumbling footsteps making their way for the door...grabbing their baseball cap, maybe a coat, maybe a baseball mitt, whatever...It happened almost every day for me, from age 8-11, probably...They were my best friends, back then...and will always bring a chuckle to my mind...even though the years and years...have long passed us by...
So...Here's to all the Howlands, Mike, Johnny & Tommy's Mom & Dad especially, who kept their kids on the straight and narrow...coming home from a hard day's work, just to make ends meet, just to make sure, all their kids, had the best, that life could offer...Because, those times were so timeless, to all of us...and the moments we shared were very heart-warming to recall, as you can very well, imagine....Down on...86th Street...down on the South-Side...just a piece of everyday Americana...that probably would have faded from memory...into oblivion...
In summary, it does seem like such an incredibly long time ago...yet, it does remain, very vivid, very heart-warming, and very much, a long-lasting memory...of those days, from my early childhood, sadly gone by...into the night...No more "B" there, anymore...no more baseball field and no more good friends who would pass on...some of them dead...some of them alive....but surely a decent part, of Jim O'Leary's memories, I was truly, very happy to share...
Mike, John & Tommy Howland moved in back when I was about 8 years old...They lived across the street, about 3 doors down, to the right...really only a stone's throw away...
I first noticed them...as they were playing street hockey wildly, out in the middle of the block, on a wintry, cold February or March day...Who were these new guys...???
See, there was a huge influx of kids, who moved in and out, on our block, back then. I'd say I hung around as many as 10-15 kids on our block, during my early years, as bizarre as it may seem...There were the Jarrell kids, Keith & Kevin, directly across the street...the 3 Howlands a little further down, and then me...who anchored all the action, that went down, on our block...for a good portion, of the early to mid 70's...
Together, we really had an amazing amount of fun...Really, you couldn't have asked for a more memorable childhood era...than the one we had...way back then...so, long, long ago...
Whether we were riding our bikes all over the place, playing ghosts-in-the-graveyard(similar to hide-n-seek), going up to our own private, deluxe baseball diamond, at the end of our block, or playing hoops on the Howlands low-hanging basketball net, which Johhny Howland would rattle and rattle, time and again, just elevating enough, to be able to dunk, like he was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar...I could certainly go on and on...and surely, I most certainly will, too...
I can remember how we would go up to this place called "THE B" a little beyond the end of the block, where there literally was a densely, wild, wilderness area, with a giant dirt hill, that rose ever so high, it had to be the highest vantage point, within our entire neighborhood...It was quite the challenge to ride your bike up and down that giant hill, following a make-shift bike path, that transversed throughout the entire "B" area...a dirt biker's ultimate dream world...of course...
Going down that killer hill was quite treacherous, but the Howland Boys were almost giddy, repeatedly, going up and down this huge hill as quickly as possible...Those were the days of famous stunt motorcycle rider, Evil Kneival, and we sure did our absolute darn best, to make our perilous plunge, down the hill, at break-neck speed, truly a thing of breath-taking, death-defying, beauty, just somehow, finding a way, to skid to a stop, tossing up a huge cloud of dust, laughing and laughing and laughing...before wiping out at the bottom of the hill...
And, "The B" was almost always like a treasure trove, of mysterious things you would find, as you made your way through the density of bamboo shoots and tall, tall grass...We'd come across wild rabbits, old tires, broken bottles, ripped-up, rain-soaked, Playboy magazines, and every now and then, we'd hit the jackpot and come across a full can of beer or many, many cans of BEER...
See, this was back in the day when Beer Cans, still had no pop-top...You'd have to use a can opener to get it open, and get at a chance to guzzle down the suds...and since none of us ever had a can opener...we'd resort to primatave measures to get that sucker open...We'd scavenger about looking for a giant rock with a severed edge, to puncture a hole somehow, in the can. and then, after getting a small puncture hole going, we'd furiously pass around the spraying can of suds, before it all seeped quickly, into the ground...
I guess this may be the reason I always had a fondness, for heavy, bitter beers, down the road because we'd always be finding some incredibly warm cans of Schlitz or Budweiser or Meister Brau which were just lethally heavy beers, back then, that had been left to cook underneath the intense, hot-hot summer heat...It didn't matter at all, to us...We'd just guzzle them down as quickly as we could, and then resumed looking through the high weeds for more...and often, we did find more...Because alot of older teenagers hung out there, during the night...
Another great thing about "THE B" was that it was nestled up against the railroad tracks, which really isolated itself, from everywhere else...You could go up and down along the railroad tracks, throwing an endless amount of rocks, at trains passing by, sometimes coming across some neat little forts that other kids had carved out, all along the tracks, most of the time, against the security fence of the Beverly Country Club...in a bunker-of-sorts...
FORTS were HUGE back then...There was still quite a bit of building of houses near the unsettled areas by the railroad tracks...and we'd grab some big sheets of wood from construction sites, when nobody was looking and haul it down the street, out into unknown domains, where we would, work like fiends, assembling fort after fort...And we just got better and better at it...as time went by...Some of them were really, really cool...
I can remember one fort...where we dug out an enormous hole, shovel by shovel, about 6 foot deep, about 12 feet wide...in a densely, high grassy plot at about 86th & Washtenaw...Then we placed a layer of sheets of wood, on top, then placed a thick layer of dirt and grass to camaflauge our new neat, humble hideout...
Then we'd hairy-scary, ride up to the White Hen Pantry where we would stock up on all kinds of soda pop and Ho-Ho's and Taco-flavored Doritos, which had just come on the market with great results and last but not least, every conceivable kind of candy, too...Then we would quickly ride, ride, ride back like little ferocious madmen, back to our new fort and hang out there, totally oblivious from the world around us...as if it were the most coolest, coolest place on Earth...
I believe Mike Howland even tried to install a chimney on this specific fort and even tried to cook a tin of some Jiffy-Pop popcorn, in this bizarre little hole he had carved out for this ridiculous purpose...Of course...As the fire grew bigger and bigger inside this little cavernous pit, the smoke also billowed out like a gusher, sending all of us, Tommy, John and me, scrambling out of the fort, except for Mike, who was gonna stay beneath, inside there, popping that popcorn as if it was the last thing he would ever do...
He did somehow manage to get the popcorn popped, as he coughed and coughed and coughed, resurfacing almost drenched in sweat and soot, emerging from the underground fort, triumphant...but alas, the popcorn was pretty wretched looking and badly burnt...But it was considered a great, great success as we passed it around, this severely burnt, mangled, Jiffy Pop tin as each took a huge handful of this awful creation...
Also...another thing that stands out is...Our baseball games were absolutely legendary...We'd probably be up at our very own dirt and grass baseball diamond we had constructed, a block away at 10AM and play way, way, way until Sundown, sometimes...It was a crazy set up, because there was a huge security fence, situated between 1st Base and 2nd Base...up against "THE B"...which meant Right Field was closed, completely. All of us somehow eventually managed to correct our swing so that we would only hit towards left field...which may seem a little unusual, but it didn't even phase us...
I do remember I had this very light, bright, shiny red aluminum bat...because...I couldn't handle the heavier bats...and that loud, ringing ping! sound, of ripping a baseball, down the line, out into the outfield, was as good as it gets...rounding the bases so quickly, at a chaotic, stutter-step pace, trying to dementedly watch our ball all the way, as we tried hastily to scramble to 2nd or 3rd Base...
I'm pretty sure, Mike and Johnny Howland, would get a hold of one, from time to time, and just sizzle one out, far, far beyond where anyone could come close to reaching...Sometimes even hitting a window of a house residing right next to the field...but amazingly, they never, ever broke any windows...
We also used the baseball field as a football field of sorts, too, when Autumn would come about...Touch football was really huge, back then, also, and our touch football games were relentlessly paced, just kids pouring their whole heart & soul, into getting open for a pass, totally out of breath, only to realize the quarterback had been already sacked, that play...
I can remember one special time...we had the ball on the goal-line, with only one play left...Keith Jarrell who was the oldest kid, and rarely hung around with us, lined up all our receivers on the right side, except for me...Of course, the play was designed to catch the other team off-guard and throw it to me, on the opposite side...wide-open, in the end zone...It played out just as Keith had drawn up in the huddle...The guy defending me, broke loose and tried to run after the mess of people in the middle of the end zone, screaming like crazy for the ball...
Here I was, standing all alone, wide-open, as I'd ever be...Keith just stepped back and lobbed this wildly high pass my way...It surely was beyond my grasp but I kept back-peddling further and further back, into the end zone and managed to come down with the ball...as I fell backwards, onto the ground, somehow able to hold tight, clutching onto the ball, despite getting the wind knocked out of me...to win the game...
There's just so, so much ground to cover...All the good times...as we grew up and up and up and then suddenly, we all kinda, shockingly, poof, disappeared off of the block, one at a time, for good...finding new friends...our own age...basically leaving it all behind...as if it never, ever, even occurred...
But I do remember the good, good times, especially, like seeing the movie TOMMY with the Howlands, way back when, when it first came out, back around 1972...I think they even had the poster from that movie, too...And they'd also sometimes buy the latest top 40 hits, up at the Evergreen Plaza Mall, that were oddly on these little, funky 45 vinyl records you'd buy for only 45 cents...I definitely remember Tommy Howland pulling out the new, latest Paul McCartney/Wings hit, Band On The Run, playing it over and over and over...
