It’s odd that on this particular Father’s Day, after feeling the short-shrift the majority of my life, I’m strangely released from the sadness of my paternal upbringing (if you can even call it that). Maybe I’ve just hashed the living prose out of it so much that I’ve set free some of those demons...
Read more »
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments, Self-Assessment | 1 Comment »
By the fourth grade I should have known better. I should have known that I was going to take my lumps for hanging onto Santa Claus the way I did but, damn, I’m nothing if not dogged in my point of view and that pretty much brings up another associated problem at the time....
Read more »
Tags: 9 year-old boy believes dog talks to Santa Claus, baby sitter, Christmas story, German Shepherd talks to Santa Claus, Santa Claus
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments | No Comments »
When I was growing up in the ’50′s and ’60′s, environmental concerns weren’t on the average person’s radar and, in fact, Rachel Carlson’s ground breaking 1962 book, Silent Spring, was the only serious look at pollution and was primarily concerned with the use of poisonous chemicals, dispersed in the ground water supply. So, when...
Read more »
Tags: childhood memories, curbside leaf burning in the city, leaf burning in the 1950's and '60's
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments, Uncategorized | No Comments »
When I was at the peak of my ‘Trick or Treat’ powers, primarily the grade school years, neighborhoods far and wide opened up like candy dispensaries. It wasn’t just a particular street or area that opened up its doors but every street and nearly every door. As long as you could keep walking was...
Read more »
Tags: Halloween, Halloween in a gentler time, trick or treat candy, trick or treat pillow cases
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments | No Comments »
I don’t think I ever quite got the worth of Kindergarten. Back in 1956, pre-school hadn’t been created and kindergarten was the launching pad for your school years. Most of the kids in my class were discovering the wonders of their newfound social circle, while others were simply enthralled with their own boogers or...
Read more »
Tags: bad piano playing, disinterested kindergarten teacher, Elvis Presley, kindergarten, music teacher, professional musician in training
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments, Self-Assessment | No Comments »
My dad (father #2) loved the grandiosity of staged illusion and made it a major part of his performing repertoire. When he spoke of the history of magic and magicians it was with great reverence for the craft and he worked hard to hone his own skills so that they were a worthy contribution...
Read more »
Tags: alcoholic father, broken dreams, father passing, levitation of woman on top of building, magic illusions, magician called Frederick the Great
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments, Self-Assessment | No Comments »
I’m not sure at what point it became clear to my mother that my biological father (father #1) was not going to make good family material but a clear indicator might have been the occasion of my birth. As my mother tells it, he was around briefly for the actual birth but sort of...
Read more »
Tags: birth stories, childhood disappointment, childhood memories, disengaged father
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments | No Comments »
Barb moved in about a block and a half from our house when I was 16 and, because she was new to the neighborhood, slowly and shyly melded into our group of pals that included several other houses on our block. We mostly hung out around my house because I had a yard big...
Read more »
Tags: dysfunctional family behavior, dysfunctional family stories, forgiveness for transgressions, gentle and kind persons, parental abuse, physical abuse, psychological abuse, shooting crime
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments | No Comments »
I’ve always operated as if I was an only child and, in any way practical, that’s exactly what I’ve been. But I do have half-siblings, by-products of my biological father’s (father #1) breezy dabble into parenthood. I have 2 half brothers and a half sister, none of whom I really know that well except...
Read more »
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments | No Comments »
It didn’t take a detective to see that there were aspects of my childhood that struggled for lack of a paternal influence and with my biological father (father #1) hiding out in parts unknown, avoiding his children like the plague, and my adoptive dad (father #2) just plain ineffectual, my mother decided to pull...
Read more »
Tags: absentee father, adolescent stories, Big Brothers of America, junior high school
Posted in Childhood Tales, Parental Moments, Self-Assessment | No Comments »