“You'll be amazing, more
thankful, put more heart and soul into your life more than most... and it will
show! I know that you went through great pain... you are now an even stronger
person that you were before. I am
so proud of you, and I wish you nothing but joy, love, and success!” – quoted
from a friend of mine.
I avoid exaggeration—except for sarcasm—and keep this narrative as factual as I can recall. It may seem unbelievable, but it is quite an adventure. Many people told me (depending on my mood, I might agree) that I was born in "the wrong time". I was born with an innate sense of doing good, with a sense of community/contribution. How would I know that it would work in other parts of the world but not on Long Island, which is full of "users". It's like Upton Sinclair's 1906 The Jungle, where the main character arrives in New York full of generosity, only to be taken advantage of by the people.
I grew up in America's first quintessential suburbia: an area named Levittown. It was filled with Levitt houses that existed since 1947-1950.
It is situated on Long Island. (Yes, I grew up on an island). Before the European Age of Discovery, the island was inhabited by Algonquin-speaking Native Americans. Undisturbed, the Lenape, Massapequa, Matinecock, and Shinnecock tribes lived there for thousands of years. Eventually, their lush prairie was paved into modern suburbs to feed New York City. (Ironically, a Native American name for the island was Paumanok, which meant "The Island That Pays Tribute". Fate has a sense of humor). In the 1610s, Dutch settlers named it Lange Eylant (Long Island).
In 1664, an Englishman named John Seaman bought settlement rights from the Massapequan Indians. That land is where I attended Jonas Salk Middle School (named for the doctor who cured polio). In 1947, William Levitt (of Brooklyn) won approval to build a mass-produced community named Levittown on the land that was previously potato fields.
My ancestry includes German, English, Alsatian, Russian, and Dutch heritage. I don't yet have many details. My last name is German, as is my father's genealogy. The earliest references of that lineage occur in Germany in the 1650s. I am not sure if my ancestors arrived as Hessian troops (from the Principality of Hesse) during the American Revolution, or fortune-seekers from the Kingdom of Prussia, or émigrés from the German Confederation of the mid-1800s.
I was born into a small family, and I don't know any of my European relatives who might exist. After only several years, three of my grandparents died. I know nothing of my paternal grandmother's family because it wasn't talked about. My paternal grandfather was a cantankerous man who was outlived by his two brothers, yet they never discussed their lineage. I only know snippets of my maternal grandparents and their ancestries. However, my maternal grandmother's family did not associate with us.
In 1904, my great-grandmother (my maternal grandfather's mother) immigrated to America from the Russian Empire. That was the year of the Russo-Japanese War and the founding of the Marxist Union of Liberation. After being a citizen of Czar Nicholas II, she was exhilarated to belong to the republic of the USA, which falsely promised less corruption than the imperial system. (The USA had only 45 states at that time). She sailed aboard a Cunard steamship, the Ultonia: an 1898 British cargo vessel that added second-class accommodations in 1903. At that time, Cunard was known for the fastest transatlantic voyages. She sailed past the Statue of Liberty and was processed through the Ellis Island Immigration Center...
...where officials uncaringly shortened her surname on her new Identification Forms—without her consent—because it was easier for them to pronounce. Her name remained altered.
On her journey, the ship docked in the Netherlands, and she bought a porcelain bowl. She lived into her 90s and died when I was young. Fond of the memories, I used that bowl, as I grew into an adult. (In her final years, she needed to live in a nursing home. The exorbitant costs—typical of American healthcare—drained all of her funds and half of the money that my grandparents worked during their lives to save. As such, it was not a pleasant start or end to her time in the USA).
My maternal grandmother's heritage is English, Alsatian, and Dutch. Her English surname was Titus, and her forebears could've emigrated anytime between the 1630s and 1850s. We suspect that they arrived early as Quakers and mixed with the Dutch, since those nationalities were the only two in the region. My Dutch (Netherlandish) lineage comes from the era of the Van Rensselaer family patroon, who founded the Dutch West India Company and settled in New York in the 1600s. For a time, Long Island was owned by that company.
Incidentally, I grew up in Nassau County. Originally, the land was part of Queens County (named for the Queen of England in 1683). But in 1898, New York City annexed it to get its revenue, so the area seceded to become its own county. It was named for the ancient noble House of Nassau (founded in 1093) that still rules the Kingdom of the Netherlands. This is its coat of arms.