There were so many old stories and old times to recall, whether it was walking all the way up to 95th & California in a blizzard to go snow sledding, and freezing half to death...or just laughing it up, tearing things up, in the spring or summer, on our old Schwinn bikes, with the ever-so-cool, banana seats or the latest 10-speeds...
And surely, if we did come across a nerdy kid who had one of those giant, obnoxious orange flags sticking out of the back of their bike, Johnny Howland, would make it a point, to make them feel like a fool for having such a stupid, stupid, ridiculous thing, hanging off the back of their bikes...
At times, its true, we were treacherous little slugs, but for the most part, it was mostly, all good clean fun. I think the only time, one of the neighbors would yell at us, was when we'd accidentally throw a ball of some sorts, out onto the crabby neighbors, the NIPPONS, precious front yard...They'd come out angry as hell and go completely ballistic as if our tiny, little footprints were going to completely alter the look of their nice, perfectly-manicured, grassy lawn...
86th Street, unfortunately, took a huge hit when we all did, finally go our separate ways...It had been almost like a perfectly isolated, peaceful sanctuary, amidst the far south-eastern corner of Saint Thomas More Parish in Chicago. A very, serene, hazy, dazy, Huck Finn/Tom Sawyer existence, to some extent, really just a pandora's box of adventure, we'd open, day, after day, after day...
And, believe me, we utilized every square inch, of territory, we could come across, barreling it into the ground...because we were filled with an endless amount of energy, having an endless amount of fun and creating an endless amount of good times...
All the laughter and all the screaming at each other, all the rough-housing, or just showing up at each others door, at the start of the day, and yelling for each other, to come out and play...We never, ever, used the door buzzer, back then, we'd just let loose with a loud, penetrating roar, that instantly got the others attention inside...And within seconds, you could hear the excited, rumbling footsteps making their way for the door...grabbing their baseball cap, maybe a coat, maybe a baseball mitt, whatever...It happened almost every day for me, from age 8-11, probably...They were my best friends, back then...and will always bring a chuckle to my mind...even though the years and years...have long passed us by...
So...Here's to all the Howlands, Mike, Johnny & Tommy's Mom & Dad especially, who kept their kids on the straight and narrow...coming home from a hard day's work, just to make ends meet, just to make sure, all their kids, had the best, that life could offer...Because, those times were so timeless, to all of us...and the moments we shared were very heart-warming to recall, as you can very well, imagine....Down on...86th Street...down on the South-Side...just a piece of everyday Americana...that probably would have faded from memory...into oblivion...
In summary, it does seem like such an incredibly long time ago...yet, it does remain, very vivid, very heart-warming, and very much, a long-lasting memory...of those days, from my early childhood, sadly gone by...into the night...No more "B" there, anymore...no more baseball field and no more good friends who would pass on...some of them dead...some of them alive....but surely a decent part, of Jim O'Leary's memories, I was truly, very happy to share...
Monday, November 17, 2008
Early 70's...Mom & Dad
...When you look back, into my life, back to the early 70's...it's impossible not to recall how my parents...had finally reached a point in their lives...where they could truly enjoy themselves, without 8 crying kids, constantly demanding their overwhelming attention...
The Lake House always seemed to be teaming with visits from my sisters and their husbands, with their wild & wooly, little ones...but there also seemed to be some breaks from the chaotic atmosphere...when my Mom & Dad would escape to their own world of excitement...
...And that meant, they were determined, to get away and have some great, great times...living life to the fullest...especially during the summers around Lake Geneva...
...Whether it was dining out, up in and around Lake Geneva., going dancing on weekends up at Lake Lawn Lodge, or even having a ball at the Arnold Palmer Golf Driving Range & Miniature Golf, in Elkhorn, it was a time of leisure and laughs...a time of noticeable relief, from my own extensive spinal problems...a time of thinking they had reached a stretch of what they thought the rest of their lives would look like...more or less, a blissful existence...
...You could sense their happiness...especially when they'd go out to Lake Lawn on a Saturday Night...for a night together, on the dance floor...See, on the dance floor, is where they met, so long before, at Saint Sabinas, deep in the heart of the South Side of Chicago...back around 1938, when they were 16 year old teenagers...
They were always like magic, on the dance floor...It seemed as though, their toes never touched the ground...just a graceful, seamless, flow, around the floor, almost the entire night...Sure, sometimes they'd stop, to order a cocktail, occaisionally, my Mom, having an ultra sweet, shake-like, creme de mint-Grasshopper and my Dad going with a brisk Tom Collins or an even brisker, Whiskey Sour...
It was their time to re-live the magic, the excitement, recapturing their youth, for just a few hours...under the stars...amidst a crowded dance floor...out in Lake Lawn's outdoor garden. They made a point, of dressing appropriately, my Mom always in an elegant, beautiful dress and my Dad in his sear-sucker, double-breasted, sports jacket...Together, their smiles were endless, it was, no doubt, their moment, to shine, once again...
It really didn't matter what kind of band was playing, could be a polka, could be a big band, could be anything...They just loved being together...period...A night at Lake Lawn Lodge, gave them more than a chance to break loose, but also a chance to realize, they were not getting older, but just entering a phase where everything seemed to be going their way, finally...
Also, on the docket, back then, was some care-free moments, of enjoying a night of golf adventures...in Elkhorn, Wisconsin, some 8 miles away...First, we'd hit the miniature golf course, at the Arnold Palmer facility, which was rather a nice, new, place...located on the outskirts of Elkhorn, out by where the bowling alley was, out on Route 67, not to far from where the McDonalds is, these days...
The course, itself, was challenging...My Dad, who was a legitimately, good golfer, often would be astounded by my Mom, a relatively decent competitor herself, who could miraculously ace a hole-in-one, from time-to-time...Right then and there...There was some uproarious laughter, when that would occur...
And after the entire 18 holes were through, there was a chance at dropping your golf ball, from the top, into a clown maze, that allowed the ball sift & boblle & bounce to the bottom and sometimes land in a tiny hole, that entitled you to a free case of soda pop...
Well, you know, who always won this...My Mom, just had it down cold...It almost seemed as if we were already thinking about dropping the ball in the maze again, every time we got beyond the 9th Hole...We'd already be discussing what flavor of Graf's soda pop we'd get if we won this time...
Would it be the foamy, root beer, which was pretty damn good...the tangy, orange soda, not bad, either or some other kind, like the new dark chocolate soda...My Dad, just shook his head, because he did not know how my Mom could repeatedly, win, every now and then...and he never, even came close.
After, the round of miniature golf, it was then onto their Driving Range, which was quite a spectacular event, in itself...My Dad, a very stocky, strong, individual, just had a knack, for crushing the ball, out beyond the range, out into a forest, way, way, out there...Move over Tiger Woods...
Me and my Mom, would be clapping, and expecting him, to keep crushing the golf ball, further and further, with every single swing...My Dad loved going to any golf range, he could get to...but this one, was his absolute favorite...Bucket after bucket, of balls, would come and go, as we'd all be swiping and hacking into every swing...sometimes connecting, sometimes hitting, what we'd call a WORM-BURNER...which was a ball, that you'd hit flat, topping it, and just watch it skid, along the grass, never getting any elevation...
There were many a night, we'd be there when the facility would be closing for the night...at 10 o'clock...Time just seemed to fly by...as fast as the golf balls my Dad would pummel out of sight. I don't think the swarms of nasty mosquitos or any rain or drizzle, ever deterred my Dad from pounding out a few buckets, every time, we went there...
It seemed like such a desolate, quiet area, for such a fine, almost pristine, facility...that was surely a hidden gem...amongst the crowded throngs of people who would flock to the other miniature golf venues, in Walworth County, including the giant frog, in Fontana...or the one up on Motel Road in Lake Geneva...
I don't know what happened but the Arnold Palmer facility got torn down...later that decade...No more free cases of soda...no more hitting the twirling-whirling windmill, or finding your ball, shooting through a hollow sounding pipe & landing into a cruddy, muddy, pool of water...No more unexpected, hole-in-one's...and certainly no more watching my father, supplying an endless amount of golf balls, sent whistling, far out, into the luminous night's sky...
These were uniquely, special times, indeed...and I'm certainly glad I had the chance to share this quick look back to a very tranquil era...where the good times, with my Mother & Father, seemed neverending...and my Mom & Dad's great love of having a good time...always made it so much of an entertaining , merry-go-round of laughs, that will always live on, in my cherished memories, forever and ever...and ever...
The Lake House always seemed to be teaming with visits from my sisters and their husbands, with their wild & wooly, little ones...but there also seemed to be some breaks from the chaotic atmosphere...when my Mom & Dad would escape to their own world of excitement...
...And that meant, they were determined, to get away and have some great, great times...living life to the fullest...especially during the summers around Lake Geneva...
...Whether it was dining out, up in and around Lake Geneva., going dancing on weekends up at Lake Lawn Lodge, or even having a ball at the Arnold Palmer Golf Driving Range & Miniature Golf, in Elkhorn, it was a time of leisure and laughs...a time of noticeable relief, from my own extensive spinal problems...a time of thinking they had reached a stretch of what they thought the rest of their lives would look like...more or less, a blissful existence...
...You could sense their happiness...especially when they'd go out to Lake Lawn on a Saturday Night...for a night together, on the dance floor...See, on the dance floor, is where they met, so long before, at Saint Sabinas, deep in the heart of the South Side of Chicago...back around 1938, when they were 16 year old teenagers...
