It Never Rained in The Bronx

IT NEVER RAINED IN THE BRONX
True, humorous stories From a real life Meshugana
Steven Chanzes
Copyright 2012 by Steven Chanzes All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher or author. Printed in the United States of America The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows: Chanzes, Steven It Never Rained In The Bronx Copyright Pending
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LIFE IS A COLLECTION OF MEMORIES.
WITHOUT MEMORIES THERE IS NO LIFE.

THESE ARE MY MEMORIES OF GROWING UP IN THE BRONX AND LATER SPENDING MY ADULTHOOD IN FLORIDA WHERE I STILL LIVE.
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DEDICATION Usually an event takes place that causes someone to write a book. I remember exactly where I was and what inspired me to put pen to paper. We had just moved to Marco Island, Florida from the Fort Lauderdale area. One of the first things I did was join the Y.M.C.A. I used to play tennis there every Tuesday and Thursday morning. I made many friends and acquaintances, one of which was Bob Grivicich, a gentleman who became a very good friend of mine. One day, in between games, we got into a discussion and I asked Bob how old he was. He replied 72, but Steve its just a number I thought about what Bob just told me and in all seriousness I said to him, tell me Bob, how many people do you know with the number 100? He picked up his tennis racket and proceeded to chase me all over the court. I couldnt believe he was 72. If I make it to 72 I only hope that I have one half of Bobs stamina. Thats when I gave thought to writing a book because experiencing the pain of seeing loved ones depart this earth way too early made me decide to put my memories into the form of a book, because once my turn comes to depart then it wont be possible to do it and I have so many memories and stories to tell that I hope you enjoy them. Anyways, Bob left us when he was 88, but he had a good run at life. Thank you Bob for giving me the idea for a book. So besides dedicating this book to my good friend Bob Grivicich I also dedicate it to the following people. Mrs. C., my wife Joy who is my best friend and the best darn doctor that Ive ever seen and Ive seen many. Honey, I love you with all my heart and soul. Thanks for putting up with all my Michigas (See a Jew for a translation) My three sons, Lorne, Derek and J-Man (Jarrett). I havent had the relationship that I would have preferred with Lorne and Derek but Jarrett has more than compensated for it. I love you all. My Mom and Dad. They gave me every chance in life to become a Mensch and to succeed through their love, educational opportunities and advice. I miss you and love you both very much. Granma. She was more than a Granma. She was my second Mom. In her eyes I could do no wrong. In my eyes she was the perfect individual. I love you Granma. As I said when you left us, Your shoes will never be filled.
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Phyllis. My sister who left us at the tender age of 60. Philly, you were and are an inspiration to me with your love of family and righteous way of life. I love you and miss you very much. Uncle Aaron or as I sometimes called him, Tonto. We worked together for a while and he used to bust my chops on a daily basis, but I looked forward to it. He was a surrogate father to me as well as my very best friend. His love and concern for family is something that sticks out in my mind. I miss you Uncle Aaron and love you deeply. Uncle Jack. I cherished the times we spent together. You treated me as if I was your very own son. I love you and miss you. Aunt Jeanie. You took me into your home, no questions asked and gave me an overabundance of love for which I will be eternally grateful. Listed above were some of the very important influences and loves of my life. But there were more, many, many more. Adele and Howie (Cousins When my sister Philly was in the last stages of her illness I remember Cousin Adele saying to me, Stevie, the circle is getting smaller. Boy, was she right.), Sam, Irene and Ira Kleinrock (Neighbors, very Loud Neighbors), Sam, Ella, Sherry and Jeffrey Grosky (Neighbors), Ronnie Krauss (Friend, killed in VietNam), Patty, Glenn, Jackie and Scott (Cousins), Paul, Amy, Griffin, Jake and Luke (Cousins), Tsippi (Cousin also nicknamed Snippy because she was clipping her Parakeets toe and accidentally cut it off), Aunt Tillie and Uncle George, Aunt Veyla and Uncle Charlie, Joel Klarreich (Friend Became an Attorney), Mike Lewis (Friend Became a Financial Analyst), Alvy Bregman (Friend Became a Doctor), Irwin Halfond (Friend Became a History Professor), Mike Jaffe (Friend Became a Psychologist), Arthur Katzenberg (Friend Became a, well, still a Friend), Aunt Rosie and Uncle Manny, Aunt Ruchel and Uncle Jake, Ronnie Garber (Step-Brother), John Catona (Friend he is as close to me as anyone), Carmine (Boss at Mutual Trust Life He didnt have time to sell insurance because he was always in his office at night with a new woman), John and Pat Candela (Friends), Bobby Pata and Leslie Morrow (Friends), Paul Geller (Friend My Granma called him a Trumbanik (Troublemaker Little did Granma realize that I was just as big a Trumbanik), Linda Schwabish (First Girlfriend we were going to get married but my Mom didnt think it was such a good idea.
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Its a good thing that my Mom was an exceptional cook), Annie Firkser and Louie the Cop (Neighbors They lived next door to us and whenever Louie saw me he made sure to tell me a joke), Mr. Dill (8th Grade Science Teacher), Mr. Pablo Rosario (High School Spanish Teacher), Mrs. Patrick (3rd Grade Teacher), Jiggy (Friend all 45 of him), Mark Feldman (Employee), Paul Podhurst (Employee), Jim Bell (Employee), Jeff Backoff (Friend), Joe Stein (Father In-Law), Gladys Stein (Joes Wife), Tom Lippett (Brother In-Law), Larry Nelson (Boss at Industrial Lighting), Steve and Sheri Crown (Friends), Jesse Fox (Friend), Randy Johnson (Boss at Progressive Lighting), Al Greiner (Boss at Lighting Company), Leon Saja (Business Associate), Marty and Arlene Mayor (Friends well, they used to be. Arlene passed away and the rest is a long, long story), Connie and Myles Loud (Friends another long story but at least theyre both alive), Joe and Rhoda Radoslovich (Friends), George Adler (The General-Cousin), Aunt Ettie and Uncle Yiddel, Aunt Lorraine (The one person to go to for advice and Love), Marv Kurz (Bandleader at my Bar Mitzvah), Stacey, Andrew, Jamie and Ethan (Nephews and Nieces), Greg, Marcy, Will and Jack (Nephews and Nieces), Roger Benson (Brother In-Law), Aunt Ethel and Uncle Morris, Stuart, Ronnie, Diane and Stan (Cousins) Ronnie Kay (Friend and Attorney well, not an attorney anymore, but he was the best), Patty Caia (Friend If Im going to war then I want Patty in the trenches with me), Dr. Russo (My Nephrologist), Dr. Paone (My General Practitioner), Dr. Frank (My Cardiologist), Dr. Vera (My Nephrologist), Dr. Gadala (Nephrologist), (All of these Doctors are charged with keeping me alive and so far they are doing a pretty good job which is kind of amazing because one of them never even reported to his classes.), Elvis (Its over 50 years and Im still his #1 fan.), Mel and Doris Goldberg (Cousins), Fay and Dick Duchin (My adoptive parents), Eddie and Bobby Duchin (Friends), Chanz, Charlie, Koko, Muffin, Henry, Binx, Zoey, Sammie and Maxie (Our Beloved Pets) and many, many more too numerous to mention; not pets but people. Thank you all for all the times spent together, sometimes laughing, sometimes crying but most importantly spending it together with each other.
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CONTENTS Foreword Preface The Neighborhood 2075 Wallace Avenue I Remember Sex - Part 1 Sex Part 2 Sex Part 3 Sex Part 4 P.S. 105 P.S. 83 Christopher Columbus High School New York University The VietNam War Relatives Dad Granma Mom Philly Tonto The Lion Sleeps Tonight Unforgettable Characters Employment Goodbye New York, Hello Florida The Journey The Taylors Transition Swollen Cheeks General FinancePart 2 My Most Unforgettable Dating Experience General FinancePart 3 Blazing Saddles My Wife, J. Stein, The Beginning Choosing a Career The Comet Kohotek Johnnie CochranMove Over Dumper Two The Shrink Who Needed a Shrink 8 13 16 42 49 55 63 66 68 76 78 87 92 104 112 119 125 132 136 139 140 141 153 163 166 167 173 175 177 179 183 191 194 199 202 204 209 214
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Ouch!!! I Think a Bug Bit Me An After Dinner Heart Attack Dont You Ever Call Me Again Ill Have a Pastrami Sandwich Not For Doo-Doo The Art of Recruiting Salespeople Undercover Football Ill Trade You Two Blues For One Red Are You Sure You Want To See Dr. Rodriquez? Win a Free Job The 44th Brigade H.E.L.P. or Should I Say HELP Very FunnyVery Funny Hes Not My Uncle Sam AlohaOy Vey I Can Help You Sir May I Have Your Signature Mr. Catona Dont Answer the Door Pets HelpTheyre Trying to Kill Me The Bitch Wont Sleep Walk No More Its 7 OClockGo to Your Room The Hells Angels Motorcycle Gang The Hawk What Do I Look Like, a Valet? Is There Any Name I Can Use? U.S. Bureau of Records, Inc. James Burnell Bell What If I Didnt Have Any Money? Youre Under Arrest What Are You Doing With Your Hands? I Know a Good Deal When I See One Pass Me Some Water You Must Be Presentable Bend Over Please 218 221 226 228 229 231 234 236 238 239 244 248 251 254 258 261 264 266 268 272 274 276 278 279 283 285 287 289 291 293 294 296 298 299 300
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FOREWORD It's Sunday, July 19, 1987. I was born forty-three years ago on this very day. What normally would be a very happy time in one's life has been tinged with sadness. My basic family roots that have shared my pleasures as well as sorrows have always been my GRANMA, my MOM and my DAD. In the space of six short years they have all left me. It doesn't seem fair. It never does. But death is a part of life. You can't have one without the other. What matters most are the memories you have, and in that sense death never fully arrives. We all have memories of our loved ones as well as of our experiences in life. This is what sustains us. This is what helps me keep my sanity intact. And so now I'm sitting on my patio in Florida overlooking our pool which in turn overlooks a lake stocked with bass, snakes and sometimes an alligator or two. Our property is enclosed by a fence which keeps the alligators out. For some reason the snakes don't come onto our property. (Maybe they don't like kosher food.) Thank God. And of course the bass know their rightful place. My oldest boy Lorne is defending his country in the service of the army. He's stationed in Germany. My other two boys, Derek, age 13 and Jarrett, 7, are away for the very first time at a summer sleep away camp in the Poconos. I thought that it would be impossible for me to ever miss their sibling rivalry. You know what I mean. The yelling, screaming, slamming of doors and eating us out of house and home. But I miss them. I really do. I can't wait for them to return home. Yes, I can't wait for the yelling, the screaming and so on and so forth. But too much of a good thing is not healthy, so of course next summer won't come quick enough for me. My wife is visiting her Dad who was hospitalized with a stroke some twelve weeks ago. He spent 10 weeks in the hospital and finally he was transferred to a rehabilitative home. His right side is paralyzed but that hasn't prevented his eighty year old left hand from pinching many a nurses rump. His first ten weeks in the hospital cost $77,000. I guess you can't put a price on a good time, especially when Medicare is paying for it. And so I'm home, almost all alone. My one companion lying down by my right side is my German shepherd, Devil. Devil is ten years old and while at times she shows her age, she's still a puppy. She's very active, frisky, friendly and extremely wise because above all else Devil is fully aware that we humans believe her to be (in human terms) not ten but seventy years old. Therefore Devil has in ten short years become the oldest living being in our house. For this she receives many considerations and privileges afforded to the matriarch of any family. For instance
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when we pile into the family van Devil must be physically assisted by yours truly due to her arthritic legs which were diagnosed by my wife Joy who has never been inside a Veterinary school, much less possess a degree. (But after all, what does our Veterinarian know.) And when I help Devil into the van she looks at me with a grin on her snout that most assuredly befits her name. And now when Devil eats I have to stay with her until she finishes every last drop, as if someone else would eat that CHAZARAI. (Chazarai is Yiddish for drek, which similarly is Yiddish for shit.) And so here are Devil and I on the patio amidst a thunderous rain storm, and I'm thinking.......... My Granma on my Mom's side was in retrospect no different than my Mom. In all actuality I was blessed with two Mothers. My Granma was the only grandparent I really ever knew as both my grandfathers died prior to my birth and my Fathers mother died when I was just four years old and I barely have any recollections of her. Granma was never sick a day in her life and up until the time she passed away from cancer at age 81 in 1981 she had only previously been hospitalized once for removal of a tear duct in her right eye. Consequently my Granma had no control over the fluid buildup in her eye and always walked around the house with tissues rolled up and tucked into the sleeve of her blouse. In this manner she was always prepared to dab at her eye when it teared up. In addition, most of the time the tissues would fall from Granma's sleeve, so if you wanted to know which room Granma was in, all you had to do was follow the trail of tissues. Approximately two years after Granma died I was in New York and went to visit her grave. Both of my sisters and their families were there too, as we had previously made arrangements to meet. It was a cold and overcast day and the wind was blowing rather briskly. I remember walking down the path to Granma's resting place with one hand holding my YARMULKE (skullcap) in place on my head for fear of the wind blowing it off. As I approached the grave site I looked down and there on the ground right next to the foot stone was a tissue. I looked around in the general vicinity and couldn't find any other tissues. I guess that none of the other residents in the cemetery had ever had a tear duct removed. Granma was the first to leave me. Even though she was 81 years old when she passed away, it was very difficult to accept her death because she had never been sick a day in her life and she was the picture of vitality. On the other hand my Mom was a very young 61 when she died. Her death was harder to accept, for two reasons. First there was her youth and secondly my Mom contributed greatly to her own demise because of her smoking habit. Now that I think back, I don't remember my Mother without a cigarette in her hand. Yet when she found out that she had contracted lung cancer she immediately stopped smoking. Unfortunately
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she made that decision too late. Approximately four months after my Mom was diagnosed with lung cancer, she died. I was and still am very angry at her for what she did to herself, but if any good came out of it; it did cause me to stop that awful habit. But my Mom paid the ultimate price for it. My Dad was a very gruff individual. He came to this country from his birthplace of Odessa, Russia in 1923 when he was either 14 or 15, depending upon which piece of identification you chose to believe. I really don't know if my Father was actually sure of his date of birth, after all he was very young when it occurred. In any event my Dad worked very hard all his life just so that his family would have no material wants, and we didn't, except for the companionship of our Dad. Dad had his own butcher store, Supreme Meat Market in Harlem, New York. Harlem is a rather large community of mostly black families and a rather large percentage of those families are to this day struggling for their very survival. On more than one occasion a black man with no money, but lots of pride would come into my Dad's store and literally sing and dance for his supper. And my Dad would always be sure to give that person some food to get him by that day. I mentioned before that my Dad was a rather gruff individual. I never saw or heard of him getting into any fights at all, but then again I never heard of anyone who wanted to fight him either. But he had a knack for agitating you to the point that you wanted to get into a scuffle. Thankfully that didn't happen in the following story. One day my Father was getting into his car to go to work. Now I grew up on Wallace Avenue in the Bronx. Seven story apartment buildings housing sixty families were lined up one after the other. Within a three block radius we had a greater population than in the same size area in virtually any other part of the United States. And because of the congestion of people there really wasn't enough space to accommodate all the cars. Cars were always double parked on the street. That was the rule, not the exception. There was never a study but I would think that the lack of parking spaces had some impact on the migration to the suburbs. What a blessing that must have been. To have your own private parking space on your own property. No more riding around half the night looking for a parking space only to find one a mile from your house. And if that's not bad enough, you got up the next morning only to forget where you parked your car the night before. So anyway, getting back to the story, my Dad got into his car and started it up. He backed up a bit and then pulled out into the street. About a half mile down the road he looked into his rear view mirror and saw a Volkswagen tailgating him. Insofar as driving was concerned there were only two things that my Father detested. One was cars that tailgated him and the second thing was cars that were on the road, because no one knew how to drive except my Dad. At least that is what he
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believed. So my Father keeps driving and the Volkswagen keeps tailgating. My Dad sped up, slowed down and sped up again. It didn't matter. The Volkswagen was in pursuit. Finally my Father had enough and stopped his car, got out and approached the Volkswagen fully prepared to engage in at least a verbal battle. But that didn't occur because much to my Fathers amazement there was no one in the Volks. You see when my Dad backed up in his parking space he latched onto the front bumper of the Volkswagen which was parked directly behind him and pulled it into the street. So there was my Dad standing in the middle of the road looking at this Volkswagen that was attached to his car. Dad looked around and spotted this guy who was standing off to the side and asked him for assistance. The two of them managed to free my Father's car from the Volks. Without saying another word my Father got into his car and drove off into the west, leaving this fellow and the Volkswagen behind in the middle of the street, making it impossible for any other cars to pass. The last time I told that story was barely two weeks ago on July 6, 1987 when I eulogized my Dad at his funeral. He died at the age of 77 or 78, depending upon which set of identification papers you chose to believe. And so within a span of six years, the three people that had the biggest impact on my life have left me. When I eulogized my Dad I said that I wasn't going to say goodbye to him because as long as I have this ability to remember, then there's no need to bid farewell. Thankfully I have lots of memories. Memories of my Granma, my Mom, my Dad. Memories of family life in the 50's and 60's. Memories of holiday festivities, family get togethers, friends, the fun times, the sorrows, riding the elevated trains, Yankee Stadium, the Polo Grounds, Ebbets Field, the Mick, the Say Hey Kid and the Duke and the arguments that ensued as to who was better. Summers in the mountains, winter snows in the city. Dating girls and hoping you could get a kiss on the first date, even if it's just on the cheek. Playing stickball in the schoolyard as well as basketball, softball, two hand touch football. Getting dressed for the holidays and then waiting for the holidays to end so you could change into your jeans and sneakers and go back into the schoolyard. Memories of the 5 cent pickle in the barrel at Moishes supermarket, the 2 cent plain, the 6 cent Coke, the cherry lime rickey or the malteds with the pretzel sticks. Knishes, hot dogs, pizza, Chinese food, Italian food, steak houses. Literally dozens of the finest eating establishments and all within walking distance of where you lived. Thousands of people walking in the streets safely without fear, day and night. Vegetable and fruit stands, Chinese laundries, doctors of all kinds, clothing stores for men, women and children. Movie houses, teen clubs. This was the Bronx, a world of its own.
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In effect until it stops raining, it's as if Devil and I are confined to a prison cell because we can't go anywhere and no one is going to trek through the storm to see us. And so now my mind slowly drifts back to Pelham Parkway and specifically 2075 Wallace Avenue where I grew up. We had over 60 families in our building with a common hallway leading to another 60 families and an underground passage leading to the next building which housed an additional 120 families. Friends? More than you could imagine or even want. And on inclement days like this we would gather in someone's apartment or even in the hallway, and entertain ourselves for hours. Yep,......................It Never Rained In "The Bronx."
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PREFACE "It Never Rained In The Bronx" is a compilation of stories, all real, none imagined. This book is partially a remembrance as well as a dedication to a very special place that seemed to exist so many years ago. It was compressed into a relatively short land mass that housed upwards of a million residents. Today people spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to live in condominiums in each and every part of the United States as well as abroad. In actuality the very first condominiums were probably constructed in the late 1800's. They weren't called condominiums back then. These new wave immigrants were plain, hardworking people who didn't categorize large edifices with such fancy names. So instead of labeling these structures as condominiums, they were simply called apartments, or should I say apartment buildings. Now many of todays condo residents live right near the beach which makes it very convenient for them to sun bathe or take a refreshing dip in the water. We basically had the same benefits and for a lot less money. In the summer time when the temperatures swelled into the nineties we went downstairs into the street and with our trusty wrench we loosened the nearest fireplug (there were at least two or three on each block) and within seconds, the coolest, cleanest and most refreshing water came spouting out for all of us to frolic in. And we didn't have to worry about getting sand in our bathing suits either. While the opening in the fireplug was large enough for vast amounts of water to come gushing out to cool us down it still wasn't quite so big that we had to worry about Jaws and his friends. And I might add something else....nobody ever drowned. As far as sun bathing was concerned, we took a blanket and rode our elevator to the top floor and then walked up one more flight to the roof of our building. There was plenty of room, it was never congested and you didn't have to worry about someone walking by and kicking sand in your face. The roofs served a dual purpose. We also used them for target practice. We would go up to the roof with balloons. Then we would fill the balloons up with water and seal them up. At that point we would wait for someone to walk by on the street below. As soon as we saw our intended victim we would toss the balloons from our seventh floor perch down to the street hoping to hit our target. We never missed and a residual effect was that all of the water splattering on the streets kept them very clean. Even at a young age we were all very ecologically sensitive. Now I know what you're thinking. Some of todays condo residents have chosen to live on golf courses as opposed to the beach. As you know golf wasn't in vogue way back then. But what we lacked by not living on a golf course was surely made
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up by the fact that we actually lived in and around a sports pavilion. On any given day you could look out your condo, excuse me, I mean apartment window and you would see hordes of people playing any number of games such as stickball, stoop ball, Johnny on the Pony, Ring-a-Levio, Iron Tag, touch football, potsie, etc. So we didn't have golf. Anyway, that's just one sport. We had a regular Olympics going on each and every day and you didn't have to train for four years before you could participate. Back then we didn't need cars to go shopping because anything and everything that we could possibly want was right in our very own backyard. Within a four or five block radius there were three or four Chinese restaurants, two pizzerias, Italian restaurants, four delicatessens, candy stores that had a fantastic assortment of fountain drinks, with all sorts of ice cream concoctions, and of course rows upon rows of candies. We had Chinese laundries, grocery stores, vegetable stands, supermarkets, all types of clothing stores, schools from grade school through high school and all of this within walking distance of our apartments. You didn't need a car to get around back then. Just a pair of hush puppies and maybe a shopping cart. Movie theaters and bowling alleys were just as convenient and the cost of our condo back then was approximately $85.00 per month.. And that included the maintenance. This magical place in time was called "The Bronx." Each square block had approximately six apartment buildings with 60 families per building. Each building would bristle with the sounds of excitement that only children can make. There was even a labyrinth of underground tunnels that connected buildings so that in the event of bad weather we children weren't a problem to our parents. We could always find a friend in our building or in an adjoining building that we could play with. We would get together either in someone's apartment or we would simply play in the hallways. On any given day there would be four or five guys standing on the street corner singing Doo Wop only to be interrupted by the sound of a bell which signified that the Good Humor Man was approaching on his bicycle driven cart to sell his ice cream pops. If you lived in The Bronx during the 1950's or 1960's then you lived through an era which can best be described as our "Camelot." This entire book is about people, all real, none imagined. This book, in part, is about the interaction of people pre-VietNam, before demonstrations, when people danced to music that had no hint of sexual or deviant behavior in its words. It's a story of exciting times. Hundreds of
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thousands of people living in close harmony with each other, caring for each other, sharing happy moments together and being at each others side when comfort was needed. This then was as close to pre-innocence as one could get. This book is primarily about the remembrances that I have of my family and friends as well as yours truly. But who knows, maybe some of these very same stories are also about you or your loved ones and friends, or at least bare some similarity. If that's the case, then you, like me, run the risk of being committed.
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THE NEIGHBORHOOD I grew up in a section of the Bronx called Pelham Parkway. It was a very healthy environment to grow up in because of the many distinct and divergent types of folks that lived there. Pelham Parkway, circa the 1950's was a dichotomy of many different peoples. There were old Jewish people, middle aged Jewish people and young Jewish people. A little of everything. The elders were the new wave immigrants that arrived in the early 1900's from places such as Russia, Rumania, Hungary and other European countries. Their decision to come to America was due to any one of a number of reasons. Some came to avoid religious persecution. Some came to avoid conscription in their countries army and some made the pilgrimage to seek a better life in a land whose streets were paved with gold. The escape to America was not easy. It was very costly to make the trek by boat to the New World, and because of this many families were split up, never to see each other again. If a family could not cross the Atlantic together due to finances, then the parents would usually send their children first, hoping to rejoin them at some later date. These new Americans landed at Ellis Island, a processing point for the immigrants which is located off the tip of Manhattan, in New York City. My Father was thirteen years old when he came to America with his older sister Veyla (Vay yah). They landed at Ellis Island in 1923. My Father and his sister, like so many immigrants spoke little or no English. This presented a problem to the immigration officials. The new arrivals spoke no English and the immigration officials spoke mostly English. Cecil B. DeMille couldn't have planned a better plot himself. All that these immigrants had on them which would attest to their identity was paperwork from their mother country that listed their name and other pertinent information, all spelled out in their native tongue, which in my Father's case was Russian. Many of the immigrants who came to this country were given a new last name because the officials had a difficult time understanding them. In some instances you were given a name that closely resembled the hieroglyphics on your paperwork. I suspect that is how a nice Jewish boy like me acquired the surname of Chanzes. Some of my relatives spell their name Chanzit. No one to this day seems to know what the proper name really was. Maybe it was Chanzekovich. Sounds Russian. Apparently some people who made the trek to Americas shores only knew their fathers profession and that is why some people are named Schneider, which in the Yiddish language means tailor or some people have the surname Blacksmith which once again indicates the profession that their father was in. I'm quite confident that there were many other immigrants who came to the New World only to leave behind in the old country their parents, relatives, friends and most assuredly their last names.
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Most of these New Americans had family and/or friends living in the States. Upon landing at Ellis Island they were processed by the immigration officials and they then took their belongings, which was usually the clothes on their backs and moved on to their new living quarters with relatives who had proceeded them to America. By the time the 1950's came around these immigrants had formed the largest middle class in the history of the United States. While few were college graduated, most were hard working, productive members of society with very strong family ties and equally strong cultural values. These immigrants were heavily involved in the garment center, in retail services, in the various trades and professions such as plumbers, electricians, doctors, lawyers, teachers, etc. They were industrious employees who came to this country with little understanding of our language and in time many rose through the ranks to eventually own businesses of their own. Interestingly enough, while the average husband put in an eight to twelve hour work day, the wives tended to the care of their children. During the 1950's most women were housewives. Their role was to raise the children. They made sure that they got off to school on time after having consumed a nourishing breakfast. Then they would clean the apartment, do the shopping, and make sure to be back on time when the children came home from school for their lunch break. Then they would darn the socks, do the laundry and ironing, greet the children when they came home from school at the end of the day and of course make sure that a hot dinner was ready at supper time. Work? They didn't have time to breathe. I grew up on Pelham Parkway which is situated in the northeastern part of the Bronx. Its western border is the world famous Bronx Zoo. Everybody fell in love with this place because it had something to offer all who visited it. On any given day there would be thousands of people visiting the Zoo which is laid out over endless acres. While the Bronx Zoo at the time was located within a heavily zoned Jewish population, the visitors to the Zoo were from all ethnic and socio-economic areas of life. Such was the magnitude of the Zoo that it drew people to its gates from all over the world. When someone was coming to New York for a visit, invariably, time permitting, a trip to the Bronx. Zoo was a must. You could spend a day at the Bronx Zoo and still not see all of its inhabitants; such was the enormity of the place. You would see people strolling through the Zoo arm in arm. Mothers and fathers pushing the little ones in a baby carriage. The sound of children's laughter. The look of happiness on the faces of people watching the various animals at play. The unforgettable odor of the elephants. Watching the chimpanzees cavorting in their cages, the lions and tigers on patrol in theirs, the
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mammoth snakes in the reptile house. Walking through the winding walkways in the Zoo which were surrounded by big, beautiful trees, barren of leaves in the winter but displaying their beauty in the summer and shedding their majestic colors in autumn. Feeding the animals, the open air caravan car which transported hundreds of people from one point in the park to another, and of course the Bronx River which at its greatest point was no more than 100 feet wide, bending its very soul throughout the Zoo. The Bronx River was stocked with various types of fish but its most famous occupant was the Carp. Now for those of you that don't know, a Carp is a Jewish Catfish. In other words it's a scavenger fish. It feeds itself on the remnants of the sea, or in this case the river. But something within the system of the Carp processes the garbage that they eat into one of the best tasting fishes found anywhere. My Granma used to make a dish called Knubbel Carp. Now the pronunciation of Knubbel Carp is not to be confused with the pronunciation of Knute Rockne, the famous coach of the fighting Irish of Notre Dame. In Knute, the K is silent, so therefore the word is pronounced Nute. Unlike our Irish friends, Jews don't like to waste letters. If we took the time to put the letter in the word, then you should take the time to say it. So the word is ki-nub-el, knubbel. Now knubbel is a Jewish word which means garlic. So Knubbel Carp is Garlic Carp or Carp very, very heavily seasoned with garlic. Granma would marinate the Carp overnight in garlic along with other types of seasonings. She would also cut the Carp into three quarter inch strips so that it would resemble a sparerib without the bone. The next morning Granma would bake the Carp and refrigerate it after it was done. That evening, this jewel of a dish was served to us straight from the refrigerator. Granma didn't warm it up. She served it cold and we would consume it ever so slowly. We devoured this delicacy cautiously for a couple of reasons. First there's a large amount of little bones throughout a Carp which cannot be filleted prior to baking and secondly the taste of this fish was second to none. So what's the rush? Granma left us in 1981 and while she left behind her recipe for Knubbel Carp, the one ingredient that she couldn't leave with us was her absolute love in cooking for her family and friends. And so all I have now are the memories of that delectable dish. Other people have tried to duplicate it, but none have succeeded. Thank God for memories. No. Thank God for Granma. Anyway, that's enough about the Bronx River. Pelham Parkway consisted primarily of apartment buildings. These buildings were either six or seven stories high with approximately nine families to a floor which translates to roughly sixty families per building. Most buildings were connected to
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other apartment buildings via a common lobby, access across the roof or a labyrinth of underground tunnels which housed the boiler room which provided heat to us during the cold winters. So while there were approximately sixty families per building, in all actuality we could have access to as many as two hundred and forty families without venturing a foot into the streets. On each block there were approximately twelve apartment buildings. Therefore there were seven hundred and twenty families on each block and with an average of 3.2 people in each family, then each block housed over 2300 people. And this statistic stretched for blocks on end. It wasn't too difficult to find a friend back then because after all there were 2300 people living on your block and if no one appealed to you then all you had to do was walk across the street and there were another 2300 people. While friends were easy to find because so many people lived in such a concentrated area, one could imagine that you could have pulled your hair out trying to find a parking space for your car. Seven hundred twenty families living on one square block. Because of the transportation system which was ingenious to New York, a car was not a necessity, so some people didn't own one, but then again some families had more than one car. It would be safe to say that those seven hundred twenty families owned a few hundred cars and one square block could only accommodate about one hundred twenty five automobiles. There were hardly any parking garages, certainly not enough to satisfy the demand, but then again not everyone wanted to pay to park their cars anyway so therefore additional garages would not necessarily have been the answer to this problem. The answer was rather simple. You either double parked your car or you drove around your area until you found a parking space, and more often than not the parking space that you eventually found could or would be as much as five blocks from where you lived. The average New York block or street is rectangular in shape. A walk around the entire block takes about fifteen minutes, only ten minutes if you're taking home a quart of Carvel ice cream. If you couldn't find a parking space close to your apartment building, then it wouldn't be uncommon if it took you ten to twenty minutes to walk to your building from where you parked your car. Ten or twenty minutes and sometimes it was raining cats and dogs and you had no umbrella. Or maybe a twenty minute walk on a blustery, windy day with a thermometer reading of 14 degrees, and this was before the "wind chill factor", which probably brought it down to minus 14 degrees. Or take that same cold day and add two or three foot embankments of snow that you had to plow through, except your plow was your feet. And of course when you have snow on the ground and you add a touch of rain, then the snow turns into ice. And now what would normally be a brief ten
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minute walk to your dwelling has just turned into what appears to be a qualifying heat for an Olympic event. Imagine walking on ice through the city streets. Walking or shall I say sliding. Trying to keep your feet under you as you walk uphill only to find yourself sliding backwards and awkwardly grasping for whatever is near you to prevent your fall from grace. You grab the bricks on the buildings or the ledges that surround the apartment buildings. Car door handles prevented many a fall as you reached out for them and held them ever so tight as your feet did a pre-Michael Jackson moonwalk on the icy streets. If you were walking with a friend and you felt yourself going into a free fall, then it was only natural to grab onto the arm of your companion and together you both made your descent to earth. People that have garages for their cars have a tendency to take the simple pleasures of life for granted. Such as knowing where your car is when you leave for work in the morning. If I had a dollar for each time someone in my neighborhood forgot where they parked their car the night before then I would have been a millionaire before I got out of my teens. So many times I remember my Father leaving for work in the morning only to come back up to the apartment in an hour to enlist my help to find his car. Like Sergeant Friday from Dragnet I would give my dad the third degree. "Dad, what kind of car are we looking for? What color is it? Are you sure that you brought it home with you last night?" As I stated before, people also double parked their cars when no spots were available near their apartment building. This created a problem not only for the person who they parked next to but quite often for all the occupants of the building. Envision one entire street that could accommodate approximately thirty parked cars on each side. That's parking for sixty. Now with cars being double parked, sixty could easily turn into one hundred. The next morning you leave your apartment to go to work. If your car is double parked then there's no problem. You just get into your car and drive away. Suppose though that the person who wants to use his car is legally parked but there's a car double parked next to him. The person that is legally parked now has a problem. He has no idea whatsoever who owns the illegally double parked car. It could be someone in his building or someone in any number of buildings within a five block area. The double parked car is locked, so he can't enter it and unleash the brake and move it. There is a car in front of him and there is a car in back of him. In other words this guy has got TZURIS (troubles). GROISA TZURIS (Big troubles). What do you do? First you turn a bright shade of red. Secondly you start reviewing your vocabulary of curse words. The third thing you do is open your car door and blast your horn. There's hardly a sound more disturbing to the human ear than a car horn. First you
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give two or three short honks. This is repeated about three times. If you fail to achieve a favorable response to your three short honks, you then move to battle plan B, which is a series of short honks repeated over and over. By now you are starting to get the attention of people in your building. Not so much the people who are preparing to go to work, because they couldn't care less. Although when they see you on the street they offer their sympathies, but as they walk away from you they've got a grin from ear to ear. Suddenly you can hear windows opening up and people are sticking their heads out and yelling at you to be quiet. They don't care that you can't get out of your parking space. They don't care that you are going to be late for work. No, all they care about is that the noise from your car horn is deafening to their ears. All they care about is that you are waking them up from a sound sleep. The windows from the apartments are open and scores of people are hurtling down insults upon you. This is where you draw the line. You do what any good field commander would do when the odds are seemingly insurmountable. It is your decision to use psychological warfare so that all of these people will be on your side and help you find the real enemy, the person that is double parked by your car. You now call upon all of your wits to deliver the ultimate battle plan. This is war and you have decided to end it in a quick and efficient manner with as few casualties as is possible. With complete confidence you now firmly place your hand on the horn of your automobile and................ PRESS DOWN. Your hand stays firmly entrenched on the horn. You gaze up at the people who are looking at you through their apartment windows. It's the same look that a General emits to his troops just before the big battle. It's a look of confidence. Those troops that see this look know very well that the final outcome of this battle rests squarely on their shoulders. And now all of these people that were mad at the person who was disturbing their sleep with this constant honking of the car horn have just switched their allegiance. You can see these people looking at each other through open apartment windows asking everyone who can hear them who they thought the double parked car belongs to. By now one of the people who were looking out the window has disappeared into their apartment. Perhaps they recognized the double parked car. Perhaps they are calling the double parkee. Usually, within two minutes, your mission will have been completed. Someone will have come down, apologetically I might add, and drive away in the double parked car, leaving you with only your thoughts on a day that has not started out very well. How often did an event like this occur? Just about every day. By now I'm sure that you realize that parking spaces were a premium in the Bronx. In excess of seven hundred families lived on each block with a parking capacity of less than one hundred fifty. So what did the geniuses that we elected to public
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office do to uncomplicate matters? NOTHING. Instead they chose to add more fuel to the fire by coming up with the noblest of ideas to clean up our beloved Bronx, and in the process, unbeknownst to them, they took a problem and turned it into a full blown CALAMITY. It was a calamity of monumental proportions. This calamity was called, Alternate Side of the Street Parking. Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays were free days. In other words you could park anywhere you wanted to on those days. Those free days were very important. It helped you recover from Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays which were not free days. They were horrific days. On Mondays and Thursdays you couldn't park on one side of the street between 8 A.M. and 11 A.M. On Tuesdays and Fridays you couldn't park on the other side of the street during those same hours. The purpose of this was so that on those days these huge machines could lumber down our streets spraying water and cleaning it of debris. Besides further complicating an already very complicated parking problem, this was also an unwarranted expense. Why? The neighborhood was like Ivory soap. It was 99.98 % Jewish. Did you ever see a Jewish person eat? Not even a crumb is left on the plate. A dog doesn't even want our steak bones when we're finished with them. So it was totally unnecessary to send these machines into our fair community to clean the streets. They were never dirty and there certainly was never any garbage on our streets. And as far as these machines watering our streets, all I can say is this. Plants you water. Most people eat to live. Jewish people live to eat. We had as many eating establishments in our neighborhood as can be found in neighborhoods five times our size. Within a five block area we had the following: No less than six candy stores, two pizza parlors, two Chinese restaurants, one Greek restaurant, one Italian restaurant, one carvel, one steak house, four delicatessens and one kosher restaurant. The candy store on Pelham Parkway served many functions. Besides having a more than ample display of every candy bar known to mankind, it also was the place to go to buy a newspaper. We didn't have newspaper machines back then but we did have a wide variety of papers to choose from. There was the Daily Mirror and the Daily News. These papers were very similar. As a matter of fact the major difference was their name. The Mirror and the News each had a morning and an evening edition. They were about the size of the National Enquirer, except the average paper had 128 pages. And for those voracious readers we also had an afternoon paper which was called the New York Post. The Post was the same size as the Mirror and the Daily News. These three papers, although they were written in English, closely resembled Jewish Prayer Books, at least for most males. This wasn't because of their contents but rather the way they were read, because just like
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a Jewish Prayer Book the reader of these newspapers would start at the back of the paper. Why? Because that is where the most reverent and holiest of information was placed. And that information was all of the sports scores from the day before as well as up dated sports stories. For a male growing up in the Bronx and not knowing which teams won and which player scored the most points and who was in first, second and third place was tantamount to treason. Coming down into the schoolyard on Saturday or Sunday morning unprepared to discuss the sporting events of the day before was, well it was like taking a stroll in the street with nothing on but your family jewels. IT JUST WASN'T DONE! After the sports section the want ads were listed followed by the movie guide. We had two movie theaters within five blocks of each other in our neighborhood. There was the R.K.O. and the Globe. Movies weren't rated back in the fifties. Children didn't have to have parents with them in order to gain admission to the theaters. There was violence portrayed in the movies, but rather a subdued violence. There were no unearthly sights of bloodshed, nor was there dismemberment of limbs. Horror movies of the fifties used more ingenuity to achieve their results than films of today. A blood curdling scream from the femme fatale put a scare into any movie patron. Who could forget the chills that ran down our spine when Vincent Price, star of the 3-D chiller House of Wax had his handsome face literally peel apart in front of our very eyes to reveal the gruesome looking monstrous ogre that was hidden beneath his mask? Sex in the movies was also portrayed in a distinctive and equally different manner in the fifties. The fires that lit our imagination were kindled so as to give our minds a chance to wander. More often than not the image of what a naked person might look like was far more exciting than the actual nakedness that is displayed in todays' movies. Movies that had a comedic tone to them were also very different from those of today. The directors understood that they could achieve the desired effect without resorting to vulgarity, whereby in todays environment, vulgarity represents the humor. Years ago parents had an entirely more prominent role in the rearing of their children. Today the television networks, the movie producers as well as the tabloids have taken it upon themselves to help educate our children to their standards and one of the by-products of this has been a tremendous moral decay in our country. Back in the fifties a day at the movies was almost just that, a day at the movies. Mom would usually pack a lunch for me. Right next to the R.K.O. theatre there was a confectionery store called Jesse's. Jesse used to sell peanuts and candy by
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the scoop. All types of nuts and candies were displayed in big fishbowls. With barely a dollar bill you could purchase enough candy and nuts to feed your face for the entire day. Once inside the theater we settled down for "a day at the movies." The fare was routinely the same. A few cartoon shorts that included Bugs Bunny, Tweetie Bird, Heckle and Jeckle and Popeye and friends. This was usually followed by a comedy short of the Three Stooges or the Dead End Kids. Then of course there were previews of coming attractions followed by two full length feature films. At this point we had spent about four hours at the theater. Unlike todays movie goers, we weren't required to leave after the showings. If we wanted, at no additional charge we could sit in our seats and see the films over and over, again and again. It was a great way to spend a Saturday morning............... and afternoon. Getting back to the newspapers, all three tabloids that I mentioned previously had plenty of advertising space used by all the major department stores such as Alexanders, Macys, Gimbals, Willoughby Electronics and Kor-Vettes to name a few. After this section you were near the front of the paper which had local as well as state and worldwide news, with the exception of the New York Post. The Post had one other interesting article that appeared in the paper every day between the main stories and the advertisements. There wasn't one self-respecting guy in the neighborhood that would skip this section. Sometimes we would read this or should I say look at this before the much heralded sports section. I'm referring to Earl Wilsons' column. Earl Wilson was a very famous New York columnist who wrote a daily article for the Post. His column was very stylish and it set him apart from all other columnists. His articles each day dealt with famous personalities from all walks of the entertainment field that were seen in New York the day or evening before. There were stories about movie stars, television personalities and sports greats who were seen in various restaurants and night spots. Some of the stories reported fights that these personalities were involved in such as the infamous barroom brawl at the legendary Copacabana that involved New York Yankee legends Mickey Mantle, Hank Bauer and Billy Martin. As great a ballplayer as Billy Martin was, due to the fight at the Copacabana, coupled with his influence over his teammates, he lost his position as second baseman for the Yanks. Soon after he was traded or fired from the Yankees, a trend that continued right up until his untimely death. One year Bridgette Bardot was visiting New York. She was staying at the Waldorf Astoria and was not granting any interviews. Earl Wilson was determined to see La Bardot. I don't think that he cared as much about the interview as he did in
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getting a glimpse of the hottest sex star since the advent of the silver screen. As was reported in Earl's column, he walked into the Waldorf and donned a maids uniform, complete with a kerchief around his head. To fully appreciate this anecdote you must visualize what Earl Wilson looked like. Earl was well under six feet and quite portly with black rimmed glasses. He bore a slight resemblance to Officer Gunther Tuddy from the hit television series, "Car 54, Where Are You." Picture in your mind Gunther Tuddy with a kerchief around his head in an attempt to impersonate a maid. One wonders what Bardot thought. Earl didn't care and neither did his readers. The main attraction to his column was that in the center of his article each and every day was a picture of a female, some more well-known than others, but all sharing something in common. They were all abundantly endowed and were either wearing tight sweaters or were showing an ample amount of cleavage. The Post was an afternoon paper and I might add an afternoon treat. And just like radio commentator Paul Harvey, Earl Wilson also had his signature sign off at the conclusion of his column, which was, "that's Earl Brother." The candy store was also a social gathering place for teenagers and adults alike. It wasn't uncommon to walk into a candy store at any time of the day, as they were usually open from six in the morning until eleven or twelve at night, and find people congregating in the booths or at the counters engaged in conversation or reading a paper while at the same time enjoying a snack, having a sandwich or sipping on one of New York's more popular fountain favorites. The drink that was probably the most popular in New York was the egg cream. There were a couple of secrets inherent to the making of a good egg cream. An egg cream consisted of chocolate syrup, milk and seltzer (club soda). Many an egg cream was spoiled for a number of reasons. First of all the ingredients had to be put in the glass in a set order with the chocolate syrup first, followed by the milk and lastly the seltzer. Do it any other way and you louse up the drink. It just won't taste the same. The other key was in how you poured the seltzer into the glass and last but far from least, great care had to be given as to the type of chocolate syrup that you used as only one brand was permissible. Now here's how to make a New York Egg Cream, and if you've never tasted it before then be prepared to experience "a drinking sensation," guaranteed to have you begging for more. Take an eight ounce drinking glass and add about one inch of Fox's U-Bet chocolate syrup. Now add about one inch of milk. If you're fortunate enough to be able to get an old fashioned bottle of seltzer, the one that comes in a glass bottle with a silver headpiece, then by all means do so because
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your egg cream will be authentic in every sense of the word. On the other hand if you cannot get the old fashioned seltzer bottle then use the common variety club soda found in super markets. Make sure that the seltzer is refrigerated and very cold prior to use. When you drink seltzer that is good and cold you'll GREPS (Belch). Don't be ashamed. Let it out. In Europe it was customary to greps after a good meal. It was considered a compliment. My Mom and Granma got complimented every day of their lives. When we had a family get together it sounded as if there was a symphony orchestra in our dining room. Now, with regards to the egg cream, take a teaspoon and place it in the glass towards the bottom. Pour the seltzer directly onto the spoon. This procedure provides the proper amount of head for your drink. Continue pouring, leaving about two inches of space at the top of the glass. Now stir your drink. If you've done this properly then the two inch space will fill up with a frothy white foam. Bet you can't drink just one. Now if you ask someone what a chocolate soda is, they'll tell you that it's made with chocolate syrup, seltzer and ice cream. In the Bronx a chocolate soda was an egg cream without the milk. It's made the same way except you don't use milk. If we added ice cream then we called it an ice cream soda. If we asked for a black n' white, then we wanted an ice cream soda with chocolate syrup and vanilla ice cream. Another very popular drink was the malted. This was a thick drink that was usually made with vanilla, chocolate or strawberry ice cream. A big tin canister was used and into this canister was placed ice cream as well as the syrup of your choice along with a small amount of malt and a lot of milk. Then the canister was placed in a mixer for about a minute. When done the canister filled up two and a half eight ounce glasses of one of the best drinks that you'll ever have the pleasure of tasting. The price? Just twenty-five cents. Actually it was twenty-seven cents because a malted tasted better with a pretzel. We used to get these pretzels that looked like bread sticks and we would dunk then in the malted and bite off a piece. Finally, one of the most splendid thirst quenchers on a hot day was a cherry-lime rickey. This drink was served in a tall, slender, frosted glass and was composed of an equal amount of cherry and lime syrup and to that seltzer was added. Stir and throw in a piece of lime and you've got one super tasting drink. As you have probably guessed by now, the candy store was not conducive to weight control.
