RITE OF PASSAGE - PART 12 - FOCUS: ON BRASS TACKS

I hope you'll excuse the delay in getting my next blog out. I've had a serious health issue, a cold or flu since the beginning of the year. In addition, the following is a more focused view on my experiences in the mid 1970's...

I didn't know what to expect - moving away from home, age 18. It was pretty much expected, my doing so, back then in the earl 70's. I was simply, an unlikely candidate; I'd never exhibited a streak of Independence. I'd lived, dependent upon my routine and controlled environment. My traditional and predictable environment. For all practical purposes I'm the kind of guy who would have lived at home, with the parents until at least age 30.

I wasn't raised in the type of family that encouraged independent thinking, self-sufficiency, or self-esteem for that matter. Most decisions were approved, and then reversed by my mother as if my mother decided I should do what I I'd just asked, or a plain, "no". My father was a sales manager, traveled a lot, and so my mother ruled the nest. To make things worse, I was a collector, of what she called "itsy-bitsy's". Pretty much everything from books, to Matchbox cars, baseball cards, and I loved to draw and write.

My mother would both look at me with pride suggesting I'd write the next "Gone With the Wind", someday, but at the same time it was a joke. In her words, "I wasn't a writer". Having said that, I wasn't a writer. That was my reality. I was to be a teacher or sales manager like my father. The collectibles I collected constantly vanished as my mother constantly cleaned. And as soon as my "childhood" waned, my drawing and writings vanished too. A passing phase she was sure I'd grown out of. Baby pictures were priceless, my drawing and writing, not at all important - just clutter.

Our's was a "proper, Christian family". Church on Sundays, though my Dad, when around, rarely went to church. In the early days they had the occasional beer, then later the Manhattans. My mother was as pure as an angel when it came to sex, no talk of it, no discussions. My father was a flirt. A damn good flirt. I'm always wondering how far he went on those business trips he often took. My mother never questioned him, and I never asked. But he made no mistake about the fact that sex was something good, and something to have whenever the opportunity might present itself. He used to say, "it's the one you could have had and didn't that will haunt you the most". And it's true. So while my mother nurtured "the husband" in me, the "faithful husband", my father secretly encouraged me to sow my seed... which was a joke as growing up I was not only extremely naive, but geeky, gawky, and thin. I was every bully's target... and up to a couple years after graduating HS I still didn't know how to talk to a woman.

Recall, at age 6 my mother forbade me to hang out with my sister and her friends, and "fixed me up with boys", to be friends with.That "forbadence" stayed with me for a long time, and still haunts me today. I was in a traffic accident a few years ago, a woman in a mini-van rear-ended me. A young, attractive woman was driving the other vehicle, and when I told my mother about the accident she made a snide comment that if a "man had been driving, I would have fought tooth and nail in court to get everything out of the accident I could". Guilt.

But to be fair, my real handicap wasn't women, it wasn't lack of motivation, but rather, my parents had protected me as much as they could while I grew up, and were constantly trying to protect me from the bullies that latched onto me. Without intending to, at least overtly, they made me dependent on them.

Now ironically, at age 18, having graduated HS and gone onto college, I was destined to be the "perfect sheep" in the family pasture. I literally didn't have a mind of my own. I fit in perfectly with a neurotic family in which the child never grows up, but is expected to behave in a way that feigns growth. I probably would have married the woman I couldn't touch, would have become a store manager at a dept. store, bought a modest house and like everyone else, hated it. But I'd learn to pretend, like everyone else, that everything was perfect.

Only one problem.

Marijuana!

Age 19 I was beginning my junior year of community college. I was pursuing an Associates of Science degree, in electrical technology. I'd begun college on schedule the fall after graduating high school. I had two terms of physics under my belt... and for anyone familiar with physics, you'll know why I'm proud of that. I carried a B average for two terms, but the math, the calculus was coming next.

It was, near as I recall the summer of 1973, I was not yet 18. At 18 I could legally drink alcohol at that time. It was, something to look forwards to. Getting drafted wasn't. I was in college because that is what a middle class person at my age did. I'd chosen "electrical technology", being as I was a home electronics hobbyist. I was also a chemist... chemistry sets being popular back then, I had a room in the attic where I had both an electronics lab, plus chemistry lab. God only knows what I created, with the chemistry set!? I had crystals, scums, bubbling mases the likes of Dr. Frankenstein. I accomplished nothing. The rest of the time I was in HS, and generally home by myself isolating myself in my room or the backyard, playing with matchbox toys.

I was a loner growing up. My first friends were my sister and her tow friends, Julie and Susie. But by age 6, my mother was actively breaking up the friendship - boys don't belong with girls.

She was afraid I'd grow up gay. I've told the story before. Her fears were totally unfounded and dysfunctional. The current controversy over "this princess" concept of raising girls is proof of that. Fact is, there was no reason my sister and her friends couldn't be my best friends around age six.

By age 19 I'd had 3 girlfriends. Brenda, in 8th grade, lasted a long, hot week... over the phone we talked about heady topics like breast size. But i broke up with her after a week, for totally insane reasons. Then, Diane, whom I met through a co-worker, a women whom I consider to be my GF, but there really was no connection; the physical attraction and personal experience was quite limited. We didn't "French-kiss" nor physically touch flesh to flesh for the 3 years I called her my GF. Then, a "fling" one Friday night when I visited a friend I'd met through my sister. Four of us were in the room. Myself and the two men played cards along with a woman sitting on a couch. My friend said if I wanted sex, just ask her. I did, but truly, I didn't know what sex was, and I was around 18 years old. I asked her, we bedded together, but all i remember is how erotic it was French kissing her. We didn't have intercourse, nor anything oral.

Around a year and a half after graduating HS, after losing my virginity to a stranger woman at a state park, I met my first "real" GF. Her name was Sue.

I met her at a party, and despite my shyness, struck up a conversation with her. By this time I had moved away from home. I was so scared... a male friend who was at my apartment, who knew Sue, I had asked his advice. His response: "If you don't ask her out, someone else will".

I asked her out.

Our first date, I hitch-hiked 20 miles in a storm of pouring rain to her house... to be with her. My friend came by later to bring me home. I honestly don't remember the first time we had sex, but I know it was very good. We eventually moved into an apartment together. We had sex at least 10 times a day... we were a couple for almost 3 years. My mother despised her, and it began the war - the war of morals.

I can honestly say "the war" escalated to the point that my relationship with Sue led to a quandary - a war between my mother and myself, a war between right and wrong, a war that ultimately made me believe I was cursed. I wasn't, but I was... because, I loved Sue with all my heart, and my mother despised her with hers.

The rebellion of youth began.

And I lost...

"Brass-Tacks"... moral, don't question authority.

I did, and I still do...