They were always like magic, on the dance floor...It seemed as though, their toes never touched the ground...just a graceful, seamless, flow, around the floor, almost the entire night...Sure, sometimes they'd stop, to order a cocktail, occaisionally, my Mom, having an ultra sweet, shake-like, creme de mint-Grasshopper and my Dad going with a brisk Tom Collins or an even brisker, Whiskey Sour...
It was their time to re-live the magic, the excitement, recapturing their youth, for just a few hours...under the stars...amidst a crowded dance floor...out in Lake Lawn's outdoor garden. They made a point, of dressing appropriately, my Mom always in an elegant, beautiful dress and my Dad in his sear-sucker, double-breasted, sports jacket...Together, their smiles were endless, it was, no doubt, their moment, to shine, once again...
It really didn't matter what kind of band was playing, could be a polka, could be a big band, could be anything...They just loved being together...period...A night at Lake Lawn Lodge, gave them more than a chance to break loose, but also a chance to realize, they were not getting older, but just entering a phase where everything seemed to be going their way, finally...
Also, on the docket, back then, was some care-free moments, of enjoying a night of golf adventures...in Elkhorn, Wisconsin, some 8 miles away...First, we'd hit the miniature golf course, at the Arnold Palmer facility, which was rather a nice, new, place...located on the outskirts of Elkhorn, out by where the bowling alley was, out on Route 67, not to far from where the McDonalds is, these days...
The course, itself, was challenging...My Dad, who was a legitimately, good golfer, often would be astounded by my Mom, a relatively decent competitor herself, who could miraculously ace a hole-in-one, from time-to-time...Right then and there...There was some uproarious laughter, when that would occur...
And after the entire 18 holes were through, there was a chance at dropping your golf ball, from the top, into a clown maze, that allowed the ball sift & boblle & bounce to the bottom and sometimes land in a tiny hole, that entitled you to a free case of soda pop...
Well, you know, who always won this...My Mom, just had it down cold...It almost seemed as if we were already thinking about dropping the ball in the maze again, every time we got beyond the 9th Hole...We'd already be discussing what flavor of Graf's soda pop we'd get if we won this time...
Would it be the foamy, root beer, which was pretty damn good...the tangy, orange soda, not bad, either or some other kind, like the new dark chocolate soda...My Dad, just shook his head, because he did not know how my Mom could repeatedly, win, every now and then...and he never, even came close.
After, the round of miniature golf, it was then onto their Driving Range, which was quite a spectacular event, in itself...My Dad, a very stocky, strong, individual, just had a knack, for crushing the ball, out beyond the range, out into a forest, way, way, out there...Move over Tiger Woods...
Me and my Mom, would be clapping, and expecting him, to keep crushing the golf ball, further and further, with every single swing...My Dad loved going to any golf range, he could get to...but this one, was his absolute favorite...Bucket after bucket, of balls, would come and go, as we'd all be swiping and hacking into every swing...sometimes connecting, sometimes hitting, what we'd call a WORM-BURNER...which was a ball, that you'd hit flat, topping it, and just watch it skid, along the grass, never getting any elevation...
There were many a night, we'd be there when the facility would be closing for the night...at 10 o'clock...Time just seemed to fly by...as fast as the golf balls my Dad would pummel out of sight. I don't think the swarms of nasty mosquitos or any rain or drizzle, ever deterred my Dad from pounding out a few buckets, every time, we went there...
It seemed like such a desolate, quiet area, for such a fine, almost pristine, facility...that was surely a hidden gem...amongst the crowded throngs of people who would flock to the other miniature golf venues, in Walworth County, including the giant frog, in Fontana...or the one up on Motel Road in Lake Geneva...
I don't know what happened but the Arnold Palmer facility got torn down...later that decade...No more free cases of soda...no more hitting the twirling-whirling windmill, or finding your ball, shooting through a hollow sounding pipe & landing into a cruddy, muddy, pool of water...No more unexpected, hole-in-one's...and certainly no more watching my father, supplying an endless amount of golf balls, sent whistling, far out, into the luminous night's sky...
These were uniquely, special times, indeed...and I'm certainly glad I had the chance to share this quick look back to a very tranquil era...where the good times, with my Mother & Father, seemed neverending...and my Mom & Dad's great love of having a good time...always made it so much of an entertaining , merry-go-round of laughs, that will always live on, in my cherished memories, forever and ever...and ever...
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Halloween in the 70's
...Ahhh...ghastly ghouls and frightful sights....it's time to look back at Halloween with pure evil delight.
Halloween...let's face it...pretty much...was like the Super Bowl of having a ball for little kids growing up in the 70's....Indeed, in fact, it was pure, kid chaos...You pretty much, got your costume, you got your giant bag, that you had every intention of filling to the very top...and you just blazed a torrid path, out the door, and down the block...with a wild, reckless abandon, jumping from house to house, loading up a ton of candy, candy and more candy...Well, you guessed it, we just could not get enough candy....
In our house...we always had a giant pumpkin that my Dad would carve up and my Mom would decorate...She'd go to great lengths to make it a very unique pumpkin which would be dispalyed in our front picture window...all ablaze, with a flashlight in it...every Halloween season...My Mom would put bright white Desitin baby butt creme on the teeth of the pumpkin, to further enhance our pumpkin's smile...And the pumpkin would also have a big cigar hanging out of its mouth and a big, black top hat...giving him an aristocratic aura...There was also all kinds of Halloween decorations throughout the house and my favorite was the skeleton Dracula that was placed on the wall as you walked down the stairs into the basement...There was always excitement in the air around Halloween and we'd always hope for decent weather...at least not frigid cold...when the big day on October 31st rolled around...
Let's go back to the kiddie costumes back then...They were very primitive compared to today's standards. As a matter of fact, they were the most uncomfortable, ill-fitted pieces of crap...Taiwain had to offer. But hey, don't tell us that....it was our true, shining moment of glory...where, most of the time we became the embodiment of our favorite cartoon character...displayed for the world to see...for only just one day...
They say that your first Halloween costume that you remember wearing while growing up reflects the true inner you...Now think way back...and try to recall that first crazy kid costume. For me, I had every intention of buying that kick-ass SPIDERMAN costume....but they had sold that out quickly. Let's face it...Spiderman was as popular back then...as he is today...So...I was forced to venture into a different direction...while grabbing at every kiddie costume they had stacked in the aisles of our Zayre store up on Western Avenue...which was alot like a Wal-mart back then...I had to sift thru all of the Bugs Bunny, Road Runner, Bozo the Clown, Captain America, The Hulk, Fred Flinstone, Superman, Magilla Gorilla, Huckleberry Hound, Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy...and on and on and on...
What did I end up with....Egad...Don't say it...Don't even say it....Uhhh...Casper the Friendly Ghost...???....What was I thinking...???...Casper was this little whimpy ghost who would whine and cry, and I don't even know why he existed except for the fact that his whole schtick was him saying over and over that all ghosts aren't so, so SCARY. Yet Casper possessed his child-like innocence and it resonated a certain pure goodness...that had you somewhat transfixed...at a young, impressionable age...Let's face it, in my neighborhood, if you wore a Casper costume...you were gonna get your ass beat, big time and your candy bag ripped out of your hands...if you didn't watch out...and run like hell...
But there I was nonetheless, poised for my first Halloween adventure...when the big day rolled around, sporting the dorky, smiling white, plastic Casper mask...which was already suffocating me, only after 2 minutes, ...ready to boldly head out on a crisp, cool autumn afternoon...
Our neighborhood itself, was prime territory for maximizing your candy obsessions...It was just row after row, of closely knit houses, that streamed block after block, mile after mile...It was a given you would cover a 4-5 block radius...in a few hours...because you were on such a wild high as you ran from house to house...like a madman...just totally focused on landing those tasty treats...from every door to door...
I'm guessing, by the end of the day, my Halloween candy bag was filled with mini Snickers, 3 Muskateers...Kit-Kats...bubble gum, popcorn balls, sugar pixies, sweet tarts, cracker jack, lollipops, ju-ju fruits, Almond Joy, malted milk balls, candy corn, apples, Hershey bars, Nestle Crunch bars...and even those nasty, nasty, nasty, peanut-butter chews...Well, as you can probably guess...that was only half of what was inside my bag that day...It was just such a huge thrill to finally get back home to my house on 86th Street, with my heart still racing, pouring out all of the endless candy onto the living room carpet and just picking up the loads and loads of candy, and letting it all sift thru your fingers, in a complete frenzy of awesome delight...Sure, my Mom and Dad would laugh at all of the candy I had managed to collect, because they knew I'd probably try to eat it all in one day...They'd just chuckle and smile...That was just a given...of course...
As we got older...our costume got cooler, we thought...Most of the girls had elaborate witch costumes and all of the boys were dressed as bums...Bums, was definitely the premium boys costume, in our young adolescent heydey, because you could basically get your Mom to tear up some old, worn-out clothes and you could just smear dirt on your face...and that's it...you were good-to-go...Even the girls liked to dress like bums in our neighborhood...But our obsession with candy...kind of fell by the wayside...at that age...and our passion for throwing eggs at each other and shooting cans of shaving cream at each other...while running around and chasing after the girls...was our primary focus by then...
It was kind of a sad jump for us...Here we were, completely having a ball, screaming adolescents, all drenched in slimy eggs and loads of shaving cream, laughing at each other...but there was a small, small part of us...that still yearned for the candy part of Halloween...I think that may have been our first big realization that we were truly growing up, really, really fast...and you couldn't go back into that time anymore and be the little candy-crazed kid...