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Some candy stores were directly responsible for making capitalists of neighborhood children or at least those children that had a yen for the free enterprise system. Most candy stores had sliding glass windows in their store front. The window was in place approximately four feet up from the ground and extended to the ceiling. The purpose was to accommodate customers who were in a rush and either wanted a newspaper which was stacked up outside the candy store or some gum or candy which was on the counter top. At that point the customer did not have to go into the store but rather go to the sliding glass window and put their money in a little PISHKA (dish) which was readily available on the counter top. At any given point in time there could be a couple of dollars in change in the PISHKA. Now two dollars might not sound like a lot of money in this day and age but back in the fifties you got three plays on the jukebox for a quarter. A frankfurter with mustard and sauerkraut was just twenty cents; with potato salad it cost an extra nickel. A two cents plain was just that and a large coke was just ten cents. A loaf of white bread was twenty-five cents and you could get an Italian hero UNGERSHTOOPED (loaded) with meats for less than half a buck. You could take the train to Yankee Stadium, see a ball game, have a hot dog and soda and still come home with change. You could go into the supermarket and get the biggest, juiciest sour pickle that you ever saw for just a nickel. You could buy a Spalding ball for a quarter and a stick ball bat for twenty-six cents. With two dollars you could eat and entertain yourself for days. But now with two dollars you're lucky enough to be able to buy toilet tissue to cleanse your TUCHAS (rear end). That's what two dollars is good for now. But back then two dollars put you on Broadway. And there it was, sitting in that little pishka. The owner of the candy store as well as his employees didn't have time to clean out the pishka every time a customer dropped a nickel, dime or quarter in it. They were too busy serving customers inside the candy store so the employees never knew how much or how little money was in it. The approach was simple. Walk up to the window and take a newspaper from the rack. Through the open window alert the owner of the store or one of his employees that you were putting a nickel in the pishka for the paper. They would acknowledge you and then as you placed your nickel in the pishka you scooped up the remaining change that was there, leaving in its place your nickel. To the best of my knowledge no one ever got caught. The one Chinese Restaurant in the neighborhood that we frequented was called Dirty Harry's, and that was before Clint Eastwood popularized that name. Actually the real name of the restaurant escapes me. I don't think I ever knew it and I must have eaten in there over a thousand times. Someone, I think it was my Father, gave the restaurant a nickname in honor of the owner Harry and in honor of.....gee, why did we eat there so much? Anyway, the food was absolutely fantastic. We either
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ate there or brought the food up to the apartment at least every other week. When you entered the restaurant Harry or his wife would greet you. The front of the restaurant was approximately twenty feet deep with tables on either side. The waiter walking down the aisle could serve the tables on each side as there was no more than a three foot separation. Beyond the aisle there was a circular area that had an additional five or six tables. The entire restaurant had no more than twenty tables and they were almost always full. Harry knew me very well as my family were steady and loyal customers. He had a very keen sense of humor. I don't know if that is indicative of Chinese people but it certainly was of Harry. One time I was in the restaurant with some of my friends having lunch. Now as you may know Chinese food causes one to drink water excessively. The restaurant was fairly crowded and I decided to have some fun with our waiter. After he would fill up my glass with water I would wait for him to walk away from my table and then I would hurriedly drink it up. As I said before the restaurant was small in size and except for when the waiter was in the kitchen, he was always in my sight. As he was serving another table I would yell out, "Waiter." He'd look up at me and I would hold up my glass indicating that I needed more water. After repeating this about a half dozen times the waiter became very agitated. He must have told Harry what I was doing because all of a sudden there was Harry standing right next to my table with a large pitcher of water. He poured a glass of water for me and stood there with a devilish grin on his face and in his unmistakable oriental dialect he said to me, "So, you like to dlink watah Mr. Chanzes? Go ahead, keep dlinking." I got the message. About a year ago my wife and I made the trip to New York and visited my old neighborhood. I hadn't been back there for quite some time. Sure enough, Dirty Harry's was still there. We went in for lunch. Harry's wife hadn't aged a day. I recognized one of the old waiters. He was still old. And then I saw Dirty Harry. He looked the same except that he had streaks of gray throughout his hair. He didn't recognize me and for some reason I was glad. If he had I'm sure he would have asked me about my family and because my Mom, Dad and Granma had all passed away, it would have been difficult for me to keep my composure. As it was I sat down with my wife and my eyes welled up. That was because I was thinking of all the memorable times I had at Dirty Harry's with my friends and my family. I might add that Dirty Harry has progressed with the times. He now has a smoking and a non-smoking section. When you walk into his restaurant you can sit in the smoking section on the left or in the non-smoking section on the right. Although both sections are separated by a common aisle of no more than three feet in width and although smoke from the smoking section fills up the non-smoking section,
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this in itself has not deterred Harry from keeping up with the times. We also had four delicatessens in the neighborhood and all of them were located within three blocks of each other. There was Zions, Sonny's, The Palace and Levine's. Zion's was on the corner of Holland and Lydig Avenue. Sonny's Deli was on Lydig, just three quarters of a block down from Zion's. Directly across the street from Sonny's was The Palace. Continuing down Lydig Avenue just one block brought you to White Plains Road. Make a quick right onto White Plains Road and a few stores down was Levine's. Four Deli's within three blocks of each other and you had to fight for a table. My Granma liked to go to the Palace. My Father swore by Sonny's. My sisters preferred Zion's. My mom had no preference and I loved them all because there was no difference between any of them. They were all equally delicious. Anytime my Dad would send me down to get some Deli he would give me specific instructions. "Professor." My Father always called me Professor. Maybe it was because of my grades, or lack of them. Anyway when he sent me down for Deli for the family he would say, "Professor, make sure you go to Sonny's. Don't go to Zion's (which was about a block closer) and make sure you only let Phil (one of Sonny's workers) wait on you and make sure to tell him that you want lean corned beef and lean pastrami, okay?" So I would SCHLEP (go) down to Sonny's. Now on any given Sunday in my neighborhood all of the delicatessens were crowded. As a matter of fact the Chinese restaurants and the pizza parlors were equally crowded. Jews don't eat to live, rather we live to eat. All we need is an excuse and within seconds our knives and forks are going ninety miles per hour. Our NACHAS (pleasures), as well as our sorrows are placated by food.....and lots of it. So I would walk into Sonny's ready to heed my Fathers advice. Usually there were six to ten people in front of you waiting to place a takeout order. Sonny had three people behind the counter including himself waiting on customers as well as filling the waiters orders for his restaurant trade. There was Sonny, Phil and Curly. Curly was a portly man in his forties with a horseshoe shaped hairdo. His hairline was no higher than his ear and curved around the back of his head to his other ear. The top of his head was probably used as a landing field for flies because it was void of all remnants of growth except for a few strands of hair that seemingly joined in unison three inches above his dome and curled to a peak. So there I was in the Deli waiting my turn which could take thirty minutes to an hour. Have you ever been in a Jewish Deli waiting to place your order with six to ten ALTA COCKAS (old Jewish men) in front of you? Sonny didn't give out numbers like they did in bakeries to determine who was next in line waiting to be served.
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This was the honor system or should I say a system without honor. The thirty to sixty minutes that you spent waiting to be served was pure torture. For a number of reasons. If you weren't hungry going down to the Deli, I can assure you that as soon as you approached the store your mouth would start to salivate. The aromas of a Jewish Deli could make a convert out of an atheist. And when you open the door to the Deli and walk in, the heavenly smells of the corned beef, the pastrami, the franks on the grill, the knishes (remember, Jews pronounce the k, ki-nish-es), the salamis hanging from the ceilings greet you as if you were royalty. And just about then the TUMULT (aggravation) starts. "Who's next?" "I am," said one A.K... (abbreviation for Alta Cocka) "No, I am," said another A.K. "I was here first"... "No, I was"... "I had to go to the bathroom"... "Too bad"... "I was talking to a friend who is seated in the restaurant"... "You lost your turn"... "Sonny, how's the corned beef today?" "Are you sure it's good?"..."Is it lean?"..."You think I should try the pastrami instead?"..."Maybe you better give me a taste"... And after all of this the big spender would order an eighth of a pound and pity the worker who goes a slice over. "I told you I just wanted an eighth of a pound. How much extra will that be?"... When my turn finally came around, I didn't care who waited on me, I didn't bother the counterman by asking for lean meat, I didn't care how much over he was on the scale. I just wanted to get out of the Deli with my sanity as well as my appetite intact. The restaurants in my community absolutely adored my family on most Sundays. Why, you ask? Because if we weren't off visiting family and if my Dad wasn't taking us out to eat, then we would order in food. And because I was the oldest child in the family, that in itself would cause me to be elected "delivery boy for the day." On the surface this honor doesn't seem so bad because if there was inclement weather such as snowstorms, rain, sleet, hail, etc., the "Delivery Boy Election Committee," which consisted of my Mom, Dad, Granma and two sisters, would refrain from voting me into office and my Mom and Granma would cook something up for us. But on those days whereby the dubious title was bestowed on me, I want you to know that it required a keen sense of skill, preparation and timeliness to fulfill what was expected of such an exalted position, and that expectation was that I would return to the apartment with piping hot food. Not food that had to be reheated, because reheated food never quite tastes the same as fresh food, but food that was hot and ready to eat. Sounds easy, because as I have previously stated we had no less than a dozen restaurants within a short walking distance. We had Chinese restaurants, delicatessens, pizza parlors, to name a few. And it would have been easy if only I could have gone to either a Chinese restaurant, a delicatessen or a pizza parlor. But unfortunately life was not so simple. My Granma was kosher and that eliminated Chinese food and pizza. So it
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was off to the Deli for Granma. While my sisters liked Chinese food and Deli, their first preference was pizza, and my parents were partial to Chinese food. So in a manner of speaking I became the first "Galloping Gourmet." It was my job to pick up delicatessen for Granma, pizza for my sisters and Chinese food for Mom, Dad and me. And furthermore it was expected of me to deliver the food piping hot. My Mom would call Dirty Harry to place the order for Chinese food. It usually took about forty-five minutes for it to be prepared. As soon as my Mom placed the order for the Chinese food I would don my track shoes and head for the pizza parlor to place that order. It usually took about twenty minutes for the pizza to be baked. While the pizza was baking I'd go across the street to the Deli and get Granma her food. With Granmas food in hand I would go back across the street to pick up the pizza. Now with a hot corned beef sandwich and an equally hot pizza I would go across the street to Dirty Harry to get the Chinese food. When I got out of Dirty Harry's I may not have looked very organized, what with my arms filled with Chinese food, delicatessen and pizza, but one thing was for sure. I smelled FANTASTIC!!! Of course every neighborhood had its own version of the infamous Madison Square garden. Our Garden was called Public School 105 or P.S. 105. Adjacent to the school was the schoolyard which was completely enclosed by either a chain link fence, or a combination fence and cement wall ranging in height from ten feet to well over forty feet. The dimensions of the schoolyard were approximately two hundred fifty feet by four hundred fifty feet. The schoolyard served many purposes, not the least of which was where aspiring future Hall of Famers practiced their craft. P.S. 105 had four basketball courts where we played half court as well as full court games. It wasn't unusual to come down to the schoolyard on a Saturday or Sunday and find all four basketball courts in use and at the same time there would be two softball games in progress or a touch football game pitting twenty-two guys in action as well as five to seven stickball games going on. The cast of players for all of these games were usually the same. It was guys known only by either a nickname or just their last name. The only people that addressed us by our first names were our parents, relatives and sometimes our teachers. We had guys like Pee Wee Cohen. Pee Wee might have been short in stature but he was a dynamo when it came to athletic competition. His diminutive size became one of his greatest assets in athletic competition. His greatest asset though was his desire to excel. Two examples come to mind. Stickball was a very popular game at P.S. 105. When we played stickball it was usually one on one competition. With a piece of chalk we would draw a box on the concrete wall in the schoolyard. From a distance of about forty feet we would pitch to the batter. Any ball not swung at and either landing in the box or hitting the lines around the
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box was considered a strike. A ground ball past the pitcher was a single; if caught by the pitcher it was an out. A ball hit by a batter that bounced for the first time past the pitching line was a double. A ball traveling far enough to hit the fence at the opposite end of the field was considered a triple and if it went over the fence which was about two hundred and fifty feet away, then it was a home run. The field of play was very narrow as it was approximately fifteen feet on either side of the pitcher. We used to use a ball that the Spalding Company made... It was called appropriately enough, .... a Spalding. Now if you had a half way decent throwing arm you could make this ball hum. Guys could throw this ball so fast that it would cause batters to be very nervous standing at the plate. A black and blue mark was often the result of being hit by the ball. That's how fast and hard it could be thrown. I could always throw the ball fast. My problem at times was my control. On this particular day Pee Wee and I were playing stickball and I was throwing the ball faster than usual with pin point control. Now I don't mean to imply that I was placing the ball in the exact spot that I wanted to but if you could consistently throw the ball into the chalked box then that was for me at least, evidence of pin point control. After two innings I was actually a run up on Pee Wee and delusions of grandeur were dancing through my head. That's not to say that Pee Wee wasn't invincible, but I wasn't in his league when it came to stickball and social status in the Bronx in the 1950's and early 60's was to a large degree attributable to how many points you scored in a basketball game or who you beat in stickball. So I had a lot riding on the outcome of this game. It had gone beyond being a game. It was for status, it was for acceptance. It was 'mano a mano.' This was what life was all about for a fourteen year old kid growing up in the Bronx. There was nothing more important in life at that time than establishing your athletic credentials. Victory in athletics meant that in team games you were chosen first. Victory in athletics gave you a new found acceptance, so much so that the tough guys in the neighborhood would not pick on you because the "unwritten law" of neighborhood sports is that you don't hit the jocks. You can bother the jocks, you can intimidate the jocks, but you don't hit a jock because that jock might hit a home run that will cause your team to win. Unfortunately not every tough guy played ball, so, so much for that theory. Anyway, so there I was with all of this pressure on my mind, projecting my new found acclaim some seven innings into the future and what does Pee Wee do? Pee Wee did what I had not seen anyone before or since do. He was having a difficult time hitting my fastball so he stood at the plate and started bunting. He bunted the ball over my head, he bunted it to my right, he bunted the ball to my left and each time he bunted the ball I became more frustrated and as a result I threw the ball that much harder which in turn made Pee
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Wee's job that much easier because the harder I threw the ball then the farther it traveled off of his bat. When I slowed my pitches down so as to prevent Pee Wee from bunting the ball past me, he would then take a normal swing and whack the ball all over the place. I don't remember the final score of the game but I vaguely remember who won. It was the short guy. Anyway I've tried to get a rematch with Pee Wee but I think he's ducking me. The other story that sticks out in my mind about Pee Wee was when he made the Christopher Columbus High School basketball team. During the school year, at the insistence of some of the members of the team, Coach Roy Rubin was persuaded to give Pee Wee a special tryout for the team which was created when one of the other members either hurt himself or got ill and was going to be out for the rest of the year. Pee Wee got the tryout and made the team, although not as a starter. Back then there was a tournament held every year at the original Madison Square Garden in New York City for the top high school basketball teams. The competition was referred to as the P.S.A.L. tournament. Students of the various competing schools would fill the seats at the Garden and we were treated to as many as three games on any given day. I forgot the team we were playing that day and quite honestly I don't even remember if we won, but I do remember Pee Wee being put into the game late in the contest. There was hardly any time left on the clock and you could see that the guys from the Columbus High team were feverishly trying to set Pee Wee up so that he could score a basket. The ball came down the court and with little time left on the clock the ball was passed into Pee Wee's hands. The court was crowded with guys almost twice the size of Pee Wee. Pee Wee reacted instinctively as any good ball player will and he realized that it would be difficult to successfully drive to the basket for a score and it would be equally difficult to shoot the ball from his present position on the court because he was being guarded so closely. With quick reflexes and speed to match, Pee Wee dribbled the ball to the corner base line of the court, a distance of some thirty-five feet. The person guarding Pee Wee backed off a little due to the distance between Pee Wee and the basket. That bit of hesitation on the part of the defender gave Pee Wee the opening that he needed to take a shot at the basket. Up went Pee Wee. He released the ball and as it made its arc towards the basket you could sense that everyone in the Garden was rooting for him. The ball arrived at the basket and in school yard parlance it was a "swish shot." The ball went through the basket without hitting the rim as it 'swished' the nets. The crowd, friend and foe alike erupted with joy. A good basketball crowd applauds not only the finesse of their players but the opposing players as well. Pee Wee started jumping in the air, raising his right arm high up and with one fell swoop bringing it down to signify his accomplishment. The Garden announcer, the late John Condon, announced to
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the crowd that the basket was made by Pee Wee Cohen. You would have thought that Columbus High had just won the championship game but instead it was one of many memorable events for a memorable guy. There were many other guys who had nicknames. There was Tubs. And he was. But you couldn't tell him that unless of course you were tired of living. Tubs was a real MESHUGANA (crazy person). He was a teenage Jewish Godfather. That's like Godfather spelled D-O-N C-O-R-L-E-O-N-E. If you had a problem with some kid in the neighborhood, then you went to see Tubs. On the other hand if Tubs had a problem with some kid in the neighborhood, then that kid considered leaving home...and quickly. It's not that Tubs went around killing people. Instead he would usually give you a good shot in the KISHKAS (kidneys) to get your attention. One time Tubs got a little carried away. Someone was bothering one of his friends and Tubs paid this kid a visit. Not exactly a friendly one. Tubs took this kid on a trip. Not in a car. But in an elevator. To the seventh floor. You see the elevators in apartment buildings would not go to the roof. They only went to the top floor, usually the seventh. From the seventh floor Tubs walked this kid up one flight to the roof. At this point the story gets a little fuzzy. I don't know if Tubs hit this kid or if he just talked to him when he got him to the roof. I do know one thing though. Tubs held on to this kid and he wouldn't let go. Tubs held onto him by his ankles. Tubs grip on this kids ankles was so tight that the kids ankles swelled up. And it's a good thing that Tubs had the presence of mind to hold this kid tightly by his ankles. Because if he didn't then this kid would have fell off the roof to the ground below which was seven stories down as Tubs was holding him over the edge. After that episode everyone did their best not to upset Tubs. Especially the kid with the swollen ankles. Another character from the neighborhood who frequented the schoolyard was a guy that everyone called "The Babe", as in Babe Ruth. The Babe loved to play stickball with kids four or five years younger than him as his chances of winning improved dramatically. Now the Babe, like his namesake, was stout and also batted from the left side. The Babe was also given a tryout by the New York Yankees, and that is how he got his nickname, but unlike his predecessor, the Babe's home run feats were limited to the confines of the schoolyard of P.S. 105. On any given weekend you could go to the schoolyard and see the Babe. He was about 5' 10" tall, portly and he appeared to have had a grin impregnated on his face. I don't think that I ever saw the Babe without a smile. I also don't believe that I ever saw the Babe without a Spaulding in one hand and a stickball bat in the other. There was one other thing that the Babe always had with him and that was his own personal statistics with regards to his stickball prowess. On any given day
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he'd be able to tell you how many home runs he had hit in the schoolyard that year. The real Babe would have been impressed. Humm. Maybe now I understand why our Babe always played kids four or five years his junior. A few years ago I went to pay a condolence call at my friend Harvey's house because his mother had just passed away. Harvey was living in Fort Lauderdale. When I walked into his home, Harvey introduced me to everyone there. During the course of the introductions Harvey introduced me to his brother in-law Shelley. I looked at Shelley and said, " Your name isn't Shelley, it's the Babe." This was 1978. I hadn't seen the Babe in at least fourteen years. He looked the same. It was if the aging process had passed him by. I desperately wanted to ask him how many home runs he had hit in 1956, 57 and 58 in the schoolyard of P.S. 105 but common sense told me not to. I mean, think about it. Did Roger Maris ever forget how many home runs he hit in 1961? I asked the Babe for his phone number and told him I would call him and we could play a game of stickball in our version of an 'Old Timers Game'. He asked me how old I was. I told him that I was only about two or three years younger than him. He said, "nah, forget it." Then there was a man we all called Pops. Pops was in his sixties and you could always find him on the basketball court with all of the teenagers. Now Pops couldn't move like us kids, but he had his own distinct and effective style. Pops would only play half court games with us. We would have six guys playing, three against three. Pops would usually guard the kid who had the poorest outside shot. Why? Because Pops would usually take a defensive position underneath the basket and allow you to shoot to your hearts content from the outside. There's no worse shame in basketball than having your opponent give you a free shot at the hoop, only to have you miss. Pop's style on offense was equally adept. He would stand in one spot about fifteen feet away from the basket and wait for you to pass him the ball. Then he would throw a two hand set shot up at the basket and more often than not the ball would go through the hoop. There was a kid who lived two blocks away from me in my Granma's building whose name was Warren Dolinsky, yet for some unknown reason the name he answered to was "Jiggy." Life had dealt Jiggy a cruel blow. Jiggy had some sort of bone disorder which was evident by the protruding lumps on both of his wrists. In addition Jiggy maxed out in height at slightly over four feet. His diminutive size kept him from competing in most sports, except for Ping Pong. In the game of Ping Pong this little guy was a giant. A funny giant, but nevertheless a giant. Jiggy could barely see over the Ping Pong table but there was hardly a ball he didn't or couldn't return. He could volley and slam with great ability. When you
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played Jiggy a game of Ping Pong it was almost as if you were just playing Jiggy's head, because that was all you could usually see at the other end of the table, just Jiggy's head. You would hit the ball to Jiggy and then all of a sudden a crippled hand holding onto a Ping Pong racket would come up from underneath the table and return the ball to your side. Usually successfully. I was and still am an excellent Ping Pong player and I played Jiggy on a number of occasions and after most games Jiggy walked away from the Ping Pong table taller than I. Of course some guys had last names that were funnier than any nickname could possibly be. Like Lipschitz (pronounced Lip Shits). And other guys had nicknames that made no sense at all, like Zorch. It was rare for girls to have nicknames, but some of them did. My Aunt Tilly nicknamed my sister Phyllis, "Murphy." I have no idea why. Neither does Murphy, I mean Phyllis. Kids weren't the only ones to have nicknames. Some adults had nicknames for their friends and the nicknames either described the line of work that the people were in or it alluded to a particular characteristic of that individual. For instance my Dad belonged to a club just across the street from our apartment building that was frequented by the neighborhood men who enjoyed playing cards. There was wagering on the games, but I couldn't tell you how much because kids weren't allowed in there and my Dad would never discuss it with us. He would talk about the people that went to the club. There was Maxie Bagels or as he was more commonly called, Bagels. Now Bagels wasn't his real last name. It just described the line of work that he was in. The most notorious of my Fathers entire card playing companions was Jake the FARTZER (one who passes gas). Now as my Father would tell us, the Fartzer had a special talent. Jake could cut the cheese; lay a bomb or just plain fart on cue. The Fartzer would be called upon to demonstrate his special abilities when my Dad or his cronies were involved in a card game and someone would sit down at the table and just KIBITZ (clown around). Money was at stake in these games and there was no room for Kibitzers. So when a Kibitzer appeared at one of the card tables, and if Jake was in the club, the high sign would go out to him and the Fartzer would take up his position at that table and do his thing. In no time flat the Kibitzer would leave and the game would continue uninterrupted. I would ask my Dad how he and the other guys could stand the odor and my Dad would indicate to me that it was a small price to pay in order to continue the card game. Our neighborhood also consisted of four Synagogues which are Jewish Houses of Worship. Now in the Jewish religion, the Sabbath, which starts at sundown on Friday and continues until sundown on Saturday, is considered to be the holiest of
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days with the exception of certain holidays that fall throughout the year. For those that wanted to attend there were Friday night and Saturday morning prayer services in the Synagogues. In our neighborhood it was usually the elderly that attended the services, not us kids, and for a good reason. As for Friday night services I can only speak for myself and not the other kids on the block. It was inconceivable for me to attend services on Friday nights because my Mom and Granma cooked a dinner on that night, that if all the elderly men had known about it, they would have petitioned the Rabbi to change Friday night services to Thursday night so they could eat in our home. But to be perfectly honest with you, these same people would have loved to have eaten in our home on any night of the week. Come to think of it, they wouldn't have complained over breakfast or lunch either, such was the ability that my Mom and Granma possessed in the art of cooking. I have yet to meet or hear of an individual that tasted either my Mom's or Granma's cooking and didn't rant and rave about it. They couldn't wait to be invited back for another royal feast. I can honestly say that I don't ever remember an invited guest not showing up for one of my Mom's or Granma's dinners. I'm willing to bet that over the years there were friends and relatives that showed up for dinner in pain or with a high fever. I'm not so brash as to say that their cooking alleviated pain or reduced a fever, but if their cooking got someone out of a sick bed to travel miles to our apartment, then just maybe their secret blends did have some medicinal purposes. A dinner cooked by my Mom or Granma on any night was special, but a Friday night SHABAS (Sabbath) dinner was extra special. The first course served was a FORESHPICE, which in English means appetizer. The foreshpice could have been any one of a number of delectable dishes, such as chopped liver which was served over a bed of lettuce, encircled by sliced tomatoes and topped off with a radish placed directly in the center. Or it could have been chopped eggs and onions. This dish was a blend of hard boiled eggs and onions, chopped and blended together with salt and pepper and a little oil. This simple dish was exquisite to the taste. Or the foreshpice could have been my very favorite, which was a GEDEMPSE (mixture). Now a gedempse consists of tiny meatballs and chicken gizzards which included the neck and the PIPPICK which is a chicken's PUTZ (Penis), served in its own juices which was seasoned with lots of pepper. This was some tasting putz. There are no adequate words that could describe the taste and flavor of the gedempse that my Mom and Granma prepared. If six people were going to sit down at the dinner table, then Mom and Granma cooked for twelve, but they could never make enough gedempse. It was that good. For that matter they could never make enough of anything that they cooked. When my Mom and Granma cooked, the smells that emanated in the apartment made you QVELL (gloat with delight). And above all, both Mom and Granma believed in a
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proper presentation of any food that they served. I mean it looked almost as good as it tasted. I say almost because no one in their right mind could expect food to taste that good. Granma was also very meticulous regarding the preparation of her food. She only used white pepper. I once asked her why and she told me that black pepper makes the food look dirty. After the foreshpice came the chicken soup. Now this wasn't just chicken soup. This was CHICKEN SOUP. There was an old time Jewish comedian who appeared in the Jewish theatre and from time to time he was on the Ed Sullivan show. His name was Menasha Skulnick. Menasha had a certain trait about him when he told stories and this trait became his trademark. When Menasha Skulnick was telling a story about oil wells and if he wanted you to know that his oil wells were far greater than any others he would say in almost a whisper, "There are oil wells, " and then he would raise his voice, "and there are OIL WELLS." Well there is chicken soup and there is CHICKEN SOUP. My Mom and Granma made CHICKEN SOUP. Some people will swear to you that chicken soup has certain healing qualities. Supposedly the A.M.A. has even subscribed to that theory. I can't swear to that, but I can unequivocally swear and attest to one thing about my Mom's and Granma's chicken soup. This was some kind of chicken soup. It cooked for hours on top of the stove in a big, big pot filled with chicken, soup greens, dill, onions, carrots, salt and pepper. When the chicken soup was served, it was generously poured over mountains of LUXION, which is a Jewish word for noodles. Even the noodles were carefully selected. They had to be Goodmans Fine Egg Noodles. No other noodles would do. Don't ask me why. But when my Mom or Granma said, "Stevala, go down to the store and get me Goodmans Fine Egg Noodles," then Goodmans Fine Egg Noodles was what they got. Why would I want to upset them by getting them another type of egg noodle? After all, did I know how to cook chicken soup? And to this delicious blend of chicken soup and luxion was added CANADELACH (matzo balls). Mom and Granma made matzo balls to perfection. They were soft, tender and perfectly round with no lumps in them. They were so beautiful to look at that you wanted to take a picture of them. But who had time for pictures? We weren't there to challenge Cecil B. DE Mille. We were there to eat, and eat we did. After the soup came the 'piece de resistance,' which was the most outrageous roast chicken that you have ever tasted. The roast chicken was my Mom's secret recipe. Mom gave the recipe to my sisters and my wife, but only my sister Phyllis has been able to duplicate it.
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To start with, Mom and Granma only used kosher chickens. Now for those people that haven't eaten kosher chickens, there is a very discernible difference in taste. Just like that famous soda commercial says, "It's the real thing." And once you've tasted a kosher chicken you'll only want the real thing. Mom would cut the chickens in quarters and season them with kosher salt, pepper and garlic. The chickens would find a home in our refrigerator for the night. The next day Mom would place the chickens in a large pan that was well oiled. Mom would then pour a couple of cups of water into the pan and start to roast the chickens. Every twenty minutes or so she would baste the chickens with the juices from the roasting pan. The chickens would cook until they were golden brown and dry, not juicy, and they were served hot, right out of the stove. In the event there were any left overs, then we would eat it cold the next day. Sometimes we would even eat it cold that very night. You see our house wasn't a bakery. You didn't take a number for service. Whoever got to the food first could eat it. If you put it back into the refrigerator for consumption later on, that food became fair game for anyone who found it. If you left the dinner table for a brief period of time, then there was a possibility that when you returned to the table, the only thing left of your dinner was your dinner plate. Just your dinner plate. And of course your knife and fork. The roast chicken was served with either a luxion or potato kugel. Now that doesn't sound right, so let me say that again. The roast chicken was served with either an OUTRAGEOUS luxion or potato kugel. Kugel means pudding and a potato kugel is a mixture of potatoes, onions and seasonings blended together in a Mixmaster. The ingredients are then placed into a well-oiled six inch high baking pan and placed in the oven. The finished product is unbelievably good. The luxion kugel consists of Goodmans Fine Egg Noodles (Do you think I should ask the Goodman company for a commission for advertising their product?) boiled in water and then drained. The egg noodles are blended together with eggs and salt and pepper to taste. Then the mixture is also placed in a well-oiled six inch high pan and baked in the oven until it is golden brown. While I loved both kugels, my favorite was the Luxion kugel. It was good hot or cold, with a main dish or just by itself. So now you see why I couldn't attend Friday night services. My Mom and Granma cooked a very heavy meal and you couldn't eat it late at night. So while we were eating our Shabas dinner, coincidentally Friday night services were being conducted in the Synagogue. Since I couldn't be in two places at once, I had to make a decision. Now insofar as the other guys my age who didn't attend Friday night services, shame on them.
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Now as I mentioned before there was also Saturday morning services. Virtually all of the guys in the neighborhood did not attend, and for the same reason. Just like with the Shabas dinner on Friday night, Saturday morning services presented a conflict for most of us. You see Saturday morning services would start at about 8 A.M., which was when our basketball, softball, football or stickball games started. There's nothing worse than having nine guys show up for a basketball game or seventeen guys appear for a softball game or twenty-one guys appear for a football game. Well, in all actuality there is one thing worse than all of that. What if only one guy shows up for a stickball game? So in keeping with the spirit of athletic competition and schoolyard harmony, we had to put our priorities in order. Now that didn't mean that we didn't attend any Saturday morning services. In order to be BAR MITZVAHED it was a requirement of most Synagogues that its young congregants attend at least ten Saturday morning services. While this presented major problems for most of us, somehow we were able to alter our athletic schedules so as to accommodate the Rabbi. There was one other time that we would have to attend Saturday morning services and this happened to virtually every guy in the neighborhood, but just once. You see, Jewish people don't like to do anything by themselves. When we eat, we like to eat with other people. We don't have to eat with a lot of people, but at least one other person. We don't even have to eat with someone that we like. Jewish people just don't do anything by themselves. We don't go shopping by ourselves; we don't go to the movies by ourselves. We need someone to take us to the doctors office and we need someone to take us home from the doctors office. We need someone to take a walk around the block with. We need someone to watch television with. We always need to be with someone. But to the bank we can go by ourselves. With regards to Saturday morning services Jewish people will not, cannot and are forbidden from praying in a Synagogue by themselves. Not only can't we pray by ourselves but we must have nine other people praying with us. And I might add that we are particular about who we can pray with. There must be a minimum of ten people and these ten people must be all Jewish and all men. The minimum of ten people needed to pray in a Synagogue is called a Minion, which is pronounced Min-Yun. As I said, the minion must consist of only Jewish men. GOYIM (nonJewish people) don't count. Boy, are they ever so lucky. And in the Jewish religion you are considered a man if you are at least thirteen years old. You may not be able to drink, but you're a man. You may not be able to vote, but you're a man. You may not be able to stay up late at night, but you're a man. Come to think of it
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I can't think of any other privilege that is extended to a Jewish kid of thirteen years of age other than being allowed to be a member of the Holy Ten. Now most Rabbis have in their possession an emergency religious service sheet (ERSS). This is a list of Jewish men who can be called up on the telephone in the event that a minion is not present to conduct religious services. Of course if it's about a quarter to eight on a Saturday morning and there are only nine men present in Synagogue and the Rabbi can't get a hold of anyone from his E.R.S.S, does a calamity like this prevent the start of Saturday morning services? Not at all. This is where the "wise men" of the Synagogue put their alternate plan into action. What they attempt to do, and always successfully, is to kidnap a ballplayer. These old men peer out the windows of the Synagogue and wait for unsuspecting kids to walk by. As soon as they see a kid afoot, they open up the door of the Synagogue and walk out with their ever present cane in hand. Whoever designed this plan knew that if they sent out an elderly man with a cane, then their chances for success would be that much greater because who could say no to an old man............. with a cane no less. So as you're walking by the Synagogue, this old man with a cane walks up to you and says, "Sonny, you've been Bar-Mitzvahed yet?" Not suspecting any devious intent on the part of this elderly gentleman you immediately reply in the affirmative. At that point, faster than a locomotive, quicker than the disappearance of a piece of my moms' roast chicken, this old man whips his cane out and grabs your arm and drags you into the Synagogue. He pleads with you to stick around for the services because if you don't then they won't be able to conduct them. What are you going to say to an old man with a cane? What are you going to say to an old man with a cane that's quicker than a speeding bullet? On that day there were only nine guys that showed up to play basketball. The next week you found a different route to travel to the schoolyard.
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2075 WALLACE AVENUE That's where I grew up. Bordered on the south by Brady Avenue, on the north by Lydig Avenue and to the west is Holland Avenue. To the average reader these are just names, but to me they represent memories. Memories that I can't escape. Memories that are forever imbedded in my mind. Memories that bring tears to my eyes, and at the same time conjure a smile on my face. It wasnt just the place where I grew up. No, it was much more than that. In retrospect it was an event, a happening. A magical time period that has never since been duplicated. Im so elated that I had the pleasure of living in that time period, in that very special corner of this wide world. And yet my heart is saddened because my children and future generations of children will never be able to experience that brief moment in time that has etched an unforgettable and idyllic imprint on my very mind and soul. Our apartment building was similar to virtually all the other buildings on Pelham Parkway. It was a seven floor elevated building. The first floor had two apartments. For the most part those apartments were underground. Light shone in through their living room windows which were above ground, but the living accommodations were below the surface of the building. The second floor had eight apartments and the third through seventh floors had ten apartments each. That's sixty apartments in all in our building and some buildings had more while few had less. Our building was split in half because there were almost an exact number of apartments on the other side of a common hallway that we shared. The only other living quarters on the first floor belonged to Joe, our superintendent. At the time Joe was a colored man. He later became a black man and had he lived long enough he would have matured into an African American. I don't think that Joe really cared much about names, but if I had to give him one then I'd say that above all Joe was a NICE man. A very nice man. His job was to maintain the building and keep it neat and orderly. That was no easy task with so many children living in the building, because if we weren't playing ball in the schoolyard, then we would carouse in the hallways, usually just after Joe had mopped the floors. But never once did I hear him utter a harsh word. Joe always had a smile on his face and was always trying to be of help to his tenants. He treated everyone with respect and in turn we gave him the respect he so richly deserved................Except when we played ball in the hallways just after he finished mopping them.
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Next to Joe's apartment was the Boiler Room. This massive room had pipes running overhead which transported hot steam to the apartments in the building. That's assuming that there was a sufficient supply of coal to heat the building. Sometimes there was. But.......sometimes there wasn't. There was many a cold night when my Mom would bang on the radiator pipes in our apartment to signify to Joe that we needed heat. Of course if the city hadn't supplied Joe with enough coal or if the boiler was malfunctioning then all we could do on those nights was to put on a pair of pajamas.......maybe two pairs, and huddle under our bed sheets with two heavy blankets on top of us. Once the morning came and in the event that the problem with the boiler wasn't corrected then we would either take a cold shower or dampen a face cloth and wipe our bodies. If we elected to take a shower, then I can assure you that it was a very quick one. In actuality the boiler room served two purposes. One was to provide heat........sometimes, and the other was to provide passage to the next building across the courtyard, 2077 Wallace Avenue. In bad weather we could escape getting wet and still visit our friends in the other building by simply going through the boiler room. Of course if you were being chased by a neighborhood bully who was unfamiliar with your building, then once you made it into the boiler room you were safe, because there were so many mazes within the boiler room, that you could easily escape unharmed. Of course a malfunctioning boiler room in the summer in New York bore no consequence to us, but nevertheless we did have our problems which to a degree were still heat related. Summers in New York can be awfully hot and humid. Some people would escape the heat by retreating to their air conditioned apartment. We didn't have that luxury because our building was not wired sufficiently for air conditioning. So we did the next best thing. My Dad bought a big fan, three feet by three feet. He placed it at the entranceway into the living room.........where no one slept. My sister's bedroom and my parent's bedroom were hot as hell, but the living room...............it was a MACHIA (a pleasure) in there.............except no one slept there to enjoy it. My little bedroom was fairly comfortable on even the hottest nights. The room was originally a small dining room. When we moved into the apartment my parents converted it into a bedroom for me. It measured 10' x 6', and that's being generous. The room (cell) had four windows in it. They lay caddy corner to each other, two on one side and two on the other. The head of my bed lay directly between the converging windows, so in the summer I would open them up and I would enjoy the delightful breeze that would flow through my room. And so
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other than the living room, my little bedroom was definitely the best place to sleep in the apartment. The other advantage to my bedroom was that it was only three short steps to the refrigerator. There was never a shortage of food in our apartment. If four uninvited people would ever show up at our apartment at dinner time, there would be enough food for them without depriving us. Fortunately there weren't that many times that uninvited guests showed up at our door, so therefore there were always leftovers to be placed in the fridge. That same fridge that was right next to my bedroom. And so many nights I would "raid the refrigerator" not out of boredom, but because my Mom was such a fantastic cook that it was hard to resist temptation. We lived on the fifth floor in apartment 548. One night on one of my infamous raids, I opened up the refrigerator. It was about two in the morning. My sisters and parents were asleep in their respective bedrooms. When I opened up the refrigerator it emitted a light. Apparently in the darkness of the apartment the light shone into my parents bedroom and it awoke my Dad. He knew where the light was coming from yet in his mind he thought that a burglar was raiding the refrigerator. After all it was a well-known fact that my Mom's cooking was outrageously good. So my Dad armed with nothing but his GATKAS (underwear) slowly walks into the entranceway of the kitchen. I didn't hear him coming. I still have the fridge open and I'm munching down one of my Mom's hamburgers when all of a sudden my Dad yells out something totally indistinguishable, "BUH, BUH, BUH." I recognized his voice and yelled back, "DAD, IT'S ONLY ME. IT'S STEVE." I flicked on the light in the kitchen real quick because I didn't want my Father to think that not only was there a burglar in the apartment, but it was a burglar who was good at imitations. I wanted my Dad to see that it really was me. We never kept guns in the apartment and so after I caught my breath I asked my Dad what he expected to accomplish if there was a burglar in the apartment, since my Dad had neither a gun or a knife or any weapon in his possession. And before my Father could answer I also pointed out that indeed if there was a burglar in the apartment, then there were only two ways for him to get out. One way was to break through one of the windows in my room and dive to the streets five floors below, but I quickly ruled that out because that seems to work only in the movies. The other way was to run past my unarmed Dad. He thought about that for a moment and finally he just told me not to open the fridge in the middle of the night. Nevertheless I went back to bed that night with a big smile on my face because I had a loving father who showed that he would risk his life for his family. That sent a gush of warmth seeping through my body........................ Or was it the
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food that he was so concerned about? Originally we lived in apartment 244 on the second floor. It was a one bedroom apartment. My two sisters and I slept in the bedroom and my folks slept on a fold out sofa in the living room. While it was a very small apartment, we never felt confined at all. We were five people sharing one shower and just one bathroom and yet other than on rare occasions, it never presented a problem for us. Eventually we moved three flights up to apartment 548 and we now had two showers and two bathrooms. The shower in my parents bathroom was a needle shower. It had an overhead shower jet and two additional side jets about two feet off of the floor. The shower was extremely stimulating. I had never seen a shower like that, yet for some unexplained reason my parents eventually decided to use their shower as a storage place. So there we were, back to one shower. I lived at 2075 Wallace Avenue in the Bronx for over twenty years, first having lived in apartment 244 and then moving up to apartment 548 where most of my memories of my childhood come from. To this day my alarm clock is set for 5:48 in the morning. It's a good thing that the bulk of my memories didn't come from apartment 244.
Every building had its own list of characters and people who stuck out in your mind. Certainly ours was no different. I don't even have to search my memory for some of them because they made such an indelible impression on my mind. On the second floor there lived Sam and Irene Kleinrock along with their son Ira. Ira was a brilliant young man. He was extremely proficient in the subject of chemistry. I'm quite sure though that one of his experiments had gone amok because his hair bore a striking resemblance to boxing promoter Don King. Because of his hairdo my father nicknamed Ira, "the mad scientist." Ira also possessed a different type of laugh than most people had. His lips would curl up and his face would resemble a pumpkin's with its broad smile and big teeth showing and you would hear Ira's infectious laugh, "hee, hee, hee, hee, hee, hee." Back in the 1950's Ira was two years older than me. Come to think of it he still is. Back then we kids used to pal around and play with other kids our own age. The only time that I can think of where age didn't come into play in our relationships was in the schoolyard. All you needed in the schoolyard was the ability to compete. Age had nothing to do with it. Yet I never saw Ira in the schoolyard. I used to run into him in the hallway in our apartment building and there were also times when his family and mine would go out to eat together on a Sunday.
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Although I truly liked Ira and his folks, I used to shudder when we had to go out to eat with them. Ira's father Sam was a plumber. He didn't own a car. He had a panel truck that housed his plumbing supplies. Therefore whenever we went out to eat, Sam, Irene and Ira would always come along in our car. To this day I cannot for the life of me figure out how Sam and Irene stayed married for so many years. Irene was very talkative, to put it mildly. I can't begin to tell you how often when we were driving along I would hear Sam say, "Irene, come up for air." But she would just keep talking. And then Sam would say in a louder tone, "IRENE, that's enough. Give someone else a chance to talk." But without missing a beat Irene kept up her end of the conversation. Then Sam would erupt. "IRENE, IF YOU DON'T SHUT UP I'M GOING TO THROW YOU OUT OF THIS CAR, WHILE JOE (MY DAD) IS DRIVING." That statement usually caught Irene's attention.....for all of five minutes. Then she would start in again. That scenario was repeated over and over again, many times over many years. Irene and Sam eventually moved to Florida. I had also moved to Florida and my folks and Granma were visiting me and I invited Sam and Irene over to our house. Sam and Irene had gotten noticeably older.....but their act was still the same. Boy could she talk and man oh man could he yell. We found out that Ira had also moved to Florida with his family. Now that Ira and I were adults, the two year difference in our age didn't matter anymore, so I invited Ira and his family over for dinner one Sunday. I thought it would be nice to see each other, reminisce and possibly strike up a relationship. It was an unusually cold and nasty day for South Florida. Ira arrived with his wife and son. Ira was wearing slacks and a shirt. Here we were, some twenty-five years after we had last seen each other. The world had changed in many ways. Man had landed on the moon. The computer revolution was beginning. Polyester was out. Black people were for the first time being identified as AfricanAmericans. We now had Heavy Metal music. Yet with all the changes, some things still remained the same. Well, at least one thing. Ira still had a Don King hairdo. Of course that wasn't all that still remained the same. Ira's son Adam and my oldest son Lorne asked me to take them to the park so that they could play ball. I drove them there and was back at the house within fifteen minutes. My wife, along with Ira and his wife were sitting on the patio. Raindrops began to fall. The rain made the temperatures drop. I was about to turn around and go back and pick up the kids when I noticed something strange about Ira. He no longer was wearing
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slacks. He now had on a pair of shorts. He also had on his "Pumpkin Face," along with the noticeable hee, hee, hee coming out of his mouth. I asked what happened and my wife told me that our German Shepard Devil did something that she had never done before or since. She just walked up to Ira, opened her mouth and regurgitated all over him. I don't know if Devil thought it was funny, but judging from Ira's reaction he thought it was hysterical. Hee, hee, hee......some things just never change. And that was the last time that I saw Ira. When I lived in apartment 244 I was best of friends with Ronnie Krauss. Ronnie was one year younger than me. We had a lot in common. We both loved to play ball and we both loved to play ball. Our building had quite a few entrances. One of them was a ramp that had a downward slope which would take you into our building on the first floor. Ronnie's apartment was on the eastern side of the ramp and mine was directly across on the western side, separated by less than ten feet. Our windows faced each other. Instead of walking down the hallway some fifty feet to each others apartment we would simply open up our window and yell across to each other in order to see if we wanted to go down to the schoolyard to play ball. We didn't need Alexander Graham Bell's invention. Ronnie's mom Evelyn was a fantastic baker. Sometimes by opening my window I could smell the luscious aromas coming from her apartment. On those days I would most assuredly run down the hall some fifty feet to Ronnie's apartment to see if he was there. Mrs. Krauss always saw to it that I didn't go away empty handed. The other memory I have of Mrs. Krauss is that she had a fascination with mouths. Particularly Ronnie's and mine. It all started when a vendor placed a cigarette machine in the building. For only 25 cents a pack back then you could get cancer and heart disease. Now it costs 10 times what it cost then, but that hasn't deterred people from smoking. Ronnie and I were about 13 and 14 years old respectively. We were able to jimmy the machine to get a pack of cigarettes. We would go into the boiler room and light up. We wouldn't smoke just one cigarette apiece. No, instead we would smoke about five each. We would come out of the boiler room green at the gills. Then for some stupid reason we would go to Ronnie's apartment to get a drink or just hang out. As soon as we walked in Mrs. Krauss would line us up against the wall. She'd make us open our mouths and she'd put her nose right up to our lips and inhale. She must have done this 20 or 30 times over a two year period. And each time she would say the same thing. "Stevie, I'm going to tell your parents that you're smoking, and Ronnie, when your father gets home I'm going to tell him too." Then Ronnie and I would go into our
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Clarence Darrow routine and beg forgiveness with a promise never, ever to smoke again. She caught us smoking 20 or 30 times and 20 or 30 times we begged forgiveness. She never ratted on us. And after her tongue lashing she would always give us a piece of cake. She was always baking. She made a banana cake second to none. Maybe that's why Ronnie and I would always go back to his apartment after we smoked a couple of cigarettes. We didn't mind being berated because we knew what the end result would be.