It and NYC are the most populous parts of New York State. Originally named New Netherlands, the area was surrendered by the Dutch to the English in 1664. It was renamed as New York, in honor of the Duke of York. His fleet captured it, and he was destined to become King James II. (Ironically, the English crowned a Dutchman as their next king in 1690, but he did not alter its name). For over a century, the Province of New York was a Crown Colony of British America. New Yorkers were so devoted to Britain that NY was the last of 13 colonies to declare independence from the British Empire, and its royal governor stayed until the year before the patriots won the war. It was the only colony that didn't approve edicts from the First Continental Congress and refused to send delegates to the second. It hosted the largest battle of the Revolution, as the British Army and loyalist (royalist) refugees recaptured the area in 1776 and retained it until the end of the war in 1783. NY was the British headquarters for political and military operations in North America, and it's flag is below. America broke away from the British Empire, yet NY calls itself the Empire State since 1785.
My maternal grandfather had a sister, but she died as a teen. Thankfully, I had a great rapport with him. He served as a police officer in his community: the Village of Floral Park.
He instilled upstanding values in me. Perhaps that is why my LEGO toy "community" had 18 citizens but nearly half were policemen. :-)
He died when I entered high school. My mother is an only-child.
Even with the relatives that I have, my family is still small. My father's brother divorced his wife and abandoned their child (I never met them), and he remains aloof. My father's father had two brothers; those uncles and aunts were active in my life. But their children were not: one relocated across the nation to New Mexico, another relocated to the edge of civilization in Alaska, another remained secluded with her own family on outer Long Island, and the fourth remained a single "party girl" whom I saw at Christmas.
Now, I'll describe where I grew up.
In the 1940s, America's "powers that be" decided to alter the society of America. Commencing post-war changes, the Levitt Multi-Housing Corporation gobbled up much of the land in Nassau County. The corporation established a community called Levittown. Like feeding a psychotic glutton, it triggered a never-ending consumption of land to constantly build more overcrowded housing. Levitt built another Levittown in New Jersey, then one in Pennsylvania, then in Puerto Rico. Levitt also consumed the 38-acre "Back Lot" at MGM Studios in California.
Similar to the "housing market bubble" of 2008, Levitt got the government's help to seduce young buyers. Thus, Levitt's homes were cheaper than renting apartments. How was that possible? The federal government backed "generous" mortgages—especially for returning World War II soldiers. But not for everybody. They wanted a specific type: mom, dad, 2.5 children, but no grandparents. Levitt homes were built without room for multiple generations, which was unlike earlier American communities. No African Americans either; original contracts precluded buyers from reselling to that race!
Before Levittown, most housing construction in America involved certain design elements. Levitt & Sons built homes that set the post-war standard: fast & cheap. No porches, no attics, no basements, no garages (at first), no ornamentation, no full second floor. Levitt built "bungalows"... the style of home that beach or prairie dwellers might use. They applied a slick advertising campaign to lure buyers.
Of course, the creation of (sterile) suburbs triggered the rotting decline of cities, for the next four decades. Such planning!
Below are ads for the Levitt homes.
Levitt distributed an Owners Manual that "planted the seed" for manic Lawn Care in the suburbs (which was made fun of in the 2005 Jim Carey movie, "Fun with Dick & Jane").
The larger houses were modeled on the cottages that Levitt's servants occupied on his estate. My family lived in the largest ranch-style version. Levittown, NY was a mass-produced community that still has no town center.
That's what you get when you build merely for profit and not for a "sense of community" like "garden-city-movement communities" have… or like Cape May or Frank Lloyd Wright's communities.
It was the result of diseased values, with no hope that its first residents' integrity lasted beyond their generation. Why? Greed and the constricted access to Long Island became a breeding ground for corrupt home-contractors, repairmen, tax collectors, gasoline/oil suppliers, utility companies, retailers, commuter railroads, car dealerships, mechanics, insurance companies, and toll collectors.
It became a place for cops to "fill their quota" via speed traps, seatbelt checks, and entrapment for DWI. Profiteers didn't see "families" needing life balance; they saw possibilities for over-consumption and financial interest rate payments.