On Halloween nights...the neighborhood took on a more ghastly, foreboding glow...especially up at Carroll Park...as the older kids wreaked havoc...where there was your fair share...of people jumping out at you and scaring the hell out of you...in the dark...wearing frightful, terrifying, scary masks...Just a totally different world and certainly no place for the little Caspers and Clowns and Little Red Riding Hoods...alike...
But for the most part, it was our age of innocence...of wearing silly costumes, of getting excited over candy, of just being out by ourselves, going door-to-door...that remains at the heart of our Halloween memories...for us kids...remembering way, way back then...
I think we all appreciate all the memories that Halloween has given us throughout our years...Our one big chance, to just let go...and pretend to be something else...providing us with an endless amount of visions...so firmly locked in our minds...and a reason to grab a big, ripe pumpkin, to put up all the decorations, to load up on the crazy candy...and just let the kid inside of us...take hold...
HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ONE AND ALL...
Halloween...let's face it...pretty much...was like the Super Bowl of having a ball for little kids growing up in the 70's....Indeed, in fact, it was pure, kid chaos...You pretty much, got your costume, you got your giant bag, that you had every intention of filling to the very top...and you just blazed a torrid path, out the door, and down the block...with a wild, reckless abandon, jumping from house to house, loading up a ton of candy, candy and more candy...Well, you guessed it, we just could not get enough candy....
In our house...we always had a giant pumpkin that my Dad would carve up and my Mom would decorate...She'd go to great lengths to make it a very unique pumpkin which would be dispalyed in our front picture window...all ablaze, with a flashlight in it...every Halloween season...My Mom would put bright white Desitin baby butt creme on the teeth of the pumpkin, to further enhance our pumpkin's smile...And the pumpkin would also have a big cigar hanging out of its mouth and a big, black top hat...giving him an aristocratic aura...There was also all kinds of Halloween decorations throughout the house and my favorite was the skeleton Dracula that was placed on the wall as you walked down the stairs into the basement...There was always excitement in the air around Halloween and we'd always hope for decent weather...at least not frigid cold...when the big day on October 31st rolled around...
Let's go back to the kiddie costumes back then...They were very primitive compared to today's standards. As a matter of fact, they were the most uncomfortable, ill-fitted pieces of crap...Taiwain had to offer. But hey, don't tell us that....it was our true, shining moment of glory...where, most of the time we became the embodiment of our favorite cartoon character...displayed for the world to see...for only just one day...
They say that your first Halloween costume that you remember wearing while growing up reflects the true inner you...Now think way back...and try to recall that first crazy kid costume. For me, I had every intention of buying that kick-ass SPIDERMAN costume....but they had sold that out quickly. Let's face it...Spiderman was as popular back then...as he is today...So...I was forced to venture into a different direction...while grabbing at every kiddie costume they had stacked in the aisles of our Zayre store up on Western Avenue...which was alot like a Wal-mart back then...I had to sift thru all of the Bugs Bunny, Road Runner, Bozo the Clown, Captain America, The Hulk, Fred Flinstone, Superman, Magilla Gorilla, Huckleberry Hound, Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy...and on and on and on...
What did I end up with....Egad...Don't say it...Don't even say it....Uhhh...Casper the Friendly Ghost...???....What was I thinking...???...Casper was this little whimpy ghost who would whine and cry, and I don't even know why he existed except for the fact that his whole schtick was him saying over and over that all ghosts aren't so, so SCARY. Yet Casper possessed his child-like innocence and it resonated a certain pure goodness...that had you somewhat transfixed...at a young, impressionable age...Let's face it, in my neighborhood, if you wore a Casper costume...you were gonna get your ass beat, big time and your candy bag ripped out of your hands...if you didn't watch out...and run like hell...
But there I was nonetheless, poised for my first Halloween adventure...when the big day rolled around, sporting the dorky, smiling white, plastic Casper mask...which was already suffocating me, only after 2 minutes, ...ready to boldly head out on a crisp, cool autumn afternoon...
Our neighborhood itself, was prime territory for maximizing your candy obsessions...It was just row after row, of closely knit houses, that streamed block after block, mile after mile...It was a given you would cover a 4-5 block radius...in a few hours...because you were on such a wild high as you ran from house to house...like a madman...just totally focused on landing those tasty treats...from every door to door...
I'm guessing, by the end of the day, my Halloween candy bag was filled with mini Snickers, 3 Muskateers...Kit-Kats...bubble gum, popcorn balls, sugar pixies, sweet tarts, cracker jack, lollipops, ju-ju fruits, Almond Joy, malted milk balls, candy corn, apples, Hershey bars, Nestle Crunch bars...and even those nasty, nasty, nasty, peanut-butter chews...Well, as you can probably guess...that was only half of what was inside my bag that day...It was just such a huge thrill to finally get back home to my house on 86th Street, with my heart still racing, pouring out all of the endless candy onto the living room carpet and just picking up the loads and loads of candy, and letting it all sift thru your fingers, in a complete frenzy of awesome delight...Sure, my Mom and Dad would laugh at all of the candy I had managed to collect, because they knew I'd probably try to eat it all in one day...They'd just chuckle and smile...That was just a given...of course...
As we got older...our costume got cooler, we thought...Most of the girls had elaborate witch costumes and all of the boys were dressed as bums...Bums, was definitely the premium boys costume, in our young adolescent heydey, because you could basically get your Mom to tear up some old, worn-out clothes and you could just smear dirt on your face...and that's it...you were good-to-go...Even the girls liked to dress like bums in our neighborhood...But our obsession with candy...kind of fell by the wayside...at that age...and our passion for throwing eggs at each other and shooting cans of shaving cream at each other...while running around and chasing after the girls...was our primary focus by then...
It was kind of a sad jump for us...Here we were, completely having a ball, screaming adolescents, all drenched in slimy eggs and loads of shaving cream, laughing at each other...but there was a small, small part of us...that still yearned for the candy part of Halloween...I think that may have been our first big realization that we were truly growing up, really, really fast...and you couldn't go back into that time anymore and be the little candy-crazed kid...
On Halloween nights...the neighborhood took on a more ghastly, foreboding glow...especially up at Carroll Park...as the older kids wreaked havoc...where there was your fair share...of people jumping out at you and scaring the hell out of you...in the dark...wearing frightful, terrifying, scary masks...Just a totally different world and certainly no place for the little Caspers and Clowns and Little Red Riding Hoods...alike...
But for the most part, it was our age of innocence...of wearing silly costumes, of getting excited over candy, of just being out by ourselves, going door-to-door...that remains at the heart of our Halloween memories...for us kids...remembering way, way back then...
I think we all appreciate all the memories that Halloween has given us throughout our years...Our one big chance, to just let go...and pretend to be something else...providing us with an endless amount of visions...so firmly locked in our minds...and a reason to grab a big, ripe pumpkin, to put up all the decorations, to load up on the crazy candy...and just let the kid inside of us...take hold...
HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ONE AND ALL...
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
The GRANNY FRANNY boat
Well, well, well........We roll into the 70's and it's time to grab the life jackets, the igloo cooler, the water skis, the suntan oil, and the beach towels...and hop aboard the GRANNY FRANNY boat...as it rumbles into your sightlines, pulling up to the pier...The Granny Franny was a 20 foot Correct Craft inboard speedboat...and I do mean SPEED-boat...It probably had the most powerful engine on Lake Geneva, for sure ..I'm guessing at least a 475-496 horsepower Chrysler Marine engine...which was like a tank engine compared to other boats...and the thunderous roar of the engine...was plainly a major characteristic of this mighty beast...
Originally, back in 1970, my Dad was just paring down his choices for a boat...He was going to go with a huge orange house boat but all the kids wanted to be able to water ski...So he searched and searched and he one day just took a ride on the new Granny Franny...being sold over at the Delavan Boat Company...(which is only yards away from my sister's Maureen's current Summer Home)...
I don't think my Dad had any clue it had such a large, ferocious, rumbling engine...It may have been one of the first boats he'd actually had ever been on...But one ride on the GRANNY was all he ever needed...It was so sleek, with a cool dark green bottom-half, creme top/interior...Plenty of room, for all the kids...And gas back then was probably less than a dollar a gallon...What was there not to love...
As my Dad wrapped up buying the Granny...the boat dealer asked him if he wanted a name painted on the back of the boat....He thought, for a moment, long and hard...and he came up with the amusing little name that would always have us laughing...See, my Mom, Frances, was only 46 years old and had around 2 or 3 grandchildren at the time...so she certainly didn't feel like an old Granny...But there it was...painted in large whispy white writing, across the back of the dark green boat....GRANNY FRANNY...
I think my Mom was a little startled...and all us kids...couldn't believe my Dad would actually name our boat such a crazy name...It pretty much freaked us all out...But it stuck like glue and anybody out on the water who dared challenge us to a race...would soon find out that the thunderously loud, dark green boat with the silly, silly name, pretty much was gonna leave you in your tracks...
I'd say we were challenged quite a bit...back then...They even used to have these high performance boats called DONZIS...and the owners of these boats prided themselves, thinking they had the ultimate speed machines...Such was not the case...The Granny not only was fast...but it cut right thru the high waves...like a knife...It left a huge, huge wake behind the boat...and anyone driving the Granny loved to put the throttle down...all the way....and hold on for dear life....It was pretty exhilerating to bounce about at about 60mph....clutching onto something...like you were on a thrill ride...like no other...
Wow!!!!!!!!!!....
That's all you could say...after lifting up the throttle and let it purr to a complete stop....