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I REMEMBER As I stated in the previous chapter, our neighborhood was a self-contained community. Virtually all of our activities, social, academic, spiritual, etc., could be accomplished within a few short blocks of where we lived. It was a rare occasion for us to venture outside the borders of our hamlet which we called Pelham Parkway. Come to think of it maybe the genius that stated that ninety-five per-cent of all accidents occur within a five block radius of ones home wasn't such a genius after all, because ninety-five per-cent of the time that's where we were; within five blocks of our home. And in case you had an accident it didn't really matter anyway because within five blocks of everyone's home there was a doctor. Now these Doctors didn't live in gargantuan fancy homes, they didn't drive big Mercedes cars and they didn't wear thousand dollar suits. When they spoke they used one or two syllable words, all readily identifiable and easily understood. They sounded just like any other adult. They looked like any other adult. The only discernible difference in their lifestyle was that their office was in their apartment. They lived where they worked. Their office was in their home. Their living room was a living room by night only. During the day it was a waiting room. What might have been a child's room was now a medical office complete with x-ray machines, sutures, needles, medicines, etc. We had all sorts of Doctors in our neighborhood. There were General Practitioners, Orthodontists, Podiatrists, Dentists, and Ophthalmologists. You name it and we had it. And if you were too sick to see a Doctor, then they would see you,......right in your own home or apartment. Have "Medical Bag," will travel. That was their slogan. A twentieth century Paladin. Fortunately these learned men did not have to travel too far, usually just across the street, but nevertheless they traveled. And unlike today when you're not supposed to get sick on a Wednesday because that's when Doctors hone their golfing skills, back then it was okay to get sick seven days a week because Doctors didn't golf, they doctored. And because these Doctors didn't drive overly extravagant cars and because they didn't wear such elegant clothes they therefore didn't charge such fancy prices for their services. These people were truly dedicated to the art of healing and not necessarily at the expense of their patients. The Doctors who practiced medicine in the 1950's were regular everyday people, so much so that one of the only ways to distinguish if someone was a Doctor was by the way they filled out a prescription. You can't understand their writing today and you couldn't understand it back then. Some things just never change. Two Doctors that stand out in my mind are "Quick Draw Levine", the General
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Practitioner that lived across the street and "Oops Jacobson," a dentist that had an office in our apartment building. Now Dr. Levine or Quick Draw had office hours and home hours. In other words if you couldn't see him in his office, then he would see you at your home. And when Dr. Levine wasn't working, more often than not you would see him standing in the street in conversation with his neighbors who represented American middle class civilization. These people were either self-employed or worked in the retail trades, such as butchers, bakers, clothing, shoes, etc., or they were in the service sector which included plumbing, electrical, air-conditioning and heating, etc. There were attorneys, insurance agents, and taxi-cab drivers. All of these people were either sitting or standing side by side in conversation with one another discussing any one of a number of subjects, such as world affairs, last nights ball scores, bargains available at Alexanders department store, their children, their grandchildren, what's for dinner tonight, what they're doing this summer, what they did last summer, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat. On each block, especially on the weekends, day and night there would be lined up no less that 50-75 YENTAS (blabbermouths) giving their advice on anything and everything. It was like a sea of mouths, opening and closing, opening and closing. If they were fish you would have a months catch in five minutes. Yet amongst all the conversations and the mixture of people there was no class distinction. A doctor talked to a plumber. A baker talked to an attorney. A teacher talked to a cab driver. No one was held in awe and everyone got along with each other. Now when Dr. Levine had to visit you at your apartment because you were too ill to go across the street to his office, he would examine you, possibly give you a shot of penicillin, converse with your parents over a cup of coffee and a piece of Danish, write a prescription for you and then either make another house call or head back to his office with usually no more than five dollars to show for his efforts. That must have been some Danish that my Mom gave to him. Oh, and one other thing. I guess that Dr. Levine felt embarrassed by charging so much for his services, so for your five dollars he also through in some entertainment, hence the name "Quick Draw." Now when the Doc diagnosed you and felt that a shot of penicillin would cure you he would load up his gun, I mean needle, and then he would take out a piece of cotton and dip it in alcohol and gently rub it on your arm where the needle would be injected or shall I say fired, because that's exactly what Dr. Levine did. He held your arm with his left hand. He had to do that because he wasn't skilled at hitting moving targets and in this way he was sure that your arm would remain stationary. With his right hand he held the needle in place between his thumb and fore finger. He then cocked his right hand with the needle in place between his two fingers and with his eyes peering above his glasses at his intended
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mark he would then coil his right hand back about eight inches from the chosen point of impact and WHAM, the needle would fly out of his right hand and travel unimpeded and unattended eight inches through the air landing precisely on target. In all the years that "Quick Draw" Levine gave shots to my family I never ever saw him miss his target. Now I only wish that I could say the same about "Oops Jacobson," our family Dentist. Dr. Jacobson maintained a "House of Pain" in our apartment building. He rented a one bedroom apartment and converted it into his very own torture chamber. Unlike "Quick Draw Levine," "Oops Jacobson" did not maintain living quarters in his office. As a matter of fact no one knew for sure where Dr. Jacobson lived and that was probably for security reasons because if we kids knew where he lived then I'm sure that we would have made his evenings equally as miserable as he made our days. Every year, prior to starting school my Mom would send us to Dr. Levine for a physical, Dr. Rubin for an eye exam and to Dr. Jacobson for a dental exam. Did I say send us to Dr. Jacobson? Actually she would let me go across the street by myself to Dr. Levine. She would let me walk five blocks all by myself to go to Dr. Rubin, but when it came time for my dental exam and all I had to do was go down to the first floor in my apartment building, my Mom insisted on escorting me there. My friends would tell me that when they had to have a cavity filled, their dentist would give them Novocain or gas or quite possibly both to ease the pain. There was a dentist across the street from us whose name was Dr. Shaeffer and besides Novocain and gas he also let you wear earphones so that you could hear music while he was working on you. The only music that you heard in Dr. Jacobsons office was the primal screams of his patients. There was no gas and he didn't believe in giving Novocain for cavities. When I was thirteen years old my Mother felt that for appearance sakes it would be in my best interests to go to an Orthodontist. How bad were my teeth? My mouth resembled a watered lawn. Watered, not manicured. My teeth were very healthy and as white as could be but they were sprouting out all over the place. I didn't have a row of teeth, I had rows of teeth. I had teeth growing on top of teeth. My mouth looked like a battlefield in progress. My teeth looked so unattractive that when I was Bar-Mitzvahed my Mom made special note to tell me not to open my mouth when the photographers were shooting pictures. I have at least one hundred still photos of myself at my Bar-Mitzvah as well as moving pictures and in every photo you see me with a big broad grin on my face with my lips curled up and my mouth completely closed. After my Bar-Mitzvah my Mom sent me to Dr. Hader, an Orthodontist whose office was on Pelham Parkway. After examining me Dr. Hader advised my Mom
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that my jaw was too small for my mouth and that is why I had teeth growing over each other. He suggested that prior to any orthodontia work I should have four teeth removed. Four healthy teeth. Four healthy teeth that never bothered anybody. Four healthy teeth that never complained. So my Mom made an appointment with "Oops Jacobson," excuse me, Dr. Jacobson. He hadn't earned the dubious title of Oops as of yet. Dr. Jacobson was going to pull out my four teeth one at a time over a four week period. What a thrilling time in my life this was. Little did I know how thrilling it would be? We lived on the fifth floor in our apartment building and Dr. Jacobson was on the first. My Mom and I left our apartment and walked down the hall to the elevator which would take us to the first floor. I was of course walking rather slowly and my Mom was right next to me giving me words of assurance. The elevator, which rarely worked, seemed to take us from the fifth to the first floor in record time. At this point my Mom and I started to walk across the hallway leading us to Dr. Jacobsons office. The distance from the elevator on the first floor to Dr. Jacobsons office was approximately 200 feet and within that distance there were actually three different exits leading out to the street......and freedom. My Mom, sensing my unrest immediately grabbed my left arm and walked me to the entrance of the Doc's office. Once inside the office you went into the waiting room. This is by far one of the worst tortures known to mankind. The waiting room. You are being asked to WAIT for your turn to experience pain. You try to take your mind off of the reason that you are there. You go to the magazine rack and thumb through all of them but your heart is not into reading at this moment. And Dentists know that. That's why all of their magazines are outdated and ancient. They know that you can't possibly concentrate on magazine articles so they stopped subscribing to them after their first two weeks of practice. If you ever want to take a history course then go into a Dentists office and read their magazines. You'll find out about all sorts of thing that happened years ago because none of their magazines are current. All of a sudden Dr. Jacobson comes out and calls my name. My feet turned into Jell-O. My Mom lifts me up and escorts me into his lab and Dr. Jacobson directs me to the chair. As I sit in the chair the Doc takes off my glasses and attaches a two foot square of cloth to my chest. I felt like a convict in one of those gangster movies walking the last mile to the electric chair...... Only I had to do it three more times. Dr. Jacobson knew my family very well and he let my Mom sit in his lab, no more than three feet from me. Besides, by State law there must be a witness to every execution. Today the tooth that was going to be pulled was located in my lower jaw on the right side of my mouth. Dr. Jacobson saw my discomfort and he told me to relax, that all would be well and that the only pain I would feel would be the brief sting of the needle that would administer the Novocain. With that
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reassuring thought in mind Dr. Jacobson approached me with needle in hand and told me to open my mouth. In unison my mouth opened and my eyes closed. I figured that while it was bad enough that I would feel some pain from the Novocain injection, I didn't necessarily have to watch the person that was causing my anguish. And so, moments later I was injected and I remember thinking to myself, "Well if this is the worst of it then it's all downhill from here." After injecting me Dr. Jacobson turned to my Mom and struck up a conversation with her. About two or three minutes later the Doc turned to me and tapped me on the bottom right side of my mouth and said to me, "Stevie, does that hurt?" I said, "Yes, it does." Dr. Jacobson told me that the Novocain hadn't taken full effect as of yet and with that he proceeded to once again talk to my Mom. Well another two or three minutes goes by and the Doc once again turns to me and taps me on the bottom right side of my mouth and asks me if that hurt and once again I told him that it did. Now the Doc looks puzzled but in a flash, as if a light bulb went off in his head, the puzzlement disappears from view and Dr. Jacobson asks me, "Stevie, did I ever give you Novocain before today?" I shook my head and said no and at that point this genius (I'm referring to the Doc), the man that graduated from college and dental school, the man that had been practicing his craft for at least twenty years, the man that had treated thousands of patients, this very same man who possessed infinite wisdom then called upon all of his resources and said to me, "Stevie, you don't realize it, but because you are so nervous, you think that your mouth hurts where I tapped it, but in reality it doesn't hurt at all. It's just your nerves. Sit back, relax, it will be over before you know it. You won't feel a thing. TRUST ME." He gave a beautiful speech. He sounded just like a politician. Unfortunately I was too young and very naive or I would have certainly realized that politicians always tell you what you want to hear, but what you want to hear and what actually transpires are usually two different things. And two different things it was. The Doc bent over me and placed his pliers on my tooth and started to jiggle it. At about that very same time I started to scream. He kept jiggling and I kept screaming. It was as if we had an act. A jiggling and screaming act except the only one getting paid in this act was the jiggler. My Mom didn't know what to do. One thing that she could have done would have been to tell the Doc to stop what he was doing but as I just said my Mom didn't know what to do. So the Doc kept up his jiggling and I kept up my screaming. Now the Doc clamped those pliers on my tooth and started to pull. Now Alan Shepherd may have been the first U.S. Astronaut in space but I can assure you that I was the first non-astronaut to see the stars. How many stars did I see? I saw stars that weren't even in our galaxy. Dr. Jacobson kept pulling on my tooth for what seemed like an eternity. I was slowly
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slipping down in the chair and the Doc then placed his knee on my chest to prevent further slippage. Blood was pouring out of my mouth and my screams were so loud that I'm sure patients walked out of the waiting room that day, never to return. My Mom was frantic when finally Dr. Jacobson pulled the tooth from my mouth. As you could imagine I was in tears, blood was still coming out of my mouth, the pain was almost unbearable, my Mom was of course consoling me and the Doc was cleaning me up. He wiped the blood from my face and had me rinse out my mouth and then placed some gauze over the new hole in my mouth which was on the right side of my lower jaw. He looked at me and you could see that he felt absolutely terrible about what had just happened when all of a sudden I saw that light bulb go off in his head again. He bent down and looked directly into my face and raised his right hand and tapped my bottom jaw on the left side of my face and said, "Stevie, can you feel that?" I said, "No." He said, "Oops." The SCHMUCK injected me on the left side of my mouth and pulled out a tooth on the right side. Thankfully he did pull out the right tooth. SCHMUCK is a Yiddish word that has many meanings. The story you have just read is but one example.
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SEX ..... Part 1 Sex in the fifties, or as we referred to it in the Bronx, "as a good old fashioned SHTUP," was more often than not just like fishermens tales. Everyone bragged about what they did the night before when in reality the night before they were thinking about what they were going to brag about the very next day. In todays environment a 13, 14 or 15 year old teenage boy meets a girl and right away hops into bed with her and after they're finished he first says hello and by the way my name is....... Not so in the fifties. Back then we had to go through a whole deal or should I say ordeal. The very first thing that most guys had to do if they wanted to have sex was to find a girl. (Otherwise it was the Ivory soap.) Girls could be found in a number of ways. In the Bronx there were two beach clubs that were open during the summer months. They were Castle Hill and Shorehaven. They were both open from Memorial Day through Labor Day. The cost was about $50 or $75 for the entire summer and for that sum of money you received a locker to store your towels, bathing suits, tennis rackets and condoms. The reason we carried condoms was: 1-In case we should ever get to be so lucky, 2-to lead our friends to believe that we were lucky or, 3-because they made great water balloons. I belonged to Shorehaven Beach Club for two seasons. I joined with three of my friends, Irwin, Mike and Joel. It was a fantastic way to spend a summer vacation. The guys and I would meet at about 9 A.M. every day and go by bus for the thirty minute ride to Shorehaven. A typical day at the club consisted of playing softball, basketball, shuffleboard, tennis, lounging by the pool and of course swimming. Shorehaven conducted dances every Wednesday and Saturday night. Saturday night was social dancing like the Lindy, the Stroll, the Cha-Cha, etc. or slow dancing which we referred to as grinding which was the touching or pressing of both bodies together while dancing to a slow tune. Unfortunately my friends and I were known as the left footed gang because when it came to social dancing we all had two left feet, so we chose not to attend the Saturday night dances. Now on Wednesday night there was square dancing at Shorehaven which is something we always attended because square dancing had many distinct advantages when you're on the make for a girl. Every square dance has a square dance caller. At Shorehaven his name was Piyute Pete, otherwise known as the Junior Samples of
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the Bronx, the character on the television show, Hee-Haw. Now what's nice about a square dance caller is that he can make the lame look like Fred Astaire because the caller is constantly telling you what to do. "Swing her to the left, swing her to the right. Hold your baby good and tight." (I always liked that part.) That was one great thing about square dancing. Everybody looks like a professional. The second great thing about square dancing is that everybody, boys and girls, show up in groups of four. Think about it. There are eight people in a square. Everybody knows that. Therefore if you're going to go to a square dance, you've got to go with three other people. That means that the only way you get shut out (no girl for the night) is if more foursomes of guys show up than girls, and to avoid that you just get there early and as long as your group doesn't resemble Godzilla and his henchman then you're a shoe in to have a girl for the night. Now the main reason that square dancing is so fantastic is because just suppose that for whatever the reason such as looks, shyness, breath, height, weight, etc., the girl who is your partner doesn't like you, yet you like her. If this were Saturday night social dancing, then after the song ends she'd say thanks and walk away. But NO-not with Wednesday night Square Dancing at Shorehaven. She's stuck with you for the whole night which is usually a solid three hours. So even if she doesn't like you, you've still got three hours to win her over to your side because the unwritten law of square dancing is that once you've made a commitment then you've got to stick out the entire three hours, come hell, high water, an ugly guy or a fat, flat bitch. Well now, the evening is set. You're going to a Square Dance. You know that you're going to meet a girl and you also know that you've got three hours to woo her. Normally the hardest part of socializing is in finding a mate. Not here. Your mate is waiting for you. There is a much different problem here, and it's this. Who's going to ask the four girls to dance? Well first we would arrive at Shorehaven and go to our lockers to spruce up and also to get our nerves up. Then we would survey the place. All around the dance floor are groups of four girls. You would think that pretty girls would like to hang out with other pretty girls. Maybe they do, but not at Shorehaven's Wednesday night square dance. You'd invariably see a group of four girls, two of which you would be proud to take home to your mother and two that you would be embarrassed to take home to their mother. This is where our friendships were always tested. Here is where the fun began. After surveying the flock we then had to decide
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which group of girls to ask to dance with us. At least three of us had to consent to ask the girls and once that was accomplished we simply walked to within no more than ten feet of them, formed a circle and in unison said, "the odd finger out asks the girls." Usually within three or four tries we had a winner. That person would have the sole responsibility of asking the girls to dance and in so doing would also have first pick of the litter. That was compensation for having been selected as our emissary. During my second and final year at Shorehaven when I was eighteen, I met at the Wednesday night square dance a beautiful girl named Linda. Linda was 16 with a face comparable to Elizabeth Taylors'. She was also ZOFTIG (top heavy). In other words she packed a set of head lights that would knock your eyes out. She was absolutely gorgeous and was always the center of attention wherever we went. Linda and I saw each other constantly for two years. We experienced just about everything that boys and girls experience in their relationships. Just about. I never did hit a home run. Lots of singles and doubles and one triple. But never a home run. I think if I would have renegotiated my contract with her for another year I could have hit one over the fence, but in all fairness to Linda I probably would have had to marry her first. She was that kind of a girl. More girls should be like her. Linda and I had some memorable times. One that I'll never forget happened on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in a Jewish persons life. On that day you are not supposed to carry money on your person. That's why the incident rate of Jewish people being mugged on Yom Kippur is very, very low, because most GENTILES (non-Jewish people) know that Jews don't carry money on that day, so they don't bother us. You can't use the telephone, you're not supposed to ride in any type of vehicle and for 24 hours you can't eat. In other words we must fast for one solid day. That is how it is referred to. It is called a fast. A Jew can't go without eating for 24 minutes let alone 24 hours. The fact that we can't carry money or ride around town is one thing. But not being able to eat for 24 hours? This is almost unheard of. Anyway, Linda and her family were very Jewish. On this particular Yom Kippur Linda wanted me to meet her and her mom, dad and brother at their Synagogue for services and then we would all go to her parents place to break the fast. Now the Synagogue was approximately ten miles from where I lived. I was dressed up in my nicest suit and proceeded to walk the ten miles to meet Linda and her family. It was a hot September day. I had to go there. I couldn't even come up with an excuse and call because they wouldn't pick up the telephone. They were very Jewish. I also knew that by going over there I still wouldn't have any chance of scoring with Linda because recreation of any kind is not permitted on Yom Kippur.
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I mean it's the type of holiday that makes you want to lie in bed all day until sunset when Yom Kippur is officially over, because there is nothing to do. You can't even read a newspaper on that day. Nothing. So I walked to the Synagogue and met everyone. For a couple of hours we prayed in the Synagogue. Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement. You confess to God the sins you committed during the past twelve months and ask of Him permission to let you live another year. Being the comedian that God is, He doesn't tell you what His final decision is. He lets you fret and worry. So if you make it until the next Yom Kippur, a year from now, then you know what His decision was. If you didn't make it, then A ZOY GAYSTUS (that's how it goes). We didn't stay for the completion of the services. We left a couple of hours prior to sundown which discloses the end of Yom Kippur. Actually the official conclusion of the holiday is marked by the "Blowing of the Shofar." Now before you give thought to changing occupations, the Shofar is a Jewish word for a Ram's horn. It looks like a wilted trumpet without the keys. The Rabbi gives a couple of toots on it and then the congregants wish each other a happy and a healthy new year and like ants flowing out of their hole, the doors to the Synagogue open up to let the people escape to their homes to break the fast. Linda, her family and I left the Synagogue to walk approximately another mile to their apartment building. It's been almost twenty-four hours without food. This is the longest mile I'll ever walk. Her parents look like they're in their early sixties but walk like they're in their late eighties. Very slow. We finally make it to their building. We enter the lobby. It's a sixteen story apartment building. They live on the fifteenth floor. I press the button for the elevator. Linda says to me, "What are you doing?" I told her I'm waiting for the elevator. She says to me that it's still the holiday. We can't ride, remember? And so all five of us walked up the entire fifteen floors. Her parents were the first ones to complete the journey. I had to take a couple of rests between floors. So now we're in the apartment and Linda's parents are setting the table for dinner. It's approximately one hour until sundown. Linda and I are in casual conversation. She asks me, " So what did you do today." I told her that I got up, showered, shaved, got dressed and made my pilgrimage on foot to the Synagogue. She asked me if I ate anything. I said "No. Like I said before, I got up, I showered, I shaved and I walked the ten miles to the Synagogue." Once again she asked me if I was sure that I hadn't broken the fast. Again I repeated myself, although this time a little agitated because she apparently didn't believe me. "Linda, for the last time, I did not eat anything. As I said before, I got up, I showered, I shaved, I brushed my
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teeth....." With that remark she yelled at me, "YOU BRUSHED YOUR TEETH?" I said "Yeah, I brushed my teeth." She said, "You broke the fast." "I did?" "Yes, you did." She started carrying on so much that I couldn't take it anymore and since there was about an hour to go until we could eat I just bolted from the apartment. I took the elevator down to the first floor. What the hell, I already broke the fast, so what if I also ride the elevator. I then put my hands in my sock and pulled out a ten dollar bill. (You think my Mother raised a Schmuck. You should always be prepared.) I walked across the street to the Pizza parlor and had two slices with a coke, then hopped a bus and rode home. The next year I confessed to God what I did and apparently it didn't annoy Him. Now I don't even bother telling Him anymore. There are three events that every guy remembers in his relationships with girls. When and how they first met, when they first went all the way and the circumstances surrounding their ultimate break off. With regards to my relationship with Linda I only can remember two events. Not because I have a bad memory, but because unfortunately one of the events never occurred. I used to see Linda every Friday and Saturday night. For two years. We would go out with a group of other people or by ourselves to either the movies or the bowling alley, fraternity parties, amusement parks, etc. We did lots of fun things that all young people do. Sometimes crazy, sometimes idiotic. Laughs, arguments. The whole spectrum. I didn't have a car, so therefore we relied on public transportation such as buses, trains and taxis. Our evenings always ended up the same. Linda and I going back to her parents apartment and sitting alone on the living room couch. Just Linda and I............. And our bodyguard. You see Linda had an older brother, Howie. At that time Howie was in his mid 20's. Very intelligent. You could tell by the conversations he would engage in. Yes, he was very intelligent. Also very brown. Brown as in sun tan brown. Whenever the subject of his employment arose, the issue was always side stepped. Finally after a year, when it looked like I might become a member of the family, Linda told me what her brother did for a living. He worked for the New York City Department of Parks. On any given day you could find Howie in a park with a big burlap bag over his shoulder and in his right hand a long stick with a sharp, thick needle on the end. Howie's job was to walk around the park and with stick in hand thrust the needle into papers lying on the ground and throw the garbage into his burlap bag. Now please don't get me wrong. It's no shame to be a garbologist, because it is an important job. And someone's got to do it. But you wouldn't think that someone with lots of intelligence would want that job. Of course you never met Howie. There were a lot of things about him that I didn't understand. Remember the
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bodyguard? That was Howie. For two years, every night that Linda and I went back to her apartment after our date, who would meet us at the door? Howie the brother and Howie the bodyguard. Linda's parents were usually asleep when we got home. Howie wasn't. NEVER. Linda and I would sit on the couch in the living room and Howie would position himself in the dining room which oversaw the living room. We could see him and of course he could see us. He would sit at the dining room table and stare at us with a grin from ear to ear. This twenty-five year old, deeply sun tanned, paper picking putz. And on occasion, like once every fifteen minutes, Howie would burp. Not a normal burp. But then again you wouldn't expect Howie to do anything normal. But a burp that would last for seven, ten, sometimes fifteen seconds. I never saw or heard anyone burp for such an extended period of time like he did. And after he burped his grin got wider as if he was showing us how proud he was of his accomplishments. There were times that I honestly thought that Linda and I would eventually get married. I often thought of tape recording Howie when he was in action. Then on our wedding night I was going to put the tape recorder under our bed and turn it on because it wouldn't have seemed right if Linda and I were alone together. As I stated before, Linda and I had a two year affair (I wish), relationship. While we shared lots of good times, there were more bad times than would be considered normal. And the person it bothered more than anyone else was my Mom. And so towards the end of our relationship, words like engagement and marriage would come out of Linda's mouth and words like 'over my dead body' would come out of my Mother's mouth. It was getting to be quite a hassle. Linda and I would have our not so occasional fights. Then I wouldn't talk to Linda. Linda would call up my Mom and threaten to kill herself by jumping off the roof. My Mom would then tell me that Linda wasn't rapped too tight. Then Linda and I would make up and before you knew it the same thing would happen all over again. It was creating a lot of dissension in my house, especially between my Mom and me and so I had to make a decision. Linda or my Mom, Linda or my Mom. It wasn't easy. I seriously gave it a lot of thought. Here I was, twenty years old. On the verge of manhood. About to enter the real world. You know, marriage, children, full time work. Was I going to let my Mother make all my important decisions for me? Was I afraid to render a decision that would go against my Mother's thinking? Was I or was I not going to stand on my own two feet. I was only twenty years old and this was by far the most excruciating and difficult decision that I had ever had to make. I pondered long and hard as to what my decision would be and then I realized that my Mom was a much better cook than Linda and so I broke off our relationship.
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Of course how we broke off is another story. Once I realized what I had to do, I then had to figure out a way to do it. At the same time that I decided to break off my relationship with Linda, New York University, the college I attended, decided to break off their relationship with me. What a coincidence. The fact that during my fourth term at N.Y.U. I had only D's and F's to show for my efforts wasn't entirely my fault. It acutely points to the failings of the school system itself. My first year at N.Y.U. I was on the freshman basketball team. In order to stay on the team you had to maintain a 2.0 (C) average. My average for my freshman year was exactly that, 2.0. During the first term of my second year I pledged the Phi Epsilon Pi fraternity house. In order to become a "Brother" you had to maintain once again a 2.0 grade point average. Bingo. Right on the nose. That was precisely what my average was. During the last half of my second year in college there were no more activities that I could join or participate in that required any kind of academic excellence. That's the reason my grade point average dropped from 2.0 to 0.5. It really and truly wasn't my fault. N.Y.U. should have had some sort of incentive programs for students at all levels in college. I'm living proof that incentive programs work. Things have a way of working out for the best. N.Y.U. didn't want me and my Mom didn't want Linda. This gave rise to an easy way out of the problem. My Mom spoke to her sister Jean (my Aunt Jeanie) and her husband (Uncle Jack) who lived in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She informed them of my dilemma (N.Y.U., not Linda) and my Aunt and Uncle told my parents to send me to Albuquerque and they would pull some strings and get me enrolled in the University of New Mexico whereby I could continue my education. I told Linda that I was going to vacation in Albuquerque for a couple of weeks because I hadn't seen my Aunt, Uncle and cousins for quite some time. Linda made me promise her that I would write every day. I assured her that I would. I decided to travel to Albuquerque by bus for two reasons. It was cheaper and safer. Up until that point I had never been on a plane out of mostly fear. My Granma, Mom, two sisters and Linda accompanied me to the Port Authority bus terminal in New York City. There I was on the bus looking out the window waiting for the bus to pull out of the terminal. There was Linda and my Mom, both crying although I suspect for two different reasons. Linda's tears were those of sadness. My Moms were ones of mixed emotions because although she would miss me, she was at the same time glad that this would be the final episode in the relationship between Linda and me. So there I am, sitting on the bus, looking down at my girlfriend, soon to be my ex and most of my family. If I didn't know better I would
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have thought I was in Israel at the wailing wall. As they were crying I suddenly remembered my promise to Linda and reached into my pocket and pulled out a packet of post cards. I once again looked out the window and saw the tears running down Linda's beautiful face. I then looked down at the post card and wrote, Dear Linda, Just arrived in Albuquerque. It sure is a picturesque place. I'll write again tomorrow. Love, Steve. The busses motor was starting to warm up. I again looked out the window and Linda was still sobbing. I took out another post card and wrote, Dear Linda, My Mom called and told me that I flunked out of N.Y.U. I'm very depressed. I'll write again tomorrow. Love, Steve. As I looked out the window, Linda was using a Kleenex to wipe tears from her eyes. I took another post card and wrote, Dear Linda, In spite of my poor grades at N.Y.U., my Uncle Jack was able to convince the Dean of Admissions to let me enroll at the University of New Mexico (true story) and upon reflection I think it would be very important for me to finish my college education. I don't expect you to wait for me for two years. Please go out with other people. Love, Steve. I once again looked down at Linda and my family, all in tears. I started to choke up. I was afraid that if I started to cry, my tears would fall on the post cards and ruin the print and I would have to write them again. Somebody up there was looking down on me because at that point the bus pulled out of the station. It took 48 hours to get to Albuquerque. One by one I mailed the post cards out. Within three days all three post cards were gone and so was my union with a very beautiful person. My first romantic relationship and one that I will never forget, my Linda. And so I enrolled in the University of New Mexico. I joined another fraternity, Alpha Epsilon Phi. Unfortunately there were no grade point requirements.
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SEX ..... Part 2 The summer months were the time of year that I always looked forward to for two reasons. First of all it signified the end of the school year and secondly it meant that we were going to vacation at a bungalow colony in the vicinity of Poughkeepsie, New York. The day after school ended we packed up my Dad's station wagon and off we went, my Mom, Dad, Granma, two sisters and I to the Forest Lake Country Club, which we referred to as Mitzmans, in honor of the owners, Nadie, Shirley and Fannie Mitzman. Forest Lake Country Club was situated on Sylvan Lake. The lake was surrounded by other bungalow colonies. Each colony had anywhere from 25 to 125 bungalows on their grounds. The bungalows were filled primarily with families who had children ranging in age from infancy to the late teens. All the residents had something in common as they were looking to escape the heat of summer in New York for a more relaxed and congenial atmosphere. From sun up to late in the evening there were plenty of activities and things to do for everyone, children and adults. And of course there was plenty of wild, unadulterated sex. I know, because I was a participant.......almost. I was sixteen at the time. I had a job at the canteen which was the soda parlor at Mitzman's. It would get very crowded there at night. It seemed that just about everyone in the colony, young and old alike would go in to have an ice cream soda, malted or coke and listen to the tunes that we kids would play on the juke box. The owners were Paul and Ruth and they had a son about two years older than me named Jerry. On this particular night my shift ended at 6:00 and Jerry then clocked in. There was a neighboring town not too far from us called Hopewell Junction. It was inhabited by a lot of tough guys. Our softball team used to play theirs and through that union we had made friends with them. All of a sudden the door to the canteen opened and in walked one of the guys from Hopewell Junction. It was Ernie. He had blond unruly hair; muscles on muscles, about 5'10", stocky build, wearing a tee shirt with the sleeves rolled up so as to support a pack of cigarettes. He had the type of face that when he smiled he looked menacing, so you could imagine what he looked like when he didn't smile. He went over to Jerry and whispered something in his ear. All of a sudden Jerry looked around the canteen and once he spotted me he said, "Steve, come over here." Jerry asked me to cover his shift because Ernie had two hot babes in the car that were looking for action. What Jerry didn't know was that he was talking to a sixteen year old virgin who never had many opportunities to devirginize himself. As far as I was concerned this was a no brainer. I told Jerry that I had just completed an eight hour shift and I didn't want to stand on my feet for another five or six hours. No sooner did I finish
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disappointing Jerry when Ernie turned to me and said , "c'mon Steve, let's not keep these two fine girls waiting." Jerry was visibly upset. He yelled out, "Steve, I'll never do you another favor, never." I thought about that implied threat for all of two seconds and said, "Okay." And so off I went, a sixteen year old virgin on the brink of a major conquest. As I walked to the car Ernie took his hand out of his pocket and said to me, "here, you'll need this." It was a water balloon, I mean a prophylactic. I couldn't hide my excitement. I was on cloud nine. At long last I was going to enter into manhood. No more would I have to make up stories about my sexual triumphs to my friends. No more would I have to listen to my friends telling me about their most intimate liaisons. Finally, it was my turn. Ernie got into his car on the drivers side and I opened the door behind him and gazed upon this very pretty young lady sitting in the back who was no more than seventeen or eighteen years old. She had long brown hair that extended below her shoulders. My eyes met hers. They were the eyes of a seductress, a teenage seductress. And then I saw her moist lips ever so slightly ajar. I thought I was going to shit in my pants. I positioned myself in the back seat next to this young beauty and introduced myself. Ernie then introduced his date to me and off we drove into the sunset. It seemed as if we were driving for nearly an hour. Ernie had his arm around the girl in the front seat and I was making small talk with Miss Seductress. The sun was hanging ever so gingerly in the lower reaches of the sky when Ernie turned off the main road onto a dirt path. I said, "Ernie, where are you going?" He said relax, we'll be stopping soon and within two minutes that's exactly what we did. It looked like we were in the middle of a farm. Ernie shut the engine off and started kissing the girl in the front. True to form I did what I was doing on the ride out to this desolated place. I just kept talking, or should I say babbling to the girl next to me. She was ready to do anything I wanted and all I could do was attempt to hold a conversation. All of a sudden Ernie turned to me and said, "Will you just shut up and kiss her." I wanted to. But I just kept talking. With that Ernie turned around and grabbed my girl by the neck, pulled her toward him and kissed her. He then looked at me and said, "Now that's what I want you to do." Sounded easy. Looked easy. But easy it wasn't. So I kept doing what I did best and that was talking. With that Ernie shot up, opened his door and got out of the car. He went around to the passenger side and opened the door for his girl. She got out of the car and they ran off into the woods. There I was, alone in the back seat of the car with this alluring enchantress. God knows what she thought of me. I know what I thought of her and what I wanted to do with her but my brain had a difficult time delivering the message to my lips and hands. So after a few minutes I asked her if
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she wanted to hear some music on the car radio? She said yes and I tried to turn on the radio. It didn't work. I realized that I would have to start the car first. I got into the front seat and turned the ignition on. The car started and the noise it was making could have woken up the dead. I turned the radio on and just about got into the back seat when I heard what sounded like horses on a stampede coming ever so closer. I looked out the window and there was Ernie running towards the car while at the same time trying to pull his pants up around his waist. Not too far behind was his girl, also running, also adjusting her clothes. Ernie and the girl got into the car and didn't say a word. I thought it would be a good idea under the circumstances if I didn't say anything either. Ernie drove to one of the girls homes, let them out and told them he'd call them tomorrow. I got into the front seat for the long ride home. Ernie looked at me and as if he was measuring each word for its impact he said, "Dont say a fuckin word." He seemed kind of upset so I honored his request.
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SEX ..... Part 3 It was easy to find girls in New York that would go all the way. If all else failed you could always find a hooker. I didn't say pay one, I said find one. Back in 1970 I was living in a hotel in Manhattan. Two of my friends, Paul and Ben came over one night. We decided to go out for dinner. The only problem we had was that we couldn't rustle up three dollars between us. I looked at my friend Paul and immediately came up with an idea. You see Paul looked like Columbo. A 400 pound Columbo. Paul was about 5'10" tall and walked with his shoulders hunched over and his head down. It wasn't that he was looking for money on the sidewalk that made him hunch over, rather I think it was due to his weight and eventually gravity took hold of him. Anyway, Paul looked like a detective. The idea was to impersonate a detective, arrest a hooker and in exchange for her freedom we would relieve her of all of her money, or at least enough money that would enable us to buy dinner. Preferably a nice steak dinner.. With an appetizer of course. All three of us went to Times Square in the heart of the city and bought a phony detective's badge in one of the stores. Since this was my idea, naturally I was chosen to carry out this devious plan. Paul was driving and Ben was in the passenger seat with me relegated to the back of the patrol car, I mean car. We cruised the streets of New York checking out all the hookers offering their wares. Finally we saw one who we thought had the qualifications that we were looking for. We were looking for someone who looked stupid. This girl that we saw looked stupid and while we weren't overly concerned with her looks, if we were looking for someone who was also pretty than we would have hit a home run because this girl definitely looked pretty stupid. We pulled up next to her and I beckoned her to the car. As she approached I asked her if she was going out tonight? She asked if all three of us were interested in her and I said yes. She said that it would be pretty expensive, but to quote my friend Paul, "If you're not going to pay, then money is no object." I told her we would meet her price and so this attractive young lady entered the car and sat next to me. We told her that we were going to our hotel room just a few blocks away. As Paul was driving I reached into my pocket, pulled out the badge and flashed it in front of her eyes. I then said to her, "You're under arrest for prostitution. Anything you say can be held against you as evidence in a court of law. You have the right to remain silent. You have the right to an attorney. Do you understand what I've just told you?" With that she started to cry. I asked her why she was crying and she told me that she had never been arrested before. I yelled out to Paul, "Pull over." I looked at this girl and said to her, "if we let you go do you promise to never, ever work the streets again? She promised me she would give up this life of prostitution. She must have thought that I looked stupider than her. All of a sudden Ben shouts out, "Were
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taking her in. She's lying to you. She's not going to give up her trade." The girl is by now frantic and she cries out, "I promise I will." For a brief moment I thought we were really detectives. I immediately came back to reality. I told her that I was going to let her go but I never wanted to see her on the streets again. She assured me that I would never lay eyes on her again and she put her hand on the handle to open the door. As she did that I grabbed her arm and said, "You know the least you could do for us as a gesture of appreciation is give us your money." She looked me square in the eyes and said, "You guys are my first trick tonight." What a development this was. Before I came up with this bright idea we at least had enough money to buy some sodas and candy bars to satisfy our hunger pains, but now all we had was a phony badge and a hooker without any money. So, we took her back to my room and took it out in trade. But we were still very hungry.
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SEX ..... Part 4 When I was twenty-four I was employed as a salesman by a company that sold encyclopedias. It was by far the toughest job I have ever had. Thankfully we didn't have to make cold calls. The company provided leads to its sales representatives. They provided many different types of leads to its reps. For instance, we could get 'shopping center' leads. The shopping center lead system was developed by some schmuck who decided to place big cardboard signs up at various supermarkets offering people an opportunity to win a free cruise by simply filling out a slip and dropping it in the bin. All winners would be notified by phone by a sales representative in the event they won. Guess what? Everybody won. We would call people at their homes and ask for the person who filled out the entry slip. If I was asked who was calling I would simply identify myself and the name of my company. At that point the party on the other end of the line would usually say that they weren't interested. I would then remind them of the drawing they entered, to which they would usually respond, "oh, that encyclopedia company." We would then proceed to tell them that they were a winner in our drawing that was held at their local supermarket. A lot of people at that point would jump up and down and shout out to anyone within ear shot, "I can't believe I won a cruise. I can't believe it." They were so happy. Real, real happy. Until I told them that they didn't win the major award, which was the cruise, but they qualified for the second place award and I could deliver it at a time convenient for them as I did need their signature. That schmuck at the encyclopedia company thought of everything. So this is how we made appointments to sell the books off of the supermarket leads. What did they win? It was a discount on a vacation. Who didn't win a prize? Only those people who didn't fill out a form. We could also obtain the Uni-Card leads. Back in the 1960's there was a credit card called the Uni-Card. The encyclopedia company would pay Uni-Card to place advertising inserts inside the statements that were mailed to the card holders each month. The ad copy would describe our encyclopedias and ask the card holder to fill out the form and send it back directly to us if they were interested in finding out more about the product. On those leads we would simply call the people and remind them of their interest and try to schedule an appointment. We were also provided with call back leads. These were people who for one reason or another didn't purchase a set of encyclopedias but wanted to be called back at a later date. What was the difference between all of these leads? Well, on the shopping center
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leads the company only charged us $1.00. The call back leads were $2.50 and the Uni-Card leads were $5.00 apiece. It didn't matter to the company if we sold any sets of encyclopedias. They were making a fortune just selling us leads. It was a tough business to succeed in. And yet I learned a lot about salesmanship working there. The encyclopedia company that I worked for did more for me than all my years spent at college. I spent five years in college and never did get my B.S. degree, but within three short months I qualified for my B.S. degree, believe it or not, working for this companyB.S. as in Bull Shit. And I say that proudly. I was taught that the sale begins when your prospect says no. Based on that assumption I had an opportunity to make many sales because all I ever heard was no. "No thank you. Not now. How much did you say it costs? Call me back later. Much later." But I did make a few sales while working there. I had to. Otherwise how could I have afforded to pay for their wonderful leads? The sales I produced were invariably made due to a technique which many years later I nicknamed the 'Columbo Close,' in honor of Peter Falk, who portrayed the legendary detective Columbo on television. There comes a time in every sales persons life when they have to accept the fact that they are not going to sell the person who is in front of them. The better a sales person you are, the least amount of times you walk away without the sale. The poorer a sales person you are means you learn to walk away many times without the sale. Good encyclopedia sales people walk away many, many times without the sale. People like me go through a pair of shoes once a week because it seemed that all I did was walk away without a sale. Talk about rejection. You don't know what rejection is until you've tried to sell encyclopedias. But I did make a few sales because of the Columbo Close. When it was apparent that I wasn't going to make a sale I would start to pack up my materials which consisted of one condensed book of topics found throughout the encyclopedias and various leaflets. You could feel the tension disappear as the prospects before you are very relieved that you're finally leaving. One of the reasons that I didn't make "regular" sales was because at the conclusion of my presentation I would try to sell the heirloom edition that the company offered. The cost then was $1,200.00. Then you proceed to drop in price by offering other less expensive sets. They all contained the same material. The only difference was the binding on the books. The last price drop was to $600.00. If the prospect says no, you thank them for their time, pack up your materials, say good bye and head for the door. You're now at the door. Your back is facing the prospects. You open the door and suddenly stop dead in your tracks and raise your left hand to your forehead and turn around with a look of bewilderment on your face. You look at your prospects and say,
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"Excuse me. How stupid of me. You know the encyclopedias that you see in the school? You know, the ones with the red bindings?" Invariably one of the prospects will say yes. "Well it just dawned on me that every once in a while there is an over run. In other words the factory prints too many sets and we are left with one or two extra editions. It's the same exact set that I have shown you here tonight. There are only two differences. One, the binding is red and two, instead of $600.00; the price for the school book edition is only $300.00. The only thing is I don't know if there are any left. I would have to make a call now to the warehouse to find out. If there is a set left I can reserve it in your name so no other company representative can claim it. Would you be interested?" If they say no, you thank them and leave, but if they happen to say yes, then you've just made a sale. After they say yes, you ask them if you can use their phone to call the warehouse. You then proceed to call your spouse, a friend, a relative, a stranger, anyone you want to because there is no warehouse. I once called my Mom, who wasn't aware of the 'Columbo Close' and when she answered the phone I said, "Hi, this is Steve Chanzes and I'm a representative with the encyclopedia company. I need to talk with someone in inventory control please." My Mom said, "Stevie, stop playing games. So how are you TOTELA (son)?" I said, "Hi, inventory control? I need to know if there are any red book editions left over from our latest school order. Okay." I'd turn to my client and tell them that they were checking to see if there are any left. At the same time my Mom was repeating into the phone, "Steven (She only called me Steven when she was upset with me), have you lost your mind? If you don't talk right to me then I'm going to hang up." At that point I would talk into the phone and say "hold on, let me find out." My Mother was yelling, "find out what?" I turned to the prospects and said, "Were in luck, they have one edition left. Do you want it?" My Mom said, "Steven, call me back later when you find your mind." And she hung up. Now I've got to keep my ear glued to the phone because after a while the phone will start making that loud busy signal noise once the party on the other end (my Mom) disconnects. The prospect indicated they wanted the red book edition and so I spoke into a phone that had no one on the other end and told the inventory control person to reserve it in my prospects name. I quickly hung up the phone, opened up my briefcase and filled out the necessary forms, collected a check either in full payment or a small deposit because the company would finance the balance.. Now I had enough money to buy more leads. Now you must be wondering, what does this story have to do with sex? The story obviously had nothing to do with sex unless you feel as I do that the encyclopedia
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company was SCREWING its very own reps by selling them leads. Well in reality I got screwed twice working for them. Once by the company due to the nature of their lead program and once in the more conventional way. One day at work I got a call from my former boss Carmine Guerriero. He had an insurance agency in Long Island and at one time I was one of his sales reps. Although I no longer worked for him, we still kept in touch from time to time. Carmine at that time was in his mid-forties, a good twenty years older than me. He had a very entertaining personality and although he was married at the time, he was most definitely a ladies man. He used to bring women into his office, lock his door and hammer them while his agents were at work within earshot of his escapades. Discreet he wasn't, but to his credit he didn't try to boff every woman he met. They had to fit a certain criteria he had established. I once asked him what that was and he said, "Steve, they must have two arms and two legs." Knowing how selective Carmine could be, whenever he would try to turn you on to a woman you had to be very careful before making a commitment, because if you complained to Carmine he invariably would ask you, "Steve, didn't she have all her limbs?" As I previously stated one day Carmine called to tell me that he went out on an insurance appointment the night before and he met this divorcee in Paramus, New Jersey who had a lot more than insurance on her mind. He told me that this woman was recently divorced. Her former husband was a doctor. She lived in a beautiful home in Paramus with her two young children. Her name was Madeline and Carmine told me that apparently she was sexually starved during her marriage and that she was more than making up for it now. He gave me her number and said that all I've got to do is call her and mention Carmine's name and that's it. He said I'd have the time of my life. Carmine said that there was no need to try to impress her. As Carmine said, "just call her, see her, and lay her." Sounded pretty easy to me Except that wasn't my style. I mean I didn't get that B.S. degree for nothing. I tried to use it at every opportunity I got. Especially now, because I was 24 and the target of my affections was on the north side of 40. About 4 degrees north. So one evening, with trembling hands I picked up the phone and called Madeline. She had a very sultry voice. Sort of like Marlena Dietrich but without the accent. I told her who I was and that Carmine had given me her number. She said, "Carmine who?" What an impression he must have made on her. I said, "You know, Carmine, the insurance guy." She said, "Oh yes, I remember. But why did he give you my number?" I wasn't prepared for that question. As a matter of fact, I really wasn't prepared for any questions that Madeline might ask me. I was
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prepared to wing it, but I never thought she wouldn't remember Carmine, nor did I ever think she would ask me why he gave me her telephone number? That's why I'm glad that I got that B.S. degree. It certainly came in handy this time. As soon as Madeline asked me why Carmine gave me her number I told her that I was looking for a date to escort me to a board of directors meeting at the encylopedia company and Carmine thought that she might like to go with me. I went on to tell her that I was nominated to the board and that I was the youngest member in the history of the company and that another board member, Joe Namath, was going to present me with a special award marking the occasion. "Carmine knew that I was looking for someone sharp to go with me to the meeting, so he suggested that I call you and see if you might be interested." Well, it didn't take too much to convince Madeline to be my escort. As a matter of fact it didn't take anything else other than what I said over the phone to convince her. She had never met me and after barely three minutes of conversation on the phone she was asking me what type of dress would be appropriate and should she wear a lot of jewelry, etc., etc. I told her that we could discuss that later. She then asked me if I wanted to see her first before I committed to taking her with me to the board meeting. So I set up a date to take her out to dinner and a movie. Now at that particular time in my life I didn't have a car. I was recently divorced and living with my folks. I had a key to my Dad's car and he would let me use it whenever I wanted to. In that way my Dad and I had a terrific relationship. All I had to do was tell him that I was going to use the car and as long as he wasn't in need of it I could have it for the night. My parents had no plans on the night I was to take Madeline out. I told my Dad that I was going to use the car for the evening and he said no. I said "Why?" He told me that I had already used it once this week. My Father, God rest his soul, had a way of looking at and analyzing things far different than anyone else. He graduated from the Joe Chanzes School of Logic. He was the only student at that school. In my life I have never met anyone else who thought quite like my Dad. Well logic told me that I had a piece of ass waiting for me in Paramus, New Jersey and I wasn't going to be deterred from my appointed rounds. So I told my parents that I was going to go over to see one of my friends and I went downstairs with one thought in mind. I knew that my Dad wasn't going out anymore that evening and my Mom didn't drive, so therefore they would have no need for the car. At that particular time my Dad didn't park his car in a garage. But it could be parked on any street within a five block radius. Each complete block had room for approximately 125 cars. Nevertheless I was determined. As luck would have it, about three blocks away I found my Fathers' car. And talk about luck, his car was
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parked at the corner and there was a fire hydrant directly behind him. Now I knew that when I returned that evening his spot would be taken. It would probably be taken within five minutes of me driving off. But I also knew that the space with the fire hydrant would be open because if you dared to park by a fire hydrant then you were sending out an invitation for the police to have your car towed. I already knew what I would do when I returned that evening. I accepted the fact that someone was going to take my Dads' parking space so I would simply pull behind them, next to the fire hydrant, and nudge the car in front of me out into the intersection. At that moment I had a distinct vision. Think about it. This was my big night. What were the chances that my Dad would have parked in a space that convenient for me to pull off this escapade? It dawned on me at that moment that there was a God in heaven, and that God in his infinite wisdom was most definitely on my side. HE wanted me to get laid. Not wanting to disappoint HIM, I drove to Paramus and met Madeline. She was very beautiful, very intelligent (a former school teacher), and very horny. That's the ultimate trifecta. We went into New York City to an Italian restaurant called Professors. Besides the great food served there, the charm of the restaurant was that when down and out actors or actresses came into the place, the Professor (the owner) would always feed them, no charge. For a brief moment I thought of becoming an actor, but I realized that with Madeline I was acting. I was playing a role. And it looked like I would get free sex at the end of the play. So I thought, free food, free sex? Hummm? I chose the latter. And besides, it wasn't fattening. And not only that, but I knew that I would get tired eating Italian food every day. And so we finished dinner and went to the movies and saw an underground film called Putney Swope. Putney was a black man on the board of an advertising agency. Putney was the only black person on the board. At their weekly meeting, the C.E.O. died of a heart attack while giving a speech. Now the other board members must elect a new C.E.O. and you can hear each one of them thinking, "I'll vote for Putney because no one else will." To the chagrin of everyone on the board their new C.E.O. is now Putney Swope. And while we were watching the film Madeline placed her hand on my thigh and gently moved it back and forth, down to my knee and up to my groin. It seemed as if she was sending me a message. But the movie was kind of entertaining, especially with Madeline's traveling hand. And I knew she wasn't going anywhere because I had the key to the car tucked safely away in my pocket. So we watched the rest of the movie and then left for our trip back to New Jersey. Once inside her home it didn't take more than five minutes for Madeline to begin
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showing me why Carmine was so enthralled with her. I didn't want to leave but I knew my Dad would be real pissed if he couldn't find his car in the morning. That's how my Dad was. Never could take a joke. So after a couple of entertaining hours in her house I said good night. As I was leaving she asked me again about Joe Namath and the board meeting and dinner and I told her I would call her in a couple of days to go over all the details with her. So I went back to the Bronx and sure enough there was a car parked in my Dad's space and there wasn't any car parked behind him due to the fire hydrant. I eased my Dad's car into the space by the fire hydrant and pushed the car in front of me a good four or five feet into the intersection and went upstairs to my room. It was about four in the morning and everyone was sleeping. The following night my Dad came home from work at the usual time of six P.M. As soon as he walked in, my sisters, Mom and I instinctively knew something was wrong. I thought for sure that he was going to accuse me of using his car the night before, but thankfully he didn't. Not only did God want me to get laid, but He didn't want my Dad to find out. All of a sudden my Father in a very disgruntled voice blurted out, "How do you like that?" Like we're supposed to know what he's talking about. And he would actually get angry at us for not knowing why he was so upset. It's that school of logic that he went to. My Mom said, "Joe, what's the matter?" My father went on to say, "Some schmuck couldn't find a parking space last night so they pulled in front of me and pushed me back near the fire hydrant." This event took place in 1968. It took me approximately 12 years to muster up the courage to tell my Father who that schmuck was. My Mom, Dad and Granma were visiting me and my family in Florida and after I told them the story they all broke up in laughter. Well, not all of them. My Dad looked at me and without a trace of a smile said, "Don't do that again." He's living in the Bronx and I'm living in Florida and he's telling me not to do that again to him. It's that school of logic. So there I am in my office at the encyclopedia company and the secretary tells me that there is a woman by the name of Madeline on the phone. I was taught a long time ago that to fully enjoy your day the first thing you should do every day is to get rid of the most unpleasant task facing you. The only problem with that logic is that the way I was leading my life back then I had unpleasant tasks all day long. I picked up the phone and said hi to Madeline. She told me how much she enjoyed our date. I told her that I too enjoyed her company and then she told me that she went out that day and bought a beautiful and apparently expensive dress as well as a jewelry piece. We had some small conversation and I told her I would call her in a day or two and make final arrangements for the board meeting and dinner. I hung up the phone and immediately began to analyze my future at this company. I
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wasn't making money. I didn't see anything on the horizon that would have a positive effect on increasing my earnings. I didn't think that I had a ghost of a chance of moving into management and on top of all this I had this woman in New Jersey who expected to go with me to a board meeting and dinner that didn't exist. I walked into my manager,s office and told him I quit. As I said before, I got screwed twice working for the encyclopedia company. The second time was far more enjoyable.
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SCHOOLS P.S. 105 The first school I attended was P.S. 105. I was there for seven years, kindergarten through the sixth grade. The school was less than one block away from where I lived. That was an advantage in more ways than one. If I had to be at school by nine in the morning I could leave my apartment at 8:55 and make it on time with room to spare. I also had the luxury of going home for lunch. My Mom was a fantastic cook and even her tuna sandwiches were unlike any you ever tasted. I remember all of my teachers in grade school, some more than others, but nevertheless they all made a deep and lasting impression on my mind. While none of us had to wear a uniform, all the boys and girls were neatly attired. The boys had to wear a white shirt and tie and the girls would don skirts. We usually gathered in the schoolyard around eight in the morning. Why so early? Simple explanation. The guys would put their books down and someone would pull out a Spalding ball. They don't make Spalding balls anymore, but they were fantastic for stoop ball, punch ball, stickball and slug. Slug was the game that we most often played in the mornings before the school bell rang. Four guys would play at a time. The schoolyard at P.S. 105 was comprised of big blocks that measured approximately three feet square. Each participant was responsible for his own block which was adjacent to the schoolyard wall. The first player was designated King. The King would bounce the ball and hit it bare handed towards the wall on a bounce. The ball would come off the wall and had to land in an opponents box or the King was out. If the King was out, then he would move towards the end of the line and the person closest to the King would now have that title as everyone would move up one box. On the other hand, if the ball hit by the King went into an opponents box then the opponent would have to hit it back to anyone and the game continued until someone made out. The object was to remain King for as long as you could. By the time the school bell rang, our shirts were out of our pants and we were in need of a shower because we had worked up such a sweat. The school bell would ring at 9:A.M. and we would go to our designated area in the schoolyard and stand single file until the next bell rang, at which point we marched into the school and went to our classrooms. Each day in grade school we had a milk and cookie recess around ten in the morning. I believe it cost us two or three cents for a pint of milk and a cookie that the school would distribute. In the fourth grade I was one of a few students appointed as a milk monitor. My job was to deliver the milk to the students. Each day I would report to a certain area in the school and was given a crate that held
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approximately forty-eight pints of milk. I then had to go to the designated class rooms and the teacher of the class would take as many containers of milk as was needed for his or her students. Once the crate was empty I would go and have it refilled. The school had four floors. There was an elevator in the building, but not for students. Not even milk monitor students. I had to SCHLEP (trudge) up and down the stairs every day delivering milk to my fellow classmates. I was SCHVITZING (sweating) and schlepping and schlepping and schvitzing and for no pay. Well, almost no pay. Every now and then I would rest on one of the stair wells in between floors and drink a container of milk. I would say that I rested four to six times each day. It didn't take too long for the school officials to take notice that there was a shortage of milk in the school because not all of the students were getting their milk with their cookies. There were many complaints and finally the officials traced down the shortage to my route. Thankfully I was allowed to remain in Public School but I did have the distinction of being the first and only milk monitor fired at P.S. 105. I believe the record is still intact. My fifth grade teacher was Mrs. Sweeney. She was in her mid-fifties and always wore granny dresses. Her hair was completely white and she made more than one student over the years turn white with her antics. She was a mean spirited bitch. I remember the following incident as if it were yesterday. We were sitting in class and one of the students, Louis Falkenstein, was being disruptive. She made him come up to the front of the class room and loosen his tie and undo the top button of his shirt. She then told him to hang himself. Poor Louie. He had to stand in front of his fellow students with his right hand grasping his tie and holding it as far above his head as he could. Thankfully she permitted his feet to remain on the floor. I guess she had a heart after all.