It's a shame that Long Island home-buyers were lured under false pretenses by the promise of "a better life".
I caught the last vestiges of "establishment" before that generation died or sold their businesses. In comparison to the quaint picture below, current-day ice cream trucks erased their prices, so the drivers can illegally charge whatever they want in different neighborhoods!
Say Goodbye to genuine integrity that made the isolated island community tolerable. The current attitude is like this...
I grew up in a Caucasian world: teachers, school janitors, mailmen, truck drivers, gardeners, and sanitation workers were white. (Yet, I grew up to savor all ethnicities.)
It was also a safe world. As a kid, I rode my bicycle all over the curving suburban streets without fear of danger… except for a barking dog. I love cycling! I put so much mileage on my bike that my father had to replace the tires.
However, my parents forbid me to ride beyond 3 streets from our home, so I had a small radius. Yet, I could ride my bike "until the street lights came on". They were quiet streets. Sections had street names starting with each letter of the alphabet. I lived in the "E" section; you entered via Entry Lane, and could leave via Exit Lane.
The only problem is that every household of 4 people has 5 cars! Lots of consumption and expenses. They hemorrhage $
Like many Americans, they became hoarders. Midnight shopping on TV. Catalogs. "Impulse buys" online. Lots of stuff to supposedly make them happy, which only costs them lots of money to buy, fix, maintain, and pay credit card interest rates for.
At dusk, all the Dads arrived home from the local commuter train station (just like scenes in "Edward Scissorhands", seen below, whose neighborhood was based on Levittown).
My Dad drove a Cadillac Coupe Deville (below). Each night, his arriving headlights decreed dread, as they angled up the driveway and glared into our kitchen windows. He was not a nice man.
As escape for me was the Levittown Public Library... sadly, 3 miles from my house. I loved going there. The librarian became fond of me—seeing me eagerly participate in "Reading for Kids" and "Summertime Reading" programs. It was an imaginative "cultivating ground" for me.
But the library was built during the same era as NYC's Lincoln Center. Similarly, it wasn't designed as a "connector" for the community. It gave a "cold shoulder" to 3 sides of the neighborhood, and sadly wasn't intended to bring folks together.
Notice the similarity: no windows, imposing walls on 3 sides.
I remain thankful for these imaginatively thought-provoking books: Choose Your Own Adventure stories that let you weave different plots by choosing options as your read the chapters.
Before Levittown, most housing construction in America involved certain design elements. Levitt & Sons built homes that set the post-war standard: fast & cheap. No porches, no attics, no basements, no garages (at first), no ornamentation, no full second floor. Levitt built "bungalows"... the style of home that beach or prairie dwellers might use. They applied a slick advertising campaign to lure buyers.
Of course, the creation of (sterile) suburbs triggered the rotting decline of cities, for the next four decades. Such planning!
Below are ads for the Levitt homes.
Levitt distributed an Owners Manual that "planted the seed" for manic Lawn Care in the suburbs (which was made fun of in the 2005 Jim Carey movie, "Fun with Dick & Jane").
The larger houses were modeled on the cottages that Levitt's servants occupied on his estate. My family lived in the largest ranch-style version. Levittown, NY was a mass-produced community that still has no town center.
That's what you get when you build merely for profit and not for a "sense of community" like "garden-city-movement communities" have… or like Cape May or Frank Lloyd Wright's communities.
It was the result of diseased values, with no hope that its first residents' integrity lasted beyond their generation. Why? Greed and the constricted access to Long Island became a breeding ground for corrupt home-contractors, repairmen, tax collectors, gasoline/oil suppliers, utility companies, retailers, commuter railroads, car dealerships, mechanics, insurance companies, and toll collectors.
It became a place for cops to "fill their quota" via speed traps, seatbelt checks, and entrapment for DWI. Profiteers didn't see "families" needing life balance; they saw possibilities for over-consumption and financial interest rate payments.
It's a shame that Long Island home-buyers were lured under false pretenses by the promise of "a better life".
I caught the last vestiges of "establishment" before that generation died or sold their businesses. In comparison to the quaint picture below, current-day ice cream trucks erased their prices, so the drivers can illegally charge whatever they want in different neighborhoods!