Hours and hours of so much fun...was spent on the Granny Franny....Whether it was Danny or Joe or Karen or Joan...or any of my brother-in-laws...getting out on the water skis...or just a bunch of tiny little grandchildren being loaded on for a gentle daylight cruise...The Granny Franny was just an endless, endless amount of fun....for all of my brothers and sisters...Maureen, Patsy, Kathy, Joan, Karen, Joe, Danny and all of the little ones, too...
Sometimes, we'd drop anchor to take a break and just float about and relax...I can then remember opening up the cooler...and digging deep into the ice and pulling out several bottles of Pepsi...or a just a few cans of Graf's Root Beer....A big treat back then was these neat little new snack crackers called TRISCUITS....We'd open a box of these salted wheat crackers and pile on a quarter slice of American Cheese...and then, keep piling it on, layer after layer...Then my Dad would pull out the portable ladder from underneath the hull and everyone would jump off the boat and swim about, usually on a hot, hot, sticky, summer day....
I can remember there were times, when it was only ME & my Mom & my Dad...just floating still in the water...My Mom perched up on the deck, up front, dangling her feet in the water, everytime a wave would cause the boat to rock up an down...My Dad would prepare to take a wild swim dive off of the boat, usually with his favorite, cannonball plunge, which would drench both me and my Mom and have us laughing hysterically...You wanna talk about some timeless moments...Man, those were the best...It seemed like they would actually last forever.
Everyone has a special GRANNY FRANNY memory...I wish I could grab at least one from each one of my brothers and sisters...No doubt about it...I'd just love to sit back and listen to everyone's special memories of this famous, irreplaceable boat...that always had us excited about going out, with an exhuberent energy, enjoying the waters of Lake Geneva to the fullest...
I'll just throw this one out there...for the fun of it...What lucky grandkid, can't recall, as their Grandpa would slowly drive the Granny Franny under the bridge as you entered the harbor at The Abbey...and he would have all the kids sit up on his lap in the captain's chair and press the button next to the steering wheel, for the extremely loud horn...to go off...so that it would echo...echo...echo...all about....What a huge thrill it was for those little ones...to generate such a huge commotion...
Going out on the Granny Franny at night was a perilous adventure, indeed...We really didn't quite have our bearings and it was a huge challenge to drive amidst all the unknown objects, floating about. It was just very cool to take the Granny out, all the time, any time, day or night...And if you add up all the time, all of us spent during the endless amount of summer hours, enjoying this special boat's unique charm, to the fullest, you'd certainly say that my Dad got his money's tidy worth and then some...
I know I could easily just float back and rattle off at least 10 to 20 pages of Granny Franny adventurous boat stories, easily...Most of them good...a tiny few, even bad...It's so hard...to think of even, stopping of writing about the Granny Franny boat, at this juncture...I just want to hold onto to those precious moments....so, so bad...
It almost makes me cry...as we drive by it nowadays, across the street from the Sentry Food Store in Walworth, today, where, the old Granny Franny, sits...alone...in a chalky gravel, side lot...its now faded green bottom looking haggard and worn...Somehow, it justs sits there, just magically, holding on, for dear life, not ready to go to that big boatyard in the sky...Put there, for all of us to drive by...and just sigh...It is truly an icon...in the history of the O'Leary family, and I always say...as I buy a lotto ticket...all the time...The first thing I do if I win the LOTTO...is buy that damn boat back, immediately, at any cost, and restore it to its full and lusterous glory...
Memories of The GRANNY FRANNY boat...truly, a captivating little piece, of such a glorious era, the early 70's and beyond...in the unique annals of Jim O'Leary's life...for sure...
Originally, back in 1970, my Dad was just paring down his choices for a boat...He was going to go with a huge orange house boat but all the kids wanted to be able to water ski...So he searched and searched and he one day just took a ride on the new Granny Franny...being sold over at the Delavan Boat Company...(which is only yards away from my sister's Maureen's current Summer Home)...
I don't think my Dad had any clue it had such a large, ferocious, rumbling engine...It may have been one of the first boats he'd actually had ever been on...But one ride on the GRANNY was all he ever needed...It was so sleek, with a cool dark green bottom-half, creme top/interior...Plenty of room, for all the kids...And gas back then was probably less than a dollar a gallon...What was there not to love...
As my Dad wrapped up buying the Granny...the boat dealer asked him if he wanted a name painted on the back of the boat....He thought, for a moment, long and hard...and he came up with the amusing little name that would always have us laughing...See, my Mom, Frances, was only 46 years old and had around 2 or 3 grandchildren at the time...so she certainly didn't feel like an old Granny...But there it was...painted in large whispy white writing, across the back of the dark green boat....GRANNY FRANNY...
I think my Mom was a little startled...and all us kids...couldn't believe my Dad would actually name our boat such a crazy name...It pretty much freaked us all out...But it stuck like glue and anybody out on the water who dared challenge us to a race...would soon find out that the thunderously loud, dark green boat with the silly, silly name, pretty much was gonna leave you in your tracks...
I'd say we were challenged quite a bit...back then...They even used to have these high performance boats called DONZIS...and the owners of these boats prided themselves, thinking they had the ultimate speed machines...Such was not the case...The Granny not only was fast...but it cut right thru the high waves...like a knife...It left a huge, huge wake behind the boat...and anyone driving the Granny loved to put the throttle down...all the way....and hold on for dear life....It was pretty exhilerating to bounce about at about 60mph....clutching onto something...like you were on a thrill ride...like no other...
Wow!!!!!!!!!!....
That's all you could say...after lifting up the throttle and let it purr to a complete stop....
Hours and hours of so much fun...was spent on the Granny Franny....Whether it was Danny or Joe or Karen or Joan...or any of my brother-in-laws...getting out on the water skis...or just a bunch of tiny little grandchildren being loaded on for a gentle daylight cruise...The Granny Franny was just an endless, endless amount of fun....for all of my brothers and sisters...Maureen, Patsy, Kathy, Joan, Karen, Joe, Danny and all of the little ones, too...
Sometimes, we'd drop anchor to take a break and just float about and relax...I can then remember opening up the cooler...and digging deep into the ice and pulling out several bottles of Pepsi...or a just a few cans of Graf's Root Beer....A big treat back then was these neat little new snack crackers called TRISCUITS....We'd open a box of these salted wheat crackers and pile on a quarter slice of American Cheese...and then, keep piling it on, layer after layer...Then my Dad would pull out the portable ladder from underneath the hull and everyone would jump off the boat and swim about, usually on a hot, hot, sticky, summer day....
I can remember there were times, when it was only ME & my Mom & my Dad...just floating still in the water...My Mom perched up on the deck, up front, dangling her feet in the water, everytime a wave would cause the boat to rock up an down...My Dad would prepare to take a wild swim dive off of the boat, usually with his favorite, cannonball plunge, which would drench both me and my Mom and have us laughing hysterically...You wanna talk about some timeless moments...Man, those were the best...It seemed like they would actually last forever.
Everyone has a special GRANNY FRANNY memory...I wish I could grab at least one from each one of my brothers and sisters...No doubt about it...I'd just love to sit back and listen to everyone's special memories of this famous, irreplaceable boat...that always had us excited about going out, with an exhuberent energy, enjoying the waters of Lake Geneva to the fullest...
I'll just throw this one out there...for the fun of it...What lucky grandkid, can't recall, as their Grandpa would slowly drive the Granny Franny under the bridge as you entered the harbor at The Abbey...and he would have all the kids sit up on his lap in the captain's chair and press the button next to the steering wheel, for the extremely loud horn...to go off...so that it would echo...echo...echo...all about....What a huge thrill it was for those little ones...to generate such a huge commotion...
Going out on the Granny Franny at night was a perilous adventure, indeed...We really didn't quite have our bearings and it was a huge challenge to drive amidst all the unknown objects, floating about. It was just very cool to take the Granny out, all the time, any time, day or night...And if you add up all the time, all of us spent during the endless amount of summer hours, enjoying this special boat's unique charm, to the fullest, you'd certainly say that my Dad got his money's tidy worth and then some...
I know I could easily just float back and rattle off at least 10 to 20 pages of Granny Franny adventurous boat stories, easily...Most of them good...a tiny few, even bad...It's so hard...to think of even, stopping of writing about the Granny Franny boat, at this juncture...I just want to hold onto to those precious moments....so, so bad...
It almost makes me cry...as we drive by it nowadays, across the street from the Sentry Food Store in Walworth, today, where, the old Granny Franny, sits...alone...in a chalky gravel, side lot...its now faded green bottom looking haggard and worn...Somehow, it justs sits there, just magically, holding on, for dear life, not ready to go to that big boatyard in the sky...Put there, for all of us to drive by...and just sigh...It is truly an icon...in the history of the O'Leary family, and I always say...as I buy a lotto ticket...all the time...The first thing I do if I win the LOTTO...is buy that damn boat back, immediately, at any cost, and restore it to its full and lusterous glory...
Memories of The GRANNY FRANNY boat...truly, a captivating little piece, of such a glorious era, the early 70's and beyond...in the unique annals of Jim O'Leary's life...for sure...
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Onward & Upward
Well...here we are...20 blogs into the Life and Times of Jim O'Leary
...I've covered such a vast array of memories...already...and yet we are only getting started...
...The 60's...in itself...was a great starting point...for anyone to begin their life. It certainly left some incredible impressions of how different things were back then...and that time has almost swept away...so many of those interesting facets and figures which held us in awe...during those daring, illustrious years, so long ago...