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P.S. 83 After graduating from P.S. 105 I went to P.S. 83 for the seventh and eighth grades. It was about a twenty minute walk from where I lived. P.S. 83 is located in an Italian neighborhood. I lived in a neighborhood that was 99% Jewish and for the next two years I would attend a school in a neighborhood that was 99% Italian. Up until that point in time, or for the first twelve years of my life, I really only knew and associated with Jewish people. It was a learning experience. I learned that there are many similarities between the Jewish and Italian people. Both peoples are very family oriented. They both enjoy traditional foods. Pastas, sausages and meatballs for the Italians and corned beef, pastrami and knishes for the Jews. And at affairs the music is lively. The Italians have their tarantellas and the Jews have their bulgars. Even the two most popular songs for Italians and Jews are very similar in name and meaning as both peoples have a tremendous devotion to their mothers. The Italian peoples praise to their mothers is sung in a song called, "Mama", and Jewish people honor their mothers by singing the song, "My Yiddisha Mama." Both songs when heard will bring tears to your eyes. In reality the only major difference between Jews and Italians is that Italian people don't take shit from no one. In some cases they'll take everything else. But they don't take shit. I found this out at P.S. 83 when I was just twelve years old. After about a week of attending school I realized that the best thing a Jew could do for himself was to have an Italian friend. Not necessarily a girl. You don't want to piss off anyone and have them think that you're invading their turf. No, you need to make friends with an Italian guy. Someone named Frankie. Or Tony. Someone with the name of Anthony could go either way. An Anthony could be meek and timid or he could be tough. But there's really no room for error so you're better off with a Tony. Think about it. Have you ever seen anyone named Tony who wasn't tough? I haven't. And other than Frankie Avalon, every Frankie I've ever met was one tough guy. So there we were. A bunch of Jewish guys between the ages of eleven and thirteen years old who all grew up in an ethnic Jewish neighborhood and for the most part only had contact with Jewish people and now we were finding out for the very first time in our lives that there's more to life than potato pancakes and matzo ball soup. It was a tremendous culture shock for most of us. On a couple of fronts. While most of the Jewish boys and girls that attended P.S. 83 were between eleven and thirteen years old, there were quite a few Italian boys who were between thirteen and sixteen years of age in the same classes that we attended. A fair amount of the Italian boys didn't have time for their studies because the clubs they belonged to
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didn't permit or provide them with the time needed to succeed in school, so therefore many of these kids were left back a number of times. Actually clubs would be the wrong word. These kids belonged to gangs. And the gangs used clubs. Hard clubs. There were three gangs at P.S. 83. There were the Golden Guineas, the Golden Guinea Juniors and the Golden Guinea Midgets. Three very tough gangs. Jews weren't in these gangs. I think the only way a Jew could even see the clubhouse was if the Jew was on a spit, being roasted. As I said before, these were tough gangs, ala West Side Story. They really existed. There were other gangs in the Bronx. For instance, there was the Fordham Baldies. You didn't have to be Italian to belong to this gang. You didn't even have to be bald. You just had to be tough. Jews didn't belong to the Baldies either. Not because we were excluded. That wasn't the reason. If we belonged to a gang, then we wouldn't have had enough time for our studies, and we certainly wouldn't have had a fair amount of time to play basketball, stickball, softball, etc. in the school yards, parks or streets. And last but far from least, the main reason we didn't belong to gangs was because we were pure chicken shit. We weren't raised to fight. We were raised to negotiate. Not that there weren't any tough Jews. If an Italian guy ventured onto our turf and a Jewish guy saw him, the Jewish guy wasn't afraid to tell that Italian guy to get out of Dodge City. I've seen plenty of tough Jewish guys under these circumstances. The Jewish guy would look the Italian guy directly in the eyes and tell him to get the hell out of the area if he knew what was good for him. The Jewish guy didn't even need a club. Especially if he had nine or ten other Jewish guys standing next to him. Well, maybe fourteen or fifteen. I had a friend by the name of Steve Pozmanter who lived on the same floor as I did. Steve was about a year older than I was and a car accident at birth left him with a scar on the left side of his face, very similar to the one Al Capone had. Steve was a big guy; nevertheless he was the target of many unseemly jokes. His nickname, not of his own choosing was Scarface. Unlike his namesake, Steve was not a tough guy and he didn't belong to any gang. When someone makes fun of you, in particular calls you Scarface, there's really not too much you can do to them if you're holding a kosher hot dog in your left hand and a pickle in your right. Those two items were Jews weapons of choice. They can't compete with a billy club or tire iron. But they sure tasted better. I'll never forget the following incident that took place in the schoolyard of P.S. 83 one Halloween morning. Steve Pozmanter and I, along with some other people were walking to school. Steve had on a brand new leather jacket, ala Fonzie from Happy Days. This was the first day he had worn it. We arrived at school and as
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customary we all mingled in the schoolyard until the bell that signified the beginning of classes for the day rang. Some of the tough guys at school came up to our crowd and started to pick on Steve. I don't know if any of these guys belonged to the Golden Guinea Seniors, Juniors or Midgets. But they were tough. They started pushing Steve around. Then they pulled out some chalk, all different colors and began to mark up his jacket. I went up to a couple of them and asked them to leave Steve alone. A Jew never tells a tough Italian to leave someone alone. It sounds like you're ordering them around. You ask. This way if they don't want to honor your request you can always look in the mirror and say, "I tried." This is how you learn to negotiate. But at twelve years old I wasn't exactly a Henry Kissinger. Worse than that, Steve, or Scarface, wasn't a tough guy. This didn't make for a very good combination. A couple of other students went and told some teachers what was happening. The best that can be said of this unfortunate incident is that Steve; (Scarface) had a huge audience of students and teachers who all watched as he got the shit kicked out of him. As bad as it was to have teachers just stand by when a student was being beaten up, it was even worse when teachers would let students have the run of the class. One such teacher was Mr. Okon, who taught shop. Wood Shop. Mr. Okon appeared to be in his sixties. He wore a hearing aid in his right ear. His hair was completely white and he walked rather slowly around the class room. A hot fire under his TUCHAS (rear end) could not have motivated him to walk any faster. Mr. Okon's time had long past. About a hundred years ago. Nevertheless he was our assigned teacher when class met for shop instruction. In the four years of high school that I attended, and considering all the subjects I studied, and the many different classes I sat through, and the various teachers I had, I can honestly say that Mr. Okon was the only teacher who took a fifteen minute break for himself during class. He would simply get up from his desk at some point during his class and tell the students that he would be back shortly. Our shop class met twice a week and twice a week Mr. Okon would take a siesta. And he wasn't even Spanish. Well, when Mr. Okon was away, naturally the mice would play. And in this case the mice were all Italian. These mice put Topio Gigio to shame. These were MICE. The Italian students, the tough Italian students ran P.S. 83. The teachers tried to compete with them for "rights of ownership," but in the final analysis while the school appeared to an outsider to be run by the Board of Education, those in the know, students and teachers alike realized that it was a different board that ran P.S. 83. This board consisted of very tough Italian students, 14, 15 and 16 years old thrown into the same classes with 12 and 13 year old kids who by and large grew up on the other side of the tracks.
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My friend Mike Lewis also had Mr. Okon as his Wood Shop teacher. Thankfully Mike wasn't in the same class with me. Or should I say that thankfully a classmate of Mike's who went by the name of Sal Raimondo wasn't in the same class with me, or any other class of mine for that matter. Sal qualified as a tough guy. No doubt about it. Worse than being a tough guy was the fact that Sal was about sixtytwo cents short of a dollar. And I'm being overly generous. When you're sixty-two cents short of a dollar, that means you only have thirty-eight cents......sense left. In other words, not very much. With thirty-eight cents (sense) Sal didn't even have two quarters to rub together. Not in his pockets and certainly not in his head. He was an accident going to a place to happen. An attorneys' dream. A student's nightmare. Sal used to come to school with knives hidden on the inside of his socks. He was a tough guy. I don't know if he was really a good fighter or if he was really that tough. But who the hell wanted to find out? At our eighth grade graduation exercises one of the teachers announced the names of the different high schools that the graduates would be attending. It was pointed out that most of the students would be attending Christopher Columbus High School. Then the names of the students accepted into the Bronx High School of Science as well as Peter Stuyvesant High School were read because in order to be approved into either of those schools you had to pass certain equivalency tests which certified that you were nothing short of a genius. And after the names of those honored students were read, the teacher emphasized that last but not least Mr. Sal Raimondo was going to enroll in some trade school. The student body almost without exception erupted into applause for two reasons. First of all everybody was happy that Sal was going to this trade school and secondly everybody was happy that they weren't. For sure my friend Mike was glad that he had seen the last of Sal Raimondo. The reason for that was because when Mr. Okon, the shop teacher, would take his periodic siesta from class; it seemed that Sal appointed himself as the person in charge. And since Sal decided that only he would be able to vote in this election, then he won in a landslide. But it was a close vote. Very close. And so when Mr. Okon left the room Sal would gather up some of the wood chips that had fallen to the floor. He would have my friend Mike stand at one side of the room and Sal would stand at the opposite side some thirty feet away. At that point Sal would instruct Mike to walk in a straight line from one end of the room to the other. And while Mike was walking back and forth, Sal would start to fire these wood chips at him. Now back in the 1950's there was a very popular arcade game whereby a bear would walk back and forth across the screen and the object was to
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fire your rifle at the bear and when you hit him he would raise both arms up in the air, emit a loud groan, turn around and walk in the opposite direction. Well that's exactly what Sal had Mike do. He would fire the wood chips at Mike and every time he hit him, Mike would have to raise his hands up in the air, emit a loud groan similar to the one the bear in the arcade game made, and then turn around and walk the other way. The game stopped when Mr. Okon returned from his self-imposed break. Yes, my friend Mike was not the least bit upset when he heard that Sal Raimondo wouldn't be attending the same high school with him. Ironically Mike Lewis was a tough guy. But there was a difference back then between a tough Jewish kid and an equally tough Italian kid. That was exhibited one day when Mike got into a fight with this tough Italian. Mike was kicking the living hell out of this guy. We were all so proud of him. Then about four Italian tough guys joined in to help their comrade. Now from the Italian point of view this was now an even fight. The tables were turned rather quickly on Mike as he got his head handed to him. After the fight, I mean massacre was over, Mike only wanted to know why his friends didn't jump in to help him. And that signifies the basic differences, even at a young age between Italians and Jews. I mean after all, someone had to be concerned with booking the rematch...............who had time to fight? I was busy negotiating. Lunch time at P.S. 83 gave most of us Jewish guys an option. Either we could go into the community and buy our lunch from a number of great Italian deli's or pizza shops or we could brown bag it and bring our lunch to school. After our first couple of weeks at school we still had two options. We could brown bag it or we could go without eating. A sort of self-imposed fast. You see at the beginning of the school term we all ventured out into the streets at noon and found some of the greatest places to eat. The pizza places were no different than the ones in our Jewish community because Italian people ran the pizza parlors where we lived, but the deli's in the Italian neighborhood by P.S. 83 offered us some of the most mouthwatering sandwiches and hero's that we ever ate. When you walk into a Jewish deli there is a certain aroma that seems to say Jewish and delicious. It's no different when you walk into a good Italian deli. The aromas that fill the air say Italian and delicious. Instead of hard salamis hanging from the ceiling, which you find in a Jewish deli, in the Italian deli there are different cheeses and sausages hanging from above. The smells of matzo balls, chicken soup, hot dogs and knishes are replaced by the superb scents of meat balls, minestrone soup, manicotti and lasagna. All the Italian deli's were good, but my favorite was one called Al's. Al had a rather small store, approximately 20 feet in length and about 10 in width, yet it was packed with people, mostly students at the noon hour, each waiting in
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line for Al to make them a hero. He just made cold subs, but they were the best I ever ate. When you walked into his store you immediately fell in line, waiting your turn. As you were waiting you would turn to your right and face a big window which looked out into the street. In the window on any given day there were at least fifty or sixty hero breads. Each hero bread had a hard shell and was about fifteen inches long. Then as the line shortened you were able to pick a cold soda out of the case. Next to the sodas were candies of all types. M&M's, snickers, milky ways. You name it, Al had it. At this point there were usually four or five students still in front of you. Al was the only worker in the place. He was busy waiting on the student in front of him. Al had to cut the hero, put mustard or mayonnaise on the bread and then slice the meat that the student chose. The meat wasn't precut. Al would take out the salami, bologna, ham, cheese or whatever else you wanted and slice it on his machine and make you one of the finest sandwiches known to mankind. He was busy as a beaver, which was kind of good, because that meant that he didn't have the time to look over by the counter and see some of the students (not me) putting candy bars in their coat pockets. When my turn came I usually had Al make me a bologna and provolone cheese hero, loaded with mustard. The hero was so huge and crammed with meat and cheese that it was difficult to finish. But I always succeeded. Al would charge us fifteen cents for the bread and believe it or not just fifteen cents for the meat and cheese. Thirty cents and you ate like a king. An extra ten cents for the soda. Forty cents for an unbelievable lunch. The candy was free. It didn't take too long for the tough Italian students to recognize the Jewish students. For one, even though we were in the same class as they were, we were for the most part two or three years younger. Besides that, the tough Italians hung outside Al's deli, while the Jewish students hung inside Al's deli. You see Al had a rule. If you couldn't pay for a sandwich, then he wouldn't make you one. That was just one of his idiosyncrasies. The tough Italian students didn't have much money, so they couldn't afford a sandwich and therefore stayed outside his place, although they did go into Al's for the candy. After a few days these tough guys would approach us as we got to Al's and ask us for money. We would tell them that we didn't have any extra money and therefore couldn't lend them any. I was surprised at how understanding they were, especially from all the stories we had heard about them. We would go into Al's to order our sandwiches and when we got out these very same tough guys were kind enough to let us have half of our sandwiches. They were very kind. Then on any given day, while walking through the hallways in school to go from one class to another, one of these tough guys would ask us for
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money so they could eat lunch. They weren't satisfied with half of our lunch. Now they wanted us to front them so they could have the lunch all to themselves. That's where I started to really learn the art of negotiation. I came away without a mark on me. And also without a dollar in my pocket. That's also when I decided to brown bag it. After a couple of weeks at our new school, we had a pretty full cafeteria at lunch time. Mostly Jews. The principle of P.S. 83 was Freida Rosenberg. Ms. Rosenberg was like a Jew in King Arthur's Court. A brown pair of shoes in a black tuxedo. A worm in a pond full of fish. In other words, she didn't fit in. Yet here was this short, feisty Jewish woman running a prison, I mean a school comprised of loads of mental misfits. During my second and final year at P.S. 83 I ran into some serious problems with some of the inmates, uh, students. I didn't get into any fights but I was of the opinion that I could hold my own in the event that I had to defend myself. But out of compassion for some of those so called tough guys I felt that it was only inevitable that one day, because of their threats and insults I would lose my cool and I would wind up doing a tremendous amount of damage to their fists with my face . There was one student in school, about three years older than me who was constantly threatening me and after many conversations with my parents, my Mother made an appointment for both of us to sit down with Ms. Rosenberg to see if she had any ideas on how we could prevent this tough guys fists from being brutally mauled by my face. At the meeting my Mother told Ms. Rosenberg about the student who was seriously threatening me with bodily harm. Ms. Rosenberg didn't blink an eyelash. She looked me square in the face and asked me for the name of the student. My Mom wanted to know what she would do once she found out the name of the person who was menacing me. The principle told my Mom that she would call that student on the carpet and warn him not to lay a hand on me and if need be she would expel him from school. Ms. Rosenberg was the judge, jury and executioner. And you weren't allowed any appeals. She was a tough lady. My Mom was about to ask me to give Ms. Rosenberg the name of the student who was threatening me when it seemed like a light bulb turned on in her head as she looked at the principle and asked her if she had had any problems with the students at the school. Ms. Rosenberg said that one student in particular was very disruptive in class and she was left with no alternative but to expel him for an indefinite period. My Mom asked her if there were any repercussions from her actions and Ms. Rosenberg said that this student threatened her life. Back in the 1950's the only way the police would have interceded would have been if the student actually carried out the threat. Thankfully that hadn't happened. But my
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Mom was acting like a dentist. She was pulling teeth because while Ms. Rosenberg wasn't about to lie, she also wasn't volunteering the truth either. My Mom asked Ms. Rosenberg if she was in fear for her life and Ms. Rosenberg said, "No, because the police escort her back and forth to school every day." That's all my Mom had to hear. With that she picked herself up and told Ms. Rosenberg that she would think of another solution other than having me give out the name of the student that was harassing me. Mom and I left the school and as we did she looked at me and said, "Stevie, promise me one thing?" "What's that Mom?" "If that student picks a fight with you, promise me you won't hurt his fists too badly with your face, okay?" "I'll try not to disappoint you Mom." I suppose word got out how tough my face was because that student never bothered me again. I guess he didn't want to risk having me hurt his hands. During the eighth grade at P.S. 83 my science teacher was Mr. Dill. He must have been around 6'4", fifty or fifty-five years old with a muscular build. His hair was solid white. A good number of his students, I included, had their hair turn solid white after Mr. Dill got finished with us. He was a great teacher. He had a way of getting your attention and once he got your attention, he never lost it. That was because once he got your attention, you never knew what he would do to get it back again. And you didn't want to know because once was enough. One day Mr. Dill brought into class a small generator. Homemade. The instrument was no more than eight inches by six inches. In the center of the panel there was a light bulb screwed into the wood and there was a wheel on the side of it with a handle attached. There were a couple of wires and screws holding this contraption together. On one end of the generator there were two knobs separated by four or five inches and standing four inches high. It looked like something you would make in shop class. A crude little gadget. Mr. Dill informed us that he needed seven volunteers for his experiment. Five students immediately got up. Three guys and two girls. Mr. Dill told the girls to sit down because this was a special experiment for just the guys. The three male students standing up at the front of the class thought they were real special. They were gloating as if they were picked to compete on Jeopardy. Mr. Dill requested four more male volunteers. No one moved. He looked at me and said, "How about you Chanzes?" I said, "Nah, not today Mr. Dill. Maybe some other time." He came to my desk and stood over me. He had a devilish grin on his face as he told me to stand up. I stood up and faced him. He said, "Are you sure you don't want to be a volunteer Chanzes?" I was beginning to have second thoughts but I stood my ground and told him no thanks. Quicker than a speeding bullet, as soon as I declined Mr. Dill's invitation, his right hand shot down inside my pants and grabbed my bare stomach. With that he started walking towards the front of the class with my paunch firmly in his grip.
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Unfortunately for me I was a bit overweight at the time and I had a rather large stomach. Unfortunate for me. Fortunate for Mr. Dill, as there was plenty for him to hold onto as well as squeeze tightly. When we got to the front of the class Mr. Dill looked down at me and asked me if I would remain there if he let go of my stomach. I assured him that I would. At that point he didn't have any problem getting the balance of volunteers he needed. Once all seven of us were assembled Mr. Dill directed all of our eyes to the light bulb sitting in the middle of his generator. He started to turn the handle on the wheel and all of a sudden the light bulb began to glow. He then had all seven of us form a semi-circle and hold hands. Then he had the lead person on each half of the semi-circle place their free hand on one of the two protruding knobs. Then Mr. Dill started to turn the handle on the wheel at top speed. Two things happened all at once. Number one, we all were getting shocked by the current that was being generated through our bodies. Number two, none of us, including the two guys holding the knobs could let go. Mr. Dill looked like the mad scientist so often seen in comic books, with his white hair in disarray and his mouth breaking out into a broad grin as he yelled out at us, "Boys, you will be good for the balance of the school year, won't you?" Y-Y-Yes, we all shouted out. And we were.
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CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS HIGH SCHOOL There are some teachers that I will never forget. Then again there are some teachers that I would like to forget. And then, just like Pablo Picasso, Elvis Presley or Babe Ruth there is probably one teacher in every students life that makes an indelible impression, so much so, that if all teachers were like that one particular teacher, then scholastic scores would shoot way, way up. There wouldn't be a hint of an educational crises. That is the fond remembrance I have of my second year Spanish teacher, Senor Pablo Rosario. I was never a good student. It's not that I wasn't capable, but in order to succeed in school you had to study. I never had time for that. I was always too busy playing ball, watching television or just plain goofing around. When it was time for a test I would buy a bottle of No-Doze (pills high in caffeine), pop a few pills in my mouth and stay up until three or four in the morning, cramming for my exam. This method enabled me to maintain a constant C average while in high school. On occasion a D, once in a while a B, but on average a solid C. I'm sure that I could have increased that average to at least a C +, but they didn't grade you for lunch. Too bad. Because I was very good at that. Never late. It was a requirement to study a foreign language in high school. Prior to choosing any subject most students gave thought as to how that topic would impact their lives. So did I. I chose Spanish because many people told me that it was by far the easiest language to learn and therefore I wouldn't have to do much studying. After all, they weren't giving away No-Doze pills. You did have to buy them. During my freshman year in high school, my Spanish teacher was Ms. Rodriguez. There are three things that I remember about Ms. Rodriguez and my first year of Spanish. One was that she hardly spoke any English. That made it terribly difficult to understand what she was saying, even for the bright and articulate students. And if they were having problems, then I didn't stand a ghost of a chance at succeeding. The second thing that sticks out in my mind about Ms. Rodriguez was when the class met her for the very first time. She walked into the room and said, "Buenos Dias," which means good morning in Spanish. Even though it was our first day in Spanish, I believe every student knew what Buenos Dias meant. That very same day she proceeded to teach us how to pronounce the vowels in Spanish which was much different than the English pronunciation. "Ah, eh, ih, oh, ooh. El burro mas sabe que tu. (The burro knows more than you)" When it comes to Spanish, the burro still knows more than me. The third remembrance I have of Ms. Rodriguez was that she gave me a D for the semester. And even then I wasn't
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upset at her for giving me such a low grade because on reflection I thought that she was overly gracious in giving me a passing one. I now had one more year of Spanish to endure. I was sweating it out. I was now a sophomore. It was my first day in Spanish class. We were collectively about thirty students sitting in class awaiting the appearance of Mr. Rosario. No one knew much about him. Rumors spread through class that he was a tough no nonsense teacher. Just what I needed. As we were sitting there awaiting his arrival the door burst open. In walked a man of about thirty-five, 5'8", and a bit portly sporting black rimmed glasses. And he had brown hair along the sides of his head with a few sprouts on the top. He was carrying a book under his left arm. As he walked in he proceeded to his desk located at the front of the class, and his eyes never left his audience. When he got to his desk he firmly placed the book on it and looked directly at us and said, "Remember this, if you want to open a door, it must first be closed." I looked at Mr. Rosario and thought rather quickly about what he said. It made sense. How can you possibly open a door if it is not closed? I immediately took a liking to him. The only thing is I didn't understand his prophecy then and I don't understand it now but it makes sense and in the final analysis, that's all that matters. Mr. Rosario in less than five seconds had done what no other teacher before or after had been able to do. He got my attention and in a very positive manner. And he could talk in English. Mr. Rosario made me want to succeed. For the first and only time in my student career I enjoyed studying. He had a way of making schoolwork fun and exciting. He had a great sense of humor and wit which he used to his advantage in his teachings. I received a final grade of B+ from Senor Rosario, but even though he made such an impact on my outlook in class, a little bit of the old me was ever present. One day I walked into class and took my normal position which was in the first column of seats about five rows up. My chair was lined up against the wall. Mr. Rosario walked in with his ever present book under his arm. As usual he walked to his desk, placed his book upon it and turned to the blackboard. He picked up the eraser and started cleaning the chalk board when all of a sudden he turned around and flung the eraser in my direction. If I hadn't of ducked, it would have been a direct hit between my eyes. He yelled out at me, "Senor Chanzes, would you like to tell your classmates about your sprained wrist?" I then proceed to tell the class what Mr. Rosario found out the day before during open school week. About two months prior I had been in a mischievous mood so I decided to make believe that I severely sprained my hand, my right hand, the very same right hand that I used to write with. I bought an ace bandage, wrapped up my hand and put it in a sling and for one solid week I was
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excused from all written assignments in each of my classes. I would wrap my hand up after I left for school each day and remove it just prior to getting home. Well, some two months later it's now open school week. That's when parents go and visit with your teachers to check on the progress you are making in school. Mr. Rosario had taken a liking to me and was extremely sympathetic during my week of agony. During his visit with my Mom he expressed how happy he was that my hand had healed properly. My Mom was taken aback and since she was not a very good improviser she asked Mr. Rosario what he was talking about. He explained what I had been doing. Mr. Rosario made my mom promise not to let on that he knew of my deception. She didn't and that is why Mr. Rosario flung the eraser at me. I apologized to the class and to Mr. Rosario. Our relationship in class carried on throughout the rest of the school year as if nothing had happened although occasionally he would ask me how my hand felt. This was a man who truly enjoyed teaching and it showed in the performance levels of his students, me included. I'm glad he did choose teaching as his profession, but if he hadn't he would have made one hell of a baseball pitcher. Christopher Columbus High School was approximately a one mile walk from where I lived. We had to be in school by 8:30 in the morning and classes were dismissed for the day at 3:30 in the afternoon. The school day consisted of eight periods or eight different classes. Your lunch period for the school year was always the same. As early as the third period which started at 10:30 A.M. or as late as the seventh period which began at 2:20 P.M. During my freshman year I had third period lunch. That was probably the worst time of the day for me to have lunch, for two reasons. Number one, I was never nor am I now accustomed to eating lunch at 10:30 in the morning. The only people who ought to eat lunch at such an ungodly hour should be those prisoners facing execution at eleven, because if they don't eat lunch at 10:30 then they'll never get the opportunity again. The second reason that lunch was not appetizing so early in the morning was because I just finished eating breakfast at eight. Who was hungry? But I had to eat because I wouldn't get another opportunity until I got home at four in the afternoon and that was too long of a wait. The only choices we had were to brown bag it or eat the food that the school served in the cafeteria. We weren't allowed to leave the school grounds for lunch. I never brown bagged it at high school. Most people would complain about the school food because it didn't taste like home cooking. As a matter of fact they were correct because it bore little or no resemblance whatsoever. I took a different approach. Although it was true that the food didn't taste anything like what was served at home, nevertheless it was tasty. It's just that their hamburgers didn't taste
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like hamburgers. As a matter of fact, whatever they served had little comparison in taste to its name. So instead of asking for a hamburger, I would wait on the food line and when it was my turn I simply would say, let me have some of "that." I was never disappointed because I didn't eat their hamburgers. I ate "that." One morning I ate too much of "that." My stomach started grumbling. I went to the bathroom to relieve myself. When I walked in it was as if I had entered a gas chamber, so thick were the fumes from the guys who were in there smoking. Every now and then a teacher would walk into the boys room and make the students put out their cigarettes as smoking wasn't allowed in school. Not on this day. At least not right then and there and I couldn't wait. And I wouldn't use the cubicle to relieve myself because some of the guys would boost themselves up to the top of the booth and fire spit balls at you, pour a cup of water on you or light a piece of paper and let it descend on you. The bathrooms in our school were used for everything but their intended purposes. I had to make a decision, a quick decision. I decided to violate the school rules as opposed to having some of the students violate me and I bolted from school and headed home. Normally it took about twenty minutes to walk home from school. I didn't have twenty minutes; such was the gravity of the situation. I was running at full speed, which for a Jewish person is not very fast at all. That's not in our training regimen. Besides, we can only run fast for about thirty seconds. Then we have to rest for an hour. So instead of the normal twenty minutes that it would take to get home, I made it in eighteen Almost made it. It's a truism, when you are heading home and you have to relieve yourself, the closer you get to home, the more you have to relieve yourself and the harder it is to contain yourself. I reached my apartment building. We lived on the fifth floor of an elevated building. I pressed the button for the elevator. It seemed like it took forever to arrive. The pains were more frequent by now. I knew it would be a close call. I instantly pressed the fifth floor button. As the elevator was ascending I reached into my pants pocket for the key to the apartment. I remember saying to myself, "Oh Shit." How apropos. I couldn't find the key. I forgot to take it with me when I went to school that morning. There was no turning back. I had to relieve myself in the worst way. My forehead was perspiring; my body was soaked with my own sweat. The elevator stopped at the fifth floor. I was praying that my Mom was home. More than that I was also praying that I could make it across the hallway some one hundred feet to my apartment door without all hell breaking loose. I opened the elevator door and I realized that I couldn't walk to my apartment door; such was the agony I was enduring. I knew that if I started to walk I wouldn't be able to contain myself and I would leave a bloody trail (not
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exactly bloody) leading to my apartment door. Pains were shooting across my stomach wall. There were approximately eight apartments to each floor. I was hoping that no one would come out into the hallway. How embarrassing it would be. I couldn't walk to my apartment so I started to hop. Just like a bunny. It was like I was at a wedding or bar mitzvah doing the dance called the Bunny Hop. Except there was no music. Unless you count the noise that the farts coming out of my ass made. About one minute or forty hops later I reached the door. It was now clearly a race against time. I rang the doorbell five or six times in a row. No answer. I pounded on the door. All of a sudden I heard my Mom yell out, "Who's there?" I yelled back, "Ma, it's me, Steve. Hurry up and open the door. Hurry, please." My Mom came as fast as her feet could carry her. She opened the door and immediately clasped her nose with her fingers and said, "Oh, Stevie." Her feet hadn't carried her fast enough. Superman couldn't have gotten there in time. My Mom said, "Don't move." She taught me an invaluable lesson that fateful day. My Mom told me to put the bottoms of my pants into my socks. In this manner nothing would fall out onto her floor. I did as she asked and made my way into the shower, clothes and all. That invaluable lesson paid off many times during the ensuing years. Thanks Mom. The next day my Mother had to write a letter to the Dean at the high school fully explaining why I left school early the day before. My Mother was a very honest woman. She wrote down the truth as to why I left. The Dean admonished me and at the same time had all to do to control himself from not bursting out with laughter. I went back to class failing to see what was so funny.
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NEW YORK UNIVERSITY (N.Y.U.) I never graduated from college. It's not that I didn't try. I should have graduated. I went to college for four years but only came away with two years worth of credits. Once again, not my fault. N.Y.U. must shoulder some of the responsibility for my poor showing in school. For a school that prides itself in academic achievement, they should have had the foresight to understand the needs of their students. And in some ways they did, but not enough. When I entered N.Y.U. my parents decided that I should be an accountant. Back in the early 1960's Jewish boys didn't have the right to decide what they wanted to be in adulthood. Their parents knew best. For most Jewish parents it was a tossup as to what their son's should aspire to. The big three were medicine, law and accounting. My grades in high school all but eliminated me from any consideration for the first two vocations, so it wasn't too difficult for my parents to decide what I should become. I didn't argue with them for a number of reasons. First of all they were sending me to a prestigious school. Secondly, they were paying for it. Thirdly, I hadn't been exposed to an awful lot of things in life because I was too busy playing basketball in the schoolyard so the thought of going to college wasn't such a bad alternative. And last but not least, if I decided that I didn't want to go to school then I would have had to go to work. I was only eighteen. What's the rush? So off to N.Y.U. I went. During my first year at school my friend Irwin and I tried out for the N.Y.U. freshman basketball team. Surprisingly we both made it. During the 1960's, N.Y.U. had a powerful basketball program. There were lots of high school basketball players who were being courted by N.Y.U.'s scouts. The freshman basketball team was difficult to make because there were so many kids who excelled in their high school basketball programs that were trying out for the team. I never played for my high school basketball team. I never tried out for it. Therefore I didn't think I had a ghost of a chance of making my college freshman team. And in all honesty if there had been people showing up for the tryouts, then I wouldn't have made the team. But in 1962 the recruiting efforts of N.Y.U.'s basketball scouts fell apart and that gave me the opportunity to realize a dream. Not exactly the dream I had in mind when I made the team, because once on the team I, along with some other team members became "scrubeenies." I don't know who invented the name, but basically a scrubeenie came into the game if we were ahead or behind by at least twenty points with no more than twenty seconds left in the game. This didn't give me the opportunity to get into too many games. Nor did it give me an opportunity to alter the outcome either. Actually I got into one game.
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I was fouled and made both shots. But my tenure on the team did improve my basketball skills. Not during the games though, but during the scrimmages we had amongst ourselves and also against the varsity team. And N.Y.U. would only let its students remain on the team if they maintained a "C" average throughout the year. And that's exactly what my average was during my freshman term at college, a "C." When my second year at N.Y.U. started I couldn't join the varsity team because my skills weren't good enough, so instead I pledged the Phi Epsilon Pi Fraternity House. There were three prerequisites needed in order to pledge and maintain your pledge status at a fraternity house. At the outset you had to have a minimum of a C average in order to pledge. Then, during your pledge year, you had to maintain a minimum C average. And last but not least, you had to be a schmuck. Because only a schmuck would put up with all the bullshit they put you through. It was a year I'll never forget as long as I live. When a school year starts, all the fraternity houses compete for students to join or "pledge" their frat house. Those students that seek to join a particular frat house are called Pledges. After their pledge period, which runs anywhere from three to six months, they then become members of the frat house and are now called Brothers. At the onset of the school year the various frat houses attempt to recruit students. They throw wild parties where the beer, booze, food and women are plentiful. And the Brothers treat the prospective Pledges as nice as can be. There's nothing they won't do for you. Up until the time you decide to pledge their fraternity house and give them your dues. Then there's absolutely nothing that they will DO FOR YOU. And they are very smart in the way they bring you along as a pledge. They don't abuse or humiliate you right away. They do it very slowly, over a period of time. Each week is a little worse than the previous one. All of a sudden you realize that you are being belittled and dehumanized but you decide to stick it out because you only have to put up with their shenanigans for a couple of more weeks. And that's what keeps you going. I had a couple of friends that pledged Alpha Epsilon Pi (A.E.P.). They had a shorter pledge term than I did at Phi Ep, but at the end of their pledge term they had to endure a "Hell Week," where I only had to endure a Hell Weekend. During my friends' hell week all the pledges of A.E.P. had to come to school naked. Well, not exactly naked, but almost. They couldn't wear any clothes. The only garment they were permitted to wear was a bed sheet rapped around their entire body. As if that wasn't bad enough, their pledge week took place during January which is normally a very cold month in New York. When these pledges walked through the halls of N.Y.U. with their white bed sheets wrapped around them they resembled
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members of the Roman Senate or more aptly some of the characters in the film Animal House that starred John Belushi. In addition to having to wear the bed sheet around themselves, the pledges were also required to carry with them a big onion. The reason for the onion was because every time a Pledge saw a Brother in the school, the Pledge was required to say hello to the Brother and prior to saying hello the Pledge had to take a big bite out of the onion in front of the Brother. Although the pledges weren't told to do so, each one of them carried breath spray with them. And did they ever need it. Alpha Epsilon Pi's Hell Week culminated on a weekend where all hell truly broke loose. If it weren't for the fact that the following events happened to my friends, then I would have had a difficult time putting any credence into these stories. But they did happen. Thankfully not to me. One story concerning Hell Week is fairly typical of frat house behavior. Each pledge was given a cup and led to a bowl of water. They were to fill the cup with water and then drink it. On the surface it seems harmless. And it was, providing you didn't mind a little goldfish in your water. All the pledges had to drink a cup of water with a goldfish swimming inside of it. As distasteful as that may seem, it turned out that the goldfish prank was by far the most easygoing one that was played on the pledges during Hell Week. It is important to note that these pledges had endured a limited amount of hazing for about three months at Alpha Epsilon Pi. They were now down to the final week, just a mere seven days and six nights of pure hell. They had no intention of letting the past three months go to waste as the following two stories will illustrate. The pledges were gathered into a room and blindfolded. The lights were shut off and they were instructed that one of the pledges would be given an object. The pledge would hold the object in his lap and rub his hands over it. Then that pledge was to pick up the object and kiss it. After doing so he would pass the object to the pledge sitting to his right. This procedure would continue until all the pledges had participated in the exercise. Once everyone had an opportunity to fondle and kiss the object they were told to remove their blindfolds and the lights were turned on. At that point each pledge saw what they all had held and kissed just moments ago. It was a cow's head. Now cows are not the most beautiful animals in the world to start with. But just a cow's head? Freshly severed? Blood stains all around it? To think that you just kissed it too? Yuck. A couple of the pledges threw up. One of the Brothers magnanimously offered to buy them hamburgers for lunch but they all declined. Who knows, maybe the pledges just finished eating breakfast and they
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weren't hungry. The following day a group of the Brothers went to Loeb Student Center at around 6:30 in the morning. They carried an unobtrusive brown paper bag with them. Inside the bag was the cow's head. Now Loeb served a myriad of purposes. You could play games there with your fellow students such as checkers or chess. You could shoot pool, play cards, just relax or study. You could also go there in the morning for breakfast. The Brothers got there bright and early prior to the arrival of the students. The dining room was very large and could accommodate hundreds of students and teachers. There were just a couple of workers there getting the place ready for the morning onslaught of students. Actually there were two black women there that day cleaning off the tables. They were at one end of the dining room. The Brothers emptied the contents of the brown paper bag they were carrying onto one of the dining room tables. The cleaning women were too busy at the other end of the room wiping the tables to take notice of the Brothers activities. The Brothers placed the cow's head on the table. Then one of them pulled a cap out of his jacket. The cap had two big holes cut out on its top. That was for the cow's ears to fit through. So they placed the cap on the cow's head. Now one of the Brothers reached into his pocket and pulled out a pair of reading glasses. He placed the glasses on the cow's face. And finally, the very last act of humiliation that this poor dead cow would suffer was when one of the Brothers placed a cigar inside its mouth. They then went off to the side, out of eye shot of the workers. All that remained behind them was a cigar smoking, four eyed, hatted cow's head sitting smugly on one of the tables. Then the cleaning women approached the table. They didn't have any idea what it was at that point because they were nearing the head from the rear. Then one of the women started to slowly circle the table to see what this object was. She was carrying a mop and pail when all of a sudden she realized what she was looking at. She let out a deafening scream, threw her hands up in the air sending the mop and pail to the floor and for a brief moment it looked as if she was being executed because the hair on her head shot straight up. From seeing her reaction it was hard to imagine her not having a heart attack. Thankfully she was able to walk away from the table that day all in one piece, although her hair was a bit disheveled. Can't say the same thing about that poor cow though. There was one more prank that the pledges of Alpha Epsilon Pi were subjected to prior to being inducted into the fraternity.....................They had to be branded. All the pledges were brought into the "branding room" together. Once there the pledges would be shown a real branding iron, as hot as could be with the fraternity's initials on it, A.E.P. The pledges were required to have their fraternities
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initials branded onto their ass forever and ever if they wanted to become a Brother in this prestigious fraternity. This prestigious and nutty fraternity. The A.E.P. insignia was the last remaining obstacle keeping these pledges from gaining entry into fraternityhood. Amazing as it seems, nobody refused. And everybody got branded.....Sort of. The pledges would all drop their pants and lay down on the floor, asses up. It looked like a Polish parking lot for bicycles. Some of the pledges would usually give a quick glance up at the piping hot branding iron with a look of terror on their faces and then turn their faces down between their folded and clenched arms. Then one of the Brothers would suddenly hand to each other Brother a lit candle. Each Brother would then hold the candle over the rump of the pledge and wax would drip off the end of the candle and fall onto their rear ends. From listening to the yelps and screams you would have thought that they really were being branded. Shortly thereafter they would become Brothers and take delight in torturing or should I say, carrying on the traditions of Alpha Epsilon Pi with the new season's recruits. My pledge period at Phi Ep was six months and instead of a Hell Week we had a Hell Weekend. One that I will never forget. From the very beginning of our Hell Weekend, we the pledges were made to look like complete, utter fools. From the very beginning......... We were given a list of items to bring with us for the weekend. We each had to bring a mop. We also needed a big valise to house soap, toothpaste, deodorant, an electric razor or blades, a new can of shaving cream, one towel, Cray paper, a carton of cigarettes even if we didn't smoke, one set of shorts, toilet paper, one complete change of clothes, one pair of dress shoes, a suit and tie as well as a bathing suit and a brick. Oh, and a pail for the mop. In addition we were all required to take the train to the fraternity house that Friday evening where we were to begin our 'memorable' Hell Weekend. Each Pledge had a Brother assigned to him. We all had to let the Brothers know which train stop we would get off at, and at what time. I thought that was a nice gesture on the part of the Brotherhood because every train stop was at least a mile away from the fraternity house. And besides the lengthy walk, we would also have to carry with us the mop and pail along with the valise that held that heavy brick. Yeah, it was a nice gesture. It's just too bad they never made it. You see, it wasn't until we exited the train station that we found out that our dear Brothers-to-be were not in the taxi or transportation business. Nope, they didn't have time for business because they were still playing the abuse and humiliation game. And it was the ninth inning. This weekend represented their last at bats. And they knew it. And we found out about it........ Right from the beginning.
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The Brothers insisted that each of us wear certain clothing while riding on the train that was bringing us to Greenwich Village, which was where our fraternity house was located. Let me start from the ground up, because the last bit of attire that we had to wear really made the entire outfit what it was. And that was, completely goofy. And that is what we looked like, Completely Goofy. The ensemble started off with a white pair of tennis sneakers adorning our feet which were encased in a purple pair of socks. We also had to wear white pants with a white shirt and a purple carnation. Obviously white and purple were the colors of the day. Once we were dressed we looked like the "Good Humor" ice cream man. The only difference was that we just had one flavor that day, and that was "Tutti Frutti." To illustrate the point, there was one other item that we had to wear. And it wasn't white or purple. It was black.....Black Mickey Mouse Ears. So each of the pledges said goodbye to their loved ones that Friday night and walked away wearing the hideous outfit I described, including the Mickey Mouse ears. At the same time we carried a valise that had a brick in it which was weighing down on our arms. You had to constantly switch the valise from arm to arm because of the weight of the brick. But first you had to stop and put down your mop and pail. We were a sight for sore eyes. At the time I lived in the Bronx, and it was a 40 minute train ride to the Village. It was the longest forty minutes of my life. Especially if you consider the fact that I'm sitting on a train full of people and I'm wearing a Mickey Mouse hat. My eyes are riveted to the floor because I know that everyone on the train is looking at me. Every now and then you'd hear a little kid yell to his mother, "Mommy, why is that man wearing a Mickey Mouse hat?" And invariably I would hear the mother whisper to her kid, "Shh. Be quiet." And on occasion I would lift my head up only to see someone turn their gaze away from me. It's not as if I was five years old. I was 19, a man. And there I was, this 19 year old man, sitting on a train, wearing a Mickey Mouse hat. Some man all right. I looked like a 19 year old manly schmuck. That's what I looked like. And you had to wear the Mickey Mouse hat because you didn't know if there was a spy on the train watching you. It was very apparent that the Brothers could and would do anything to either embarrass or cause us grief. Sometimes both. And if any of us were caught without our "ears" and without the carnation in place, then we would have been instantly expelled from the fraternity. And now, by adding the mop and pail it instantly transformed us into a different character. We went from resembling the Good Humor man to more like looking like Cousin Ernie (Ford) on the I Love Lucy show.