Say Goodbye to genuine integrity that made the isolated island community tolerable. The current attitude is like this...
I grew up in a Caucasian world: teachers, school janitors, mailmen, truck drivers, gardeners, and sanitation workers were white. (Yet, I grew up to savor all ethnicities.)
It was also a safe world. As a kid, I rode my bicycle all over the curving suburban streets without fear of danger… except for a barking dog. I love cycling! I put so much mileage on my bike that my father had to replace the tires.
However, my parents forbid me to ride beyond 3 streets from our home, so I had a small radius. Yet, I could ride my bike "until the street lights came on". They were quiet streets. Sections had street names starting with each letter of the alphabet. I lived in the "E" section; you entered via Entry Lane, and could leave via Exit Lane.
Levittown remains unchanged... except for remodeled homes, as seen below.
The only problem is that every household of 4 people has 5 cars! Lots of consumption and expenses. They hemorrhage $
Like many Americans, they became hoarders. Midnight shopping on TV. Catalogs. "Impulse buys" online. Lots of stuff to supposedly make them happy, which only costs them lots of money to buy, fix, maintain, and pay credit card interest rates for.
At dusk, all the Dads arrived home from the local commuter train station (just like scenes in "Edward Scissorhands", seen below, whose neighborhood was based on Levittown).
My Dad drove a Cadillac Coupe Deville (below). Each night, his arriving headlights decreed dread, as they angled up the driveway and glared into our kitchen windows. He was not a nice man.
As escape for me was the Levittown Public Library... sadly, 3 miles from my house. I loved going there. The librarian became fond of me—seeing me eagerly participate in "Reading for Kids" and "Summertime Reading" programs. It was an imaginative "cultivating ground" for me.
But the library was built during the same era as NYC's Lincoln Center. Similarly, it wasn't designed as a "connector" for the community. It gave a "cold shoulder" to 3 sides of the neighborhood, and sadly wasn't intended to bring folks together.
Notice the similarity: no windows, imposing walls on 3 sides.
I remain thankful for these imaginatively thought-provoking books: Choose Your Own Adventure stories that let you weave different plots by choosing options as your read the chapters.
I also treasured the audio books titled Little Thinker, with clever sound effects.
Coupled with my other readings, they instilled a sense of upbeat exploration that I retain when adventuring through life.
There were several Public Pools planned into Levittown. Residents got Pool Passes mailed to them, each year. I walked with my sister (2 years younger than me) to our closest pool. Our mom didn't want to join us.
For Junior High School, I walked 1.7 miles to school because we didn't qualify for bus service. By then, I had a 10-speed bicycle (similar to this)...
But my parents refused to let me ride it to school. They feared vandalism, theft, car crashes, bad drivers, and the lack of bike lanes in America. However, my long walks had moments of intriguing scenery: a colonial clapboard farmhouse built in the 1730s...
...a chapel with cemetery (created as St. Jerusalem by German immigrant farmers in 1856)...
...and a forlorn railroad car from 1912.
From my schools, church, and Boy Scouts, I was repeatedly involved in various Food Drives, fundraisers, cleaning up parks, going with my Music Class to sing at nursing homes, and I was encouraged to help my elderly neighbors rake their leaves or shovel their snow. Honestly, I was happy to do it.
I grew up in time to hear my elders bemoan the recent demolition of the 1895 Garden City Hotel (build by the great architects, McKim, Mead & White—where Vanderbilts, JP Morgan, and Charles Lindbergh stayed, and where turn-of-the-century fox hunts began).
For Junior High School, I walked 1.7 miles to school because we didn't qualify for bus service. By then, I had a 10-speed bicycle (similar to this)...
But my parents refused to let me ride it to school. They feared vandalism, theft, car crashes, bad drivers, and the lack of bike lanes in America. However, my long walks had moments of intriguing scenery: a colonial clapboard farmhouse built in the 1730s...
...a chapel with cemetery (created as St. Jerusalem by German immigrant farmers in 1856)...
...and a forlorn railroad car from 1912.
From my schools, church, and Boy Scouts, I was repeatedly involved in various Food Drives, fundraisers, cleaning up parks, going with my Music Class to sing at nursing homes, and I was encouraged to help my elderly neighbors rake their leaves or shovel their snow. Honestly, I was happy to do it.