...Whether it was my O'Leary family members caught in a time warp, remembering themselves so vividly, drifting way, way back to that era...or good friends my age who also firmly clutched their Frito Bandito erasers & did some outrageously, ridiculous things pretending they were young NASA astronauts, too...It's all good stuff, for all of us, to hold onto, flashbacks that should be cherished, at least one more time, to some extent, just for the laughs, just for the fun, just for the hell-of-it...For so many of my nieces & nephews, this has been a glimpse of the history of their Mom's & Dad's, Gramma & Grampa, Uncles & Aunts...And for those who have only known me, from recent years, this has provided a great deal of nostalgia & curiosity, an insight into a world they may never, ever, realized...had existed...And really, the best is yet to come...
...Of course, with all this in mind...I'm not through...by any means...We are just about to embark on a wonderous journey through the 1970's...Another decade of long-lost symbols, fads & functions that will all be inter-woven together, from my perspective, at that time...I was only a young kid, still, but I was growing up rather quickly...And that decade held a huge cluster of both good and bad moments which will transpire right before your eyes...
I'm really kinda torn by turning the pages of time, so quickly, yet there is a sense, within me, that so many people are anxious to roll on...into the future...with the anticipation...of what lie ahead...in the crazy, upside-down world of Jim O'Leary...
Really, the 70's were some pivotal years...when I still had just an amazing amount of robust energy, a budding imagination, ready, about to take off and such an endless, endless passion to have a good time....And I don't intend to dissappoint...by holding off on that slice of my life, so let us go...steady & straight...Onward & Upward...
...I've covered such a vast array of memories...already...and yet we are only getting started...
...The 60's...in itself...was a great starting point...for anyone to begin their life. It certainly left some incredible impressions of how different things were back then...and that time has almost swept away...so many of those interesting facets and figures which held us in awe...during those daring, illustrious years, so long ago...
...Whether it was my O'Leary family members caught in a time warp, remembering themselves so vividly, drifting way, way back to that era...or good friends my age who also firmly clutched their Frito Bandito erasers & did some outrageously, ridiculous things pretending they were young NASA astronauts, too...It's all good stuff, for all of us, to hold onto, flashbacks that should be cherished, at least one more time, to some extent, just for the laughs, just for the fun, just for the hell-of-it...For so many of my nieces & nephews, this has been a glimpse of the history of their Mom's & Dad's, Gramma & Grampa, Uncles & Aunts...And for those who have only known me, from recent years, this has provided a great deal of nostalgia & curiosity, an insight into a world they may never, ever, realized...had existed...And really, the best is yet to come...
...Of course, with all this in mind...I'm not through...by any means...We are just about to embark on a wonderous journey through the 1970's...Another decade of long-lost symbols, fads & functions that will all be inter-woven together, from my perspective, at that time...I was only a young kid, still, but I was growing up rather quickly...And that decade held a huge cluster of both good and bad moments which will transpire right before your eyes...
I'm really kinda torn by turning the pages of time, so quickly, yet there is a sense, within me, that so many people are anxious to roll on...into the future...with the anticipation...of what lie ahead...in the crazy, upside-down world of Jim O'Leary...
Really, the 70's were some pivotal years...when I still had just an amazing amount of robust energy, a budding imagination, ready, about to take off and such an endless, endless passion to have a good time....And I don't intend to dissappoint...by holding off on that slice of my life, so let us go...steady & straight...Onward & Upward...
Sunday, October 12, 2008
The Race to Space
....One thing that remains...within the heart & soul of every kid...who grew up in my late 60's era, early on, in our childhood, was the endless fascination with SPACE...We were literally born and raised within the span of when the Apollo Space program was in its hey-dey...It almost seemed like there was a blast-off every six months back then...each mission looming as a more and more important element in unraveling the mysteries of the universe....
...And don't think we weren't bombarded from every angle on the illustrious, magical possibilities---That conquering space was THE greatest acheivement our world could ever acheive...
Yet...as a kid...we couldn't exactly grasp all that...so instead...we were constantly fed a huge dose of silly space related cartoons and tv programs that elevated all our imaginations to new heights that other generations really had not had....
You could certainly start off with THE JETSONS...a harmless, piece-of-fluff, cartoon that followed the charmed life of George Jetson, daughter Judy, Jane-his wife, his boy-Elroy and some crazy dog that was always causing some kind of chaos...It was space age, personified, and all of these wild futuristic devices they incorporated into the show...made it a super big hit with one and all...They had huge TV screens that just plopped down out of nowhere, telephones very reminiscent of our cell phones today...Food that cooked in ovens in seconds...And the cars were like floating space roavers that zoomed throughout its kooky solar system of old-fashoined stores and burger joints that were revved up special to look ultra-modren...supposedly a quick glimpse of the cosmic world that lie ahead for all of us....
Really...almost all of the cartoons back then...would utilize the adventure of space as a way to keep us all glued to the screen, dreaming of the endless possibilites...of what maybe, our destiny, would be, of someday...all of us...finding our way...into the far reaches of space....
Check out an episode of Clutch Cargo, which was about the most absurdly drawn, cartoon, which utilized the bizarre option of big, moving, red lips, to advance the dialogue of a scene while stuck on the same page of frozen cartoon images...(Search Youtube. com....Creepy Cartoon with Human Mouths...)
It's so proposterous to see this fluid transition from Earth to Space...within seconds, with a child named Spinner and a dog named Paddlefoot...along for the rocket rode with Clutch...
And this image was almost repeated in some way, shape and form for every show embracing our nation's passion for space exploration...I guess, we were a unique generation exposed to such a bizzare perspective...that all things space related...held the key to our future...
...And the tv shows also liked to play up this angle too...Who can forget the rabidly popular, I DREAM OF JEANNIE.....Here we had an incredibly gorgeous, knock-out of a girl locked up in a bottle, magically released by an astronaut, who had landed hard in a remote area...From there, the whimsical adventures of Jeannie and her master, Major Tony Nelson were born....to light up our eyes, with hilarious spoofs and stories...We just couldn't get enough of that...
Also, the fascination with space carried over to everyday life for us kids, as several food products had a space connection, that we all just had to get our hands on...TANG-an orange flavored powder mix was plugged as the drink of the astronauts, loaded with Vitamin C, which at the time, nobody heard of....What was Vitamin C...???...Well, we concluded, if those darn astronauts were drinking this stuff...I gotta try this stuff, too....
An even funkier concoction, were, SPACE FOOD STICKS...This was the primative, early form, of what an energy bar, would someday evolve into...It was a chewy, little elongated stick that was about 5 inches wide...and tasted sweet & spongy....when you tried to eat it...Wow, us kids all thought...There's astronauts, circling the Earth, right now...and I'm chewing on the exact same food that give them a tremendous jolt of energy, to keep them focused on their mission....Of course, you'd chomp away, and chomp away, waiting for some boost in energy but it was about as nutritious as a bowl of Captain Crunch cereal....
You can pop up some commercials on TANG and SPACE FOOD STICKS on YOUTUBE.com and find yourself, laughing hysterically, at these totally over-hyped, proposterous food and drink creations that were really just ordinary items that held no magical powers so many of us were led to believe....
Oh yeah, then there was STAR TREK too...that took hold as a cult classic down the road...but at its inception...Star Trek just seemed a little bit too loony...for us to accept...It took awhile to really catch hold of its special brand of sci-fi noteriaty....Captain James T. Kirk & Doctor Spock beckoned us to believe that both aliens and humans could get along and the amazing journeys that they took us all on....built a foundation of what so many future sci-fi classic inventions...would capitalize on...to render us down their paths of exploring the cosmos....
Of course, previous generations can shout out that FLASH GORDON was the original space show that all others are based upon...but most of us...in the late 60's...had no idea that such great innovative short, feature film classics even existed....
I know nowadays...space has lost its luster...As much as the media tries to hype the vitality and importance of what space missions are providing today....The real, day-to-day news, just seems to overwhelm our interests in paying any attention to any kind of space stuff...It is kinda sad...but...it has lost its shock value also because so much of what we use today, from cell phones to I-Pods, have just as much of an innovation factor...that are just common advances we've come to expect to happen...In our time...the great innovations were touted as coming to fruition from our beloved NASA Space Program...
LET US COMMENCE THE COUNTDOWN...!!!
Five....Four....Three.....Two....One.....BLAST-OFF......!!!!!!
Just a quick, short phrase, every one of kids, of long ago, would repeat, with a great amount of heart and enthusiasm....Whether it was when we paused before we were about to run outside to play for the day or driving our parents nuts, engaged in a mega-solar lift-off while orbiting our tasteless, vegatables on a fork when we were ordered to eat them at dinner time...Yeah...we were imaginative kids...all hepped up on the abundance of space stuff that intertwined into our daily rituals...It's probably a good thing that we would grow out of that phase quickly as we did...but it nonetheless...is rooted cosmically, way, way back...deeply into our spacious orb of conscienceness...whether we like it or not...even to this very day...if we care to dwell upon and admit it....Well...at least...I'll climb out of my lunar module and admit it..........Oh well, I'll say it again.......as I fondly bid good-bye....How times....have changed....!!!
...And don't think we weren't bombarded from every angle on the illustrious, magical possibilities---That conquering space was THE greatest acheivement our world could ever acheive...
Yet...as a kid...we couldn't exactly grasp all that...so instead...we were constantly fed a huge dose of silly space related cartoons and tv programs that elevated all our imaginations to new heights that other generations really had not had....