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Once we got off the train we were greeted by our assigned Brother. It was then that we were first told that we would have to walk to the fraternity house while our Brother drove along in his car right next to us. The walk through the Village while tiring wasn't really humiliating, because we were in the Village, Greenwich Village. We looked just as good, if not better than most of the people living there at the time. At least it seemed that way. The Brothers arranged it in such a way that each pledge would arrive that Friday night in half hour intervals. During the previous week we were told that once inside the fraternity house we could not speak to another pledge unless a Brother gave us permission to do so and we were also told that in order to talk to any Brother we first had to have that Brothers permission. And the only way to get permission to speak was by asking for it in a certain way. We were given a script that we had to memorize. We were told that once we got to the door of the frat house, we should knock on it and when a Brother answered we were to repeat the following. And we were told to also repeat it every time we wanted to talk to any Brother for the balance of the weekend. I've never forgotten it. "Most efficacious, perspicacious, capiocious, vice-gerund. It is with the utmost tolselemnity that I dare address thee. Oh Lord, oh master, may I speak?" And if the Brother didn't respond to your request, then you were told to go back to whatever you were doing. But there were exceptions. If you had to do something that required a Brother's permission, like asking for a glass of water because you were dying of thirst considering they haven't let you drink anything in ten hours or asking if you could go to the bathroom because your bladder was bursting at the seams, then under those circumstances, if the Brother didn't respond to your first request, then all you had to do was repeat the same request again and add an additional sentence, which was, "Oh Lord, oh master, may I speak freely." Now the Brother had to make a quick decision. Should he let you talk to him and possibly ask him a non-sensical question or should he run the risk that you were going to urinate on him if he denied your request. It wasn't too difficult of a decision for them to make. Although there were times during that weekend that each of us wished that they would deny us the right to talk to them. One of the only times that I definitely remember a Brother talking to any of us on our first request for permission to speak was when we first knocked on the door of the frat house that Friday evening. One of the Brothers said, "Who goes without?," to which I responded, "It is I, Pledge Steven Chanzes." The Brother opened the
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door, and if looks could kill, then I wouldn't be writing this story, because he looked mean and nasty. He stared at me and said, "Come in Pledge Steven Chanzes. We've been waiting for you." My ordeal started Friday night around eleven and continued unabated through three o'clock the following Sunday afternoon. Once inside the fraternity house I was stripped of all of my rights. I was now a thing, an object. And I quickly learned that there were going to be three changes taking place in my life. Immediately. And lasting for the entire weekend. First of all, the Brotherhood decided that all pledges should go through a vigorous fitness schedule. Thankfully it was just a ten hour program. Ten hours of pushups, sit ups, running, etc. Yeah, just ten hours. Ten hours every damn day. Upon entering the fraternity house you have to open your valise to account for the various items you were required to bring with you. Once it was inventoried you were told to change into your shorts and go into the main room. When I walked into the main room it reminded me of Vic Tanny's Health Salon. Well, almost. Ours didn't have any machines. Just a bunch of fraternity Brothers yelling out at some of my fellow pledges, "I SAID GIVE ME TWENTY PUSHUPS RIGHT NOW COHEN. DO IT, DO IT, DO IT. I DON'T CARE HOW TIRED YOU ARE. EITHER DO IT NOW OR GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE AND PLEDGE ANOTHER FRATERNITY. DO IT, DO IT, DO IT." You'd hear shouting all around you. Music blasting in the background. Brothers yelling out, "GIVE ME 50 SITUPS SHITHEAD." "JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP AND KEEP RUNNING IN PLACE. I KNOW WHEN IT WILL BE TIME TO STOP." Of course the more you exercise, then the hungrier you get. We certainly exercised a lot, and you couldn't imagine how hungry we would get. I don't know if my first meal was breakfast, lunch or dinner because all the windows were boarded up and after a while you lost all perception of time and you had no idea if it was day or night. We weren't allowed to wear watches and of course when in our presence, neither did the Brothers. For our first meal we were given a menu from some local diner and we were told that we could order any sandwich plus either a cup of coffee, tea, glass of milk or soda. In addition we were allowed to smoke one cigarette with each of our meals. One of the Brothers brought back a big box containing our food. We all sat down in a circle and as the Brothers placed our food in front of us we were given instructions not to open our sandwiches until we were told to do so. Once we all had our sandwiches in front of us we were then told to open them and to our surprise we each did have a sandwich..........Not the one that we ordered, but nevertheless it was a sandwich. And they were all the
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same. Two pieces of dry white bread, with lettuce and a slice of tomato inside. Once we got over our initial disappointment, each of us devoured our sandwich. It was the most delicious dry white bread, lettuce and slice of tomato that you ever ate in all your life. Of course in our condition, just about anything would have been delicious. As for the drinks we ordered, once again we all got the same thing. A glass of warm water. If you were a smoker you were given one cigarette. If you didn't smoke then the carton you brought in was divided up by the Brothers. During our Hell Weekend we were fed five times. Three on Saturday and two on Sunday. And each meal was identical to the first one. The third change we had to get used to was our sleeping accommodations as well as sleep time. After we finished our first meal the Brothers said that they wanted us to get some well-deserved sleep. None of us argued. We were in complete agreement. We were absolutely tired and exhausted from a natural lack of sleep as well as the amount of exercising we were being subjected to. We were told to get the Cray paper and brick that we had brought with us. At that point we were instructed to wrap the brick in the Cray paper and put it on the floor. Once that was done we were told that the brick in front of us, the one with the colorful Cray paper wrapped around it was now our pillow, and furthermore they told us that every pledge must sleep with his head on the pillow. Now I don't care how tired you are, believe me when I tell you that it's very difficult to sleep with your head on a pillow when the pillow is a brick. And so there we were, five guys wearing our sneakers, socks and shorts. Nothing else. No shirt, no pajamas. Not even a blanket. Just sneakers, socks and shorts and lying on a bare wooden floor with our heads propped up against a brick. Although it was difficult to fall asleep, nevertheless we did. But not for very long. Just for eight hours. Or so we were told. Actually we were permitted a mere thirty minutes of sleep. Then we were awoken. In our condition it would have been difficult to have been roused by an atom bomb and fortunately for us none of the Brothers had access to such types of weapons, but they did have the next best thing. And that was a stereo which started to blast rock n' roll music at a feverishly high pitch. We all awoke instantly as if a bomb had detonated. Immediately we were put through some drills. Exercises. And then some more exercises. We were all on the verge of physical exhaustion. There comes a point in time when your mind plays funny tricks on you. I was at that point. One of the Brothers noticed how lethargic I was and he beckoned me to the back room. When I walked into the room there were a couple of frat brothers there and one of them was wearing a doctor's white uniform. He asked me if I was tired and exhausted
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and of course I told him I was. It was very evident. He told me to drop my pants and he would give me a shot that would perk me up. Even though I was fatigued I wasn't stupid. Well, not completely. I looked at him quizzically and he immediately told me that he was studying medicine in school and I had nothing to worry about. As I said, I wasn't completely stupid, but I was stupid enough to drop my pants, lie down on the bed and let him give me a shot. I felt a sharp pain but I must admit that ten minutes after I got the shot I felt like a new man. In rapid succession I could see each of my pledge brothers lining up for their shots. We each received three shots over the weekend. It enabled us to get through some very difficult times. After the weekend was over we found out how the shots were administered. It was done in a very simple manner. When we lay down on the bed, a brother would place the needle in his left hand, bring it down towards our rump and then with his right hand he would pinch our ass. In other words, instead of getting shots we were getting our asses pinched. And we thought that we felt more alert. If you remember we did bring toothpaste, soap, shaving materials and deodorant with us. But we never used any of it during our weekend. Except the shaving cream. Sometime Saturday morning we were told to change into our bathing suits. After doing so we were brought into the main room and ordered to empty our cans of shaving cream on each other. As messy as it was it was still a lot better than doing pushups, sit ups or any other type of physical exercises. After the shaving cream fight was over we each toweled off and changed back into our shorts. At this point we looked like shit and we smelled worse. But our ordeal was far from over. After we ate we were told that we would now go downstairs to Washington Square Park. Each of us wondered what the brothers had in store for us. It didn't take long for us to find out. The brothers were in a gambling mood so they thought it would be a good idea to have us run approximately one mile around the park and they would bet on us as if we were horses. How could they possibly mistake us for horses? Horses smelled much better than us. At least on that day. The odds that I would win the race were 100-1. Obviously I wasn't one of the betting favorites. As a matter of fact I was picked to finish dead last. And I almost did. Thankfully I just finished last. All of us were totally exhausted that day. I honestly thought that if I got out of the gate fast (there I go again, thinking I'm a horse) and opened up a big lead, then my pledge brothers would give up and just finish the race without giving me any competition. I might have been right. But I never did find out. At the outset of the race I did just what I wanted to and that was to open up a big lead. I was about one third through the race. I was way out in
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front. There was no one close to me. My adrenalin was pumping....................And then it stopped..............And so did I. I didn't just stop. I collapsed. I fell right to the ground in the middle of the park. At that point the brothers ran up to me and exhorted me to get up. I told them that I simply couldn't because I felt like I was dying. The brothers, with all the compassion they could muster up told me that they didn't give a shit and that if I didn't get up they would blackball me (prevent me from joining the fraternity ) in the event I didn't die. At that point my suspicions were confirmed. These guys were a bunch of sadistic bastards and I was in a no win situation. Die or be blackballed.......... I chose to die. When the brothers saw that I wasn't getting up, a couple of them lifted me by the shoulders and walked me back to the frat house. I didn't die, as you probably noticed, and they didn't blackball me. But I found out later that day why they were so concerned about me. It had nothing to do with me being blackballed. Certainly nothing at all to do with my health, God forbid. The reason for their anxiety was because in the middle of the park there was a police station and the brothers were afraid that if a policeman saw the condition I was in, that it might cause him to file a report with the school which could have a negative effect on the fraternity house and the way they haze their pledges. And to think that I maintained a C average for this abuse. And so we all returned to the frat house. It was late Saturday afternoon. This would all be over in less than twenty-four hours. Every one of us was determined to stick it out, no matter how much mistreatment was showered upon us. No matter how intolerable the conditions were. And just when we thought that it couldn't possibly get any worse, it did. We were all told to dress up. Suit and tie. Dress shoes. There we were. Five guys who had just been through what seemed like a war. And we looked the part. Worse than that, we smelled it too. But we were wearing our finest duds. And for good reason. Because no self-respecting girl would want to dance with anyone else. And that's what we had to do. The brothers had arranged for a sister sorority house's pledges to visit us that afternoon. We were told to pick a partner and dance with her. And the girls were told by their sisters that they had to dance with us, so once the girls entered the frat house they too lost most of their rights. Like the right to dance with someone who didn't stink. They lost that right. Of course, to add insult to injury, the only songs that were played that afternoon were slow ballads. So between the smell of our bodies and the smell on our breath, it was a very long afternoon for the girls. Very long. The next day Hell Weekend came to a close. I was now a brother. Now it was my
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turn to exact revenge and ridicule the new core of pledge recruits. But that wasn't my style. I think the worst thing I ever did to a pledge was to give him a five dollar bill so he could go downstairs to the deli and bring me back a pastrami sandwich. My first two years at N.Y.U. came to a close shortly after I became a brother in Phi Epsilon Pi fraternity. During that time I maintained a C average, in part due to school requirements regarding the freshman basketball team and equally in part due to mandates regarding the pledging of fraternity houses. And so I entered my junior year in college, eagerly awaiting the challenges that lay in front of me. And there were many, the least of which was attaining passing grades in my classes. But there were no more basketball teams or fraternity houses to join, so my scholastic career came to a screeching halt. If only N.Y.U. had the foresight to acknowledge what made some of their students successful...............
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THE VIETNAM WAR No other war has divided this country to the extent that the war in Southeast Asia did. Our country was equally split apart regarding this conflict. If you listen to the political pundits they will tell you that people of stature and prominence were on both sides of the issue. And they are right......Partially. I say partially because these so called "People of Prominence" who opted to extricate us from Viet Nam, people like Senators Robert Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy, Vice-President Hubert Humphrey as well as many other dignitaries, all came to their rightful moral decision as a result of listening to the youth movement. But not after many thousands of America's finest had laid down their lives for a cause we had no right being involved in. It was after all the people of my generation who were truly responsible for eventually getting the "ear" of the Washington bureaucrats through our "Marches for Peace" and our loud voices that constantly told the establishment in no uncertain terms, "Hell no, we won't go." Our involvement in Viet Nam was in no small part aided by President Kennedy's determination to send advisors to that region. There has been unproven speculation in the years since his assassination that had President Kennedy lived, he would have brought our advisors home and we never would have engaged in a war that cost this country the lives of more than 50,000 young Americans. Unfortunately for those that lost their lives as well as those Americans that did return home but suffer from various ailments, both mental and physical, the answer to that question will forever remain a mystery and subject to debate. The youth of America saw no reason to die for a conflict that was primarily a civil war, a struggle that had been going on for generations. We were branded cowards by the "establishment" as well as the veterans of the various wars this country had been engaged in. No one wanted to listen to us. But we kept talking. As we ultimately found out, our leadership did in fact lie and deceive us. General William Westmoreland and Secretary of State Robert McNamara were instrumental in prolonging the conflict by their ill-timed and quite often purposefully erroneous advice to President Johnson. We, the youth of America stopped the Viet Nam war. Not the endless array of loud and destructive bombs that our armed services dropped along the countryside, but rather the reasoned and continuing resonant voice of the young whose impassioned pleas changed forever the course of American politics. Finally our political leaders paid heed to what we were saying, either out of a sense of morality or because they saw their political lives coming to an end. And so they joined our ranks as did many people from all walks of life. But while the war was in progress there were difficult decisions that
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had to be made by many young adults. At the time of the Viet Nam conflict we were still under the laws of conscription. Many of us received the call to our country's service with the all too familiar letter that opened up with the word, "Greetings." Some of us didn't get the welcoming letter from our Uncle Sam. My friend Ronnie didn't. He chose to enlist in the armed services when he was just eighteen. That was in 1963. We just had advisors in Nam back then. No war, just advisors. The armed services offered a way to serve your country and also see the world, compliments of our government. Ronnie enlisted with dreams of going to France, Germany, Italy or some other European country. Shortly after his enlistment the armed conflict in Viet Nam began. Dreams of seeing the Eiffel Tower, participating in an October Fest or seeing the Vatican would have to wait. Ronnie was needed in Viet Nam. But he didn't stay there very long. Not long indeed. You can now find Ronnie, or rather his name on the Viet Nam Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C. Or you can go to Valhalla Cemetery in upstate New York to see my friend. Ronnie never did get to see France, Germany or Italy. He also never saw his twenty-first birthday. I was a bit more fortunate than my friend. First of all I didn't enlist and secondly when I was drafted the war was on. I, like so many of my friends and other young adults across our nation now had to make a choice. We didn't have many, but we did have some. Many American boys ran away to Canada to seek asylum and start their lives over again. I had a friend who did that. As far as I know he is still there. Some years after the war ended, our government offered complete amnesty to any boys who wanted to return from Canada. Other guys opted to face the possibility of a five year jail term by refusing to be inducted. As for me, I kept my options open. That was because I didn't want to go to Canada and to be honest with you I wasn't that thrilled about sitting in jail either. So I decided to just play the waiting game to see if my government really wanted me. The only problem with that option is that they never come out and officially notify you that they are not interested in your enlistment. So every day you live through a hellish nightmare. And for me that nightmare usually occurred around one in the afternoon. Because that's when we received our mail. And when the mail came the walk to the mailbox was excruciatingly, painstakingly slow for me. I would always wonder if this would be the day that I would receive a letter from my infamous Uncle Sam. And for over one year I never did. And each day that
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the government passed me over was both a cause for celebration as well as nausea. Celebration because I wasn't being called into service. Nausea because it could be a very short lived celebration as there was always tomorrows mail. Thankfully there wasn't any mail delivery on Sunday. It truly was a day of rest that both God and I needed. But the inevitable finally occurred. My Uncle Sam remembered me and he sent me his "Greetings." I was notified by the government to report for my physical at 39 Whitehall Street in lower Manhattan. At that particular time once you passed your physical you could expect to be inducted into the army within a month or two and then as soon as you completed six weeks of basic training in all probability your ass as well as the rest of your body was going off to Viet Nam. That wasn't something that I wanted to leave up to chance, yet I had no concrete idea on how to avoid the service. Once again I had to play it by ear. The day of my physical arrived. I went down to Whitehall Street and saw many guys from my neighborhood there, just like me, hoping and praying that they wouldn't pass the exams. Some of them, like myself had notes from their doctors stating for one reason or another why they weren't fit for service. My optometrist wrote a note stating that I was color blind. It didn't help. I could have been blind and it wouldn't have done me any good. In those days if you could walk, even limp, you passed the exam. And that's not too much of an exaggeration. As it turned out I passed every physical and written exam given to me that day. Time was running out. There was only one thing left to do before I would be officially classified 1-A and in all probability inducted into the army within a month. And that was to sign the loyalty oath. And so at the end of the day we were all taken into a room no different than the average grade school room. Lots of individual desks, all lined up one behind the other, about fifteen deep, ten rows across. We all took our seats. There were about one hundred fifty of us. One hundred fifty young men. Some of us were scared out of our minds because we were cowards, some of us were terrified because we felt that America didn't belong in this war and we shouldn't have to risk our lives for an unjust cause and yet there were some young men that day that wanted the opportunity to go to Nam. I wasn't associated with the latter group. The only Orientals I wanted to see were those in my neighborhood that owned the Chinese restaurants. And I might add that I didn't have to take a physical to go there either. As we took our seats, papers were passed out to us. You could feel the tension in the room. The instructor told us to print our name and address on the cover sheet.
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He then told us that there were a series of questions that we had to answer, all pertaining to our political affiliations, such as were we members of any communist or fascist party? In a very distinct tone he advised us that we could check yes or no to each question and then in a barely audible manner he also advised us that we could plead the Fifth Amendment to any of those questions. And then in a shrill voice he barked out, "Is anyone a member of or have you in the past been a member of any communist or fascist organization?" I looked around. No one answered in the affirmative. He then said, "Is anyone a member of or have you been a member of any organization that preaches the overthrow of the U.S. government?" Once again I looked around and once again no hands went up. And finally the instructor looked at us and said, "Does anyone here today plead the fifth amendment to any of these questions." At that point I didn't bother to look around. My hand immediately shot up. Once the instructor confirmed the reason I had raised my hand, I was taken a short distance to a Colonels office. The Colonel introduced himself and then asked me why I was pleading the Fifth Amendment to certain questions? I told him that it was my right to do so. Again he asked me why and again I repeated my answer. With that the Colonel handed me a piece of paper and told me to immediately report to the army psychiatrist located on the third floor of the building and after I was examined I was to report back to him. So I trudged upstairs to see the shrink. His secretary let me in immediately. No waiting. I thought for sure that there would be a line up and down the entire hallway waiting to see the Doc. But I was the only one there. The Doc was extremely professional. Stupid, but professional. Probably symbolic of most psychiatrists. At least those in the army. He was about sixty years old. White hair. He had half-moon glasses so that when he looked up at me I could see his eyes rising above his eye glass frames. No sooner did I walk into his office when he glanced up at me and said "What's your name?" I said, "Steve Chanzes." He then asked me why I was there? I told him that the Colonel sent me there because I was crazy. He said, "Let me see your papers?" I gave them to him. He wrote something on them, handed them back to me and sent me on my way. I said, "Doc, aren't you going to give me any psycho evaluation tests?" Once again he looked up at me over his spectacles and said, "I just did." I looked down at the paperwork that he just handed me. The Doc had used the dreaded "N" word in his evaluation of me. I was enraged. I was seeing red. My blood was boiling. How despicable of him. How nasty. How cruel. He had signed his name below the "N" word which was the one word evaluation of me that would send my head spinning around and around. "N"ormal. It was at that point that I became convinced that the army was run by mental incompetents. I went back downstairs and gave the report to the Colonel. He quickly glanced over it and told me to report back
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tomorrow at nine in the morning. I asked him why and he told me that there would be one other person that would have to talk to me. I asked him who and he just said, "See you tomorrow." I went home to ponder my fate. I had no idea what lay in store for me the following day but I was determined to tough it out. Once again I went over my options and I concluded that I wasn't going to run away to Canada or anyplace else and if it meant that I had to face possible imprisonment, then I would do so if that was the only alternative left. I didn't sleep very well that night. When I arose that morning I saw an unshaven face in the bathroom mirror. It was at that point that I realized that I was fighting a war. Not the one the army wanted me to fight, but the one I chose. And like any other warrior about to engage in battle, grooming wasn't at the top of my list. At that moment I decided that whoever was going to interview me would know that they were in a war too. They would know by my look and by my smell, because not only wasn't I going to shave, but I also wasn't going to bathe or put on any deodorant. My Mother thought I was crazy. That's when I told her, "Mom, if only you would have been the shrink that examined me, then I wouldn't have to go through all this MISHIGAS (unnecessary troubles)." And so once again I traveled down to 39 Whitehall Street. I used the subway train which was the common mode of transportation. As usual the train was jam packed with people heading to work in Manhattan as it was the morning rush hour. All the seats on the train were occupied. It was standing room only as was usually the case at this time of the day. We were like a can of Sardines. All crammed together. The only difference between the people on the train and the can of Sardines was that there was only one person that day in my train car that smelled fishy. And that was me. Finally the train arrived at my station. After standing on the train for over an hour I was glad to get off. Equally glad that I got off were the people who were standing next to me. I reported to the Colonel's office and announced myself to his secretary. No sooner did I sit down when a gentleman about forty years old in a three piece suit came into the room and introduced himself. As he told me his name he also showed me his business card. He was a special representative for a firm in Washington, D.C. called the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the F.B.I. He asked me to follow him and we started to engage in some small talk when I said, "Sir, I apologize for my rudeness." Sensing a quick victory he stood still and
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said, "Steven, what are you apologizing for?" I looked at him and said, "To be honest with you, I forgot my business cards. But I could write down my name, address and telephone number for you?" He placed his hands on his hips, looked at me, and shook his head up and down and a smile developed on his face as he started to walk down the hallway blurting out, "Mr. Chanzes, I already have that information. Just follow me please." We went into a rather large room which could have seated fifty people easily. Yet there was just a big desk in the front of the room with two chairs five feet in front of it. There were windows up front looking out onto the street. The rest of the room was outlined with three bare walls. My interrogator asked me to take a seat. At that point he once again tried to ingratiate himself to me. He tried to win me over to his side, but I knew the game. He was the enemy. He didn't give a shit about me. Couldn't care less. If after our meeting I was inducted into the army and went to Viet Nam and got killed, then when he found out he might have said, "Oh yeah, I remember Chanzes. He was the unshaven guy who smelled as if he hadn't taken a bath in weeks. Yeah, I remember him. Too bad he got killed." I was determined not to let him have that opportunity. After some small talk he told me why he thought our country was right in engaging in the Viet Nam war. We discussed the pros and cons about it and of course he didn't see my side of it at all. As far as I was concerned he was thoroughly brain washed. Then the questioning began. "Mr. Chanzes, are you or have you ever been a member of any subversive organization that has preached the overthrow of the U.S. government." "Mr. Chanzes, are you a member or have you ever been a member of any communist or fascist organization?" He continued with questions along the lines indicated above and to each question I answered, "I plead the fifth amendment." You could see his face grow angrier and angrier as I constantly exercised my rights. It got to the point where he started shouting at me and implying that I wasn't a true American. That got me very upset and I said to him, "You know, for someone who believes in our country and what it stands for, then how come you don't believe in our basic rights as Americans and one of those rights is to be allowed to plead the fifth amendment when questioned in a scenario such as this? It seems to me that you're the one who is un-American." He didn't answer me. He
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just looked at me with a smirk on his face. I didn't know what he was thinking and I couldn't care less. He was using his credentials to try to overpower me and he realized that it wasn't working. He then tried a new line of questioning. "Mr. Chanzes, have you ever been outside this country?" I thought about that for a while and it dawned on me that when I was about three years old my parents took me to Canada on a vacation. I answered the question honestly and said, "Yes." He then said, "Where?" I said, "I plead the fifth amendment." He then said, "Mr. Chanzes, have you ever visited any communist country?" Once again I exercised my rights. This type of questioning went on for another fifteen minutes. My antagonizer thought he was on to something as I kept giving him ammunition, except my bullets were all duds. Thankfully he didn't know that and at that particular time he couldn't prove it either. After about an hour of intense questioning I asked my adversary if I could have something to eat. He said that all he could offer me was a cup of coffee. I took him up on his offer. When he returned the questioning continued with the same results. He was miffed and perplexed. He then decided to try a new tactic. This educated man bends down so that his eyes are looking directly into mine and says with all candor, "Mr. Chanzes, I'm going to ask you once again all the questions that I have previously asked you. I'm only going to ask them one more time." That was the best news that I had heard all day. He then continued, "And if you don't answer yes or no to these questions, then for the rest of your life you will never be given a job that enables you to have access to top secret information. Do you understand that?" At that point he stood up and stared down at me, confident that he had finally broken through my protective shield. I took a sip of my coffee and looked up at him and said, "Does this mean that I could never become president of the United States?" Again he went into his routine which consisted of him staring at me with a smirk on his face while shaking his head up and down. If he could have hit me and gotten away with it, then I'm sure he would have exercised that option. Thankfully for me he didn't. After a few seconds he told me that our interview was over and I would receive a letter from the Selective Service within a couple of weeks. Approximately two weeks later I did receive a letter from the Selective Service System which said in part that my induction into the army was in abeyance. In other words it was being held up while the F.B.I. investigated my background. About two years later I received another letter from Selective Service telling me that the F.B.I. had cleared me for induction into the army and I was being
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reclassified 1-A. I wrote a letter back advising them that in the interim I had gotten married and that my wife was pregnant. I asked for a hardship deferment to which they agreed. And so I never got the opportunity that the army offered me to defend the South Vietnamese and equally as well the North Vietnamese never got the opportunity to try to kill me. I also wish with all my heart that they never had the opportunity to kill the 50,000 plus young Americans, one of which was my friend Ronnie who hopefully along with the other victims of the Viet Nam tragedy did not die in vain. Let us all hope and pray that our beloved America will never make such an idiotic mistake again. May God bless you and take care of you Ronnie and all the other American boys and girls, men and women, who gave up their lives or who are suffering from physical wounds or the mental defects caused by that war.
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RELATIVES Aunt Ethel- She really wasn't my Aunt. She was my cousin, but from the time I was a little kid I always called her Aunt Ethel and I called her husband Uncle Morris. Two very nice people who left an indelible impression on me and who I miss. My Aunt Ethel was a great cook. To be honest with you, everyone on my Mom's side were great cooks except my Mom and Granma. That's because they were fantastic cooks. One summer my folks along with Granma went on vacation to Albuquerque, New Mexico. Actually they didn't go on a vacation to Albuquerque because nobody vacations in Albuquerque. Think about it, did you ever meet anyone in your entire life who said to you, "You know, I think I'll take a vacation in Albuquerque." Actually they went to visit my Mom's sister, my Aunt Jeanie who happened to live in Albuquerque. One day my Aunt Ethel calls me and asks me if I'd like to come over for dinner that night. I didn't have to ask her what she was making because I knew that whatever it was I would enjoy very much. Aunt Ethel lived on the same floor, the fourth, as Granma. On any given day you could see either one of them in their house dress shuffling down the hall with a small portion of food asking the other to taste it and see if it needs any seasoning. Whenever my Granma or Aunt Ethel would ask me that I always gave them my stock answer. "You know what, I'm not quite sure. You better give me a little bit more to taste. Then I'll be able to tell you." So anyway, I went to my Aunt Ethels for dinner. As soon as I walked into her apartment I knew that I was in the right place at the right time. I wasn't quite sure what she was cooking but by the smells filling the air I knew that whatever it was would be absolutely delicious. She didn't let me down. Then again, she never did. The main course that evening was meat loaf. It was a meat loaf like you've never tasted in your life. How good was it you ask? It was the kind of meat loaf that didn't require a salad, vegetables or potatoes; because once you tasted this meat loaf you didn't want to fill yourself up with anything else. You wanted more room for more of my Aunt Ethel's meat loaf. She called it her French meat loaf dish. Aunt Ethel placed the meat loaf on the table and started to slice it. As she did you could see hard boiled eggs throughout the middle of the entire meat loaf. I couldn't wait for her to give me my portion. My first portion. It was mouthwatering. Delectable. Aunt Ethel, as my Mom and Granma did, only used the finest meat. I don't know about the eggs, but you couldn't buy better meat. I'll tell you how good this meat loaf was. It didn't require ketchup. Now that's good meat loaf. Some years later when I had moved to Florida I told my wife about my Aunt
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Ethel's French meat loaf with the eggs and how delicious it was. I got so excited about it that I decided to make it for dinner that night. I went to the butcher store and bought some HOCHFLAISH (The best ground meat that money can buy) and brought it home and prepared it with various seasonings and of course the eggs. I put it in the oven and Joy and I couldn't wait for it to be done. I knew that it wouldn't taste just like my Aunt Ethel's, for after all she had been a cook for about forty years. I just started ten minutes ago. There is something to be said about experience. Even I knew that. But I was hoping that it would in some small way remind me of my Aunt Ethel's meat loaf. All of a sudden the timer on the oven went off, signifying that the meat loaf was ready. I told Joy to sit down at the table because I was the chef and waiter for the evening. Joy sat down and I opened the oven and I almost started to cry. I yelled out, "What happened to my meat loaf?" Joy came running over and we both stood and looked at my Aunt Ethel's meat loaf. No, it wasn't my Aunt Ethel's meat loaf because her meat loaf wasn't yellow on the outside like mine was. The eggs had oozed through the meat loaf and were baked on the outside of it casting a yellow tint to my dinner. I looked at my wife and told her that I must have used too many eggs. I guess that's where experience comes in handy. The meat loaf was very hot and needed to be cooled off, so while we were waiting I decided to call my Mom to tell her what happened. I reached Mom at home and told her about my meat loaf. She then asked me how I made it. I told her that I seasoned the meat and then I placed the meat in a pan and molded it into a loaf. At that point I made a well in the middle of the meat and cracked a few eggs in there and then braided the meat together to enclose the eggs in the middle of the loaf. My Mom screamed with laughter into the phone as she said, "Stevie, you're supposed to hard boil the eggs before you put them into the meat." Hum. How was I to know? I'd only been a cook for ten minutes.
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Aunt Tillie- My Aunt Tillie was my Father's brothers daughter, making her my cousin Tillie. But I called her Aunt Tillie. Why should she be any different than my other cousins? Aunt Tillie and Uncle George, her husband, lived in Elmont, New York, in a big, beautiful home not too far from the Belmont Race Track. During the summer months we would go there for a Sunday barbecue. Aunt Tillie would usually have about ten to twenty people over at her house, mostly relatives, not including our family which was an additional four or five, depending if my Mom and Dad could convince Granma to go. And the one thing that impressed me about my Aunt Tillie was that she was very fair and understanding when it came to these get togethers at her house. My Dad would bring the steaks, about twenty or thirty, and my Aunt would let my Dad use her grill to do the cooking. As I said, she was very fair and understanding. She understood in a very fair way that these cookouts wouldn't cost her a plug nickel. But in all honesty I always had a great time. Especially with my Uncle George. He was a conversationalist extraordinaire. I remember one time I sat down next to him and he said to me, "Hi Stevie." He was remarkable. One Sunday when we were over at my Aunt and Uncle's house, Aunt Tillie asked my folks if it would be all right if I spent the week there. My Aunt decided that she wanted to put in an above ground swimming pool but first she would have to have the ground leveled. I was about sixteen at the time and in pretty good shape. I thought it might be a good learning experience and fun as well. So my parents and I agreed that I would spend the week there and my folks would pick me up the following Sunday. I was up every morning at six. Breakfast was either a couple of eggs with toast or toast with a couple of eggs. My Aunt Tillie wasn't very imaginative when it came to food. Lunch was the same every day. Tuna fish. Sometimes my Aunt would even take it out of the can. But most times she just opened the can and gave it to me with a piece of bread. Dinner was either franks n' beans, spaghetti or roast chicken. I must admit that the chicken was delicious, but of course you would expect it to be because my Aunt would get that from the supermarket, already prepared. Julia Childs didn't live in fear of my Aunt Tillie. My Aunt and Uncle were putting in a very big pool both in size and depth. For one solid week I used a shovel to dig into the ground, remove dirt, move it to another part of the property, then use a leveler only to find out that the part of the ground that was even now needed to be leveled and the part that was uneven was now level. Dig into the ground, remove the dirt, move the dirt to another part of the property and then use the leveler. For one solid week. Ten hours a day. The only thing I had to show for it after one week was a good sun tan. The ground was as
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uneven as it had ever been. What I thought would be a good learning experience turned out to be exactly that, a good learning experience. During that week I learned that if I was going to earn a living in life, it certainly wouldn't be in the ground leveling business. When my parents picked me up that Sunday they were amazed at the condition of the property that I had worked on. It looked as if dozens of groundhogs had been at play. The next week Aunt Tillie hired three burly men to level the ground. It took them one solid week to accomplish the task. I personally think these three big strapping men could have done it in much less time, but where were they going to get such delicious tasting tuna fish like my Aunt Tillie's? At one point in time Aunt Tillie and Uncle George were operating a combination newsstand, candy store, which was so typical in New York. They also served breakfast and lunch. She could handle that. She and my Uncle could make eggs, bacon, tuna sandwiches and the like. That was easy. I didn't say it was good. I just said it was easy. But she couldn't stay open for dinner. Word would get around in no time about her meals. She would lose every customer. She knew that. She was far from stupid. She could have hired a cook. But what cook would want to work just for food. So they were open just for breakfast and lunch, seven days a week. Their place wasn't too far from the Belmont Race Track. Maybe two miles at the most. Apparently they were doing very well, but they were putting in lots of hours, and considering their age and with the type of work they were doing, where you're on your feet all day, it was a grueling grind. They could have hired a couple of workers to ease their burden but instead they offered my parents a full partnership. Nothing down. It must have been a great offer, because my Mom, who up until that point had never worked while she was married, decided to take my Aunt and Uncle up on their proposal. But first Mom and Dad thought that they better work there on a trial basis before actually committing to the offer. Maybe my Mom was also wondering why my Aunt and Uncle didn't hire a couple of workers. Mom and Dad soon found out. According to my parents they were both being verbally abused by my Aunt and Uncle, particularly by my Aunt Tillie. And on top of that, my Aunt had a way of doing business that went against my parents' basic way of treating people. My parents lived through the depression and possibly because of that they were very giving people. Actually so was my Aunt Tillie. It's just that she would only give you something if you paid for it. She once yelled at my Dad for giving a customer a glass of water with his meal.
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The diner only wanted water with his meal, nothing else. My Aunt lambasted my Dad for not insisting that the diner order something to drink besides water, something that costs money. That was the straw that broke the camel's back so to speak. After that episode my parents called off the partnership. Now my Aunt and Uncle had no partners and no workers. The one thing they didn't have though was a water shortage.
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Uncle George-A major part of my Aunt and Uncle's business was selling newspapers. In particular the Sunday newspaper. More people bought the paper on Sunday than on any other day of the week. Probably because it was so thick and had so many sections to it. Of course it also cost more. The papers were delivered in the middle of the night around two or three in the morning. A truck would make its rounds dropping off the papers which were in sections and tied together by string. It took quite a bit of time to put the various sections together to complete a paper. I'm sure it would have taken less time had my Aunt and Uncle hired someone to help them, but that was against their religion. And so my Uncle would come to work on Sunday around four in the morning to put the sections of the paper together. One Sunday Uncle George arrived at the store at his usual time and there were the papers right next to the door of his business. He looked down at the bales of papers and noticed that some of them were wet. As he bent further down he smelled an all too familiar odor. It was urine. During the night someone had peed on his Sunday papers. My parents related the story to me and as they did they were laughing hysterically. They said that now my Uncle goes into the store on Saturday nights, sleeps there and sets his alarm for when the newspaper truck comes by. He probably used to sell a hundred papers every Sunday and just because one was a little wet, he decided to sleep there on Saturday nights. Prior to having the luncheonette, Uncle George had a grocery store in Harlem, New York. One morning he was opening up his store when he was held up by a gunman. All my Uncle remembered was that he was knocked to the ground unconscious. One of his workers showed up and revived him and they opened up for business. My Uncle was complaining that he didn't feel good and that he had pains in his stomach. His worker suggested that he go to the hospital but Uncle George decided to tough it out. About an hour later the worker noticed red stains on my Uncle's uniform. My Uncle took off his clothes to find out that not only was he knocked to the ground earlier that morning but he was also shot in the stomach. He was like a mailman because nothing could keep him from his appointed rounds. Not even a bullet. Thankfully he survived. Some years later Uncle George had a stroke. Thankfully it didn't really impair his speech because he never talked a lot anyway. My sister Madeline was getting married and of course Aunt Tillie and Uncle George were invited. I hadn't seen either of them in about five years and I was looking forward to seeing them again. My Mom warned me that Uncle George now had to use a cane due to his stroke. It seemed that it had impaired his mobility.
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I was in the hallway and walking towards me were my Aunt and Uncle. He was walking rather slowly. I looked at him and immediately felt a tinge of sadness for him. But then the sorrowful expression left my face and was replaced with a smile, for after all that my Uncle George had been through, he was still my Uncle George in every sense of the word. He hadn't changed one bit. There he was, walking towards me. A man who had recently suffered a stroke and who now had to depend upon a cane so he could get around. And he indeed did have his cane. Not where most people would though, under the circumstances. But most people were nowhere near like my Uncle George. He had the cane by his side as he was supposed to. It just wasn't by the side of his feet. It was by the side of his chest. Right next to his chest. Actually he had the cane wrapped around his neck. I walked up to my Uncle, kissed him and said hello. I then said, "Uncle George, aren't you supposed to use the cane to give you support when you walk?" He looked at me and said, "Yea," and he kept on walking with his cane fully supporting his neck. Even though he had suffered through a stroke, he still hadn't lost his uncanny ability to communicate.
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DAD My Dad was a very nice and caring person. You just couldn't tell that from the way he talked. Yet he was like the dog whose bark was worse than his bite. But boy could he bark. He never once laid a hand on me. He didn't have to. He accomplished the intended effect with just his voice. And his look. If I did something wrong, which was only once a day, he would look at me in such a way that I would start to tremble. I think sometimes it would have been a blessing if he would have hit me instead. Wham. A smack in the face and it's over. I guess he felt that was the easy way out. Because he never hit me. He just looked. Directly at me. I was both afraid to look back at him and I was scared to look away from him, probably for fear that he would start to yell at me. And then as we looked at each other he would start to shake his head from side to side. And he would keep repeating the word, "Ah." Then after what seemed an eternity, probably two minutes or so, he would just turn around and walk away, his head down, shaking side to side with the word "ah" coming out of his mouth. I always wanted to know what the word "ah" meant to him, but I was scared as shit to ask him. Ah, I mean, oh well. And he couldn't take a joke. He couldn't tell one either. Maybe that's why. I remember a joke I once played on my Dad. It was shortly after my Father retired from his business, which was a meat market in Harlem, New York. Well he didn't actually retire. My Dad was a butcher and after much careful consideration he decided that he wasn't interested in the business anymore. Being held up four times within one month with guns blazing did have some effect on my Dad's decision. And so Dad just closed up his shop and took Mom, my youngest sister Madeline, Granma and me to Florida for a well-deserved vacation. On our way back from Florida Dad let me drive the car and we were going to try to drive straight through to New York which was about a twenty-four hour haul. Along around eleven at night Mom was getting nervous about driving through the night and so she suggested we check into a motel. Dad registered at the front desk and got two rooms next to each other. We took the luggage out of the car and Dad put the key in the door but it wouldn't open. He tried and tried but to no avail. I saw my Father struggling with the key and I noticed that just below the slot where the key was inserted, there was a little knob. I asked Dad to let me try to open the door. He said, "You think I don't know how to open a door? They must have given us the wrong key." I said, "Let me try Dad." And so I reinserted the key into the lock and while turning the knob I pressed the little button below the slot and of course the door opened. I opened the door just enough to get a foot in. The room was dark and as I started to walk in I blurted out, "Oh, excuse me. I'm sorry." And
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I shut the door. Everyone behind me thought that I had walked in on some unsuspecting people in the room when in all actuality there was no one there as I was just playing a practical joke. Mom, Granma and my sister thought it was humorous that I walked in on other people but my Dad was furious that the motel keeper gave us the key to an occupied room. Just as he was about to go back to the front desk I told Dad of the prank I played and as loud as he could he yelled at me at the top of his lungs, "SCHMUCK." He yelled so loud that you could have heard him in Jacksonville, Florida which was pretty good because we were in Florence, South Carolina. You could see the lights of quite a few rooms illuminate as some of the occupants faces appeared in the windows as they looked outside to find out what was causing this commotion. My Mom, Granma and sister were still chuckling from the prank I played, but true to form there was my Dad walking into the room, head down, swaying side to side, with the only noise coming out of his mouth, the inevitable, "ah." The rest of the trip was uneventful as my Dad refused to let me open any more doors to the motel rooms. "Ah." My Dad came to this country when he was thirteen years old. By law he had to go to "Continuation School" until he was sixteen. His English at that time was limited. The following story was relayed to me many times by him. I have no reason to doubt it because he was never one to make up tales. It seems that one day in class the teacher asked my Father a question. My Dad had no idea what the teacher was talking about. One of the students sensed that my Dad didn't know the answer so he told my Father, "Joe, say shit." My dad, with a broad grin on his face said to the teacher that the answer is shit. I asked Dad what happened next. All he said to me was, "Stevie, I never asked that kid again for any help." While we're on the subject, some years later Dad woke up in the middle of the night to get something to drink out of the refrigerator. At the time we had a dog named Bo-Peep. Bo-Peep was a toy poodle, very tiny. Bo-Peep only saw the outside world when my Mom took her to the vets office. Otherwise she truly lived a dogs life. Mom would place newspaper on the floor leading into the kitchen for Bo-Peep to alleviate herself. Our dog was definitely house broken. She only did it in the house. And she did a lot of it too. And for good reason. Bo-Peep never ate Kibbles n' Bits, Alpo or any other type of Chazerai (You should know the definition of that word by now) that most people feed their pets. Not Bo-Peep. She ate whatever we ate. For breakfast Mom would usually make her a scrambled egg. No toast, just the egg. For lunch she would have tuna fish or egg salad. Dinner was a snap. If Mom made steak for us, then Bo-Peep had steak. If Mom made lamb chops, then Bo-Peep had lamb chops. And there were never any leftovers. Certainly not on our plates and never on Bo-Peep's. That dog lived a
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very long time, cholesterol and all. And so my Dad got up in the middle of the night and started to walk into the kitchen when he stepped on one of Bo-Peep's presents. There are two disadvantages common to not walking your dog outside. One is the odor, which thankfully wasn't noticeable in our apartment because BoPeep was very small as were her bowel movements. Besides, as soon as she relieved herself, someone would roll up the newspaper and toss it down the incinerator. The second disadvantage that befalls any pet owner who does not walk their dog is that you never know when your pet is going to relieve themselves. That night my Father didn't know. All he knew was that he stepped in something mushy. So what did he do? He hopped into the adjoining bedroom which was occupied by my sisters Phyllis and Madeline. Unfortunately my sister Phyllis occupied the first bed in the room. My Dad tapped her on the nose. Phyllis stirred in her sleep. She opened her eyes only to look directly into my Father's foot which he had raised to her eye level. Dad said, "Phyllis, look at this." She couldn't see what Dad was pointing to because it was still dark, but being a human being my sister did have to breathe every now and then and once the odor hit her she screamed out as loud as she could, "DAD." My Father simply said, "Phyllis, look what Bo-Peep did." Phyllis immediately applied for a transfer of beds with Madeline. Madeline wouldn't budge, Phyllis kept her old bed and my Father started using a flashlight whenever he decided to get up in the middle of the night to raid the refrigerator, much to Phyllis's delight. One summer when we were vacationing at Mitzman's bungalow colony or as it was commonly called, Forest Lake Country Club, my Mom and Dad bought me a fishing rod for my birthday which is in July. That was my first rod n' reel. The brand name was Shakespeare. If you're into fishing then you will be very satisfied with their equipment. If fishing isn't your game, then try reading his books. Anyway, Dad decided to show me how to fish. Let me preface this story by stating that up until that time my family would succumb to the religious experience of eating appetizing at least once a month. The appetizing would consist of Lox (Smoked Salmon), baked Salmon, Sable, bagels, cream cheese with scallions mixed in, little black olives, and smoked Whitefish which was one of my personal favorites. As anyone who has ever eaten Whitefish knows, it is served in as close to a natural state as is possible. From the sea it goes to the smokehouse and then to your house in an almost pristine condition. When you sit down at the dinner table you look directly at the Whitefish and it appears that the Whitefish is looking right at you because its eyes are wide open staring into space. Other than being smoked, the only markings on the fish are on its belly which has been sliced so that you
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could peel back the skin. You tear back the skin and take chunks of the fish off of its bones and either eat it as is or put it on a bagel with some cream cheese (tomatoes, onions and lettuce are optional) and boy do you have a good tasting sandwich. When my parents gave me the rod n' reel I was sixteen years old. So up until that point in time I can remember eating appetizing since I was five or six. We ate it at least once a month if not more. Why was it a religious experience you ask? Because I used to pray with all my heart and soul every week for my parents to buy appetizing for that nights dinner. And once a month God would honor my request. I guess He would have done it more often but His schedule is very strenuous. Anyway, being the type of person I am, I forgave Him. One day Dad decided he was going to teach me how to fish. The bungalow colony we stayed at was adjacent to Sylvan Lake. The lake was huge and surrounded by similar bungalow colonies such as ours. The lake was also filled with, amongst other fish, lots of Bass. My Dad's plan for the day was to catch a few Bass and then fillet them and put them on the grill for that evenings supper. I couldn't wait for Dad to show me how to fish. Although I was a teenager at the time, I had never developed an appetite for fishing. My Dad was going to show me what I had been missing all these years. And to his credit he did forever change my feelings about fishing. And that is certainly one of the many memories I have about him. So we went to the dock fully equipped and confident that this would be a memorable day, one that we would not only enjoy but one that would see us return to the bungalow with loads of Bass. And my Dad didn't let me down because it truly was a very memorable day. It started at the dock that morning. Dad had a bucket full of Minnows which we used for bait. He attached a Minnow to the hook and cast his line into the lake. Within a couple of minutes something bit at the bait. My Dad was ecstatic. He was landing a fish within minutes of showing me how. He was so proud of himself and I of him. Dad was fighting with the fish, but it was evident that the fish was going to lose. BOY DID THAT FISH LOSE. All of a sudden the fish jumps out of the water in a last ditch attempt at survival. But he couldn't release himself from the hook. Most fish usually take twenty minutes to die once they are pulled out of the water. They die from asphyxiation. When you think about it, it is a slow and tortuous, agonizing death. It would be as if someone held your head under the water until you died. Ooh. This fish didn't have the luxury of worrying about a slow, tortuous and agonizing death. It was over before it was over. The fish comes out of the water as my Father is reeling it in. It was an eight inch Perch. My Dad was holding the rod upright and there was this Perch, just flapping in the air trying to release the hook from its mouth. Now a Perch is very similar to a Whitefish. The major difference in appearance is that a Perch has
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stripes around its body. Deep brown stripes. Take away the stripes and it looks just like a Whitefish. You know, the Whitefish that I was so crazy about? Well my Dad looks at the Perch as it's flapping in the air and then looks at me and says, "Stevie, this fish is too big to use for bait to catch Bass." Without so much as a second for me to respond, Dad turned back toward the "flapping" fish and placed both hands around its body and twisted the poor fish until it broke in half. At least the fish didn't suffer very long. As an eye witness to that event it caused me almost irreparable harm. I immediately told my Dad that I didn't feel like fishing anymore that day. As a matter of fact I didn't go fishing for over 7,000 more days. And then only because my oldest son Lorne kept begging me to take him fishing. I took him to the pier in Pompano, Florida. After we finished fishing I asked him if he enjoyed it. He said, "Yes." I said, "Good. Remind me next year and we'll do it again." But worse than that was the fact that it took me over thirty years before I could eat Whitefish again............................................... Stories about food abound when I think of my Father. Partially because that was such a big part of our lives. We spent a lot of time around the dinner table, eating, talking, and kidding around. My Mom never had to call us for dinner. We were already there. My Dad, like all of us, had certain habits. One of them revolved around food. In particular, soup. Dad didn't like his soup hot. Not at all. Because hot was too cold for him. His soup had to be so hot that it could melt iron. Now of course he wouldn't eat soup that hot. Not my Dad. He wasn't stupid. He didn't want to scald himself. So he would put his spoon into the soup, bring it up to within an inch of his mouth and blow. He would hold that tablespoon of soup in front of his lips and blow on it for what seemed an eternity and then he would sip it out of the spoon. He repeated this process over and over throughout his life. He never varied it. Tablespoon of soup to the lips, blow on it for a minute or so, then slowly sip it. Never changed his routine. Always the same results. Well......... almost always. One time my Mom and Dad went to a restaurant along with my sister Phyllis, my brother-in law Roger and their kids, my nephew Gregg and my niece Stacie. Roger ordered Vichyssoise which is cold soup. My Dad didn't know what Vichyssoise was. He asked Roger and of course Roger told him what it was..................... Sort of. He just told him that it was soup. He didn't tell him that it was served cold. So my Dad told the waiter that he wanted the same soup that Roger ordered. Roger
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started to tell Dad not to order the soup because he didn't think that he would like it. My Father wouldn't listen, he told Roger to be quiet and he ordered the Vichyssoise, not knowing that it was served cold. The waiter brought over the soup and my Dad went into his routine. Tablespoon of soup up to the lips, blow on it, and start to sip. As soon as the soup entered my Father's mouth it did an about face as my Dad spit it out, at the same time yelling, "It's cold, the soup is cold." Roger then told him that Vichyssoise is cold soup and he thought my Dad knew that. (Yeah, right.) My Dad wouldn't hear any of that and he just kept mumbling, "What kind of a way is that for soup to be served. Ah."
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GRANMA She was the love of my life. My second Mom. My protector. The person I most admired. There are no words adequate enough to describe the loss I felt when she left me and the void that exists in my heart to this very day. When my Granma died I donated prayer books to our synagogue in her memory. The inscription I placed inside says: In Loving Memory of my " Granma " BESSIE TEITELBAUM ' Her Shoes Will Never Be Filled ' Stevala I am her Stevala. She will always be my Granma. That will never change. Nor will the wonderful memories that I have of her. Above all, the memories of my Granma's devotion to her family. Her bright, cheerful attitude that lit up a room when she walked in. She couldn't read, she couldn't write, yet she communicated with everyone and everyone wanted to communicate with her. She was the center of attention at any gathering, whether it was family, friends or people she was meeting for the first time. She was left a widow at the young age of forty and raised three children, putting one son, my Uncle Aaron through college and law school. She worked in the garment industry as a sewer. She was sought after in the work place for her integrity, her work ethic and her superb skills. In her personal life she would have been the 'Grand Prize' for any man, except no man could catch her. She lived her life for her children and then her grandchildren. She could have been one of the worlds master chefs and to those of us who were fortunate to taste her mouthwatering preparations, she indeed was the worlds master chef. Instead of being paid in money, she was repaid with love and kindness by all those who knew her. In the event that one of her children, grandchildren, relative or friend took sick, then she was there. You didn't have to ask twice. Sometimes she would even offer medical advice, as when my Aunt Ethel, who lived on the same floor as Granma, took sick. The doctor came over to the apartment, which was a usual custom back then. The doctor's fee was $2.00 and if you needed a shot then it cost $4.00. If you didn't have the money the doctor would put it on your tab. Maybe that's why in those days the doctors worked seven
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days a week if they had to. They were there for you. So the doctor was prescribing medication for Aunt Ethel, who had a very bad cold. Granma told the doctor that my Aunt didn't need the medication that he was prescribing. Instead, Granma said she would cut a raw potato into slices. Then Granma told the doctor that she would dunk the potato slices into urine and place the potatoes on Aunt Ethel's forehead. To be totally honest, I don't know whose urine Granma was referring to. I don't think she would have asked the doctor for his. My guess is it would have been my Aunt Ethel's urine. Unfortunately, all the participants are no longer here, so we'll never really know. But I do know that the doctor politely vetoed Granma's suggestion and told my Aunt to take the medicine he prescribed. Aunt Ethel did get better. She was back on her feet within three days, without having to wear potato slices on her forehead. Wet potato slices no less. Now I'm not talking from experience, but knowing my Granma as well as I do, I'm sure that had Aunt Ethel taken Granma's advice and put the potato slices on her forehead, then she would have been better within twenty-four hours, not seventytwo. But what do doctors know? Granma was never herself sick a day in her life until her bout with cancer that lasted three months and took her at the age of 81 to hopefully a better place. Granma always had her own apartment. She was very independent. She lived just a block or so away from us. There were many times that I would go up to Granma's apartment to fix either her television, vacuum cleaner or some other appliance. As I write these words I can see her now answering both my knock on the door and ringing of the bell. I loved to kid around with her. "Who is it?" "It's me Granma." "Stevala, quiet, I'm coming. Stop ringing and knocking." I can hear her feet shuffling down the hallway. And then the door opens and this woman short in height but not in stature looks upon me with a smile that says I love you. And she knew that I loved her back. We didn't just kiss at the door. We hugged each other with all our might. I knew at a very young age that my Granma was a very special person and I was so lucky to have her. During the last five years of her life Granma lived with Mom and Dad. She was still as independent and mobile as ever but didn't want to live alone any more. My Mom had gone to work for the first time since she was married and my Dad had opened up a new, but unlicensed business called Coast to Coast with Yussel (Yiddish for Joe). After Dad closed his butcher shop, people in the neighborhood would ask him to either drive them downtown to work, or drive them to a doctor, airport, etc. And of course they would pay Dad for his service. It didn't take too long for Dad to build up his business and I gave him the name for it. He never
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officially used it. Coast to Coast with Yussel was a name known only by a few close friends and relatives. He didn't have an official name for his business. No name, no business cards. Can you imagine how big he would have grown if he had advertised? "Ah." So Granma is now living with my Mom and the heir apparent to Yellow Cab Company when the phone rings. Let me backtrack for a moment to set up this story. Granma came to the U.S. from Rumania. She went to work as a child and therefore didn't get a formal education. In other words, Granma couldn't read or write. She also couldn't pronounce the letter W. Apparently things were bad in Rumania and the government couldn't afford a complete alphabet. So they omitted the letter W and the W sound. It was replaced by the letter V. Makes sense to me. I mean, after all, the letter V is right next to the letter W in the alphabet. Therefore the Rumanian government didn't have to go too far to find an acceptable substitute. So on occasion when I would ask Granma what she did that day, she would tell me, "I Vent shopping." So as I said, Vun day, I mean one day (it's catching) Granma was alone in my parent's apartment and the phone rang. The person on the other end wanted to speak to my Father. Granma told the caller that my Dad wasn't home at the time and the caller asked Granma to take a message. Now Granma is not going to let the caller know that she can't read or write. So as Granma is searching for a pen and paper, she is repeating to herself the callers name over and over. She is making sure that it is imbedded in her mind because Granma can't spell. Now even though Granma can't read or write, she can do numbers. BIG numbers. People who cannot read or write have a tendency to write big. Don't ask me why, but they do. So Granma gets a piece of paper, 8 1/2" x 11". This will give her plenty of room to write down this persons telephone number, especially if she uses both sides of the paper. So the woman says to Granma, "My number is 234-6677." Granma is still writing down the number 2 and the caller has already given her the complete number. Granma tells the caller that there is a bad connection, so please repeat the number and say it slowly. And so the caller had to repeat the number three or four times and finally Granma gets the number written down and repeats it to the caller to make sure it's right. Then the caller tells Granma that when my Dad calls her, in case she is not at the number she just gave to Granma, then here is another one. At that point, Granma with conviction in her voice calmly tells her, "Listen lady, I'm not a secretary. I just take VUN number." And VUN number VAS all that Granma took.