I grew up in time to hear my elders bemoan the recent demolition of the 1895 Garden City Hotel (build by the great architects, McKim, Mead & White—where Vanderbilts, JP Morgan, and Charles Lindbergh stayed, and where turn-of-the-century fox hunts began).
That didn't matter to modern suburbanites, many coming from Brooklyn and Queens...
Nor did it matter for insatiably greedy developers, who still carve up any remaining space for "McMansions" and malls.
Nor did it matter for insatiably greedy developers, who still carve up any remaining space for "McMansions" and malls.
LIFE LESSON: By the time I was a young adult—seeing the world beyond my backyard—I realized how corrupt and ugly LI's suburbia was. Price-gouging, ripoffs for auto/home repairs that don't fix the problems, mechanics or plumbers who create more problems than existed, and fees/surcharges for almost everything.
Those tree-lined homes look nice, but in order to get to any stores or activities, you must DRIVE somewhere… often a LONG time-consuming route. Hempstead Turnpike is the most congested road, punctuated at nearly every intersection with traffic lights that block the flow of traffic, so that it takes a half hour to drive a 10-min distance.
Thanks to corrupt Sanitation Departments and Road Construction crews, the average suburbanite must endure unnecessary, year-round traffic jams—just to commute daily to work, visit friends, go to the movies, or go shopping. Ask anyone from LI, and they'll describe how as soon as you get onto the entrance ramp to the nearest parkway, highway, or expressway, you undoubtedly encounter this...
They have speed-trap cameras. Speeding fines are doubled in work zones, so don't be surprised if that encourages the "work zone" to linger longer than necessary.
Regardless of the season, LI traffic and "rubbernecking" makes driving terrible... especially in snow (which they're known for being ineffectively sloppy about removing).
Watch this amazing short video to prove how things could be rectified with proper Driver Education... that NY doesn't care to do.
It reminds you of Michael Douglas's character in the film "Falling Down", where he gets fed up with unnecessary traffic delays (by overpaid lazy road crews) and explodes at them.
LI is notorious for surprising late-night drivers with nighttime construction, too. It's never-ending.
With all that year-round roadwork (and such high taxes), you'd think that LI would have the BEST infrastructure and best roadways. Nope. It's almost the same story that explains why the most-used and highest-charging subway system (NYC's MTA) is still in such a dilapidated condition.
In traffic jams (either by construction, congestion, rubbernecking, or a car being towed away), the polluted air was heavy with the nightmarish implication that the situation was inescapable. Thus, you spend a lot of money for a good car, which you can't drive anywhere (despite the car ads on TV). You'd be hard-pressed to find a driver from Long Island who's unfamiliar with the boredom and frustration that came from sitting in endless day-after-day traffic.
Hence, LI is famous for "Road Rage": cutting people off, jamming on the brakes to scare the person behind them, racing someone to show aggression, blaring the horn endlessly, flashing the high beam headlights in someone's rearview mirror to agitate them, "tailgating", speeding around someone and then suddenly stopping in front of them to aggravate them. During my commute to my post-college job on the congested Seaford Oyster Bay Expressway, I regularly saw drivers get out of their cars to threateningly approach, curse, kick the door, and instigate fights with other drivers! I'm not lying! It was terrible.
Long Island generates so much money in traffic fines that it is served by Nassau County Police, NY State Troopers, local Incorporated Village Police Departments, and citation-writing Park Rangers. Via "entrapment", they target cars leaving bars and catering halls. Yet, they don't notice illegal aliens riding in the backs of commercial lawn-service trucks, or the swerving cars leaving the local firehouses' summertime parties! They stand at the ends of highway exit ramps… to zap each and every vehicle with a speed gun (resembling the picture below).
If those disturbances weren't enough, any day of the week could erupt with local noise. Starting at 8am, gardener crews used leaf blowers, lawnmowers, edgers, hedge trimmers, shredders, and backhoes. When I was 12, I was told to begin mowing our front & back lawns… like other sons did.