You could certainly start off with THE JETSONS...a harmless, piece-of-fluff, cartoon that followed the charmed life of George Jetson, daughter Judy, Jane-his wife, his boy-Elroy and some crazy dog that was always causing some kind of chaos...It was space age, personified, and all of these wild futuristic devices they incorporated into the show...made it a super big hit with one and all...They had huge TV screens that just plopped down out of nowhere, telephones very reminiscent of our cell phones today...Food that cooked in ovens in seconds...And the cars were like floating space roavers that zoomed throughout its kooky solar system of old-fashoined stores and burger joints that were revved up special to look ultra-modren...supposedly a quick glimpse of the cosmic world that lie ahead for all of us....
Really...almost all of the cartoons back then...would utilize the adventure of space as a way to keep us all glued to the screen, dreaming of the endless possibilites...of what maybe, our destiny, would be, of someday...all of us...finding our way...into the far reaches of space....
Check out an episode of Clutch Cargo, which was about the most absurdly drawn, cartoon, which utilized the bizarre option of big, moving, red lips, to advance the dialogue of a scene while stuck on the same page of frozen cartoon images...(Search Youtube. com....Creepy Cartoon with Human Mouths...)
It's so proposterous to see this fluid transition from Earth to Space...within seconds, with a child named Spinner and a dog named Paddlefoot...along for the rocket rode with Clutch...
And this image was almost repeated in some way, shape and form for every show embracing our nation's passion for space exploration...I guess, we were a unique generation exposed to such a bizzare perspective...that all things space related...held the key to our future...
...And the tv shows also liked to play up this angle too...Who can forget the rabidly popular, I DREAM OF JEANNIE.....Here we had an incredibly gorgeous, knock-out of a girl locked up in a bottle, magically released by an astronaut, who had landed hard in a remote area...From there, the whimsical adventures of Jeannie and her master, Major Tony Nelson were born....to light up our eyes, with hilarious spoofs and stories...We just couldn't get enough of that...
Also, the fascination with space carried over to everyday life for us kids, as several food products had a space connection, that we all just had to get our hands on...TANG-an orange flavored powder mix was plugged as the drink of the astronauts, loaded with Vitamin C, which at the time, nobody heard of....What was Vitamin C...???...Well, we concluded, if those darn astronauts were drinking this stuff...I gotta try this stuff, too....
An even funkier concoction, were, SPACE FOOD STICKS...This was the primative, early form, of what an energy bar, would someday evolve into...It was a chewy, little elongated stick that was about 5 inches wide...and tasted sweet & spongy....when you tried to eat it...Wow, us kids all thought...There's astronauts, circling the Earth, right now...and I'm chewing on the exact same food that give them a tremendous jolt of energy, to keep them focused on their mission....Of course, you'd chomp away, and chomp away, waiting for some boost in energy but it was about as nutritious as a bowl of Captain Crunch cereal....
You can pop up some commercials on TANG and SPACE FOOD STICKS on YOUTUBE.com and find yourself, laughing hysterically, at these totally over-hyped, proposterous food and drink creations that were really just ordinary items that held no magical powers so many of us were led to believe....
Oh yeah, then there was STAR TREK too...that took hold as a cult classic down the road...but at its inception...Star Trek just seemed a little bit too loony...for us to accept...It took awhile to really catch hold of its special brand of sci-fi noteriaty....Captain James T. Kirk & Doctor Spock beckoned us to believe that both aliens and humans could get along and the amazing journeys that they took us all on....built a foundation of what so many future sci-fi classic inventions...would capitalize on...to render us down their paths of exploring the cosmos....
Of course, previous generations can shout out that FLASH GORDON was the original space show that all others are based upon...but most of us...in the late 60's...had no idea that such great innovative short, feature film classics even existed....
I know nowadays...space has lost its luster...As much as the media tries to hype the vitality and importance of what space missions are providing today....The real, day-to-day news, just seems to overwhelm our interests in paying any attention to any kind of space stuff...It is kinda sad...but...it has lost its shock value also because so much of what we use today, from cell phones to I-Pods, have just as much of an innovation factor...that are just common advances we've come to expect to happen...In our time...the great innovations were touted as coming to fruition from our beloved NASA Space Program...
LET US COMMENCE THE COUNTDOWN...!!!
Five....Four....Three.....Two....One.....BLAST-OFF......!!!!!!
Just a quick, short phrase, every one of kids, of long ago, would repeat, with a great amount of heart and enthusiasm....Whether it was when we paused before we were about to run outside to play for the day or driving our parents nuts, engaged in a mega-solar lift-off while orbiting our tasteless, vegatables on a fork when we were ordered to eat them at dinner time...Yeah...we were imaginative kids...all hepped up on the abundance of space stuff that intertwined into our daily rituals...It's probably a good thing that we would grow out of that phase quickly as we did...but it nonetheless...is rooted cosmically, way, way back...deeply into our spacious orb of conscienceness...whether we like it or not...even to this very day...if we care to dwell upon and admit it....Well...at least...I'll climb out of my lunar module and admit it..........Oh well, I'll say it again.......as I fondly bid good-bye....How times....have changed....!!!
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
From Bozo to Baseball
...As long as I can remember back, I have always been a completely obsessed sports fan...I mean I had every imaginable trading card of every player of every team from almost every sport. Looking back, I can even recall opening up a pack of baseball cards and seeing a Mickey Mantle card and being pissed that I got his card, furiously tearing it up and throwing it up in the air because he had retired that year...I'm thinking that must have been around 1969 and that card today probably would buy me some season's tickets to any sports venue for a year...
...All the Chicago teams were huge favorites to me growing up and it's impossible to rate them in some kind of all-time favorite order...But I do intend on spending some time giving you some of my insights and recollections regarding my vast array of golden sports memories throughout these memoirs...
First up...the Cubs...I know...I know...that's a shocker...me being from the South-Side but the Cubs were on WGN and they had a huge advantage of gaining my attention over the years...especially as a little youngster...On any given day, you could go from watching the kooky antics of Bozo's Circus at Noon followed by the Cubs Lead-Off Man Show...at 1pm...(which was sponsored by Danley Garages way back then and even now)...
....The Cubs were loaded back in 1969, so many of those players have their numbers flying out on flagpoles erected in the outfield bleachers...nowadays...but back then...these guys just were average to decently-great prospects...who could just do it all, that magical season...Santo, Billy Williams, Glenn Beckert, Randy Hundley, Fergie Jenkins and Mister Cub, himself, Ernie Banks...
...As a kid...baseball was King...It was by far...America's Pastime...in every sense of the word. Every kid wore a baseball cap...and they probably wore that cap every day, no matter how sweaty and grimy and dirty and ripped and bent it got...Losing your baseball cap was like losing a limb...It almost felt un-natural not to have one on...I kinda got mad because I'd see so many Cubs caps at department stores back then...but hardly any White Sox caps...It's no wonder that the Cubs held a huge lead in popularity...All the White Sox had back then was an aging shortstop, Louie Aparicio and a young fast-ball pitcher Tommy John...I can't recall anyone else being that great...maybe pitcher Joel Horlen and new knuckle-baller Wilbur Wood but that is reaching...a bit...
...We were basically a young generation that had inherited a passion for baseball from our fathers...who were equally rabid about baseball from their early years on up...also...My Dad absolutely hated the New York Yankees...and I also followed his lead by hating the Bronx Bombers...from the get-go, too...They were just awful back then...the Yanks...but they had the mystique of DiMaggio and Gerhig and Ruth to fall back upon...even though...that was a good 20-30-40 years before... Heck, Joe DiMaggio was doing Mr. Coffee commercials and that pretty much guaranteed a huge load of good poblicity & sales from his legendary, impeccable image, alone...
...Back to the Cubs in the summner of 1969...It was a special year in Cub history...They had spent so many years without a glimpse of hope of winning a championship...for so long...It had to have been way back around World War II...when they last had a decent chance of taking home a World Series...But this year in 69...everything was going their way...They were way out in front of the Cardinals, I believe and also the Mets...who were still basically considered a rummy expansion franchise compared to everyone else...
...I was up in Children's Memorial Hospital...at the time...for an extensive 3-4 month stretch and you just had to watch the Cubs to keep away the boredom...of being stuck in bed, in a huge plaster cast...after some kind of hellacious back surgery...
...All the doctors and nurses and just about anyone would come into my room and ask me for a score update...while the Cubs were on...because they knew I was glued to the game of that day and could pretty much recall all the highlights like a human highlight reel...
...Children's Memorial Hospital was only a little over a mile away from Wrigley Field...and Cub Fever was running rampant in a huge way...This just had to be their year, everyone kept excitedly repeating, over and over...
...Eventually, I was released from the hospital in July that summer but I kept a close eye on the Cubs as they made their way towards their pennant push...Jack Brickhouse and Lou Boudrou and Vince Lloyd were the everyday WGN announcers back then...and they were great broadcasters who shared the same enthusiasm for this incredible year...evolving on a daily basis for throngs of dedicated fans...Everyone was purely awe-struck by the lead the Cubs kept building and building upon...Wow...coulde this really be the year...!!!!
....The Cubbies, somehow, came up a little short...in the end...down the stretch...as the Amazing Mets...came out of nowhere with some awesome pitching talent...from the likes of young guns--Nolan Ryan & Tug McGraw & Jerry Koosman & Tom Seaver who would go on to capture the National League crown followed by an improbable World Series title....