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In October of 1968 we went to Florida for a vacation after my Dad retired. Dad, Mom, Granma, my sister Madeline and myself. It was an exciting time of the year, especially if you were a New Yorker. The New York Mets, who less than ten years before were the laughing stock of baseball, were now on the verge of winning their first world series ever against the Baltimore Orioles. But even more amazing than the Mets was that my sixty-eight year old Granma was still knocking em' dead on Miami Beach. We were staying in the Carillon Hotel on the infamous Collins Avenue in Miami Beach. We had just finished eating dinner. It was about eight in the evening. My Mother, Father and sister were going to their rooms for the rest of the night. Granma said to me, "Come Stevala, vill (we'll) go out and have a great time. Ve're young and alive, not deadheads." So Granma and I vent downstairs to the cabaret lounge. Granma was bedecked in a mink stole with a string of pearls around her neck. She looked fantastic. But then again, why should that night have been different than any other night? A sixty-eight year old Granma with her twenty-four year old grandson. A sixty-eight year old Granma walking ever so proudly with her twenty-four year old grandson. There were about 150 people in the cabaret lounge that night and we were the only people aware of our relationship. We walked to our table arm in arm. When we sat down Granma continued to hold onto my arm. After a while it became very apparent that people close to us thought that the relationship I had with my table mate was anything but that of Granma and grandson. I let Granma know that people were watching us and were probably thinking that I was a gigolo. Granma looked at me and said, "Stevala, let's not disappoint them. Give me a kiss.............On the lips." I'm sure that everyone in attendance that night remembered the show. Not the one on the stage. The one at the table where the elderly woman and the young man sat. Our show was definitely better. One other thing. My Granma was a darn good kisser. One year for my Granma's birthday I bought her a parakeet. She named him Butchie. She fell in love with him and he with her. Granma taught him to talk and as a reward she would always give him a sampling of food, her food. Once he tasted her food and realized what he had to do to get Granma to feed him, he started to talk up a storm. Butchie's cage was on the kitchen table. This bird wasn't stupid. He wanted to be where the action was. When dinner time came around Granma would open Butchie's cage and say, "Butchie, come here. It's time for dinner." She didn't have to ask Butchie twice. He would jump from the cage entrance to the top of Granma's glasses. Granma would extend her finger to
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Butchie and he would jump on it as Granma drew him closer to her lips. She then would ask Butchie for a kiss and there they sat, at the kitchen table, pecking at each other. Then after they finished making out, Butchie would jump onto the table to await the evenings meal. He would either eat off of Granma's fingers or she would place some food on the table for him. Whatever Granma ate, Butchie ate. And he lived to be nine years old which for parakeets is considered to be an advanced age. Must have been the chicken soup. One year Granma was going away on vacation and because Butchie wasn't used to being alone, she asked us if we would watch him for her. Of course the answer was yes. One evening we were playing with Butchie in my sisters bedroom. We opened up the cage and he flew out. He would fly back and forth to each one of us and then take off again. All of a sudden he flew to the top of the window, landing on the curtain rod. It was raining cats and dogs outside. My sisters window faced the courtyard. Butchie was hiding behind the curtain and after a while we noticed that he wasn't answering our calls and we didn't hear him speaking, I mean chirping, so we looked up behind the curtain and noticed that the top of the window pane was slightly open. Not open quite enough for a person to fit through, but just enough for a parakeet. I opened up the window and I could hear Butchie chirping. As I said, it was pouring cats and dogs and we all felt that this was the last anyone would see of Butchie. It was dark outside, so I couldn't see him, just hear him. I called out his name but to no avail. Now his chirping finally ceased. Either he died or flew away to an impending doom. We were preparing what to say to Granma. We knew she would be heartbroken. Then I decided to go downstairs in the pouring rain to see if I could locate Butchie. So there I was, in the courtyard some five stories below our apartment, yelling out, "Butchie, Butchie," as the rain cascaded down upon me. I was drenched. I was about to give up when I looked up to my apartment window and there was my Mom gesturing with her hands to come on up. I signaled that I couldn't just yet as I had to make every attempt to find Butchie. When Mom realized that I wasn't coming up she opened the window and yelled out that Butchie was back. I ran upstairs to find Butchie in Mom's arms. She was drying him off. He wasn't about to leave. He knew that he never would have found a better home. Granma's sister-in law was Tonta (Aunt) Rosie. My Aunt Rosie was a very nice person. She lived down the block from us and yet we didn't see much of each other. But whenever we did, it surely was memorable. Aunt Rosie outlived two husbands. I didn't know the first one, but her second husband was a favorite Uncle of mine, Uncle Manny. He always had a smile on his face and whenever he saw me he would greet me by saying, "Hi Stevie" and at the same time he would take
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his thumb and forefinger and with all his might he would squeeze one of my cheeks. I really did like my Uncle Manny, but I am so thankful that we didn't see him that often. My cheeks couldn't stand the abuse. Aunt Rosie's first marriage produced a daughter, my cousin Tsippy or as we later learned to call her, Snippy. The reason for the name change was that cousin Tsippy had a parakeet. Cute little bird. And very different from most other parakeets. You see this parakeet only had one leg. He was born with two legs, but cousin Tsippy one day decided to cut the bird's nails. In her exuberance to do a good job she accidentally cut off one of the bird's legs. Hence the name change from cousin Tsippy to Snippy. Aunt Rosie had one other child, my cousin Murray. He was a nice guy too. You could certainly tell that he was part of the family. Not ours though. My Aunt Rosie's. Murray and Snippy were definitely a quinella. Birds of a feather as you might say. What I remember about Murray was that he used to walk around with an Elvis Presley type hairdo. Slicked back hair with a big pompadour in the front of his head. Murray was about two inches shorter than Elvis. But that wasn't the only difference. He wore big black rimmed glasses that would invariably fall down to the tip of his nose. So Murray was constantly pushing his glasses up with his fingers. And whenever he saw Granma, he would yell out, "TONTA, HOW ARE YOU?" And he would grab Granma and try to kiss her. Oh did Granma hate that. You see Cousin Murray had some sort of skin pigmentation that was consuming his entire body. It seemed like a dark stain was engulfing him. Granma did everything within her power to avoid kissing or coming close to Murray. I guess she thought it might be contagious. Maybe that's why we never saw too much of Murray and his sister Snippy. But you could always see Granma and Aunt Rosie sitting together on the park benches by Bronx Park East on any day of the week. Day in, day out, you could see the two of them holding court. You would think that besides being related to each other, that they truly enjoyed each others company. Maybe they did, but it seemed to me that Granma always loved to give Aunt Rosie a dig, an aside. And so one time after I had moved away from the Bronx, I returned for my sister Madeline's wedding. I was in my parents apartment and of course Granma was there. The wedding was less than a week away. The conversation around the table turned to Aunt Rosie and I asked Granma if she would like me to play a joke on her. When I told her what I was going to do, she nearly fell off her chair and she said, "Stevala, go ahead and do it."
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I then called Aunt Rosie on the phone. She answered and I pretended that I was a radio announcer calling people at random. I went on to tell my Aunt that if she could sing the Campbell soup song then she would receive a free case of her favorite Campbell's soup and that we would play this spot on the radio in about twenty minutes. All of a sudden Aunt Rosie started singing, "Um, um, good. Um, um, good. That's why Campbell's soup is Um, um, good." I told my Aunt that she won and we would be sending her a case of soup and I also told her to call all her friends and relatives to let them know that she would be on the radio very shortly. Granma was in hysterics. All of a sudden she started naming people that she wanted me to play this prank on. Fortunately for me, dinner was about to be served. And when dinner ended Granma forgot about it. Until the day of the wedding, when I reminded her...... The wedding day arrived and we were there sitting at our table. It so happened that I was sitting at Granma's table. It was a beautiful affair. The band leader was Marv Kurz. Marv had first played at my Aunt Lorraine and Uncle Aaron's wedding. Since then he played at my bar-mitzvah, my sister Phyllis's wedding and now my sister Madeline's wedding. He didn't need any other customers. Just the Chanzes family. He was a great musician, but more importantly an excellent entertainer. During dinner Marv's band would play different selections in between courses. Soup was about to be served and I noticed that a couple of tables away from us sat my Aunt Rosie, so I told Granma that I was going to ask Marv to play the Campbell's soup song. I started to get up from my seat. As I turned away from the table I could hear Granma whispering rather loudly, "Stevala, don't go. Stevala, she'll know." Of course I wasn't going to tell the bandleader to play the Campbells soup song. And my Granma knew that. It was just a game that we both enjoyed playing. And we played different versions of it many times over the years. From the beginning I never called her Grandma like all my friends called their BUBBIE (Grandma). I intentionally omitted the "D" sound when talking of her or to her. She was and will always be a very special person. Very special and very different from all other grandma's. That's why I call her Granma.
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MOM My Mother passed away on August 24, 1985, just a scant ten days short of her sixty-second birthday. It may sound funny but I could never envision my Mom getting old. She was always so beautiful. Inside and out. In April of 1985 we found out that she had developed cancer. Approximately one month later we realized the severity of it. Three months later she was gone. From the physical world. She still lives on in the eyes of all those she loved and those that loved her. And there were many. The last time I had seen Mom prior to her final hospital stay was about one month before she left us. I had specifically come up to New York to be with her, knowing full well that time was not on her side. One month later I eulogized her at her funeral. Although I had committed those words to memory, for some inexplicable reason I saved the speech. Had I not, then they would have been forever gone. What I said that day was: "Approximately four weeks ago I came up to New York to visit my Mother. One morning, while reading one of the local papers I came across an anecdote which now, one month later, appears to be quite prophetic. I'd like to share with you people here today what I had read. It was the inscription on the tombstone of a former boxing champion, and it said: "You can stop counting now, because I'm not getting up anymore." Well, about four months ago, my Mother entered into the fiercest battle of her life. She fought valiantly and with more courage than we thought humanly possible. At one point during her hospital stay, she looked up at us, and with true grit in her voice she said, "I'm not giving up." Such was the fighter my Mother was. But unfortunately the inevitable finally occurred and last Saturday we too stopped counting, because our champion wasn't getting up anymore. Those of you who knew my Mother know what type of individual she was. My Mother was a very, very decent woman. Rich in tradition and high moral values. I believe the highest tribute that I could pay to my Mother would be to say the following: She was a friend to her friends, a Daughter to her Mother, a Grandmother to her grandchildren, a Sister to her brother and sister, a Wife to her husband and a Mother to her children. All of these in the truest and finest sense of the word.
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My Mother will be sorely missed by her many friends, co-workers and relatives, and in particular by her two son-in laws, her daughter-in law, her many wonderful grandchildren, her sister, her brother, her husband and of course by her own three children, that is my sisters Phyllis and Madeline and me, her ZEIN (son). And so, while my Mothers physical presence has been taken away from us, there is no power on the face of this earth that can ever remove her spirit and that which it stands for, nor diminish the many, many wonderful memories that we have. And so while it is true that we mourn the death of my Mother, It is also true that we shall forever celebrate her life." -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------When I think of my Mom, many words pop through my head to describe her. Beautiful, phenomenal cook, loving wife, doting mother, caring and devoted daughter, a gifted singer. Anything nice. That was my Mom. I've searched my memory for stories relating to my Mom that have a comedic flair to them and unfortunately I don't remember many. I do know that she got a lot of NACHIS (pleasure) out of her life, although because of her premature death, she missed out on a lot as well. But the most vivid memory I have of my Mom is that she showed her love for us every day of the week, 365 days a year. She demonstrated all through her life what a good parent should be. Even such a simple task as ironing clothes took on a new meaning when my Mom did it, and it turned out to be no small chore. Forget about the shirts and the pants. Everybody did that. My Mom wouldn't let me go out of the house unless my GOTKIS (Jewish word for underwear) were pressed. Like someone was going to notice if they weren't. Even my socks were ironed. Do you know what it's like to put on freshly ironed socks and gotkis? Let me tell you. It a MACHIA (pleasure). And I was never late when my Mom cooked dinner. In fact I was always early. I was the official taster in the house. Breakfast, lunch or dinner. It didn't matter because my Mom was a gourmet cook. Every meal was an experience that we all eagerly looked forward to with anticipation. At some point in time my Father realized that Mom was working awfully hard or maybe my Mom was the one that realized that. Anyway, one of my parents had the good sense to recognize that fact and so my Father hired a maid for my Mom. I'm
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sure that other people in the building had maids, but quite honestly I don't ever remember seeing any. My Dad had a butcher shop in Harlem, which was and still is a rather large community that had many impoverished SHVARTZES (Black people) living there. Dad hired one of his customers whose first name was May to clean our apartment one day a week. My Moms' first name was the same as our maids, except my Mom spelled it Mae. That was one way that I could tell the difference between my Mom and our maid. In addition it would be a cold day in August when my Mom would let anyone enter her apartment if it wasn't clean and presentable, and that included the maid. I can still see my Mom running around the apartment, cleaning here and there, picking up laundry, getting rid of SCHMUTZ (dirt). Like what was the maid going to do if she came into a dirty apartment? Was she going to complain to the union or God forbid picket us? All maids should have a job like our maid had. May worked for my Mom for fifteen years or should I say that my Mom worked for May for fifteen years. May would get to our apartment at about 8:30 in the morning and before she could get her coat off Mom had coffee on the table along with some Danish or muffins. May would usually be finished with her breakfast break by 9:15, unless my Mom was still talking to her. Mom did most of the talking when she and May were at the breakfast table. May would drink her coffee, take a bite of her Danish and occasionally look up at my Mom and say yessssss Misssss Maeeeee. It would take her all of 20 seconds to say three words. If you ever watched the old Amos N' Andy shows, there was a character called Lightnin. He was very slow and pronounced in his ways. Mae was our Lightnin. When Mom got up from the table and took her coffee cup and plate to the kitchen, May figured that break time was over and she also took her cup and plate to the kitchen sink. At this point my Mom would delegate the responsibilities for the day, making sure to give the maid all of the easy jobs and keeping the difficult ones for herself. I guess my Mom felt that if she gave difficult tasks to the maid, then she might not ever see her again and my Mom would be relegated to doing all of the work. So while the maid was ironing, my Mom was running around with a feather duster, doing the floors and in general doing her best to guarantee that the N.A.A.C.P. never accused her of overworking the maid. It must have worked because we were never picketed, we were never sued and in fifteen years May hardly ever missed a day of work. May was so dedicated that she refused to take a vacation. Vacation? She had 52 vacation days a year. That's broken down into the one day a week she came to our place, each and every week of the year. Now one of the traits in my family is that we virtually all have thin hair. My Mom
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and Granma both wore wigs. My Aunt Jeannie, (Mom's sister) and my Aunt Ethel (Granma's niece) have each worn wigs for years. Well our maid did not know that my Mom wore a wig and one day when she was cleaning the apartment, Mom asked her for assistance. My Mother wanted to clean the drapes, so she got the stepladder and climbed the three steps up to undo the hooks that held the drapes to the drapery rod which was attached to the wall over the living room windows. Our maids job was to take the drapes from my Mom and lay them down on the floor and at the same time observe what my Mom was doing so that at some point in the future she could climb the ladder and undo the drapes from the hooks. Of course the maid only worked for us for fifteen years and quite obviously this wasn't a long enough training period, so all during that time, twice a year, my Mom would make the pilgrimage up those three steps to undo the drapes. On this particular day, while removing the hooks that held the drapes, Mom lost her footing and fell down the three steps to the living room floor. As her body struck the floor the wig flew off, and there was my Mom lying prone on the ground with her wig lying about three feet from her head. With that our maid started yelling at the top of her lungs, "Miss Mae, your head fell off, Miss Mae your head fell off." As scared as our maid was, that was nothing in comparison to how she reacted when my Mom turned around on the floor and showed her that her head was still firmly attached to her body. The maids hair literally stood on end and for a brief moment she looked just like part of our family because my Mom said that she was as white as a ghost.
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PHILLY Whoever thought that I would be writing about my sister Phyllis, or as I called her, Philly, in the past tense. She passed away in June, 2008. She was only 60 years young. She died from the disease that is slowly eradicating my familycancer. God forbid if someone in the family should die from a good old fashioned heart attack. Nope. Cancer. Thats what we have to look forward to. Oh boy, I cant wait. Philly had the most severe form of brain cancer that one could get. Its called glioblastoma, a stage four cancer and the average life expectancy once diagnosed is a mere two years and thats just about how long my sister survived..two years. It was about three months before Philly passed away that I found out how severe her cancer was. Up until that time I was led to believe that the disease was in remission and at the time I didnt know that it was a glioblastoma. When the disease surfaced again, I started going up to New York every other week to spend as much time with Philly as I could. Anyone who has seen a loved ones condition deteriorate knows what I and everyone close to my sister went through. At first youre in denial. It cant be as severe as the doctors make it out to be. Its my sister Philly. Shes only 60 years young. She has always been the epitome of health. Very conscious of what she ate. And her exercising was power walking, her arms moving to and fro, back and forth and her legs moving as fast as they could without breaking into a run. How could my sister Philly be sick..but she was and slowly denial became reality. Seeing her deteriorate right in front of my eyes. Not being able to conduct a conversation with her. Questioning the existence of the Almighty. Staying up half the night on the internet hoping beyond hope to find some answers that will lead to her cure. Finally it sets in and you realize that theres nothing you can do but let nature take its course and in the interim make your loved ones last days as peaceful as is humanly possible. I was in Hawaii when Philly passed away. I eulogized her and asked Cousin Paul to read it at the funeral, which he did.
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EULOGY FOR MY SISTER PHYLLIS I'm sorry that I'm not here today, but I would like to thank all of you for being here to pay tribute to and to honor my sister Phyllis, whom I affectionately called Philly. I came up to New York a few times during the past couple of months to see my sister Philly. Most of the time she was sleeping and completely unaware of her surroundings. I'd find myself sitting by her bedside, holding her hand and staring at her beautiful face, hoping beyond hope that she would acknowledge my presence. Now, having had time to reflect, I'm comforted in the fact that my sister Philly wasn't suffering, but rather getting ready for her next journey, one that will give her what she so richly deserves, and that is an everlasting peace. Yet as I held Philly's hand and looked down at her I didn't see my niece Stacy and nephew Gregg's mother. I didn't see my brother in law Roger's wife. What I saw was my little sister, my little sister Philly. My little sister Philly who carried my Talus down the aisle at my Bar Mitzvah that doesn't seem so many years ago. My little sister Philly who could hit the heck out of a ball, better than a lot of the guys when we were kids. My little sister Philly, who shortly after she got married to Roger invited me over for dinner where she made for the very first time Pirogen........or at least that's what she said they were. To me they looked like miniature Mexican sombreros. Lots of dough. We could have used them as Frisbees. But after tasting one I realized that Philly had promise and sure enough she became a cook "extraordinaire." My little sister Philly who at one time was helping me move from one hotel to another. As we were driving through the streets of New York, all of a sudden Philly yelled out, "Look, Steve, it's hangars." I looked through the car window to see what Philly was looking at. Then I turned to her and said, "Philly, hangars are what you put your clothes on. Those two young ladies standing on the street corner over there......why, they're called hookers. Everyone who has known my sister for any period of time will have their own stories to talk about but the one story about my sister that everyone knows is simply this. She was a very decent and caring individual. I always told my sister Philly how much I loved her but for some reason I never told her how much I truly respected her. I had the utmost respect for her because amongst other things she
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created a very loving home for her family and helped raise two fantastic children who gave her much nachus in return. After all, isn't that what life is all about? Although her life was unexpectedly cut short, we can all still rejoice in the many pleasures she witnessed in her lifetime. The pleasures of a loving and caring husband who saw that her final days were spent in comfort. The pleasures of two outstanding children who were at their mother's side, day and night, attending to her needs. The pleasures of four loving grandchildren, a caring son and daughter in law. The wonderful relationship she had with my wife Joy who many times said that Philly was the sister she never had. Not to mention the many relatives and friends that she leaves behind who were touched by my sister Philly. One of the last times I visited Philly, cousins Howie and Adele came over to see her. Adele looked at me, and with tears welling up in her eyes she said, "Stevie, the circle is getting smaller." Cousin Adele is right. The circle has become smaller. But the good news is that theres going to be one hell of a welcoming party up there to greet my sister Philly. I love you Philly.....Rest in peace.
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TONTO No, this isnt a story about the Lone Rangers trusted Indian companion. Instead its about a very learned individual. Arguably one of the brightest individuals I have ever known. He knew just about everything there was to know.Just about. Im referring to my Uncle Aaron. When I first called him Tonto, he said to me, Steve, do I look like an Indian? Of course not. You dont look like an Indian. The problem is that you think youre so smart and youre really not, because if you were then you would realize that in the Yiddish language an Aunt is called a Tonta, so therefore it stands to reason that an Uncle must be a _ _ _ _ _. As I said, my Uncle knew JUST ABOUT everything. My uncle Aaron (my Mothers brother) and I had a relationship that lasted a couple of months shy of sixty years before he passed away in April of 2004. The first forty years werent extraordinary. As a matter of fact they were probably no different than most relationships between uncles and nephews. I always saw him on the holidays because that was a time that families got together for scrumptious feasts, conversation and storytelling. And on an occasional Sunday he and aunt Lorraine would visit us or we would visit them. Nothing special. Then my uncle and I had an argument, a disagreement and we stopped talking to each other for almost a year. I like to tell people that my uncle and I stopped talking to each other because of health reasonswe got sick of each other. One day while at work I received a call from Cousin Patty (aunt Lorraine and uncle Aarons daughter). She wanted to know what caused the problem between us. I told her my side of the story and within days she arranged a meeting between my uncle and I at her house in New Jersey as I had told Patty that my wife, sons and I were going to New York for a vacation within the next couple of weeks. That visit started a 20 year relationship second to none. My Uncle and I buried the hatchet and proceeded to talk to each other over the next 20 years at least 4-5 times per day, sometimes just picking up the phone to tell the other party a joke, sometimes to discuss business and at other times to attempt to solve some of the worlds problems. And always at the end of a conversation my Uncle would say, Steve, kiss Joy and kiss the boys and tell Joy to give you a big kiss from me. I dont know of any other uncle and nephew that had a relationship similar to mine with my Uncle Aaron. He was like a father to me, also a confidant and my best friend. When I knew that his days were numbered I flew up to New Jersey to say goodbye. It was the toughest goodbye I ever had to make. I miss my Uncle terribly..and I miss his kisses.
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THE LION SLEEPS TONIGHT Some events happen on the spur of the moment, you know, not planned as happened in the following story. Joy, I and the kids went up to New York to visit family. We stayed at my sister Phillys house. One day Joy and I along with our sons Derek and Jarrett went to the Bronx Zoo. We took my nephew Gregg with us. The Bronx Zoo is a place that everyone should go to at least once when visiting New York. I grew up within walking distance of the Zoo so as a child and young adult I ventured there many times. All five of us were walking through the Zoo when my nephew Gregg says to me, Uncle Stevie, what do they do with the Lions when they get old? A fair question and it certainly deserved an answer. Without giving much thought to the question I told Gregg and my two sons that once a Lion gets on in years their teeth start to rot. Instead of putting them to sleep, because other than their teeth they are still healthy, the Vets at the Zoo pull all of their remaining teeth out and clip their claws and then let them roam freely around the Zoo with all of the visitors. Well the kids, all of them got excited. They couldnt wait to see a lion so that they cloud go up and pet him. Then, without any warning I yelled out, There goes a Lion, and the kids started running in the direction that I had pointed but they couldnt get a glimpse of the Lion. That episode was repeated about four or five times that day and then when we were ready to leave the Zoo I confessed my sins to my kids and nephew. So here we are, some twenty years or so after that episode and I get an email from my nephew Gregg. He told me that he took his two sons to the Zoo and told them the story about the Lions and watched as they went running after one in the hopes of catching him. I dont know if Gregg told his children the truth about the Lions but Im sure if he hasnt then at some point in time he will so that they can play this prank on their children in the future. Hey, thats what Uncles are for.
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UNFORGETTABLE FRIENDS & CHARACTERS Paul -My granma called him a TRUMBANIK, which means trouble maker. Little did granma know that I was just as much a trumbanik as Paul was, if not more. I met Paul when I was 22 and he was 23 and for the next four years, until I moved to Florida, Paul and I were virtually inseparable. He even helped me move to Florida, although not knowingly. But that's another story. We shared the same desires. Broads and food. And not necessarily in that order. Paul tipped the scales at close to 350 pounds. I weighed about 225. His desire for food was obviously greater than mine. But not by much. His dress code was always the same. It never changed. He wore a Detective Columbo rain coat every day, rain or shine. And he had a special phrase that I heard him use many times and it always cracked me up. He would say, "Money is no object." You have to understand that the only thing that stood between Paul and the poverty level was the fact that his parents let him live at their home. Hmmm? Sounds familiar. And while Paul didn't give the appearance of wealth, nevertheless he could convince you that he was J. Paul Getty, Jr. He had the gift of gab. And so if Paul was negotiating for something on credit, invariably the lender would look at this 5'10", 350 pound Columbo wannabe and ask him if he could afford whatever it was he was buying. And then Paul would utter, "Money is no object." And that was enough to convince the lender. And yet Paul was as nice as they come. He'd give you the shirt off of his back. And if he did, then you wouldn't need any other clothes because Paul was so big you could actually wrap his shirt around your entire body. And I used to goof on him incessantly. And he always believed my stories. I was always a schemer. A plotter. You know, someone who was up to no good. I don't mean no good in a harmful sense, but rather in a playful one. At least I thought it was. I was living with my parents again, shortly after my divorce. I was twenty-four years old and although I loved my Mother's cooking, that wasn't the reason I was living at home. I had a severe case of that Italian disease, myfundsarelow." But I was working and I was ambitious. As a matter of fact I ambitiously worked at a different job once every three or four months. It was mostly my Mom and Granma who would MITCHA (bother) me. They couldn't figure out why I kept quitting every job I would get. And I would keep telling them the same thing, over and over. "I DON'T LIKE IT." And they would say, "How do you know? You've only been there for three days?" It was a regular comedy routine. And it was a long running one at that. It actually lasted until I was thirty-two because it wasn't until
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then that I held a job for at least a year. That's when the mitchating stopped. But as I said I was ambitious and my friends knew that, but Paul one day fell for it hook, line and sinker. I had gotten him a job as an insurance salesman at my former place of employment. The owner was Carmine Guerriero. Carmine was a super, super guy. He was the type of boss that you wanted to please. He was very congenial, a good looking man, dapper dresser and loved to play jokes. Of course if you play, then you're not always the pitcher. Sometimes you have to catch one. And both Carmine and Paul did in the following story. One evening I was sitting at home (my parents place) when the phone rang. It was Paul. He barely was able to speak his name when I yelled out, "Paul, call me tomorrow. I'm working on a big deal and I need the phone line free. So call me tomorrow." I didn't wait for his response and I just hung up the phone. My Mom looked at me and asked me what kind of prank was I playing on Paul. She didn't even think to ask me if I was working on a big deal. A big meal, yes. A big deal, well it never even entered her thoughts. Such was the faith she had in her son. I told my Mom that I acted on impulse when Paul had called, and I have no idea what I am going to tell him when he calls back tomorrow. And I didn't. And so the next evening the phone rings and of course it's Paul. I still hadn't formulated a plan so I once again told him about the deal I was working on and I needed the phone line free. Paul asked me to please give him some details. As soon as he said that I responded, "All I can tell you is that I'm working on a deal that will take me all over the United States, state to state whereby I'm going to make a fortune. Now I've got to go. Call me tomorrow." The same thing happened three days straight. The pitch of Paul's voice was getting higher and higher every day as the excitement grew. On the fourth day when he called I let him know that I'm on the verge of putting together a deal that will enable me to make thousands of dollars each week going from state to state and this project will last one year. Over the phone line I could hear Paul suck in his breath and ask me, "Stevie, is there anything for me?" I said, "Paul, I don't know?" He then said, "Stevie, I don't want to work for Carmine anymore. I'm sick of the insurance business. I want out and maybe we can help each other. Here's my idea. I'll be your valet. I'll see that all your clothes are laid out properly each day. Just give me three hundred dollars a week and pay my expenses and I'll be the best valet any man has ever had." I said, "Paul, I would love to do that. The only thing is I need someone who can move on the drop of a hat." Paul says, "Stevie, don't worry. Say the word and I'm gone." I said, "Listen Paul, I may find out today or tomorrow if the deal is good. If it is then I gotta go to Las Vegas because that's my first stop. I'll be there about a week." I could hear Paul grow short of breath over the phone. He says to me, "Stevie, I'm going to stay
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home tonight, just in case you hear anything. Tomorrow I'm going into work and I'll wait there all day until hopefully I hear from you." I told Paul that would be fine and we hung up. The next day around three in the afternoon I called Carmine's office asking for Paul. His voice gave away his emotional stance. He was poised, anxious and above all ready. What I had to say would either be one of Paul's biggest letdowns or quite possibly one of his most treasured remembrances. It turned out to be a little bit of both because he answered the phone and said, "Stevie, did you find out?" I said, "Paul, it's a done deal. You must meet me at Kennedy Airport in one hour, at 4 o'clock. If you don't have a change of clothes then don't worry because I'll buy you another wardrobe when we get to Vegas." Before I had had an opportunity to gauge Paul's reaction and tell him that I was just joking, I heard him literally yell out at the top of his lungs, "CARMINE, FUCK YOU, I QUIT." And then he flung the phone down on its hook. I immediately called Carmine's office back only to be told by the secretary that Paul had just cursed out Carmine, quit and ran out of the office. So Paul went to Kennedy Airport and I asked the secretary to please connect me to Carmine. When I told him what happened he couldn't contain his laughter. He knew that Paul would call him back for his job. He only asked that I relate to Paul that he was livid with anger and wasn't going to hire him back. Then I had to face Paul. I thought of that and decided to call him instead...............After he got home from the airport. Paul and I shared a philosophy. "Just because you're poor, it doesn't mean you shouldn't eat.......................well." And well we ate, many, many times. Upon reflection I don't understand why we were so daring back then. We could have gotten into a lot of trouble. And we came awfully close too. It all started one evening when Paul and I decided to go out and grab a bite to eat. I was living in one of the hotels in the city. More frequently than not, Paul would stay over. There were two beds in the room. Paul's didn't cost anything. Mine was $55.00 a week. We were deciding which restaurant to go to when we both realized that there wasn't a restaurant in town that could satisfy our hunger pains since all we had between us was a lousy three cents. Normally we dined at around four in the morning. That's when the Fink trucks, the ones that carry fresh bread and warm pastries would roll through the city dropping off the days food supplies at eateries that were just opening up or hadn't opened. It got to the point where we
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knew the route pretty well. We would wait for the driver to drop off a supply of bread and pastries at the front door of a restaurant that hadn't opened and then after he left we would help ourselves to either a late dinner or an early breakfast. If we were going back to the hotel to grab forty winks then it was obviously a late dinner, but if we were going to be up a while then it was an early breakfast. It didn't matter what you called it because the menu never changed. Hot rolls, muffins and Danish. Sort of like a buffet. There was nothing to drink though, but the price was right, so why complain. But this night was different. It was about seven o'clock. We were very hungry and we weren't going to be able to hold out until four in the morning. It is said that necessity is the mother of invention. How true that is, because if we weren't so hungry and if we weren't equally so poor, then I never would have thought of how to solve our problem. But as it is I came up with a solution in very short order. I turned to Paul and told him to shower, shave and put on his best threads and I would do the same because I was taking him out to dinner. He said, "How, where?" I said, "Don't worry, just remember not to take your wallet with you." That was probably the only thing that made sense to Paul because there wasn't anything in his wallet anyway. I remember what happened as if it were yesterday. We both walked out of the hotel wearing three piece suits. We looked sharp. Two sharp bums. We drove to Greenwich Village, about three miles from our hotel to one of the more renowned steak houses, OHenrys. Years ago, before the restaurant occupied the space, it was a slaughtering house. When the restaurant opened they maintained some of the ambiance of the former occupant by having the waiters wear butcher uniforms which were white smocks. In addition there was saw dust all over the floors, which is something you find in butcher stores and slaughtering houses. Paul and I walked in, sat down and literally ate everything from soup to nuts. All during the meal Paul kept asking me how we were going to pay for dinner. He wanted to know if I was holding out on him. I kept telling him not to worry. Just enjoy the food. And enjoy we did, but eventually we couldn't eat no more and we had to pay the bill. I asked the waiter for the check. I'm sure that he was calculating the heavy tip he would get from these two Park Avenue type gentlemen as he brought the bill over I reached for my wallet. It wasn't there. I put my hands in my other pants pocket, only to find that my wallet wasn't there either. I then reached inside my jacket pocket. Same results. I was putting on a show for the waiter and he was just standing there, taking it all in. I turned to Paul and asked him if he brought his wallet with him. Paul was now starting to understand and he
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said he didn't. I then looked at the waiter and threw my hands up in despair and asked him to please bring over the matres. When the matres arrived I simply told him that I was taking my client out for dinner and I inadvertently left my wallet at my hotel room. I told the matres that Paul and I would drive back to my place, retrieve my wallet and we would return within thirty minutes. The matres was sort of suspicious so he called over one of his workers and told him to follow us in his car. This way we wouldn't have to come back to the restaurant. Like we were going to anyway. All three of us walked out of the restaurant. I told the worker the name of the hotel we were staying at just in case he lost us in the traffic. Of course I didn't give him the name of the actual hotel we were staying at. The worker got into his car which happened to be parked a few cars in front of Paul's. Paul and I got into our car and proceeded straight up the street behind the restaurant's employee when I told Paul to signal as if he was going to make a right turn at the next corner. Paul signaled and also honked his horn to make sure the worker saw him. The fellow saw Paul's signal and turned right. Paul and I kept going straight...................... That episode started an eating spree, no an orgy of food, second to none. For the next three weeks Paul and I ate as if we were going to the electric chair. And we almost did. Well, not the electric chair, but we almost got executed. More of that later. It was apparent to me that it was relatively easy to eat for free, provided you pulled off these stunts in high class restaurants. My reasoning was that the owners, matreds, or waiters wouldn't start a commotion because of the clientele. On the other hand if you tried to pull off these shenanigans at a greasy spoon, then you could get your hands chopped off. And so over the next three weeks we ate at New York's finest restaurants. Even when we had money in our pockets we wouldn't pay. The reasoning was quite simple. It was important that we keep practicing our craft. And practice we did. On all types of restaurants and all over the city. We would always alternate. One time Paul would take me out to eat and the next time I would take him out to eat. After a while we thought that we were infallible. We felt so confident in our abilities that one evening we invited our friend Ben out to dinner. We decided to go to Chinatown. It was my turn to be the spokesman for the group. This was the very first and also the very last time that we tried to do this with more than two people. When we finished eating we went up to the counter and I told the cashier, who as we found out was also the owner, that I had invited my two friends out for dinner and I left my wallet at home. I told him that we would be right back. He looked at us and said in his unmistakable oriental dialect, "Let me see identification." I told him that I accidentally left my wallet at home
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and therefore I had no identification on me. He then said, "Let me see identification of other two men," to which I responded that they too didn't have their wallets because I was taking them out to dinner. Now he was starting to get angry and he bellowed out at me, "You mean no one have identification on them?" I said, "that's right, but don't worry, we'll be right back with your money." He then said to me, "You go get money. Friends stay here till you get back. Then they can go." I told him that they both have to come with me because one of them must get home immediately and the other person has the car. Surprisingly he gave up without any further hassle and in a low condescending voice said, "Make sure you come back with money." I told him not to worry and then I really pressed my luck when I said to him, "Can I also have a large order of ribs to go. It's for my wife." When he heard that he yelled out at me, "FIRST YOU BRING BACK MONEY, THEN YOU GET RIBS." I said okay and off we went. We never did get the ribs............................... The very last time that Paul and I ate for free was also almost the last time that we ever ate. We ventured out of Manhattan and went to a well noted Italian restaurant in Brooklyn. It was Paul's turn to buy. As usual we were dressed up in our finest three piece suits. Since it was the only suits we owned, it wasn't too difficult to pick out our wardrobe for the evening. It was a very expensive restaurant, but as Paul would say on many occasions, "Money is no object." And so we ate. Rockefeller's money couldn't have bought a better dinner. That's how good the food was. And the service was impeccable. Everyone in the restaurant, from the waiters to the matres, treated us like royalty. That is until Paul told them that he forgot his wallet. Then the matres asked us to follow him. If we had any thoughts of bolting for the door they were quickly dispelled when the matres asked two of his associates to make sure we followed him. And follow him we did. We followed the matres to a place in the restaurant that most of his patrons don't see. It was a place for his very special customers like Paul and me. There we were. Three tough Italians and two wise ass Jews. We were definitely outnumbered, although if it was only one Italian we still would have been in a distinct minority. Then the matres, who just moments before was so courteous to us as we ate dinner and who spoke so well, all of a sudden looks at us and says, "So you guys taught you could cop a free meal, huh?" Paul told him of course not and he repeated the same story that he and I had told other people in similar situations countless times before. The matres then looked at his two friends and said, "Whatcha we do wid dese bums." One of the guys said, "Wadda ya want us to do wid dem?" I felt a sudden urge to relieve myself as I looked at these three guys. If looks could kill, then they would be saying YISKOR (prayer for the
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dead) for us. The matres asked Paul when could he come back and pay the bill. Paul told him that he would pay it the very next day. Surprisingly the matured said, "Fine. But make sure you're back here tomorrow, you understand?" We both said yes. I felt a sigh of relief. Our nightmare was about to end on a happy note, but then the matres said to Paul, "Gimme your phone number." Paul gave him a number which I knew wasn't his. The matres told his friends to watch us as he dialed the number that Paul had given him. It turns out that the telephone number didn't belong to anyone as it was disconnected. And that's exactly what I thought was going to happen to us. I thought for sure that our arms would be disconnected from the rest of our body. Thankfully the matured had a sense of humor. He looked at Paul with daggers coming out of his eyes and said that he was only going to ask him for the correct number one more time. Once more I felt that urge to relieve myself, but this time Paul gave him the right number. The matres must have also realized that it was the right number because he never dialed it. He got his point across to us and the very next day Paul and I went back to the restaurant and paid the bill. Since that episode occurred I have eaten in many Italian restaurants. But before going in I always check to make sure that I have my wallet........
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Irwin Sherman-Irwin was about fourteen years older than me so we didn't pal around, but he was best of boyhood friends with my Uncle Aaron. Two stories stick out in my mind regarding Irwin. One was related to me by my Uncle and the other I saw firsthand. For years my Uncle would occasionally tell the following story about Irwin. I never fully believed it until Irwin came up to our apartment to pay a condolence call after Granma died. I asked him to repeat the story and he did, verbatim. It seems that when my Uncle and Irwin were in either their late teens or early twenties, Irwin had purchased a beautiful winter coat. The coat had wide lapels which were in fashion back then. Both my Uncle and Irwin were standing on the corner of Wallace and Brady Avenues with my Uncle admiring Irwin's coat. This was the very first time that Irwin had worn his new coat and he was very proud of it. He had worked hard and saved up his money so that he could by this coat. All of a sudden my Uncle noticed a thread hanging from one of the lapels. My Uncle told Irwin to stand still as he pulled on the thread. And he pulled and pulled. Irwin was getting nervous but my Uncle assured him that he knew what he was doing. And so there were these two young adults standing on the corner, one with his hands at his side and the other with his hands at shoulder level, pulling on a thread that had no end or so it seemed. Irwin grew more hesitant and my Uncle grew more confident as finally my Uncle pulled the remaining thread from its place in the lapel. My Uncle looked at Irwin and said "That's much better. Now your coat looks perfect." And then Irwin took his lapels in his hand and turned them upwards and as Irwin's hands stretched up beyond his head, so did his lapels as they came up and off his shoulders. My Uncle had removed the very thread that secured the lapels to Irwin's coat. My uncle was never fully aware of the speed in his legs until that momentous day................ One day Mrs. Sherman came up to my folks apartment and told them that the following week her son Irwin would appear on the television game show, "Who Do You Trust," which was hosted by Johnny Carson. This was just prior to Carson hosting the Tonight Show. The following week we all gathered around our television set as the show started. Within minutes of the opening of the show, Johnny introduced his first guest, Irwin Sherman. Carson proceeded to ask him what type of girls he liked and Irwin replied that it depended on his mood at the time. Sometimes he liked flat chested girls and sometimes he preferred the buxom type. Carson then asked him if he was going out with anyone at the time and if so, what type of girl was she. Irwin indicated that he was seeing someone who was
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the buxom type but he didn't think that she was too crazy about him. Carson asked why and Irwin said, "Because she told me she just got engaged to some other guy." Irwin had Carson and the audience in hysterics.
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Mr. Goidel-He is my Aunt Lorraine's father. Therefore he wasn't related to my family but he could have been because he truly was a character. He possessed a very raspy almost guttural type quality to his voice. He resembled Myer Lansky in looks. I don't know about anything else although I suspect that he could have held his own in any fight. What sticks out in my mind about Mr. Goidel was his appearance. Through all the years I knew him it seems that he always wore the same thing. Dark pants, a white shirt, tie and dark jacket. I never saw him wear a bathing suit, shorts or any other attire. I saw him in the winter time, I saw him in the summer time. I saw him all through the year and I can honestly say that I do not remember him wearing anything other than what I have described. Who knows, maybe he had the right idea. When Mr. Goidel got up each morning he didn't have to give thought as to what type of shirt or pants to wear. He didn't have any concerns about which shoes to put on or if he was color coordinated. I guess many years ago Mr. Goidel found a nice outfit that looked good on him and he decided that as long as it looked good why not wear it............continuously. And he did. Or so it seemed. And something else I remember about Mr. Goidel was the way he positioned himself on a chair. As soon as he came into your home and said hello to everyone he would ask for an ash tray and head for a chair. And he would never sit on a couch. It wasn't because he was anti-social. Not at all. I believe he chose to sit by himself because if he hadn't then it would interfere with his special way of positioning himself. He would sit down on a chair and cross his right knee over his left knee bringing the heel of his right foot to within six inches of the floor. His right foot would then start to move back and forth. Not far. Just a short six inches or so. But if you happened to be walking by Mr. Goidel without paying attention, then it's very possible that your shin may have met the fronted point of Mr. Goidel's shoe.....on the upswing. Then he would light up a cigarette. I never saw any person in all my life light up as many cigarettes as Mr. Goidel did. And then again, I never saw a smoker smoke so few. He would cradle the ashtray in the palm of his left hand and place it on his right knee, which by now was stationed above his left knee. Then he would lean forward and with the cigarette held firmly between the first and second fingers of his right hand, he would slowly bring the cigarette up to meet his lips. He would then inhale some smoke, remove the cigarette from his lips, and leave it remaining no more than four inches from his mouth with the lit end of the cigarette facing skyward. He would then exhale the remnants of the smoke he just ingested and enter the conversation that was being held in front of him. And there he would
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remain. Leaning forward. Conversing with friends and family with his left hand cradling the ashtray which was resting on his right knee. And as he engaged in conversation the two fingers of his right hand continued to hold his cigarette which was facing skyward. The smoke would curl up the cigarette and head to the ceiling as Mr. Goidel kept involved in conversation. There would come a point in time whereby his cigarette consisted of two inches of paper and three inches of ash. Usually someone would tell him to flick his ashes. That's when Mr. Goidel would demonstrate his acrobatic qualities. You see at this point if there was any movement whatsoever from Mr. Goidel's right hand, the same right hand that was now holding a cigarette which consisted mostly of ashes, then it was possible that those ashes would break up and fall to the carpeted floor below. And so Mr. Goidel would slowly move his left hand that was holding the ashtray towards the cigarette being held by his right hand. Distance to travel? About twelve inches. Time of travel? Seemed like ten minutes. Performance wise, I would give Mr. Goidel a ten. His eye hand coordination was excellent. You could see his eyes focusing on the movement of the ashtray while at the same time glimpsing at the cigarette for fear that if the ashes would tumble from their place then he would have to move the ashtray very quickly to capture the ashes. Finally the ashtray would be resting under the cigarette. With the pointer finger of his right hand he would tap the cigarette and the ashes would fall harmlessly into the ashtray. The ashtray would now return to its original spot above the right knee. The only difference is that Mr. Goidel was still holding the cigarette over the ashtray and every once in a while his finger would tap it. It looked like he averaged two puffs a cigarette......... Mr. Goidel was also responsible for altering my career. We were sitting in the living room of my parents apartment. Just Mr. Goidel, my Uncle Aaron (Mr. Goidel's son-in law) and myself. There was Mr. Goidel, in his position, one leg over the other and holding a cigarette facing skyward when something prompted him to ask me in his deep, raspy voice, "So Stevie, whatta you wanna be when you get outta school?" I said, "I want to be an actor." Rosily he said to me, "Okay, imitate your Uncle and me." At that point while I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to be in life, I certainly knew what I didn't want to be, and that was an actor.
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Norman Weiss-Norman was my Uncle Aaron's third father-in law. My uncle was married only one time and he only had one mother-in law. His mother-in law Helen was first married to Mr. Goidel. That union produced my uncle's wife, my aunt Lorraine. After Helen and Mr. Goidel divorced she then married Harry Kaufman. That union produced two children, Steven and Florence. Harry Kaufman passed away and some years later Helen married a truly unforgettable loving character by the name of Norman Weiss. That union produced an endless supply of lox, baked salmon, sable, sturgeon, bagels, cream cheese, etc. It wasn't because Norman owned a food store. Not at all. But he did work in one. And Norman's prices were a lot different than the one's posted on the board. On any given Sunday my Dad would walk into the store that Norman was working in and wait on line to be served. He wouldn't let anyone wait on him except Norman. When it was my Dad's turn to be served Norman would say, "Gentleman, what would you like?" That's how Norman addressed his customers. "Gentleman." My Dad would order the usual supply of appetizing as I mentioned above. The bill would come to sixty or seventy dollars. if you were paying the 'board' price. But Norman didn't charge my Dad the board price. He gave him a special price of $10.50, or something close to that figure. Norman would place the order in a big brown paper bag and mark on the outside of the bag the total amount due. My Father, with SCHPILKES (fear) in his pants would timidly wait his turn to pay at the cash register. And when it was my Dad's turn he would approach the register with a sack of goodies weighing him down and over flowing the bag. He would show the bag to the cashier, pay his bill and walk out. I would often ask my Dad, "What kind of a schmuck did the owner employ at the register, whereby they couldn't see that it was impossible for the bill to be that low considering the amount of food you had in the bag?" My Dad would tell me that the schmuck that the owner employed at the register was the owner himself. To the owner's credit though, he always gave the right amount of change. So I guess he wasn't a complete schmuck. My uncle Aaron had a better deal with Norman. At the end of the work day Norman would wrap up some lox, whitefish, baked salmon, etc. Each would be in their own wrapper. Then Norman would stuff his pants and jacket pockets with these delicacies, go home and pick up his wife Helen, put the appetizing in a bag and off to New Jersey they would go to visit my aunt Lorraine and Uncle Aaron. Lox and baked salmon are to this day the types of fishes that you never grow tired of eating.. Especially at Norman's prices.
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EMPLOYMENT When I was 24 years old I was hired by the Cohn Hall Marx Corporation. They were a division of United Merchants, which was a leader in the garment center business in New York. The company sold the materials that ultimately were converted into clothes, such as blouses and sweaters by the various manufacturers. My sister Phyllis and my Uncle Aaron had preceded me into the garment industry, with Phyllis having a secretarial position at J. P. Stevenson and my Uncle having risen to the position of Vice-President of Hanora Fabrics. My Uncle more so than my sister was responsible for my entrance as well as departure from this industry. To say that my Uncle couldn't see the forest through the trees was never more moving as I recount my rise and fall from the garment industry. The year was 1968. I was 24 and recently divorced. I had just quit a job as an insurance salesman. I had been with the firm for almost a year and I didn't want to disappoint my folks by staying with the company. After all I had a reputation to preserve, which was never having held onto a job for at least one year. I was getting perilously close, so I quit. Once again, it was one of those jobs that I just didn't like, so I decided to explore other avenues for my career advancement. My parents were at their wits end. Here I was, there 24 year old son, unemployed and with no idea as to how I would make my way in this world. Back then, in the 1950's and early 1960's, if a Jewish guy wasn't married by the time he was 22, and besides that, if he wasn't an accountant, a teacher or pursuing a law or medical degree, or if he wasn't working for one of the major corporations like Texaco or General Motors, then it seemed as if the roof was about to cave in or even worse he found people questioning his religious affiliation. Was he a Jew or wasn't he a Jew? Was he only pretending to be Jewish? Did he know he was a Jew? Did he know what was expected of young Jewish men? PRESSURE, PRESSURE, PRESSURE. My parents and Granma were upset and very nervous. Their friends children had all graduated college, had wonderful jobs and gotten married. And here I was, there only son, recently divorced and unemployed with no discernible future ahead of him. They wondered what would become of me. As far as I was concerned I had a roof over my head, courtesy of Mom and Dad. I had three square meals each day, once again, courtesy of my parents. And my Dad would let me use his car most of the time. So I figured, what's the rush? Am I going to do that much better on my own? I figured that I had plenty of time to make a decision regarding my career.