Only six years later, noise-polluting garden crews of (underpaid) illegal aliens did the work. Imagine 30 houses on a lane. That's hours of noise! AND, you heard the gardeners working in the yards BEHIND yours, too. No "sitting on the patio with coffee and newspaper". No "summertime hammock" or "sunbathing" if a gardening crew suddenly arrived and needed to trim your yard or a neighbor's trees. You had to close the windows, too, or suffer a layer of "garden dust" inside your home. Naturally, it seemed to occur right after your car was washed.
Not to mention that since all of the homes were built in the same years...
...they all needed new roofs, vinyl siding, rain gutters, driveway paving, cesspools, and windows at around THE SAME TIME. There were years of never-ending construction noise.
Perhaps my father saw the "writing on the wall" for LI's suburbia (and its never-ending rising taxes). He secretly wanted to move upstate to the countryside... without us.
...they all needed new roofs, vinyl siding, rain gutters, driveway paving, cesspools, and windows at around THE SAME TIME. There were years of never-ending construction noise.
Perhaps my father saw the "writing on the wall" for LI's suburbia (and its never-ending rising taxes). He secretly wanted to move upstate to the countryside... without us.
My father commuted via the Long Island Railroad (the busiest yet most corrupt commuter railroad in America) to
Manhattan. *(Near the station, people saw wild turkeys crossing Wantagh Avenue. It was still that bucolic, back then. The New York Times wrote about the turkeys:
http://www.nytimes.com/1984/02/12/nyregion/wild-turkeys-find-a-home-in-li-suburb.html
http://www.nytimes.com/1984/02/12/nyregion/wild-turkeys-find-a-home-in-li-suburb.html
However, as overdevelopment spread, they disappeared... along with rabbits, hummingbirds, frogs, possums, and raccoons).
My dad did not find beauty in a metropolis. He hated his job and the
city. As for my mother? She was afraid of taking chances with almost anything. So, they kept life
grounded by staying in, each as a “homebody”. Preferring to stay amidst suburban "cookie-cutter homes", my parents were actually against venturing into NYC. My father decreed our vacations to be in repetitive “woodsy” areas and to meagerly associate amongst his aloof
relatives for “obligatory holidays”. It was the same thing, year after year. Only once did he succumb to his uncle's instructions to take our family to Disney World (a very American thing to do). Being too cheap and fearful of people/germs, he refused to use an airline. Instead, he drove the 1,200 miles, which took two days to accomplish! We merely spent two days in the amusement park and applied two days to drive home. Not fun.
My mother was an only child. She had self-esteem issues that she carried through her years (and multiple therapeutic
scenarios). Sadly, she was
not good at getting things done, making decisions, or doing the simplest things
in the absence of my father. As
such, I grew up being drawn into a parenting role for my own mother and for myself. She confided in me, solicited advice
from me, asked my help strategizing against my father, asked my help in
managing her bills and stabilizing her finances. None of it was forced at gunpoint onto me, and I accept responsibility for trying to aid her. I believed that it was the right thing to do... but I wish that I received level-headed advice, at the time, to steer me away from it.
I'm different from many people: I don't settle for mediocrity. I'm not a snob, but I always try to do my best. Even in elementary school, a teacher complimented that I was never distracted by things like a pen dropping in the back of the classroom. As other kids turned around to see what happened (as if it were some miracle), I recognized the sound and simply kept my attention focused on the lesson ahead. (You'll be surprised how many adults still get distracted by the sound of a pen falling in the middle of a meeting). I scored well on all the "classifying" exams. I scored very well on the NYS-madanted Regents Exams (hardly any other state in America has those, but NY schools happily charged money for preparative tutoring), as well as the pre-SAT and SAT exams ($ame $ituations there).
As a teenager, I worked to pay for my own school supplies, and I earned college scholarships and grants. It taught me the value of money management and "trade-offs". Never allowed to ask my parents for money, I saved up and bought my own word processor, then my own computer (after college), my own car (after college), my own cell phone (after college) and my own clothes (via catalog, until I had a car). Unlike many kids, I never received "an allowance" from my parents, but I did I open my own bank account at a young age.
My sense of values is unique. As a boy, after I broke my mother's crystal bowl, I waited in the kitchen for her to find me—ready for my punishment that I knew I deserved. As a young adult, I recall speeding on the expressway, but as I saw a hidden policeman emerge from his speed-trap to pursue me, I automatically pulled over (he didn't even need to drive off the grass). He still gave me a ticket... and a court summons.