...It was a bitter moment in time...to see the Cubs fade to a bunch of no-name guys from NYC but most of the Mets young players would go on to have stellar careers...The pain of losing for the Cubs almost overshadowed the brilliance of the Cubs players efforts...and that year...1969...would go down as one of the most traumatic as well as most memorable years in Cub history...
...Over the years...I have continued to follow baseball and the Cubs with great interest for many reasons. Some of my most favorite baseball memories are Cubs games or Sox games that I have either watched or attended with great friends and I'm sure I'll be jumping back in time to give you a glimpse of the essence of Wrigley Field and Comiskey Park and all that has transpired...before my eyes...Oh yeah, let's not forget those White Sox who got their act together finally...for some very memorable teams from the late 70's to mid-80's...And what about old Comiskey Park...which may have lacked the charm of other parks like Wrigley Field but still was held in reverence by baseball purists as the real place to see baseball in Chicago...I have every intention of instilling the aura that surrounded these ball parks, which should be alot of fun...
...Right now...at this moment...in October of 2008...the Cubs, the Sox and even the Brewers are in the play-offs, perched up at the top...ready to take a shot at a World Series title...The Cubs will face off against the Los Angeles Dodgers...another team...I really hate...We'll see what happens...The Sox are tussling with the new kids, the Tampa Bay Rays...and the Brew Crew are in for a battle with the Phillies of Philadelphia...These lucky teams are going for it all...this post-season...so this year, especially, in 2008, has been a remarkable year for baseball....that has unfolded...for all of the fans in the Upper Midwest and everywhere across the U.S.A...to enjoy immensely and elusively try to hold onto...every minute they can...
(...As a footnote...I did want to mention that with all those loads and loads of baseball cards I had collected, they had to be stacked, piled all up in rubber bands...My Dad, seeing this, would come home every so often with some really cool cigar boxes for me to store all my cards in...These cigar boxes were mostly top-notch, wooden, with a heavy metal clasp to keep it shut tight and its dimensions were a perfect fit for stuffing a huge bunch of cards together...And after awhile...the cards even developed a distinct pungent, sweet tobacco smell to them...Every so often...years later, whenever I would light up a cigar on occasion...I would think back to those cigar boxes my Dad had given me long ago...Gosh, that huge collection of baseball cards would be worth a fortune, right now, but I know I would probably still keep them, if I had the chance...I laugh now because I can still remember having a rookie Lou Pinella mini-poster they had specially made of all the promising rookies coming up back then when he came into the big leagues with the Kansas City Royals...Here we are, 40 years later and Lou is pretty much the cagey old manager of the Cubs...with his trademark fiery temper boiling over, now and then, beneath that once, youthful and talented athlete...from ages ago...You could say I did keep myself quite absorbed in sports back then...but it was a great hobby...and to think back at all the outstanding players I got to watch flourish before my eyes...was quite a treat...)
...All the Chicago teams were huge favorites to me growing up and it's impossible to rate them in some kind of all-time favorite order...But I do intend on spending some time giving you some of my insights and recollections regarding my vast array of golden sports memories throughout these memoirs...
First up...the Cubs...I know...I know...that's a shocker...me being from the South-Side but the Cubs were on WGN and they had a huge advantage of gaining my attention over the years...especially as a little youngster...On any given day, you could go from watching the kooky antics of Bozo's Circus at Noon followed by the Cubs Lead-Off Man Show...at 1pm...(which was sponsored by Danley Garages way back then and even now)...
....The Cubs were loaded back in 1969, so many of those players have their numbers flying out on flagpoles erected in the outfield bleachers...nowadays...but back then...these guys just were average to decently-great prospects...who could just do it all, that magical season...Santo, Billy Williams, Glenn Beckert, Randy Hundley, Fergie Jenkins and Mister Cub, himself, Ernie Banks...
...As a kid...baseball was King...It was by far...America's Pastime...in every sense of the word. Every kid wore a baseball cap...and they probably wore that cap every day, no matter how sweaty and grimy and dirty and ripped and bent it got...Losing your baseball cap was like losing a limb...It almost felt un-natural not to have one on...I kinda got mad because I'd see so many Cubs caps at department stores back then...but hardly any White Sox caps...It's no wonder that the Cubs held a huge lead in popularity...All the White Sox had back then was an aging shortstop, Louie Aparicio and a young fast-ball pitcher Tommy John...I can't recall anyone else being that great...maybe pitcher Joel Horlen and new knuckle-baller Wilbur Wood but that is reaching...a bit...
...We were basically a young generation that had inherited a passion for baseball from our fathers...who were equally rabid about baseball from their early years on up...also...My Dad absolutely hated the New York Yankees...and I also followed his lead by hating the Bronx Bombers...from the get-go, too...They were just awful back then...the Yanks...but they had the mystique of DiMaggio and Gerhig and Ruth to fall back upon...even though...that was a good 20-30-40 years before... Heck, Joe DiMaggio was doing Mr. Coffee commercials and that pretty much guaranteed a huge load of good poblicity & sales from his legendary, impeccable image, alone...
...Back to the Cubs in the summner of 1969...It was a special year in Cub history...They had spent so many years without a glimpse of hope of winning a championship...for so long...It had to have been way back around World War II...when they last had a decent chance of taking home a World Series...But this year in 69...everything was going their way...They were way out in front of the Cardinals, I believe and also the Mets...who were still basically considered a rummy expansion franchise compared to everyone else...
...I was up in Children's Memorial Hospital...at the time...for an extensive 3-4 month stretch and you just had to watch the Cubs to keep away the boredom...of being stuck in bed, in a huge plaster cast...after some kind of hellacious back surgery...
...All the doctors and nurses and just about anyone would come into my room and ask me for a score update...while the Cubs were on...because they knew I was glued to the game of that day and could pretty much recall all the highlights like a human highlight reel...
...Children's Memorial Hospital was only a little over a mile away from Wrigley Field...and Cub Fever was running rampant in a huge way...This just had to be their year, everyone kept excitedly repeating, over and over...
...Eventually, I was released from the hospital in July that summer but I kept a close eye on the Cubs as they made their way towards their pennant push...Jack Brickhouse and Lou Boudrou and Vince Lloyd were the everyday WGN announcers back then...and they were great broadcasters who shared the same enthusiasm for this incredible year...evolving on a daily basis for throngs of dedicated fans...Everyone was purely awe-struck by the lead the Cubs kept building and building upon...Wow...coulde this really be the year...!!!!
....The Cubbies, somehow, came up a little short...in the end...down the stretch...as the Amazing Mets...came out of nowhere with some awesome pitching talent...from the likes of young guns--Nolan Ryan & Tug McGraw & Jerry Koosman & Tom Seaver who would go on to capture the National League crown followed by an improbable World Series title....
...It was a bitter moment in time...to see the Cubs fade to a bunch of no-name guys from NYC but most of the Mets young players would go on to have stellar careers...The pain of losing for the Cubs almost overshadowed the brilliance of the Cubs players efforts...and that year...1969...would go down as one of the most traumatic as well as most memorable years in Cub history...
...Over the years...I have continued to follow baseball and the Cubs with great interest for many reasons. Some of my most favorite baseball memories are Cubs games or Sox games that I have either watched or attended with great friends and I'm sure I'll be jumping back in time to give you a glimpse of the essence of Wrigley Field and Comiskey Park and all that has transpired...before my eyes...Oh yeah, let's not forget those White Sox who got their act together finally...for some very memorable teams from the late 70's to mid-80's...And what about old Comiskey Park...which may have lacked the charm of other parks like Wrigley Field but still was held in reverence by baseball purists as the real place to see baseball in Chicago...I have every intention of instilling the aura that surrounded these ball parks, which should be alot of fun...
...Right now...at this moment...in October of 2008...the Cubs, the Sox and even the Brewers are in the play-offs, perched up at the top...ready to take a shot at a World Series title...The Cubs will face off against the Los Angeles Dodgers...another team...I really hate...We'll see what happens...The Sox are tussling with the new kids, the Tampa Bay Rays...and the Brew Crew are in for a battle with the Phillies of Philadelphia...These lucky teams are going for it all...this post-season...so this year, especially, in 2008, has been a remarkable year for baseball....that has unfolded...for all of the fans in the Upper Midwest and everywhere across the U.S.A...to enjoy immensely and elusively try to hold onto...every minute they can...
(...As a footnote...I did want to mention that with all those loads and loads of baseball cards I had collected, they had to be stacked, piled all up in rubber bands...My Dad, seeing this, would come home every so often with some really cool cigar boxes for me to store all my cards in...These cigar boxes were mostly top-notch, wooden, with a heavy metal clasp to keep it shut tight and its dimensions were a perfect fit for stuffing a huge bunch of cards together...And after awhile...the cards even developed a distinct pungent, sweet tobacco smell to them...Every so often...years later, whenever I would light up a cigar on occasion...I would think back to those cigar boxes my Dad had given me long ago...Gosh, that huge collection of baseball cards would be worth a fortune, right now, but I know I would probably still keep them, if I had the chance...I laugh now because I can still remember having a rookie Lou Pinella mini-poster they had specially made of all the promising rookies coming up back then when he came into the big leagues with the Kansas City Royals...Here we are, 40 years later and Lou is pretty much the cagey old manager of the Cubs...with his trademark fiery temper boiling over, now and then, beneath that once, youthful and talented athlete...from ages ago...You could say I did keep myself quite absorbed in sports back then...but it was a great hobby...and to think back at all the outstanding players I got to watch flourish before my eyes...was quite a treat...)
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