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My parents didn't exactly see it that way. So one day my Mom and I went out to New Jersey to pay a social visit to my Aunt Lorraine and Uncle Aaron. Little did I know that it was a subterfuge to get me out there specifically for the purpose of deciding what kind of jobs or industries I should look into. My Uncle immediately took charge. He asked me what I was interested in and I told him that I didn't know. So he took out the Sunday paper and methodically went over every job listing in the employment listings to see what peeked my interests. He quickly saw that the only thing I was interested in was in going back home to the Bronx. So as a last desperate attempt to save the day and not look bad in the eyes of his sister (my Mom), my Uncle suggested that I seek employment in the garment industry which had been so fruitful for him as well as my sister Phyllis. That was his first mistake. Unfortunately I didn't realize it then. I applied to a few firms and finally I was hired by Cohn Hall Marx to work in the administrative department. It was the most hectic and competitive environment that one could work in. Salesmen would push the companys latest line of goods to the manufacturers and then submit orders which had to be filled yesterday. And there was no room for error. Salesmen would carry swatches of materials with them to show to the buyers. When an order was placed the salesman would attach the proper colored swatch to his paperwork for processing. Then after the order went through normal credit procedures, the paperwork, including the swatch were sent to the dying plants located in New Jersey. The dyers would process a sample of the order for the simple reason that the salesman had to make sure that the color of the sample exactly matched the swatch. On any given day you could walk down Seventh Avenue in New York City, which is the heart of the garment industry and see people hanging out windows 5, 10 or 20 stories above the ground. And they are all doing the same thing. They are holding in their hands the swatch and the sample order, comparing them in natural daylight to make sure that before they give the go ahead to the dye plant to fill the order, the two pieces of material are a perfect match. One slip up and the salesman could lose the account and Cohn Hall Marx would have to eat the dye job. I'm willing to bet that the garment industry was the leading cause of heart attacks and ulcers over all other types of industry. And so here I was, working in this highly competitive industry. I was the first one in the office in the morning and the last to leave at night. I loved my job. For the first time I could see myself breaking my employment record of not having ever worked a job continuously for at least one year. I honestly thought up until that point I would have a tougher time breaking my record than anyone else would have in breaking Roger Maris's record of 61 homers in a single season. All the
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sales people liked me. Murray Wolfson who was in charge of our department took notice of me and was enamored by my work ethic. Then one day Mr. Wolfson's assistant gave notice of his resignation. Mr. Wolfson interviewed three people for the newly opened position. I was one of the three. I wasn't employed nearly as long as the other two. I felt that Mr. Wolfson was interviewing me for the sole purpose of letting me know that while I wouldn't get the opening this time, rest assured that there was going to be a spot for me down the road. I was honored. I also got the job. Now I was more than honored. I was ecstatic. It seemed like only yesterday that I was in doubt as to what my future held in store and now thanks to my Uncle's advice, here I was, the assistant to the head of the department. Of course I received a substantial pay increase which made it that much more exciting. I felt that I owed my Uncle Aaron big time..........................Thankfully I didn't pay him because my ecstasy didnt last very long. About two months later a former salesman of the firm, Mike Stevenson, calls me at work and asks me to stop up at his place after I was finished for the day. I went to see Mike and he told me that when he worked at Cohn Hall Marx he was very impressed with my skills and work ethic. He had just opened up his own textile business and made me an offer to be the inside man and he would be the outside sales representative. Just the two of us. As the company grew I would partake in its profits. He made me a very generous offer. I then gave a two week notice to Murray Wolfson. Each day after work at Cohn Hall Marx I would go up to Mike's office for two hours of training. I was catching on real quick to Mike's system and he was pleased with my efforts. Then one day towards the end of my first week of training Mike took me over to the rack of textiles he had and he said to me, "Steve, what color are these goods?" I looked at them and told him, "They're blue." Mike looked at me and said, "Almost. They're purple. Let's try again." He then pointed to another sampling of material and asked me the same question, to which I replied, "They're green." He looked at me and said, "Very close Steve, but they happen to be brown." I'm color blind. I knew it and my Uncle knew it. And if you're color blind, then you don't stand a ghost of a chance of making it in the garment industry. Since I would have been the person approving the dye jobs for Mike's orders, he obviously said that he couldn't use me, which I understood. I told Murray Wolfson what happened and he was willing to let me still keep my job, but I saw no future in the garment industry because I couldn't distinguish colors. Although for some time after when I looked at my Uncle I frequently saw the color red........................
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LADY WE JUST KILL EM, WE DONT BURY EM I was employed by Prudential Life Insurance Company located at 26 Court Street in Brooklyn. They compensated their new recruits by putting them on a three year validation pay schedule. It worked in the following manner. My draw was $500.00 per month and during the first two months of the contract period I was not expected to make any sales and I would still receive my draw. The next month I was expected to earn at least $50.00 in commissions in order to receive the $500.00 draw and each month thereafter I would be responsible for bringing in more commissions than the month before in order to justify the $500.00 draw that Prudential was paying me. During the third year of the contract I would actually be making more in commissions than the draw that I was being paid so that at the end of the three years my commissions earned was equal to the draw that I was paid. This is how insurance companies can hire new recruits because success is not instantaneous. There is a learning curve. They were no different than any other insurance company that would hire you. In other words you were expected to approach your relatives and friends in order to try to sell them a life insurance policy. In short order you immediately find that your friends are no longer your friends and your relatives have disowned you. Its that simple. Anyways I was right on schedule after my first two months of employment with Prudential Life Insurance Company. They paid me $500.00 per month and I had no sales. I probably would have had a stellar career with them except for the fact that now I was expected to make sales. That was the fly in the ointmentBut I tried. There was a sales agent at Prudential who had an in at the phone company and that person would provide the agents with a monthly list of the names, addresses and telephone numbers of people who had just received telephone service. The only other way that you could find the new telephone listing of an individual was by calling information because their name wouldnt appear in the telephone book until the new one came out, so this was a very valuable list. The Prudential agent had a great business going for himself because he would give out sheets of the new listings to those agents that wanted it. There were approximately 1,000 names on each sheet and the Prudential agent would charge two cents per name or $20.00 per sheet. Then the agents who purchased these lists would send out letters to these individuals advising them of some new, outstanding insurance policy that Prudential had and those that were interested would send back the bottom part of the letter which had room for them to insert their date of birth, telephone number and best time for an agent to call them. About 5% of the people who received
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these letters actually responded and then we would call them to set up an appointment and hopefully sell them insurance. The Prudential agent that sold us these lists also received 50% of any commission from sales that we made. His name had to appear on our order sheets so that Prudential could pay him his 50% and give him credit for half of the insurance sale. He had a great business going on at Prudential Life Insurance Company. He received $20.00 for every sheet of names that he sold to other agents and he also got credit for half of their sales. He was the leading salesman for the company and yet he didnt sell any insurance himself. I had bought some lists and one of the people that responded to the letter I sent was Arthur Milden who lived in Brooklyn and worked for a pest control company. I sold Arty a life insurance policy and pretty soon we became good close friends. Every time we had a conversation he would drum into my head what a profitable business pest control is. He said the markup was phenomenal and if he left his place of employment to open up his own pest control company then most of the people he serviced would come with him. I always had the entrepreneurial spirit and that coupled with the fact that I wasnt doing well at Prudential Life Insurance Company made me lean towards going into partnership with Arty. One thing was stopping me from making that decision. Arty said that we needed about one thousand dollars to go into business for rent, utilities, furniture, product, etc. Since he had the license to practice pest control and he was bringing accounts with him he felt it was only proper that I fund the venture. I couldnt disagree with him but I was about one thousand dollars short. Then a dramatic event occurred that made me decide to go into business with Arty and at the same time figure out a way to raise the thousand dollars. Prudential Life Insurance Company terminated me. I had no job and I was married with an infant son. Its not that I couldnt find another job but the lure of going into business at the tender age of 24 was like a dream come true. But I needed a thousand bucks, Thats all that stood between me and who knows, maybe becoming the next Lee Iocacca. I racked my brain. How could I come up with a thousand dollars? Then all of a sudden it hit me. It was as plain as the nose on my face. Well, not exactly, but it certainly was as plain as the diamond engagement ring on my wifes finger. After appealing to my wifes logic as to how this could change our lives she finally agreed to let me pawn the ring with the promise that as soon as we made money I would buy it back from the pawn shop. And just like that Arty and I were in business. We found office retail space on busy Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, New York. We named our business A & B Exterminators. Arty and I were partners and the agreement we entered into was
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that I would build up the business by getting additional accounts and Arty would do the servicing of the accounts as insects and me never did get along. Most of the clients that Arty brought with him lived in the poorer black sections of Brooklyn. If they lived in an apartment building then we would charge them $5.00 and if they lived in a house then our monthly fee would be $7.50. Besides those accounts Arty also brought with him landlord or as we called them, Slumlord accounts. The average Slumlord that we had owned between 25 and 50 buildings in Brooklyn. All the buildings were similar in the sense that they were in dire shape, needing all sorts of repairs and they were all inhabited by poor black tenants. The Slumlord would pay us $3.00 per building once a month for our pest control services. Now $3.00 to do an entire building seems pale in comparison to the $5.00 we charged tenants for their apartments but it made good sense to have Slumlord accounts. First of all we didnt have to service every apartment in the building, just those that left a notice with the superintendent of the building requesting our help. That usually numbered around four or five. Secondly we had approximately five Slumlord accounts with each one providing us with about forty buildings. Do the math. Those Slumlord accounts paid our rent, electric and telephone bill each month. The private accounts we had would provide us with some take home pay each week until the business was built up and we could generate a decent check. And business was building up for a couple of reasons. The first thing I did was to purchase a cross street directory which is a telephone book listing people by their street address as opposed to alphabetically. The purpose of using the cross street directory was to acquire new accounts in close proximity to each other. That way our service rep didnt have to spend a lot of time traveling from stop to stop so therefore he could service more accounts in any given day. The second thing I did was to call people during the dinner hour because that is when they were most likely to be home. I still remember my pitch over the phone. It went like this. Hi, Mrs. Brown, this is Steve Charles (I never used my real last name) with A & B Exterminators. Im calling to see if you are having any problems with rats, mice or cockroaches. At this point any one of a number of things could happen. Some people would yell into the phone, Im eatin dinner, why you callin bout cockroaches.and they would hang up. Some people would just hang up the phone but some people would ask us what we charge for our services and in that manner we were able to add additional accounts to our business. Arty was still our only pest control service man but pretty soon we had to hire another person to do service work. That was after my next brainstorm. Better than 90% of our clientele were black so I decided to place an ad on a black run radio station, WWRL. At the time they had in their employ the number one
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rated black disc jockey, Mr. Frankie Crocker. The cost of radio advertising back then was relatively inexpensive and it gave us an opportunity to reach our audience as most black people listened to WWRL. My sales representative at the station brought me down a script that the disc jockeys would use. I looked it over but it didnt have any pizzazz. No oomph. So I decided to write my own radio commercial. I remember it as if it were yesterday. Youre in your car or at home listening to WWRL radio station. A song is playing on the air. After the song ends you hear the disc jockey repeat the following. Bulletin, bulletin, bulletin. (I could imagine that some people would now be turning up the volume on their radio to hear what was happening.) And the advertisement continued, The president of A & B Exterminators has just announced that his company has gone to war against rats, mice and cockroaches. At a press conference earlier today the president said, (in an upbeat fashion) Were gonna sock it to the mice, Were gonna sock it to the rats, Were gonna sock it to the roaches, now how about that. And for the first fifty people who call and take out our service we are going to include at no charge a gallon of our revolutionary chemical that will kill roaches and insects on contact. Well the phones rang off the hook with people who wanted to sign up for our service. They rang so much that we had to get an answering service to take our calls when we werent in the office. And we also had to hire another rep to service the accounts as Arty could no longer handle the influx of business that we were generating. Arty told me that at times when he serviced new accounts that responded to the radio advertisement the people would start to sing, You gonna sock it to the mice, you gonna sock it to the rats, you gonna sock it to the roaches, now how about that. The slogan was catching on. Business was picking up. Things were looking good. I could see the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Arty and I were discussing ways in which we could expand our business and then out of the blue two things happened that put a halt to our ambitions. The first event that occurred was that our new rep got sick and couldnt go on his route. And it was a Saturday which was our busiest day because thats the day that most people are at home. Arty said that we had no choice. I had to don the pest control garb and cover the reps route. I pleaded with Arty not to make me go out and cover the route; such was my fear of cockroaches and rodents. But my pleadings fell on deaf ears. And then Arty gave me my final instructions. Dont forget to wear boots and coveralls. And when you come out of a persons apartment make sure that you stomp your boots on the ground a couple of times. I of course asked why and he said because if any cockroaches were either on your pants or had crawled up your legs, then they would fall off. Obviously my partner was a very experienced pest
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control service man who was imparting his wisdom to me. I was now certainly confident that I hadnt chosen a dummy to be my partner. After all, our partnership consisted of two people and one dummy was enough. After Arty imparted on me the benefit of his years of experience in the pest control industry I almost tendered my resignation. My nerves were on edge but somehow I knew that I had to and I would get through the day and hopefully return to the office the same way I left it..free of roaches. Arty told me that I only had one account to service and that was from our biggest Slumlord. He had over seventy buildings that we serviced and I was to do as many as I could, making sure to visit the superintendent at each building to see if any of the tenants wanted pest control service that day. And so I went on my way. And I learned from the experience. The first thing I learned was that this wasnt something I ever wanted to do again. The second thing I learned was that most of the tenants that requested our service would have been better off without it. Why? Because if a tenant saw a few cockroaches during the preceding month and requested us to spray their apartment then by the time I finished spraying, a few cockroaches turned into literally hundreds as they all came out of every nook and cranny, the baseboards, the oven, behind the stove, the kitchen cupboards, the ceiling. They were running for their lives and so was I. As soon as I got out of someones apartment I would stomp my boots ten times or more and sure enough a few roaches would fall to the ground. But even though I decided that I would never do this again, my next experience sealed my fate. I didnt have to worry about telling Arty that I wouldnt go out on any service calls anymore because he wouldnt let me under any circumstances. And thats because the next tenant that I saw told me that she had a dead mouse under her stove. I said, Good, that shows you how well our chemicals work. She then asked me to remove the body. I said, lady, we just kill em, we dont bury em. She yelled and screamed at me insisting that I remove the dead mouse but I kept telling her that we werent morticians or should I say miceticians and I went to the next tenant. By the time I got back to the office my partner was there and he was steaming. He asked what happened and I told him. It was then that I found out that the tenant complained to the superintendent who in turn called the Slumlord who in turn called Arty to tell him that he was canceling his account with us. I looked at Arty and told him that I tried to warn him not to send me out. He promised me that he would never send me on a service call again. He kept his promise and I kept my partnership.Oh, and when I got home I threw out the boots and clothes that I wore that dayBut not before I stomped my boots a few times in the hallway outside my apartment.
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And so business was doing well. Our visions of financial success were fast becoming a reality. The phones were ringing day and night as people were responding to our ad that we placed on the radio. Then one day our account representative at WWRL radio station paid us a visit. The news he gave us sent our dreams crashing down. He told us that the powers that be at WWRL believed that through the use of our commercial we were pandering to a black audience. I looked at the rep in utter amazement. I couldnt believe what he was saying. I then proceeded to ask him a series of questions. How many of your sales reps arent black? None. How many of your disc jockeys arent black? None. How many records are played by the disc jockeys from artists that arent black? Once again the same replyNone. I said, Youre right. We are catering to a black audience and that is exactly what your station caters to. My sales rep understood my plight but there was nothing that he could do. He arranged for me to speak to his boss at the station but they wouldnt budge. They implied that I was poking fun at black people. How? They never did adequately explain. WWRL did the radio commercial over and it was a dud. Hardly any response. They completely left out the sock it to me phrase and of course business suffered. Although our business was ailing, that still didnt take any of the fun out of it that we occasionally experienced. Like the luncheonette down the block from us. Maxs Luncheonette. The owner of course was Max, a man in his fifties who was a concentration camp survivor. He still bore the numbered identification that the Nazis put on his arm. And yet with all of the hardships that he suffered he had a fantastic outlook on life and a keen wit about him. Arty and I used to go there a couple of times a week for dinner because he had a cook who reminded you of home cooking. And we never missed dinner on Friday nights at Maxs because his cook would prepare chicken soup with matzo balls and either roast chicken or a brisket, both of which were delicious. After a period of time Max let us service his restaurant. Arty would go in at night after Max closed and spray the restaurant. I told Arty never to go in on a Thursday night because I didnt want any uninvited guests in my matzo ball soup when we went in on Friday for dinner. So Arty told Max that he could only spray on either Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday night. And thats what he did, but one week Max was having a problem and he asked Arty to please spray on Thursday night. So Arty did his thing and the next night we went to Maxs for our customary Friday night dinner. A black fellow walked into the luncheonette, sat down in the booth next to us and ordered a tuna sandwich. All of a sudden I heard the black fellow yell out, Hey, and he got out
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of his seat, sandwich in hand and walked up to Max who was behind the counter. He said to Max, Look at this; Ive got a cockroach in my sandwich. Without batting an eye Max said, What color is it? The guy said, Brown. And Max said, Its not mine, we only have black ones. I thought the guy was going to hit Max, but instead he threw the sandwich down and stormed out of the place. Max turned to us and said, Boys, didnt you spray last night? I said, Sure we did Max. The cockroach was dead, wasnt it? And without another word Arty and I continued eating our Friday night dinner at Maxs.
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GOODBYE NEW YORK, HELLO FLORIDA In late 1970 I moved into my bachelor apartment in Queens, New York. It was a quadplex owned by a German landlady who lived in one of the units. The name of the street, ironically, was Normal Road. I had turned twenty-six that previous summer and I had a lot of free time on my hands as I had saved up a couple of dollars. So I decided to take some welldeserved time off from work.....At least I thought it was well deserved. Since I had so much free time I thought I would get the most out of my self-imposed vacation by catching up on my reading. I had heard about this new publication that had come out that was getting lots of unfavorable reviews in the media. My thirst for knowledge was so absorbing that I was determined to find out once and for all if everything that the press was saying about Allan Goldstein's new publication was true or a complete fabrication. And so I bought the most recent edition of his weekly paper called "SCREW." Mr. Goldstein's paper in many ways resembled Playboy magazine. Both were adult in nature with many pictures of women's naked bodies. Of course Screw was by far more graphic in detail than Playboy and definitely appealed to one's prurient interests. They both published articles or commentary detailing the sexual revolution, but Screw published one feature that Playboy did not and that was a personal column. Both men and women detailed, sometimes quite graphically, exactly what they were looking for. I saw one ad that appealed to me. It said, "Let's meet over coffee, tea or me." A woman in Pennsylvania authored the ad. I wrote back to her and said, "Let's skip the coffee and tea." About two weeks later I got a phone call from her. Not only was she in dire need of male companionship but she had one other distinct quality that attracted me to her. Her father owned a major, well known department store in Pennsylvania. In other words, the bitch had bucks. What a quinella. She's in heat and she's got money or she's got money and she's in heat. Either way it's a no lose situation for me. We made arrangements for her to meet me. She was going to fly into Kennedy airport in New York on a Friday and stay with me the entire weekend. She told me that once I got to the airport I should look for a woman with a name tag on her
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chest. When I first laid eyes on her I wished the name tag was bigger and instead of being placed on her chest that it was covering her face. Now I knew why she was advertising. And she certainly picked the right paper to do so in, because it looked like I was going to get SCREWed........Twice. If ever the old adage regarding putting a flag over one's face and doing it for "old glory" held true, this was it. And this wasn't even a woman. This was the Titanic that I was gazing at. She was HUGE. I had to make some quick decisions. I knew that she was coming down to meet me for a sexual dalliance. Under normal circumstances I wouldn't have approached her at the airport. I would have kept walking and gone back home and not answered the phone or any knocks on my door. But in the back of my head I kept hearing a little voice that said, "Schmuck, she's got money." And so with my heart pounding out of fear that in the event we had sex she would want to sit on top and crush me to death, I introduced myself. She was obviously happy to meet me. Actually she would have been happy to meet any man. She said she wanted to go to a nice Italian restaurant for dinner. I lied and said that I inadvertently left my wallet at home. She immediately told me not to worry as she wanted to take me out and that she had plenty of money, so I should pick a very nice and expensive restaurant. At that point the thought of a very good restaurant was the farthest thing from my mind. My main concern was trying to find a restaurant that was very dimly lit because I didn't want to have a clear view of her face while I was eating. I found a restaurant and the only thing I remember about the evening was that when she paid for dinner she took out a wad of travelers checks to pay for the meal. Then I had to take her back to my apartment dreading what lay ahead. As we were driving there I pretended that I was sick. Well, actually I was, except I couldn't tell her what I was sick of. And so when I awoke Saturday morning I was still a virgin. That Saturday and for approximately three succeeding Saturdays, we did the same thing over and over. We would go down to the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City and buy very inexpensive bus tickets. Why? Because banks weren't open on Saturday and therefore we couldn't cash her travelers checks. So in order to do so we had to buy a bus ticket for $1.50 or so and pay for it with a $20.00 travelers check. The ticket agent would give us the ticket and $18.50 in change. We would go from ticket agent to ticket agent, buying the most inexpensive bus tickets they had. We would cash in a few hundred dollars of travelers checks so that I could have some spending money for the week. After a few weeks she understood why I really wanted her to come down to visit me and
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so she decided to end our relationship. It's a good thing too, because I was running out of excuses as to why I couldn't consummate our union.............. As I stated previously the name of the street I lived on was called Normal Road. If nothing else I certainly proved the theory that opposites attract because within three months my very normal landlady requested that her very abnormal tenant (me) leave. It was January 2nd, 1971. There was a knock on my door. It was my landlady. She told me that I was a very noisy tenant and she was asking me to leave. I said, "When?" She answered, "Now." She handed me my security check of $145.00 and said she would appreciate it if I left before the day was over. I had nowhere to go. I could have gone back to my parents apartment but as tempting as it was I knew that would be a last resort for me. I was a twenty-six year old man. Well, young adult. Okay, big kid. And I couldn't bring it upon myself to go back home to live with my parents. I still had tremendous pride. Not much money, but lots of self-esteem. So I started to load up my car. Well it really wasn't my car, but I treated it as if it were. About one week before my landlady asked me to leave I received in the mail a B.P. credit card that I had applied for. I made some calls and to my surprise I found out that Hertz was accepting the card for their car rentals. I was now driving a very big and beautiful brand new Ford Fury. With the car almost packed with my belongings I decided that since I was homeless and unemployed and had nowhere to go then why not take a vacation in Florida. It seemed like the natural thing to do. It would give me an opportunity to get my head straight. I didn't relish making the drive alone so I called my friend Paul and asked him if he wanted to vacation in Florida with me for a week or so. Paul was a year older than me, also unemployed and living with his parents, so he didn't have tremendous pressures. He didn't think twice. Within an hour I picked him up at his folks home and I bid a silent goodbye to my beloved folks, Granma, New York and the many wonderful memories of a magical place called, "The Bronx." While I knew that I would see my loved ones again, little did I realize that the Bronx would very quickly become a memory etched into my mind, never to be duplicated again.
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THE JOURNEY Paul took one suitcase with him. When we opened up the trunk of my car he noticed that I had everything but the kitchen sink in there. He wondered why. I didn't want to tell him that I was evicted so I just said that you never know what the weather is going to be like in Florida at this time of year and I just want to be prepared. He bought my explanation, put his suitcase in the trunk of my car and off we headed down south. It took us exactly twenty-four hours to drive down to Florida as we drove straight through stopping only for gas, a quick bite or a rest room stop. Once in Florida we settled down in a Ramada Inn on Federal Highway in Fort Lauderdale. We would have preferred the Holiday Inn on the beach, but they weren't accepting the B.P. credit card. And so that night we decided to venture down to Miami to go to one of their singles bars. No sooner did we leave the hotel room and get in our car when another auto with two young women pulled alongside us and honked their horn. When I looked at them the driver resembled the wicked witch of the east. Her companion looked like she was from the west. The Bobsey Twins. I smiled and kept driving. The girls pulled behind my car and kept on honking. Paul told me to pull over because the girls obviously wanted some action. I told Paul to clean his glasses and take another look at the women. But Paul couldn't care less what they looked like. His philosophy was, "In the darkness of night every woman looks like Marilyn Monroe." It was hard to find fault with Paul's philosophy except that it wasn't completely dark and I knew what they looked like. As things turned out I owed Paul a deep debt of gratitude for making me stop to talk to the women that night although I didn't realize it then, but I would within a week. All we did that night with the girls was buy them a soda and get their phone numbers. I took the drivers phone number. Her name was Ann Taylor. The next time I saw Ann was a week later. It was a memorable night as well it should have been. After all how could you expect me to forget the night I proposed to marry someone?
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THE TAYLOR'S I had been in Florida for about a week. In that short period of time I decided that somehow, someway, this is where I wanted to settle down. I felt that there were enough opportunities here whereby I could achieve some form of financial success and enjoy a lifestyle much different from my native New York. So I called my parents and Granma and told them that I wasn't coming back to New York other than to visit as I had made up my mind to stay in Florida. I tried to get Paul to stay but he missed the warmth of his bed in his parents home. So there I was. All alone, some 1250 miles away from where I had spent the first twenty-six years of my life. It was very sobering. Reality was setting in. I had some pressing problems that I knew had to be taken care of as quickly as was humanly possible. For starters I knew that the Ford Fury that I rented for one week was now one week past due. Then there was the matter of my B.P. credit card. I was charging my motel room to the card and also the food that I ate. And of course my gasoline purchases. Normally that wouldn't be a problem except I wasn't making any payments to the card company. You didn't have to be a rocket scientist to understand that this couldn't go on forever. I had less than $200.00 to my name. It was time to go to work. While I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do, I did know that I definitely had to increase my cash reserves, so I applied for a job at the labor pool. I reported at six in the morning. Me and ninety-nine other men, most of whom were alcoholics. There were more people there than there were jobs. The regulars were chosen first. As luck would have it I was selected that day for one reason only. I was a rare commodity. I was an individual seeking employment who also had a car. Because I had transportation I was therefore able to transport some of the men to the job site. I drove four of my new found buddies to a highway that was being enlarged in Miami. Once there the "boss" of the project gave me a yellow flag. I asked him what it was for. He told me to stand by the medium and direct the traffic. I was on the job at eight in the morning and except for a thirty minute lunch break I worked or rather stood continuously until seven at night. I worked over eight hours that day and netted less than $5.00 an hour after taxes. At that rate I didn't have to be overly concerned about a night life because first of all I couldn't afford one and secondly when I got home I was so tired that all I wanted to do was take a long hot shower and go to sleep. I got up the next morning and said to myself, "This is not a job for a Jewish boy." If they wanted me to be the boss,
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then I would consider it. But to stand in the middle of a highway holding up a flag as cars sped by at high rates of speed was not my ideal way to earn a living. And so I said to myself the heck with it and I didn't bother to report to work. Just then the phone in my room rang. It was the front desk. They told me that the credit card company wouldn't let them charge the next days room to my card and they needed me to make arrangements to pay for my accommodations. I told them that there must be some mistake and I would take care of it immediately. And immediately I did because immediately I packed my belongings, placed them in my car and high tailed it out of Dodge. I knew now that it was only a matter of time before I would have to give back the car and so I began to think. I needed someone to talk to. I had cousins in the area, Lil and Harry Chanzes. Harry was my Dad's nephew. I was too embarrassed to confide in them and I wasn't looking for a handout. Somehow I knew that I could solve my problem. I just didn't know how, but I knew that I would. Then I remembered the witch, I mean the girl Ann that I met about a week ago. I called her and asked her out for that night. She agreed to meet me at a coffee shop. When we met I found out that she lived with her parents and younger sister Ellie. Ann was eighteen and the first real "Hillbilly" that I had ever met and I think that I was the first New York Jew that she had ever come into contact with. After about two hours of conversation I could see that Ann had taken a liking to me. I also knew that I needed a place to live, so having nothing to lose I asked Ann if she would marry me. Not right away, but sometime in the future. She didn't even bat an eyelash. She jumped up and said yes. I was on a roll now, so I decided to see how far I could press my luck. I then asked her if she thought her folks would mind if I moved in with them. She said hold on, walked over to the payphone, dialed a number and then in a thick southern accent I heard her say, "Pa, I found me a New York Jew who wants to marry me. Can I bring him home?" About fifteen minutes later I met the rest of the Taylor's. They lived in a very nice neighborhood in Plantation, Florida which was a sub division of Fort Lauderdale. They had a three bedroom home. One for each of the girls and one for the Taylors or Ma and Pa as I shortly came to call them. When I first laid eyes on the Taylors that evening I quickly realized without even talking to them that the only thing missing to complete the picture was the still that produces "Moonshine." They were very nice people. Very nice "Hillbilly Type" people. Mr. Taylor was in his early forties, slightly over 6'0" tall, lanky with a grip that
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could drop you to your knees in an instant. He had a responsible position at Florida Properties as their transportation manager. And that's exactly what he looked like. When you looked at Mr. Taylor you said to yourself now there's a man that works with cars, trucks or similar type vehicles. He had that look. He also had certain idiosyncrasies about him which I found out about within a week. One of them was that he couldn't stand long hair. The best way to describe Mrs. Taylor was that if she would have dyed her hair white then she could have been Mammy Yokum's twin sister. She would walk around hunched over carrying an empty Maxwell's House coffee can with her that was lined with sheets of paper towels. She always had a big 'chaw' of tobacco in her mouth and every now and then she would lift her homemade spittoon up to her lips and spit some tobacco juice into the can. You never saw her without her spittoon. As I found out later Mrs. Taylor was a nurses aide. For the life of me I just couldn't imagine her tending to some sick elderly person and then using her spittoon within their sight. Maybe that's why they were sick. Ellie, the youngest daughter, was sixteen years old and a bit chunky but she had a beautiful face. She always had the opposite sex on her mind. I suspect too much so. Ann introduced me to her family and within a mere fifteen minutes or so I actually felt like I was a part of the clan. They were the most hospitable people you could ever want to meet. Ellie offered me her bedroom. She decided that she would rather sleep on the sofa in the living room. I didn't argue with her. I lived with the Taylors for approximately four months. I truly was living the Life of Reilly. Ma and Pa would leave the house around seven in the morning. Ann was also a nurse's aide but didn't have to report to work until eleven, so as soon as Ma and Pa left for work Ann would come into my room. The first morning that she came into my boudoir I literally shuddered. I still hadn't adopted my friend Paul's philosophy about women and besides at seven in the morning it's very light outside and consequently inside the house as well. That first morning I was about to tell Ann that I had a splitting headache when she surprised me by letting me know that she was a virgin and she wouldn't consummate our relationship until I gave her an engagement ring. I immediately said to myself, "Honey, don't hold your breath." So for the better part of four months Ann would come into my bedroom every morning and lay down beside me. As soon as she did, my instinctive response was always the same. "Okay, what's for breakfast?"
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It usually worked. On the days it didn't I went through a lot of Listerine. Around 10:30 in the morning I would drive Ann to work. She had a brand new Camaro that she let me use. Once I moved in with the Taylors I gave my rented car back to Hertz. I originally rented it for one week and had kept the car for close to four. There was no sense in keeping it anymore because Ann's rental rates were much less and she even gave me a credit card for gas and around $25.00 a week in spending money. Hertz couldn't match the offer. So after dropping Ann off at work I would bum around town and usually get back home at two, just in time for Ellie to make me lunch. Then I would have to listen to her confide in me about her many boyfriends and of course she was always seeking my advice in so many ways that as far as I was concerned I was really earning my keep. I would pick Ann up at her place of work at six in the evening and bring her home for dinner. Ma Taylor was a great cook. Just as you would suspect, there was always plenty of homemade corn muffins to go around each evening and equally as well there was always plenty of food. I ate virtually everything that Ma made except when she got "real southern." I quickly learned to ask what's for dinner before I ate anything that was on my plate. That's because one night Ma said that we were having Mountain Oysters for supper. I immediately told her that I never did acquire a taste for oysters or clams. Fortunately for me Ma Taylor was a very honest person. She told me that these weren't really oysters. She had me come over to this big pot that was on the stove. She uncovered it and told me to look inside the pot and take a whiff. I did as she suggested and to be truthful it did smell good but whatever was in the pot didn't resemble oysters. I asked Ma what was cooking? That's when she told me that Mountain Oysters were another name for Pig's testicles. I said, "You know what Ma? It doesn't look like you have enough in the pot for everyone. I'll just make myself a sandwich." She understood. One evening Ann and I along with Ellie and some fellow she recently met were all sitting around the dining room table engaged in conversation. This kid was about nineteen years old with real long hair down to his shoulders. He was kind of boisterous and every now and then Ellie would tell him to lower his voice because if her Pa got up and saw this guy he would go ape over his long hair and there's no telling what he would do. The guy asked why her father would get upset and Ellie kept telling him that Pa just don't like long hair on men. Well we all started talking again and sure enough this kid starts raising his voice and once more Ellie tells him that he better lower it, because if her Pa wakes up and comes out and sees this kid with the long hair, then anything could happen and for sure it wouldn't be good.
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By now the kid thought that Ellie was goofing on him so he purposely started talking loud and sure enough Mr. Taylor awoke, walked into the kitchen, saw this long haired kid and screamed at Ellie, "What the hell are you bringing these long haired hippies into my house fer? You got ten seconds to get the hell out of my house son or I'm gonna blow you to kingdom come." With that Mr. Taylor disappeared. Ellie told this kid to high tail it because her dad was going to get his rifle. Now I must tell you that Mr. Taylor's looks could scare the hell out of you when he was dressed up in his Sunday finest, but just having awoke he was even more menacing. The kid got up and bolted for the door and ran into the street. All of a sudden Mr. Taylor appeared, rifle in hand and asked where the kid was? Ellie said that he ran out of the house. Mr. Taylor ran outside and all I heard was this kid yelling from a distance, "Please, don't shoot." Mr. Taylor yelled back, "Don't you ever come back here son, ya hear?" "I promise, I won't." Those were the last words I ever heard from that kid. And the last time I ever saw him too. Mr. Taylor came back in and muttered, "I told ya Ellie, I don't like long haired hippies." As he turned to go back to bed I said, "Pa, is my hair okay." He turned around and said, "Well, you could use a little trim." I went to the barber the very next day.............. I had been living at the Taylor's for about three months. Life was great. I was really enjoying myself. Ma and Pa were real happy too because it appeared that their daughter Ann found a nice young man to settle down with. That was a minor predicament that I had gotten myself into, but I was confident that I would be able to extricate myself from it in due course. Meanwhile I had a roof over my head, three square meals a day, a beautiful Camaro to ride around in and some spending money. No sense upsetting the apple cart. Then one day, out of the blue, Ma came up to me and said that she and Pa would like to talk to me. I had no idea what they wanted. The only thing that ran through my mind was that they were going to try to pin me down to a wedding day. The wheels started to turn. I wasn't ready to move out. After all, how much could you save when you're only earning $25.00 a week? Soon my gloomy despair turned to cheerful optimism. Ma and Pa told me to have a seat at the kitchen table. It was just us three. Pa just kept staring at me as Ma approached and with a quizzical look on her face she said, "Steve, Pa and me just wanted to know if yer a professional gambler?" I told her that I wasn't. Then her voice got real low and she looked over her shoulders one at a time and returned her gaze to me and said in a barely audible tone, "Steve, are you in the Mafia?" I said, "Ma, of course not.
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Why would you even ask me that?" She looked at me and with a very puzzled voice said, "Steve, Pa and I can't figure out how you are surviving?" I said, "What do you mean?" At that point Pa chimed in and said, "Now Steve, you've been living here for better than three months and you ain't worked at all and you seem to git along jus fine. We can't figure it out." Statements like that by Ma and Pa made me wonder what kind of a life I would have had, had I been born and raised in Butchers Hollow, Kentucky. It was now becoming very apparent that the end of the rainbow was in sight and that there was no pot of gold waiting for me, just a long lonely highway, so I started to make preparations for life absent the Taylors. But first I needed a car and a job, and in that order.
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TRANSITION My life was now undergoing a transition. I was twenty-six years old with no visible means of supporting myself, no transportation to take me to the unemployment office and no money for the very basic necessities to sustain life, such as food. Since I didn't have a job there was also no compelling reason for a bank to approve a loan application for me to buy a car. Then all of a sudden it dawned on me that if I had been working for a fair amount of time, then I could probably qualify for a small loan. I told Pa about my problem. He told me to call a finance company and tell them that I worked for his firm and to use his name as my immediate supervisor. I looked in the yellow pages under the heading "Finance Companies" and one name jumped out at me. It was General Finance which was advertised as "the friendly finance company." I called them on the phone and spoke to the manager Raleigh Baker and applied for a $600.00 loan which at that time was the maximum amount they would lend. The very next day I went down to their office to meet my new friend Raleigh and watched him as he peeled off six fresh one hundred dollar bills and placed them in my hand. I walked out of Raleigh's office with a new found attitude, a new lease on life and six new one hundred dollar bills. Life was once again on the upswing for me. It was now time to get my own car, then a job and finally my own pad. There was a B.P. gas station on Federal Highway in Fort Lauderdale that I used to go to for gas. They weren't far from the Ramada Inn where I originally stayed when I came to Florida. It was run by a nice young kid by the name of Randy who was always trying to make an extra buck through various and sometimes deceptive means. My kind of person. Occasionally Randy would have cars for sale on the lot. I figured I could get a pretty good bargain there so I went to see if he had any deals on cars. Sure enough he had one clunker. We agreed on $150.00 for it. I reached for my wallet to plunk out the cash and there staring me in my face was my B.P. card. I knew it wasn't good but I told him to see if he could put it through. Randy had a book from B.P. that listed cards that could no longer be honored. Of course my card number was listed in there. Randy told me the bad news and as I was about to give him the cash he suddenly informed me that he could put my purchase on the card if I let him boost the price of the car up to $300.00. I was at a loss for words because on the one hand I couldn't charge $150.00 on the card, but now I could charge twice that price. I said, "How are you going to do that Randy?" He said, "Simple." And it was simple. It seems that B.P. instructed its attendants to verify any charge on a card in excess of $15.00 but anything less could be
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automatically put through. Randy ran off thirty charge tickets, each one for $10.00 and of course back dated each ticket so as not to run off all the charges on the same day. So now I had my wheels, but more importantly, I still had my six crisp and fresh one hundred dollar bills. One down, two to go. A job was next, then my own pad. I pulled into the parking lot at Florida Properties and walked over to the receptionist and asked to see the transportation manager, Mr. Taylor. Pa came out and greeted me, took me into his office, had his secretary pour me a cup of coffee, had me fill out a few forms and told me to report back for work at four in the afternoon. I told him that this had been a pretty eventful day what with me getting a car and a job within the space of a couple of hours and I felt like celebrating with his daughter Ann that night, so I asked him if I could start work tomorrow. He granted my wishes. I called Ann at her place of work and told her the good news. She was ecstatic. I asked her if she wanted to go out later that evening for dinner so that we could celebrate my good fortune. Of course she said yes and that night we went out to one of Fort Lauderdale's better steak houses. Ann insisted on picking up the tab. Being the type of person I am, I didn't want to disappoint her, so I let her have her wish. And so the day came to an end. I had gotten a loan, a car, a job, a fantastic steak dinner and I still had six crisp, fresh one hundred dollar bills in my pocket. Of course I still had a major problem but one that wouldnt rear its head for about thirty days. You see the folks at General Finance werent really that friendly because on the one hand they gave me six hundred dollars, but on the other hand they expected me to start repaying them the six hundred dollars plus interest in monthly payments beginning in about thirty days. Obviously they were nothing but Indian givers. Oh well, that was a problem that I would have to deal with in about thirty days, but right now as good as things were I still had one unpleasant chore to do before retiring for the evening. As unpleasant as it was, I was getting used to it. Well, sort of. It was time to kiss Ann good night.
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SWOLLEN CHEEKS It was April of 1971. My three month vacation was over. Once again I was about to enter the work force. My position at Florida Properties wasn't very difficult nor was it very strenuous. The company sold land in Florida. They had solicitors who would approach tourists either on the beach or at hotels or at various entertainment spots in the area and these solicitors would offer a free breakfast in exchange for the tourists attending a ninety minute presentation on one of the many properties that the company was promoting. The tourists would be picked up in the morning at their place of lodging and driven to a restaurant in Fort Lauderdale. After they finished eating they would then be taken to another location to view a film of the property being offered and then a sales representative would try to sell them. Then they would be driven back to their hotel or wherever they were staying. All I had to do was call our drivers in the evening and tell them the names and addresses of the people they were to pick up the following morning and at what time. I would report for work at four in the afternoon and leave at ten in the evening. Very easy work and naturally very low pay. But it was a start. After all I hadn't worked for over three months. I needed to get back into the swing of things and Florida Properties offered me that opportunity. Now the company had an office in the Holiday Inn which was located on the beach in Fort Lauderdale. I would report there at four in the afternoon and there would always be three or four people in the office, but by five I was the only one there for the rest of the evening except for nightly visits by Leroy. I met Leroy my very first night on the job. Leroy was a black man in his midforties who worked for a florist company during the day and ran his own janitorial company at night. One of his accounts was the Holiday Inn. He was a very hard working, compassionate and fun loving individual. He would usually get to my place around seven at night and we would sit and chat for ten minutes or so. I always had fresh coffee brewing and sometimes he would bring in donuts or cookies that his wife made. I looked forward to his nightly visits even though he could only stay for a short period of time. One night I was on the phone when Leroy came in. I waved hello to him, continued my conversation and watched out of the corner of my eye as he went to pour himself a cup of coffee. Just as he took his first sip I put the phone down, turned around towards Leroy and blurted out, "LEROY, DON'T SWALLOW THE COFFEE." I had a look of concern on my face as I approached Leroy. Meanwhile Leroy looked as if he had been hit on both sides of his face because when I yelled at him not to swallow the coffee his lips closed tight and his cheeks puffed out as if
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they were swollen. He was looking at me with grave consternation, not knowing what to do and wondering what was in his mouth. I told Leroy not to worry and that everything would be all right. I continued to explain that about fifteen minutes before he arrived I had to relieve myself and since no one was in the office to answer the phones I emptied my bladder into the pot of coffee and then the phones started to ring and I hadn't had a chance to empty the pot and make fresh coffee and....... Well as soon as I started to explain what happened, Leroy's eyes started to bulge out of their sockets. If Leroy would have been a white man then I'm sure his face would have turned green, but under the circumstances I couldn't tell. He ran over to the bathroom and spit out the contents that were in his mouth and then started to wash his mouth out with water for what seemed like an eternity. He would take a swig of water and swoosh it around in his mouth and then spit it out into the sink only to continue the process over and over, all the while hearing me howl with delight as I was actually doubled over with laughter. After he finished cleansing his mouth he came over to me and said, "Steve, what's so funny? I almost swallowed your piss. That ain't funny. You're a sick man, pissing in a coffee pot. You really sick, you know that?" After I composed myself I told Leroy that I was just joking. I told him that I had never peed in the coffee pot. He didn't believe me so I went over and poured myself a cup of coffee and drank it in front of him. Leroy just stared at me and said, "Steve, you a sick man, you one sick man?" I worked at Florida Properties for another two weeks and saw Leroy every night. We chatted and laughed as we had done before. He still brought in homemade cookies or donuts. I enjoyed his company. He was a good man and he certainly could take a joke..... But he never did have any more of my coffee.
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GENERAL FINANCE........PART 2 I was still living at the Taylor's home saving my money for my own place when the telephone rang one afternoon. I answered it and the person on the other end of the line asked for me. I didn't recognize the voice so I said that I wasn't there. At that point the party identified himself as a representative of General Finance and he asked me to have Steve Chanzes call him. I asked him what it was in reference to and he told me that Steve had taken out a loan a little over a month ago and had failed to mail in his very first payment. I quickly thought over what this fellow was telling me and I realized that while I was thankful for the loan that General Finance gave me, I wasn't in a position right now to start paying them back. I needed every penny that I had because of my circumstances in trying to obtain my own apartment. General Finance would have to wait. Immediately I told the guy on the other end of the line that Steve Chanzes had moved out about a week ago. He asked me if I knew where he moved and I said, "Sure, California." He asked me for the address in California and I told him that Steve didn't leave one. About two days later I heard a knock at the door. I peeked out the window and saw some guy standing by the door that I didn't recognize, so I opened the door. The fellow standing there was about 5'8", portly, in his early thirties with blonde hair. He said, "Steve?" I said, "Nope, he moved out a while ago. Can I help you?" He identified himself as Claude Cooper, the assistant manager of General Finance. I went through the motions with him and gave him the same information that I had given over the phone the other day to the General Finance representative that called. He thanked me, gave me his card and told me that if Steve ever called to please get his phone number and address and notify him at the number listed on his business card. I said, "Sure Claude, you'll be the first person that I call." Once again he thanked me and drove off. It was getting hot in Dodge City. I checked my finances. It was time to relocate. I found an affordable apartment in a development complex in Fort Lauderdale called Key Palm Villas. It had a swimming pool and clubhouse. The units were nestled amongst literally hundreds of trees. It was absolutely gorgeous. I even had my own dishwasher as well as a private patio overlooking the complex. It reminded me so much of the Bronx........Yeah, right. Now I just had to say goodbye to Ann and let her know that I didn't think that our relationship would work out and of course I had to say goodbye to her family and thank them for all of their help. It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be. Everything went smoothly. They were really very nice people. Strange at times,
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but very nice and if you needed a friend, then you couldn't ask for anyone better than Ma and Pa. Everyone understood my decision and of course since I was still gainfully employed by Florida Properties, I would still be seeing Pa (I couldn't stop calling him that) on occasion. Remarkably enough I even enjoyed kissing Ann goodbye.......That's probably because I knew that I would never have to do it again.
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MY MOST UNFORGETTABLE DATING EXPERIENCE It was now mid April. I had been in Florida for almost four months. In that short time I had accomplished quite a bit as far as I was concerned. I had gotten a car, my own apartment and a job, albeit not the one that would provide me with the future that I aspired to, but it was a start. There was one thing missing though. I needed the companionship of a member of the opposite sex to fulfill my natural desires. And my opportunity came when I least expected it...... I had contacted my cousins Harry and Lil and made arrangements to visit them in Hollywood, Florida. I hadn't seen them in maybe ten years and I was looking forward to spending a pleasant day there. When I arrived a couple of their friends were also there. We all had a great time and of course everyone wanted to know what I was doing and why I came to Florida. I filled them all in on what had happened in my life and then out of the clear blue sky Harry and Lil's friends said that they knew a very nice girl who they were sure would be interested in going out with me. (Obviously I didn't tell them everything about my life.) I thanked them and took down her number. The next day, which was Monday, I called her on the phone and introduced myself. Her name was Lori and she knew that I would be calling. We had a very pleasant conversation. I asked her out for the following Saturday. She said she would love to go out with me. During the week leading up to our date I spoke with Lori every night on the telephone. We just seemed to hit it off. We basically liked the same things. Furthermore, she was full of pep and vitality and that alone made me look forward to our date. We left our plans open for that Saturday evening. As you could imagine Saturday couldn't come fast enough, but finally it did arrive and when I showed up at her place I was very pleasantly surprised. She was a very attractive young lady of about twenty-three or four and adding to her beauty were her breasts which were amply exposed as she was wearing a low cut blouse that revealed quite a bit of cleavage. She was very friendly and I knew that had this been a baseball game, then when my turn came to go to bat, I would most assuredly hit a home run. I couldn't wait to get up to the plate. But first I had to take her out. I had thirty-five dollars in my pocket. Surely I thought that would be enough for a nice dinner and maybe a movie. This was back in 1971 when prices were a lot less expensive than they are today. And of course if we had gone to dinner and to a movie then I would have had enough money for the evening, but that was not the case....
