Part 2

One more thing I have to relate
about dear old Maryland,
much as I hate to even think about it:
One day at the bus stop,
this big kid beat me up
and I don’t even remember why.
Maybe he said something to me
and I said something back,
never realizing
people kick your butt
without even thinking
for that sort of thing.
It terrified me
someone would
just start hitting you,
me,
over mere words,
over anything.
No one in my family ever kicked anyone's butt.
In my family,
people hardly raised their voices in anger.
None of my friends in Athens,
in fact, no one at all,
had ever gotten mad
and attacked me physically.
I now knew
the world is dangerous;
and, to make matters worse
much, much worse,
I ran home yelling for my mother
to save me
and naturally I concluded
I was a chicken,
a yellow-bellied coward,
those were the words for it
way back then.
My Dad was of no help at all,
he knew nothing of fighting,
even though he had been in World War II.
Through sheer luck,
Dad landed
in one of the safest of overseas theaters,
building airstrips
in, of all places,
India
for B-29’s to take off from to fly the Hump,
Dad, the amateur expert
on the ferociously bloody Civil War,
who wanted to go to West Point
and almost made it in.
This shame and humiliation followed me
for a very long time
as my mouth got my ass beat again
much later,
among other humiliations
it brought down upon me
along the way.
When will I ever learn?
But, I now know
I’m not a coward,
neither mental nor physical,
I’ve proven it more than once;
but, it took a long time,
a very long and very painful time
to figure that out.

How I became me (part 1)

How young was I
when I started being me?
It began,
I remember,
with curiosity
(same thing that killed the cat).
Everything interested me,
especially things in books,
and sports,
and people,
and girls.
I fell in love with girls very early on.
Little girls in movies
like Priscilla in Johnny Tremain,
I can still sing The Sons of Liberty,
Jesus, it was 1957,
I was only five,
and the circus girl in Toby Tyler,
Hayley Mills in The Parent Trap,
even cute pictures
of little girls in magazines.
It didn’t take much for me to fall in love.
My little boy picture
must be next to the encyclopedia entry,
“hopeless romantic.”
Music came a little bit later,
but not much.
I liked the stuff my Mom listened to,
Tommy Dorsey, Glen Miller, and Dixieland,
but I trace the real passion
to third grade in Rockville, MD
and my friendship with Howard Pomerantz,
also my first Jewish friend.
I asked him, “What church do you belong to?”
and he said, “I’m Jewish.”
and I said, “What’s that?”
Howard and I talked music
It would have been 1963
I remember Kennedy-Nixon when I was up there
(Kennedy wasn’t shot until after I got back to Athens).
I was excited because the Democrat finally won one,
having suffered through Adlai Stevenson losing to Ike
when I was 4 years old.
So, I was into Top 40.
The Monster Mash was the first single I ever got
after talking my Dad into buying it for me
which took some real persuasion
as I recall.
I can still sing the whole song.
I remember listening to records over at Danny Muller’s house.
It was his big sister, Shirley, who had the records and the record player.
She had Elvis’ album Blue Hawaii.
I didn’t particularly love Elvis
As he seemed a bit passé;
and the late doo-wop tunes
like Blue Moon
were kinda ridiculous
I felt.
What grabbed me was r&b,
Party Lights and the Locomotion,
twisting again with Chubby Checker
when I was up there with the Yankees
who made serious fun of the way I said, “bicycle.”
And the best dance I could ever do was the Jerk.
Ironic?
Anyway, I could jerk my little boy body with the best of them
all in time with the beat,
to accent the music,
and, no use being falsely modest,
it’s still one of my major talents.
Another thing that happened up there,
this guy in a suit who sold musical instruments
came by the school,
- I think it was Aspen Hills,
the third grade -
and gave a little aptitude screening test
to all the kids.
It consisted of him tapping out a rhythm on top of a desk
and the kid repeating it accurately.
I aced it
and ended up with a trumpet,
the twisting loops of copper and brass
all shiny and beautiful.
I ultimately hated the damn thing,
but I stayed in band long enough to learn the basics of music,
which came in handy much later.