I'm different from many people: I don't settle for mediocrity. I'm not a snob, but I always try to do my best. Even in elementary school, a teacher complimented that I was never distracted by things like a pen dropping in the back of the classroom. As other kids turned around to see what happened (as if it were some miracle), I recognized the sound and simply kept my attention focused on the lesson ahead. (You'll be surprised how many adults still get distracted by the sound of a pen falling in the middle of a meeting). I scored well on all the "classifying" exams. I scored very well on the NYS-madanted Regents Exams (hardly any other state in America has those, but NY schools happily charged money for preparative tutoring), as well as the pre-SAT and SAT exams ($ame $ituations there).
As a teenager, I worked to pay for my own school supplies, and I earned college scholarships and grants. It taught me the value of money management and "trade-offs". Never allowed to ask my parents for money, I saved up and bought my own word processor, then my own computer (after college), my own car (after college), my own cell phone (after college) and my own clothes (via catalog, until I had a car). Unlike many kids, I never received "an allowance" from my parents, but I did I open my own bank account at a young age.
My sense of values is unique. As a boy, after I broke my mother's crystal bowl, I waited in the kitchen for her to find me—ready for my punishment that I knew I deserved. As a young adult, I recall speeding on the expressway, but as I saw a hidden policeman emerge from his speed-trap to pursue me, I automatically pulled over (he didn't even need to drive off the grass). He still gave me a ticket... and a court summons.
The most important
thing for a father is to be involved in his children’s’ lives. My father never got the memo. He refused to show emotion. I only saw him cry once. When I was a young boy, my paternal grandfather died, and Dad hadn’t got what he expected from the will! From that, I learned what Self-Help author, Stephen Covey, calls “Putting Your Ladder Up Against the Wrong Wall”.
My father’s life was planned for him by his
father, a very
successful advertising man (a true "Mad Man") of the 1960s.
He bought a new car every year (with cash), owned gleaming wooden rumrunner
boats, multiple homes, and the first color television in his neighborhood. He got his two sons into “the business”. My dad expected to “have it made" on "Easy Street” by following my grandfather’s orders. So, Dad got married, had two kids, moved to suburbia, bought a four-door sedan (but kept his classic 1960s convertible). He gardened (as was socially expected), and plodded along at his commute and occupation—which he
hated. He bitterly complained
about his work and his bosses. He usually stormed home, finding all that was negative. He held it against our family. My father had no interest in my sister or I during much of our
childhoods. He once said that he supported us by working eight hours a day at a job that he couldn't bear.
The attention we did
receive from him was physically violent. We could sense the anger bubbling inside him… then it only took one mistake to launch him
into screaming, banging his fists, and throwing things.
If he found a room was untidy, he launched the stuff and furniture out into the hallway. I was
chased by that madman around the house and thrown into my chair, which promptly
fell backwards... because I wasn’t fast enough with my homework. As a boy, I recall being knocked
out of my kitchen chair and another time thrown into the wall when I didn’t learn how to tell
time on a clock quickly enough or because I brought a toy to the dinner table. I was locked outside when I didn’t do
my outdoor chores before dark. I
had my face pushed down to “lick up” urine at the base of the toilet bowl when
I was learning to use it as a “stand-up adult”. I was often hit with his belt when I didn’t learn things fast enough for
my father: flash-cards for mathematics, tying knots, putting worms on
fishing hooks, holding the flashlight late at night as he worked on his cars, not stepping carefully enough in his garden when he wanted help weeding.
My mother insistently hid that illegal Child Abuse from our relatives and neighbors and my teachers. (As you'll learn, when it finally came time for a member of our family to face legal penalties, she decided that it should be me).
My father had no interest in my extracurricular
activities: concert band, jazz band, marching band, Sunday School, pottery or woodwork in Junior High, track team, Boy Scout leadership roles, and
being an acolyte at church. I was
definitely afraid to tell him that I was gay.
Thought I'd take a peek and see if you'd posted it yet, and wow! From what you've written so far, I can see you've come a long way. Such a tragic childhood, and I'm guessing the worst is yet to come...
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