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We got into my car and she asked me if I liked jazz because Buddy Myles and his band were playing in Miami at the Marco Polo Hotel. I said of course I like jazz. That night I would have done anything that she liked. I wanted to make as favorable an impression on her as was humanly possible. And I also wanted to get back to her place as quickly as we could because then I was hoping we would do something that I enjoyed........and hopefully her as well. So off we went to Miami to see Buddy.... We walked into the hotel and the first thing I noticed was that there was a $4.00 cover charge. I only had $35.00 on me and quick as a flash eight of it went south. We sat down inside the club and the waitress came over to take our order for drinks. At the same time she told us that there would be three acts prior to Buddy Myles coming out and the entire show would last about four hours. All I was thinking about now were those beautiful breasts sitting across the table from me and now I would have to wait approximately five hours or so before I could make a formal introduction of them to my hands. I couldn't wait for the show to start. Actually I couldn't wait for it to end........... The cocktail waitress brought our drinks to us. She said that she wasn't allowed to run a tab and we would either have to pay for our drinks each time they were served or she could hold a credit card. I had destroyed my B.P. credit card, not that it would have been of any help to me if I hadn't, so all I could do was pay cash as the drinks were delivered. The tab for the first round was $3.50. It was $1.75 per drink. I didn't want to look cheap in front of my date, so I also included a $1.00 tip and as quick as you could say bye-bye, that's exactly what happened to $4.50 of my money. It went bye-bye. I now had only $22.50 left. The first act came on the stage. Four hours to go. I started computing in my mind and I realized that I had enough money for five more drinks. Not five each, but five in total. That also meant that there wouldn't be any money left to tip the valet. No big deal. He was going to get a good look at her boobs and that was worth more than any tip I could possibly give him. I figured if I only had one more drink the rest of the night, then my date could have an additional four, or one an hour. Problem solved........Or so I thought, because just as I realized that all would be well the waitress came by and Lori ordered another drink. Within ten minutes she had finished her first one and now was about to start on her second. At this rate I wouldn't be able to stay at the show for an hour, let alone four. All sorts of thoughts were going through my mind. Should I tell her that I didn't feel good and that we would have to go? I quickly ruled that
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out because I thought that by the time I got her home it might look awfully suspicious if I suddenly felt better and tried to come on to her. So after much thought I finally decided to play it by ear and see if I could convince her to ease up on the drinks. And to my amazement it worked............For all of ten minutes. We hadn't been in the club for thirty minutes and she was already ordering her third drink. I had $18.00 left and now it looked like my only hope would be for Lori to become inebriated. Then I could get her some coffee to sober her up..........Put her in my car................And take her back to her apartment. But unfortunately that didn't happen because apparently this chick was a professional drinker. Booze had no effect on her whatsoever. I did my best to try to get her to slow down, but to no avail. We hadn't been in the club for much more than an hour and I had less than $5.00 left. It was decision time. I looked at Lori. She was a pretty sight for sore eyes. If it weren't for her drinking or if I had more money with me then my final decision might have been different, but alas such was not the case. I looked at her again. She smiled at me. She was having a good time. Then my gaze diverted to her bosom. To me they were "picture perfect." And it was the beauty of her breasts that ultimately caused me to extricate myself from the problem that I was facing. I got up from the table and told Lori that I was going to the men's room. And I did.....And upon leaving the men's room I went outside and gave the valet my ticket. He brought me my car. I gave him a dollar tip, got into my car and as I drove off I kept picturing Lori's bosom. Her big and beautiful bosom. Yes, that convinced me beyond a shadow of a doubt that when Lori finally realized that I had left the club that she would have no problem finding someone else to drive her home......Lucky guy. A few months later my parents and Granma came down to visit me for a couple of weeks. This was the first time I had seen them since I left New York some eight months ago. I was now married and starting a new life. All of us were having a great time during the visit and one day my Dad said that he, Mom and Granma were going to visit his nephew Harry and his wife Lil. He asked Joy and me if we wanted to go and I made up some excuse as to why we couldn't. When they returned later that evening my Mom, Dad and Granma all said what a nice time they had and that Harry and Lil were sorry that Joy and I weren't there. I immediately felt relieved that my cousins didn't dime out on me. A few days later as my folks and Granma were preparing to leave for their trip back to New York my Mom pulled me on the side and said to me, "You know something Steven? You're not normal." I said to her, "What do you mean Mom?" She looked at me and just shook her head and said, "You know. You know what I
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mean." She never did tell me what she meant by that comment......But I had an idea.
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GENERAL FINANCE........PART 3 It was now late April of 1971. I had been in Florida for almost four months and I felt that now was the time to pursue a career, one which I knew did not exist for me at Florida Properties. So I started scanning the want ads in the newspaper. There was one ad that attracted me. The company was advertising for a manager trainee in their finance department. It offered a fair starting salary with opportunities for advancement. The ad did not state the name of the company but it did give a telephone number to call and the name of the person to contact. That person was Raleigh Baker. The name certainly sounded familiar. I called the number that was listed and the person on the other end answered, "General Finance, may I help you?" I immediately hung up the phone. Not out of fright, but because I decided then and there that I wanted that job and I might as well go down there in person and apply. After all, I did know the manager of the company, so it's not as if I was a stranger coming in off the street. As a matter of fact, not only did they know me, but I was listed on their books as an asset to their company. I was an account receivable. A delinquent account receivable, but nevertheless a legitimate asset of the company and as such I felt that I should be given preferential treatment. I walked into their office and the young lady at the counter asked if she could help me. I saw Raleigh Baker sitting in the back doing some paperwork. I raised my voice and said that I was there to see Mr. Baker. The receptionist asked me if I had an appointment to see him and as I was about to answer her, Raleigh lifted up his head and saw me. He then blurted out, "Steve Chanzes, is that you?" I told him it was and he told me to come on back. We exchanged some pleasantries and then Raleigh told me that he understood that I had gone to California and he asked me how long I'd been back in Florida? I told him that I never left. He was taken aback and then I told him the complete story. It was at that point that he asked me when I intended to repay the loan. I told him that if he hired me to fill the position he was advertising then I would repay a portion of the loan each week until it was paid off. Otherwise it would be a while. He looked at me and said, "Mr. Chanzes, you've got one set of balls." I said to him, "Does that mean I've got the job." "Yeah, you got it. Be here tomorrow morning at nine sharp and my assistant will train you." I thanked Raleigh from the bottom of my heart for the opportunity and told him that I would be the best collector he ever had and he acknowledged that he honestly felt that I would be, due to my brazenness. As I started to leave a familiar face walked into the place. It was Raleigh's assistant, Claude Cooper. Raleigh said, "Claude, I want you to say
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hello to our new addition to the company, Steve Chanzes." Claude looked at me and said, "That ain't Steve Chanzes. This is the guy who said Chanzes went to California." Raleigh undid the confusion and Claude had a fit. He threw a tantrum and told Raleigh not to hire me and Raleigh just looked at him and said, "Claude, I've got a feeling that Mr. Chanzes is going to work out just fine. If he's good enough to fool you then he's going to do us some good here. Mr. Chanzes will be here tomorrow morning at nine. Now you two guys shake hands and let's work as a team." Begrudgingly Claude shook my hand. I reported the next day for work and over a period of a couple of months I came to respect Claude for his talents and by the same token I also earned his respect as I became one of the best collectors that General Finance ever had, partially due to my fierce competitiveness and partially due to the fact that my mom's critique of me was correct............................... I'm not normal. I quickly learned that General Finance had four types of customers. Those who religiously mailed in their payments each month, those who you had to physically see each month in order to collect their payments, those who you had to harass or be inventive enough in order to collect monies due and those who just plain wouldn't or couldn't pay. As a collector the most exciting part of the job was to be assigned the name of an individual who had been written off as a dead beat because they hadn't made a payment on their account in over six months, even though many collectors in the past had made many attempts to secure payment. One such individual was James Smith. Mr. Smith was in his fifties and had taken out a $600.00 loan three months ago and had never made a payment. He now owed in excess of $700.00 due to interest charges being added to his delinquent balance. Raleigh told me that no less than four collectors had tried to get Mr. Smith to make a payment but each attempt was met with empty promises that resulted in dismal failure. He further told me that Mr. Smith usually could be found sitting on a wooden orange crate in front of his home on the weekend. I told Raleigh that I wanted to have an opportunity to work the account. He didn't object. That Saturday I drove by Mr. Smith's home and sure enough, sitting in the back yard on an orange crate was a gentleman who fit Mr. Smith's description. I got out of my car and introduced myself and it was indeed him. He gave me the same story undoubtedly that he had given the other four General Finance representatives that had preceded me. He said that he couldn't pay now, but maybe he would be able to in a couple of months. I listened. Then when he finished explaining to me
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why he couldn't make a payment I asked him if he had eaten breakfast. He said no and I told him to come with me and we would grab a bite to eat. He was elated. He told me that I was by far the most understanding representative that General Finance ever had. He said that all the others would yell at him when he couldn't make a payment, but not only didn't I yell at him, I was taking him out for breakfast. He assured me that he would make a payment next month in part due to my nice manners. I thanked him as we drove off. We pulled into the parking lot and as soon as I turned off the ignition Mr. Smith turned to me and said that there wasn't any restaurant in this shopping center. I didn't say a word. I just got out of the car and walked over to his side and opened the door and beckoned him out. He asked me where we were going and I told him that as long as I was taking him out for breakfast I would appreciate it if he could do me one small favor. He said, "What's that?" As we walked through the center I pointed to the sign straight ahead. Mr. Smith stopped dead in his tracks and as I grabbed his arm he yelled out, "OH NO, I AINT GOIN THERE." I said, "C'mon. It'll be over in a flash and then we can use some of the money they pay you to put on your account at the loan company." He looked me straight in the eyes and said, "Did anybody ever tell you that you're not a normal man?" I asked him if he knew my mother, but as it turned out he didn't......Mr. Smith calmed down fairly quickly and when he did we walked through the doors of the John Elliot Blood Bank. Thirty minutes later Mr. Smith and I walked out of the blood bank. He now had a band aid covering the small puncture in his arm where the technician drew blood. He also had fifteen dollars more to his name than he had had prior to giving blood. I quickly relieved him of the fifteen bucks and we drove off to a restaurant for breakfast, just as I had promised him. I was the first General Finance representative to collect money from Mr. Smith. I couldn't wait to tell Raleigh. I was on cloud nine. Once inside the restaurant I told him to order whatever he wanted. He said to me, "You really are a nice man." After breakfast I drove Mr. Smith back to his home, thanked him and gave him a receipt for the first payment on his loan. It was only three months past due and it wasn't for the full amount but it was a start. He thanked me for breakfast and just as I was about to drive away he yelled out, "HEY." I said, "What's the matter?" He said, "This receipt is only for five dollars. I got fifteen for the blood. What happened to the other ten?" I said, "We ate breakfast, didn't we? And I had to pay for it, didn't I? Did you think they were giving away the food?" I started to drive off and he walked into the middle of the street and once again yelled out, "YOU CRAZY BASTARD, YOU'RE NOT NORMAL. DON'T EVER COME BACK
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HERE AGAIN." I stopped the car, leaned out of the window and said, "Are you sure you don't know my Mom?"............... Friday and Saturday were referred to as "chase" days in the collection business. We would hit the streets Friday afternoon around four and work until nine and start over again Saturday morning at eight and work straight through until nine in the evening, because if you didn't make your collections on the weekend then you had to wait until the following weekend when your clients got their paycheck before you could "chase" them down again for payment. General Finance had offices throughout the state of Florida and the offices competed with each other on a monthly basis to determine which one was the most efficient. There were many variables used to determine which office was the best one. The number of loans made for the month was one item. The total dollar amount of loans made was another item. Of course total dollars collected for the month was a part of the equation to determine the number one office. And last but not least, the percentage of delinquent loans outstanding was also a consideration to determine the most efficient office. The last point, the delinquent percentage of loans outstanding was in my opinion a very false and misleading figure. The reason I say that is because all we had to do was collect $5.00 every sixty days from an account and by doing that it would keep them off the delinquent report. To show the disparity, a $600.00 loan required the client to repay $34.00 a month. So if they couldn't make a payment, then as a last resort we could collect as little as $5.00 every sixty days, and by doing so they wouldn't appear on the delinquent report and therefore on the surface it would appear that it was a good loan. I didn't agree with that philosophy because I felt that once you let a client know that they could get by with a $5.00 payment every sixty days, it would become difficult to get them back on a regular pay schedule. So as a result I would never allow a client to pay such an inconsequential amount. Never...........Of course there were always exceptions to the rule. Like Mrs. Peacock........... One Saturday morning I went to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Peacock. They were a very good account of General Finance...... That is, until they met me. They used to pay their monthly obligation like clockwork.....But then I spoiled them. Raleigh Baker couldn't understand what had happened to the Peacocks. He said that they were such a good account and now they were struggling and only making minimum payments. I told him not to worry. One day they would get back on their feet again and start to make full payments, but right now we would just have to live with the minimum payment of $5.00 every sixty days. Raleigh just couldn't understand.
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It started that Saturday morning when I knocked on the door of the Peacocks. It was around ten o'clock. I had never met them before. The loan they had taken out in finance parlance was called a "full boat." In other words they had applied for and received the maximum loan allowed which at the time was $600.00 and every month the collector would go to their home and pick up the $34.00 payment. Mrs. Peacock greeted me at the door and I introduced myself. She invited me in and told me to have a seat at the dining room table while she went and wrote out a check to my company. As soon as I had walked into her house there was this unmistakable luscious odor that confronted my nostrils. I said, "Mrs. Peacock, what are you cooking?" She said it was fried chicken, which was something she cooked every Saturday morning. I told her that it smelled fantastic. She knew what I was hinting at so she walked me over to the stove and pointed to this huge pot that had at least a dozen pieces of chicken frying in it. She said to me, "Do you know when the chicken is ready?" I said, "No." "When it rises to the top, then it's ready." I told her that I didn't know that and as soon as the words exited my mouth Mrs. Peacock blurted out, "Look, that piece just came to the top. It's ready. Would you like to try it?" She didn't have to twist my arm. I sat down at the kitchen table and within minutes had consumed some of the finest fried chicken that I had ever eaten in my life. I thanked Mrs. Peacock and told her that her chicken was the best I ever had. She asked me if I wanted some more. About three NeHi Orange sodas and five pieces of chicken later I once again thanked Mrs. Peacock. I told her to rip up her check and that I would make a payment for her. Not the full payment, just a partial one. She was so glad that she told me to stop by every Saturday morning around this time and she would gladly feed me some of her chicken. And so for the next four months I stopped by Mrs. Peacocks home every Saturday morning around ten and sat down and ate some of the most scrumptious fried chicken known to man........And once every sixty days I would give General Finance $5.00 to be credited towards her account.....And Raleigh couldn't understand what had happened. Of course if he had eaten some of Mrs. Peacocks chicken then he would have understood completely............ I thoroughly enjoyed working at General Finance. It gave me a good education on how to deal with people, one which was not taught in schools. Each day we were confronted with applicants who would tell us anything to get us to approve a loan for them and subsequently each day we were challenged by folks who would come up with an endless array of excuses as to why they couldn't repay their loan. Our job quite obviously, was to make prudent loans and at the same time understand that while people did have legitimate excuses as to why they couldn't make
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payments on their obligations, it was still our duty to collect and at times to pressure people into honoring their legal responsibilities. Just as some of our debtors invented stories as to why they couldn't make payment, we too would use a "creative" if not ethical approach to secure restitution. Raleigh usually turned to me when all else failed as he did with an unpaid and overdue account by the name of Betty Brooks, a/k/a Betty Wright. Raleigh's desk was directly to my left, about three feet away. One day at work my phone rang. I picked it up to hear an all too familiar voice. The party on the other end said, "Mr. Chanzes, I need to see you in my private office immediately." I turned to my left and looked at Raleigh as he hung up the phone. He gestured towards the front door. I knew what he meant. This wasn't the first time that Raleigh had called on me. Instinctively I arose and headed towards the front door to go into Raleighs private office which was located at one of the tables in the restaurant next door. Raleigh had a penchant for feeding me when he assigned me a tough case. I took my seat at one of the tables and sixty seconds later in walked Raleigh with Claude Cooper. They took their seats next to me and Raleigh told me about this latest case that he wanted to assign to me. The total debt was only $125.00 but it was now a matter of principal and Raleigh wanted this debt wiped off the books. The debtor was Betty Wright. She had borrowed $75.00 to buy a sewing machine and had never made a payment. With delinquent interest added on to her account she now owed $125.00. To compound the problem, it seemed that Betty Wright had used an alias when she took out the loan. She had used the name Betty Brooks and in addition she had produced false identification to secure the loan. Raleigh and Claude told me that if I could get Betty to honor her rightful obligation then that would go a long way in increasing my chances of running my own office for General Finance. Using that as an inducement along with the fact that Raleigh was buying me breakfast made me feel extremely confident that I could collect the debt. If nothing else, it was a matter of taking pride in the work that I was doing and wanting to prove the old adage, "You can run, but you can't hide," and once I found you, then it was all over but the counting. Early on in my brief career at General Finance, once I had proven that I had an uncanny ability to collect past due delinquent accounts, Raleigh and I had established some very basic ground rules. I was given complete freedom and discretion in my collecting techniques. Raleigh had adopted the Armed Forces strategy of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" with me, long before Bill Clinton had ever thought of it. And so Raleigh would never ask me how I was able to collect some accounts that had been dormant for months if not years, for fear of what my answers would be. But sometimes Raleigh knew what I was doing. He just
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pretended not to hear, as with Betty Wright or Brooks, whatever her name was. We went back into the office and Raleigh handed me the Wright/Brooks file. The first thing I wanted to do was ascertain if she had a working telephone number. I called the number listed in her file. A woman answered and I said, "Betty?" She said, "Who's calling?" At that point I felt confident that indeed I had found the person in question, but I had no idea what to do or say so I said that we have a bad connection and I'll call back. I hung up the phone and started to think...... It didn't take long to come up with an answer. I called back within five minutes and once again a woman answered the phone. I said, "Betty?" She said, "Yes, it's Betty." I asked her if she was Betty Wright and she said yes. I then identified myself as Sebastian Carlyle, Attorney at Law for General Finance and I told her that I had sworn out a warrant for her arrest. I looked towards my left and Raleigh had his elbows on his desk with his arms facing straight up as they cradled his head which by now was shaking from side to side. I kept hearing him moan, "Oh no, oh no." At the same time Betty was screaming into the phone, "What do you mean you have a warrant for my arrest?" I explained to Betty that what she did to obtain the loan for the sewing machine was illegal and if she didn't immediately bring the monies owed into our office then I would have no recourse but to have her arrested. She said she didn't have any money but if I would give her an hour she would borrow it and bring it down to the office. It was now ten in the morning. I told her that in the event she doesn't raise the money by eleven, she should call me or else I would have no choice but to have her arrested. I hung up the phone and waited for her to either appear at our office or at the very least call me in an hour. As I was tending to other business I kept hearing Raleigh repeat over and over again, "I'm going to need an attorney because of you Mr. Chanzes. I can see it now; I'm going to need an attorney." I told him to relax and not to worry. Sure enough at exactly eleven o'clock the phone rang and my receptionist told me that Betty Wright was on the phone and wanted to speak to Sebastian Carlyle. I got on the phone and Betty told me that she wasn't able to raise the money and asked me if I would give her another hour to do so? I told her I would and once again reiterated that if she wasn't able to raise the money then I wanted to hear from her within an hour. She assured me that she would either be at my office by noon or at the very least call me. Noon came and once again I got a call from Betty telling me the same story as before and once again she asked for a one hour reprieve. I consented and for the next three hours, at one, two and three, Betty called with the same story. Each time she called I agreed to withhold filing the warrant as long as she tried to raise the funds and called me with the results of her efforts. The last
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time I heard from Betty was at three o'clock. I tried calling her at four and also at five that evening, but there was no answer at her number. It was Wednesday. I had no idea what happened to her. I thought that maybe she just stopped answering her phone out of plain fear. For the rest of the week, both Raleigh and Claude kept ribbing me about Betty Wright and my nom de plume, Sebastian Carlyle. It was now Saturday. Another chase day in the finance business. I had gotten married about two weeks ago and I asked my wife if she wanted to accompany me to see how I earned a living. She hopped into the car and off we went. I took with me my usual assortment of accounts that I would try to get payments from and I also wrote down Betty Wright's address. I couldn't figure out what had happened to her. I had put the fear of God into her, which was very evident by the hourly calls she made into the office asking me not to have her arrested as she was trying to raise the money to clear her account. Something had gone wrong. I was sure of that, but I didn't know just what had happened..............But I would soon find out. Joy and I pulled up to Betty's complex. I decided that I would identify myself by my real name, not that of Sebastian Carlyle. And it's a good thing I did. I knocked on Betty's door and a woman about 25 old answered the door. As soon as I saw her, I prayed that this woman wasn't Betty. I identified myself as Steve Chanzes from General Finance and the reason I was there was because Mr. Carlyle had sent me out to see if Ms. Wright still lived there. As it turned out this woman was Betty Wright and she instantly went off on a tirade as to what a low life this Sebastian Carlyle was. How he had her calling him every hour while she was trying to raise the money she owed. She also complained about what a hot day it was last Wednesday when she was running all over town trying to scrape up the money. My wife and I looked at her and we both felt compassion. Then Betty Wright told us that after she made her last call at three to Mr. Carlyle, she passed out on the street and was rushed to the hospital where she stayed for two days. Thankfully she was okay, but my wife and I felt terrible, because here was this woman who had taken ill on the streets because I had her thinking she might get arrested and she wound up hospitalized for a couple of days. We were both grateful that she was okay and of course we were even more elated that no harm came to the child she was about to have as Betty Wright was in her ninth month of pregnancy, a condition that Sebastian Carlyle knew nothing about. After Betty calmed down my wife and I took her back to the office and had her fill out a new application using her proper name. Over a period of three months, Betty Wright paid off her loan in equal monthly installments. And Sebastian Carlyle never practiced law again........
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BLAZING SADDLES If I was a wealthy person I would probably sue Mel Brooks for stealing my idea. Blazing Saddles was a great movie but the campfire scene was first performed by yours truly along with a couple of friends of mine. But first lets go back to the beginning, as this book would not be complete without a discussion of my use of drugs. My first twenty-six years I lived in New York and my total consumption of drugs was limited to one joint that a friend from N.Y.U. supplied to me. In all honesty I didnt get high, either because the pot wasnt robust enough or because I didnt inhale it properly. Shortly after moving to Florida I became friendly with a couple of guys, Chris and John, and they taught me how to smoke pot and to do another drug as well. Once I had my first joint it then became difficult to resist, so occasionally I would light up. I remember once that I had to take a lie detector test for a position I applied for. Prior to taking the test the examiner asked me some questions so that he would be able to adjust the machine based on my answers. One of the questions he asked was if I ever smoked pot. I answered, Occasionally. He wanted to know when was the last time I smoked a joint and I told him, last night. He then asked me when did I smoke prior to last night and I told him, the night before last. Once again he asked me when did I smoke prior to the night before last and I told him, the night before that. He then said to me, I thought you only smoked occasionally and I replied, Well, I only smoke at night, not during the day. He then administered the lie detector test and I passed with flying colors..Its a good thing that I only smoked pot occasionally. On another occasion my wife and I had over two of our friends, Marty and Roberta, for dinner. Joy had set the table with tuna fish, bagels, mayonnaise, tomatoes, lettuce, onions and cucumbers. She set the table prior to our guests coming over because it was one of those occasional nights, you know, where we would smoke a joint or should I say joints. The normal practice of smoking a joint is to light one up, take a hit and then pass it to the next person. No one would ever accuse me of being normal. We didnt do it like that. Everyone had their own joint. In this manner you didnt have to worry about catching any communicable diseases. We sat down in the living room and each of us smoked a joint. In no time we were all higher than a kite.and good and hungry.
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We then went to the dining room table to make our tuna sandwich. I was the first one at the table. Normally it would take no more than five minutes to prepare a sandwich, but as I said no one could accuse me of being normal. I picked up a bagel. I now wanted to put some mayonnaise on my bagel. The mayonnaise was located on my right, behind me. For some reason that didnt sit well with me so I walked around the table to get to the mayonnaise. Joy, Marty and Roberta followed my lead, all of us laughing our asses off. After the mayonnaise I wanted to put some lettuce on my bagel and once again it was to my right, neccesating me to once again walk around the table as if I was the Pied Piper because everyone followed me. The same sequence of events held true for the tomatoes, onions, cucumbers and tuna fish. What should have normally taken no more than five minutes to make a sandwich took almost twenty minutes. Now what does this have to do with the title of this chapter, Blazing Saddles?Nothing, absolutely nothing, but the following story does. Shortly after arriving in Florida I made friends with Chris and John who introduced me to pot and a drug called mescaline. Mescaline has basically the same effects on your body as LSD, the only difference is that Mescaline is inorganic and passes through you at the end of your trip. I took four trips on successive weekends with Chris and John. While all were memorable, my first trip was something Ill never forget. The drug comes in the form of a grey tab about 1/8th of an inch on all four sides. All three of us were in my apartment and we each placed a tab on our tongue in front of each other and then swallowed it. The purpose of this was to show each other that we actually took the drug. I didnt know what to expect but since I was in the company of two good friends I felt that all would be well. And it waswell almost. After about a half hour I started to feel a tingly sensation all over my body. The best way to describe it was that my entire body from the tips of my toes to the top of my head felt as if it was having an orgasm.I could live with that. We then went downstairs and John drove us to Holiday Park in Fort Lauderdale. We took our Sestas (mitt that Jai Lai players use) with us. Holiday Park had three wall handball courts and we would occasionally go there to play Jai Lai. Two of us would play at one time and the third person would sit on a bench directly behind the court. Chris was playing John and I positioned myself on the bench. It was about ten at night and it started to rain slightly. Either John or Chris hit the Pelota (ball) over the court and went in search of the ball. As Im sitting on the bench I gaze up at the top of the wall which had a light shining from it to illuminate the court. And there were the rain drops falling from the sky except they didnt look like raindrops to me. Illuminated against the rain they looked like stars in the galaxy and I thought that I was in a space ship speeding through our solar system. And there I was sitting on
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the bench, rocking back and forth, steering my ship through the solar system when two gentlemen walked up to me. I didnt recognize them. Maybe they were stowaways on the ship. In any event at that time both Chris and John came back and quickly came up to me and pulled me up and took me to the car. They left the stowaways on the ship. We then went to a restaurant because we all had the munchies. I dont remember what we ate. I just remember that it was a lot of food. After eating we went back to my apartment and listened to some music. It was the Moody Blues album, In Search of a Seventh Cord. Ive heard parts of the album since but it didnt have the same feel as that night. The third part of the trip was the most frightful. All of a sudden I started having bad thoughts. All I remember now is that I wanted that trip to end as it ceased being fun and all I could hear either Chris or John say is, Steve, its gonna be alright, which they kept repeating. The following day I wrote a song called, Its Gonna Be Alright as well as another druggie song entitled, Space Man. One of the verses went like this. Shadows appear and theres really nothing, Its your mind playing tricks, searching for something, Dont need no ships, Im gonna take you higher. Higher than youve ever been before, higher than youve ever been before, Higher, Higher Finally the third part of the trip ended. I was coming back to my senses when all of a sudden I felt an extreme urge to release gas, you know, fart. Not wanting to embarrass myself in front of my friends I did my best to hold it in, but finally.poofit came out and as soon as it did both Chris and John exploded, not in laughter but from their rear ends. And so the three of us sat around for ten of fifteen minutes farting and laughing. Thats when they told me that the trip comes to an end when you pass gas as the drug passes through you. I did three more trips on the next three weekends and then made a conscious decision not to do it anymore.but Im glad that I had the experience.
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MY WIFE, "J.Stein"............The Beginning It was May 1, 1971. I was in the process of furnishing my bachelor apartment. I needed the usual supplies of pots, pans, utensils, dishes, etc. I went to W.T. Grants, a chain of department stores which has since gone out of business. I loaded up my shopping cart and was waiting my turn on line. I took notice of the cashier who was a cute young girl with blonde hair. Finally it was my turn and she started ringing up my purchases. The first thing that struck me about her was the way she carried herself. She appeared to be in her late teens, attractive, friendly and at the same time very virtuous and of good moral character. It was just a gut feeling that I had about her and as I was about to introduce myself I noticed the name tag she was wearing. It said, "J. Stein." I was immediately taken aback because my first wife's maiden name was also Stein. I thought real quick and decided that complete honesty would be the only way to proceed so as she continued ringing up my purchases I asked her if she knew Mimi Stein (my first wife)? She said no, so I continued with my questioning. I asked her if she knew Dave and Helen Stein (my ex in-laws)? Once again she replied in the negative. Then I asked her if she knew any Stein's from Brooklyn as that is where my ex-wife and her folks were from. Again she said no. At that point I felt comfortable so I said to her, "Okay, give me your telephone number and I'll call you later and we can make a date to go out." Once again, true to form she said no. She was now bagging my purchases, so I knew that I didn't have much time left to get her phone number so I asked her once more for it and once again she replied in the negative. She was just about to give me the total amount due for what I bought when I noticed that there were about ten people in line behind me waiting their turn to check out so I just plopped myself down on the floor and told her that I wasn't getting up until she gave me her telephone number. She looked down at me and frantically said, "Get up or they'll fire me." I looked back up at her and said that I wasn't leaving until she gave me her telephone number. All of a sudden she blurted out her number. I quickly arose and asked her for a pen and had her repeat the number to me. I asked her what the "J" on her name tag stood for and she said, Joy. I told her that I would call her later that evening. Around 9:30 that night I called the number that Joy gave me and much to my surprise she had given me the right one. I guess she was afraid of what I might do if she had given me a wrong number. We talked on the phone for approximately an hour and at the end of our conversation I asked her out for the following evening. With little hesitation she said yes. I did ask one favor of her. I told her to make sure that she told her parents that she was going out with a nice Jewish boy. She promised me that she would honor my wishes....
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It was now the following day, May 2nd. I was preparing for my date with Joy. I wanted to make as good of an impression on her as I possibly could under the circumstances. I had everything under control except for two problems. One that I was aware of and one that I would find out about later on during our evening together. The problem that I knew that I had was a relatively minor one. I had a used car........ A very used car. One of the things it lacked was a floor board on the passenger side of the car. It had rotted away and there was a big gaping hole that gave a clear view of the ground below. I took some cardboard and placed it over the hole. It made it a bit uncomfortable for the passengers because they would have to plant their feet far apart on the floor or else risk that their foot or feet would go through the floor. While it was a tad unpleasant for any passenger of mine, it was still a lot cheaper than me having to buy another car. Monetary considerations won out. Easily... Joy and her folks, along with her older brother Tom lived in a very nice home in a middle class neighborhood in Lauderhill, Florida. Joy greeted me at the door and introduced me to her family. At that point Joy excused herself and said she would be ready in a couple of minutes. Mr. and Mrs. Stein made me feel welcome and as we all engaged in some light talk my eyes took notice of the walls in the living room and how they were decorated and all of a sudden my face turned red and I couldn't wait for Joy to reappear. The reason for my discomfort was because I had grown up in what I refer to as an "Ivory Soap" neighborhood or community. It was ninety-nine percent Jewish. Virtually everyone who lived there was Jewish and the name Stein was a very distinct Jewish surname. As a matter of fact, up until the time I met Joy and her parents, I didn't know that they made Stein's any other way. Not only weren't the Stein's Jewish, as I could tell by the picture of Jesus Christ on the wall, but as I found out later the Stein's were also German.....A Jew's best friend. The only thoughts going through my mind was that Joy did what I had asked her to, which was to tell her parents that she was going out with a nice Jewish boy. All of a sudden I started to sweat. It was as if I was in an oven. I looked at the Stein's and I didn't notice any perspiration on them at all. I wondered if it was my seat?.... I never found out because Joy suddenly reappeared and we left... We went to an Italian restaurant on our first date. Well.......... it really wasn't an Italian restaurant. It was like an Italian restaurant. Actually it was a diner that served spaghetti and a couple of other Italian dishes. And if I hadn't of found out that Joy wasn't Jewish when I went to her home, I would certainly have surmised it when we went out to eat because Jewish people don't order spaghetti and meatballs
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with a glass of milk. And when she did I told her, "Listen, spaghetti and meatballs goes with soda, beer or wine. Milk goes with Tuna fish. Which do you want?" Our date wasn't more than thirty minutes old and already we had had our first fight. Notwithstanding the spaghetti, meatball and milk story, the evening proceeded on very smoothly. We were enjoying each others company and planning for our second date when on our way back to her house (I had to have her home by ten because she had school the next day) I found out about the second problem. It had rained very heavily the night before. Many of the streets had huge puddles throughout them. Joy and I were talking as we were driving in the car when all of a sudden I went through a large puddle. Thankfully this happened towards the end of our date. As my car went through the puddle, the force of the water came up under the car and entered into the glove compartment, forcing it open and splashing directly onto her. She was drenched. I was hysterical. Little did I know at that moment that the event I had just witnessed would be the start of what has so far been forty years of unexpected and fun filled incidents that we have endured together. The next day I traded my car in for a 1967 Bonneville convertible. It didn't have the "glove box" feature that my other car had. Listen, I was a young kid. I couldn't afford every option. I thought the convertible alternative was more suitable and as I was driving it home to show to Joy I imagined that we were out on a date with the top down and it started to rain and when I tried to close the convertible top it got stuck. Now we would both get wet. Fortunately that never happened. It was now May 24th. Joy and I had known each other for twenty-four days. During that period we had dated about ten times. We would have seen each other more often except that her mother didn't approve of our relationship and did everything she could to break us up, in part because I was eight years older than Joy and in addition because I was Jewish. That was the very first time in my life that I was discriminated against because of my religion. But I got even with Joy's mother.........I married her daughter. It was the twenty-fourth of May and Joy and I after having known each other for only twenty-four days were now eloping to Dillon, South Carolina. We couldn't get married in Florida because at that time if you were under twenty-one you needed parental permission and since Joy was only eighteen the only permission her parents would give her regarding me, was permission for her not to see me and of course that doesn't make for a great marriage, so we eloped to the nearest state that would accept our hands in matrimony without anyone's permission but ours.
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The night before I prepared about twenty sandwiches for our ride to Dillon. It was a twelve hour trip and we had to be there by nine at night in order to be married by the Justice of the Peace, so we didn't really have too much time to stop along the way. I met Joy near her school. She parked her car and hopped into mine. It was about six thirty in the morning. Six hours later her mother would start to get suspicious because Joy hadn't returned from school. That was cutting it close because it would take six hours for us to drive through Florida and enter Georgia. My one major fear during our trip was getting stopped by the Florida State Troopers but thankfully that never occurred. At about 8:40 on the night of May 24th, 1971, having known her for only twentyfour days, Joy Stein became Joy Stein Chanzes. We took the honeymoon suite at "Pedro's South of the Border," a motel resort in South Carolina by the South Carolina, North Carolina border and dined on fried chicken. It wasn't quite as good as Mrs. Peacocks and it certainly cost a whole lot more but there was nothing I could do about it. After all Mrs. Peacock only made fried chicken on Saturday. Joy and I got married on a Monday. We made our return trip to Florida the very next day. Much to my surprise my new found mother in-law had a welcoming committee for us.....The Lauderhill Police. They showed me their credentials (their badges) and I showed them mine (our marriage certificate). They gave us their blessings and left. Now Joy and I had one piece of unfinished business left to do. We had to go to Joy's parents home so that they could meet their new son in-law ......... and Joy also needed her pillow. I don't remember exactly what was said that night. My memory is blurred. What I do remember is that there were a lot of high pitched voices, mostly coming from Joy's mom and brother. Joy's mom refused to let Joy have her car back. Usually cars get repossessed for nonpayment. This was probably the first time in the history of mankind that a car got repossessed because its owner eloped. I was furious. We needed the car but there was nothing I could do about it. Visions of suing my mother in-law were quickly dispelled because since we were just starting out in life I thought that once my mother in-law got over this episode she would probably have us over for dinner many times since we only lived about ten blocks away and that would surely save us some well needed money. Of course after having eaten my mother in-laws cooking a few times, I realized later that I should have sued her instead.
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And to this very day she has never forgiven us for what took place on May 24, 1971. She still holds a grudge, albeit a small one, but it's there. In some ways I can understand because I too still hold a grudge against her. The difference is that her grudge against me is for something that happened only one time, over forty years ago. My grudge against her is also for one thing, but it's one thing that she constantly does and has been doing for over forty years and I think she does it on purpose. Just to upset me. And I wish and pray that she would stop doing it, but she never does. But in some ways I can now control it better so I don't get upset that often. I just tell her, "No mom. I can't.......... Why don't you just come over to our house for dinner"..................
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CHOOSING A CAREER Now that I was married there were two pressing issues that I had to deal with. I needed to choose a career and I needed to earn money.........And not necessarily in that order...... I quickly realized that I didn't want my lifes work to be in the finance business because it wasn't that enjoyable and the pay was even less accommodating. I decided to temporarily seek employment in the insurance industry because it was something that I was familiar with as I had worked for two insurance firms when I had lived in New York. In addition, due to the nature of the business, whereby your time was mostly spent outside the office, I would be able to continue my search for a "career opportunity" while still earning a decent pay. The insurance industry at best is a difficult business to succeed in. The usual "modus operandi" is to have the new sales representatives make a list of all their friends and relatives and contact them with the express purpose of selling them an insurance policy. The end result is fairly obvious. Before you know it you have no friends and your relatives all want to disown you. But I had just moved to Florida, so I didn't have many friends anyway and as far as relatives were concerned, what's the worst that could have happened? My mother in-law wouldn't have talked to me anymore? That thought alone was the motivating factor that made me apply for a position as an insurance agent. There was another appealing aspect to the insurance industry. Those that run it realize the adversity that faces all new sales representatives in their quest to gain acceptance in the community as an insurance professional, so most major insurance companies offer a remuneration program which is referred to as a validation schedule and this payroll plan is for new reps only and the duration is normally for three years. It works in the following manner. Let's say that your starting draw is $250.00 per week. In order to justify the company paying you that sum of money you must earn in actual commissions only $25.00 per week during your first three months. In effect the company is advancing you $225.00 per week above and beyond your actual earnings if in fact you only earned $25.00 per week as in the above example. Then during your next three months, in order for the company to continue to pay you your draw of $250.00 per week, you have to earn $50.00 per week in commissions. In this manner the average new insurance agent can survive financially because the company is actually carrying the agent for a period of time while the agent learns his craft. With a normal validation schedule pay program, during your first two years the company is actually paying you more
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than you have earned. During your third year you start to pay back your indebtedness to the company because in order for them to continue paying you your draw of $250.00 you must actually earn more than that so at the conclusion of your third year, in theory you are no longer indebted to the company. I applied for a position at Western Life Insurance Company. I was hired at a starting draw of $200.00 per week. That was in 1971. To put things into perspective with regards to the cost of living back then, we had bought two new Datsuns. Our payments were $55.00 per month on each car. Joy was earning approximately $150.00 per week, so together we were keeping a roof over our heads. Other than the validation schedule that I had to adhere to, the only other requirement at Western Life was for its sales representatives to attend a weekly sales meeting every Monday morning at ten. With that type of an office structure I unmistakably had a lot of time on my hands as most of my sales were residential which required me to work at night, giving me my days to myself. Most of the other agents used that time to sun themselves on the beach or to do other meaningless things. I thought otherwise. I saw an opportunity to earn some decent monies over the next few months. It was as plain as the nose on my face..... I then applied for a job as a sales representative at MILICO, Massachusetts Indemnity and Life Insurance Company. It was a perfect job for many reasons. First of all it was in the insurance industry, something I was presently involved in. Secondly they also had a validation schedule and they were going to pay me $250.00 per week. And last but not least, they had their weekly meetings on Tuesdays, so it didn't conflict with my Monday meetings at Western Life Insurance Company. Of course neither company knew that I was working for the other. Quite obviously they wouldn't have tolerated that so I kept my mouth shut and didn't rock the boat. I was now earning $450.00 per week and I still had three days to account for... I still had plenty of time on my hands so I kept on applying for other outside sales jobs. I almost landed one at Prudential Insurance Company but I had to turn it down. Their meetings were on Monday, the same day and time as Western Life. I needed a company that had meetings on a Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. There were many times that I would call an ad listed in the paper and ask the recruiter over the phone if they had weekly sales meetings and if so what day was it on? They had no idea why I was asking that question and I'm sure many of them put the phone down in a stupefied state of mind because they felt that I sounded like a good applicant but they couldn't understand why I would refuse an interview because their sales meetings were either on a Monday or Tuesday morning.
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Finally I found a company that had sales meetings that didn't conflict with the present ones that I was attending. It was Zenoll Furniture Company. Zenoll's sold furniture in predominantly black neighborhoods. This was in the days before black people found out that they really weren't black, but rather African-Americans. It was my job to go into an assigned area and sell furniture to the residents and collect the monthly payments as well. In addition I had to attend a sales meeting every Wednesday........Perfect. For this position I earned a salary of $150.00 per week plus commissions equal to another $150.00 per week. I was now earning about $750.00 weekly and I still had two days unaccounted for..... My multi-facetted career came to an end about four months later. The insurance companies, Western Life and MILICO were putting lots of demands on me. Each company wanted me to earn approximately $50.00 per week in commissions in order to justify paying me $200.00 and $250.00 per week. I couldn't take the pressure so I had to resign.....
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THE COMET KOHOTEK It was sometime in 1972 I believe. Joy and I lived in the Meadowbrook apartment complex. We moved into a brand new unit. The complex had a pool and tennis courts. It was heavenly. I was still in a dream world because I couldn't get over the fact that not too long ago I had lived in the Bronx, whose memories I wouldn't trade for all of Rockefeller's money, but here I was living in Florida and having a pool and tennis courts and beautiful weather all year round. It was almost like a dream come true. We lived on the third floor and our patio overlooked Inverrary which was a large development that Jackie Gleason not only promoted but also lived in, and for many years he was also the host of the Inverrary Golf Classic. Many mornings on my way to work I would ride down Rock Island Road which was adjacent to the Inverrary golf course and I could see Jackie Gleason out on the golf course. Even at a distance he was very noticeable because his golf cart had a Rolls Royce Grill and he always wore knickers. Just about the time that we moved into Meadowbrook, Inverrary had just completed building its million dollar clubhouse. The event was publicized in the local papers. About the same time the Inverrary Clubhouse was opening up there was another event receiving much publicity. It was the imminent arrival of the Comet Kohotek. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity to see the Comet because it wouldn't show itself for another hundred years or so. It was going to be visible in the southern sky which our patio oversaw. The comet was going to make its appearance at approximately two o'clock in the morning. Joy set the alarm to wake us up so that we could be an eye witness to this once in a lifetime celestial event. The alarm went off precisely at two. At least that's what Joy told me, because I didn't hear it. I was out like a light. All of a sudden she started screaming at me to get up. She said the Comet Kohotek was visible in the sky and was emitting a clear cut flame across the southern atmosphere. I told her that I was tired and would see it on the news in the morning. She tried to get me to change my mind but when she saw that I wasn't budging she quickly returned to her seat on our patio to watch the galactic show. That morning Joy told me what a beautiful sight I missed the night before. She said that the Comet Kohotek created a visual effect that lit up the night sky giving it the appearance that it was on fire. I was in a rush that day, having gotten up late, and I told Joy that I would have to see it on the evening news. I kissed her goodbye and left for work. I got into my car and turned on the radio and drove off. Within minutes the news
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came on and there were two lead stories. The first one had to do with the Comet Kohotek. The reporter said that due to cloudy atmospheric conditions the Comet Kohotek was not visible in Southern Florida last night. The second story had to do with the Inverrary Clubhouse. It had only been open less than a week and last night a freak fire caused it to burn down to the ground, illuminating the sky for miles and miles. Joy still swears that it was the Comet Kohotek that she saw.............
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JOHNNIE COCHRAN...............MOVE OVER!!! Everybody names their kids and their pets. Some people even name their boats. Very few people have a name for their hot tub. We did, and for good reason. We called it "Oppie's Tub," named after a former employee of mine, Paul Oppenheimer. I had a company called Fantastic Finds and Paul was one of our salesmen. We sold advertising specialties to businesses. My salespeople worked on a commission basis and I would advance them their full commission pending payment from their clients. In the event their accounts didn't pay me then I would deduct the charge back from their next commission statement. It was a system that worked fairly well and enabled me to recruit salespeople with minimum exposure on my part. One day Mr. Oppenheimer walked into my office and said that he was quitting. He didn't tell me why and he didn't tell me if he was going to a competitor, which I suspected he was. He just quit without an explanation. I wished him the best and told him to come back in two months for a final accounting of his orders. He told me he would and we shook hands. Usually when a salesperson resigned or was terminated there would be a small balance due them once all their open accounts settled. On rare occasions the sales representative would have a negative balance and actually owe monies to my company after their accounts were resolved. In those cases I would never ask the representative to pay me and for two good reasons. Number one, I had usually made a fair profit on their sales and I could absorb a small loss when they left and secondly they would laugh at me if I tried to collect monies from them that were rightfully due me, so why bother. But God forbid if I owed them money, even if it was a dollar, you could rest assured that they would be camped at my door with their palm extended, expecting and rightfully so, for me to pay them. Mr. Oppenheimer waited two months after he quit and one Thursday called me to let me know he would be in for his final paycheck the next day. I told him that after his accounts had settled, he actually owed me over $300.00 but I was canceling the debt because he had been such a good employee of mine. He immediately got very defensive and accused me of cheating him out of monies due him. I told him to come in the next day and we would go over every account that was outstanding when he left the firm and if need be he could call any of the
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accounts that didn't pay me to confirm that I was totally honest with him. He said that he would see me the next day. Sure enough he came in on Friday and I had all of his accounts on my desk. I told him to have a seat so we could start to go over his orders so I could show him which ones didn't pay the company. He just looked at me, gave a smirk and walked out. I then put together a detailed analysis of his account file and mailed it to him. About a week later Joy and I went to New York to visit my folks. One day I got a call from my manager saying that Oppenheimer was calling the office on a daily basis and insinuating to whoever picked up the phone that I hadn't been honest with him and had cheated him out of commissions. I told the manager to ignore the calls and eventually they would cease. And I was right. But not immediately, because the calls persisted for the two weeks that Joy and I were in New York and they endured for an additional two weeks upon our return to Florida. But finally they did stop. We hadn't received a phone call from Oppenheimer for at least a month when one day a process server came into my office and handed me some papers. It was a subpoena. Oppenheimer was suing my company (which was me) for $2,500.00 in small claims court. I gave tremendous thought to the lawsuit............ About two seconds worth. Then I called my attorney and scheduled an appointment to see him. One thing that I found out about most attorneys many, many years ago is that they're good..............for nothing. My attorney was no different. On the day of my appointment I went to his office and showed him the papers that were served on me and told him my side of the story, assuring him that Oppenheimer owed me money, not the other way around. Without flinching my legal advisor told me to offer Oppenheimer $1,000 to settle the case. I said to him, "ARE YOU NUTS? Give him $1,000 dollars? He doesn't deserve 1,000 cents let alone dollars. No, we're not settling this case if settlement means that I have to pay him." My attorney told me that in order to defend me in court he would have to charge me at least three grand. I said, "Fine, charge me three thousand and when you go to court I want you to counter sue the son of a bitch for $100,000.00 for harassing my staff with all of the phone calls he made to my office." My attorney knew me very well from past dealings and he wasn't going to try to alter my feelings because he knew that I was adamant in my views and that if he got me riled up then the only person that would really suffer would be him....To the tune of $3,000.00 because I would use another attorney.
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On the day of reckoning I sent my attorney to the courthouse by himself as I wasn't subpoenaed so therefore I didn't have to appear. Oppenheimer elected to represent himself. When the case was called in front of the bench my attorney handed Oppenheimer and the judge who was presiding a set of papers. The judge looked them over and asked Oppenheimer if he had an attorney? He responded, "No." At that point the judge advised him to give thought to retaining one because he was being counter sued for $100,000, and since my lawsuit was out of the realm of the small claims division, then Oppenheimers suit would also be heard in the regular civil court. And so Oppenheimer and my attorney left the courthouse with Oppenheimer carrying an additional piece of paper that he hadn't had when he entered the courtroom. That piece of paper had a price tag.........$100,000.00. Our court date was three months away and within three weeks I quickly realized that this wouldn't be your typical courtroom case. I submitted a set of questions to my attorney and told him to put those questions into a set of interrogatories which I as the petitioner had a right to ask of the defendant (Oppenheimer). They were sent out via certified mail, signed for by Oppenheimer and never returned. I then told my attorney to subpoena Oppenheimer so that we could ask him questions under oath. Once again the request was ignored. My attorney then went in front of the judge presiding over the case to advise him of the conduct of the defendant and the judge authorized a certified letter to be sent to him advising him to appear for the deposition or risk being held in contempt of court. This time Oppenheimer didn't sign for the certified letter. The court date was rapidly approaching and it was anybodys guess as to what would happen. And nobody guessed right..... The pre-trial conference was set up approximately one week before the actual trial. It is at that hearing where the attorneys for both sides are asked if they are ready to proceed with the case and they also have to list their witnesses, if any, that they are going to call upon. They are also given the option of requesting a trial by jury or by the judge. If one of the two parties in a lawsuit decides that they want a trial by jury then the other side must abide by that decision. I told my attorney to request a jury trial because I felt that judges make decisions based on law and jurists make theirs based on which attorney is a better actor. The law has little place in a jurists mind. My attorney called me in my office and said that we would be going to trial the following week and it would be in front of a jury and furthermore he went on to tell me that Oppenheimer didn't object, mainly because he never showed up for the pre-trial conference. The judge, given the circumstances of the case and actions or
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inactions by Oppenheimer said that the trial would go on as scheduled. My attorney and I showed up at court for our trial. The judge was there and so was the jury panel. Conspicuously absent was Oppenheimer. After the jury was selected the judge looked at the six jurors and remarked to them, "This trial is going to be very unusual. As a matter of fact I don't remember ever having presided over one quite like it. The reason for its peculiarity is because the defendant will not be here. Therefore you will not hear any objections from him and it is up to you to decide if the plaintiff is telling the truth." And so the trial proceeded. It took approximately thirty minutes for my attorney to present our case. I was the only witness. The jury deliberated about an additional fifteen minutes. They found Mr. Oppenheimer at fault and awarded me $50,000.00 in damages. Compensatory damages. That means they were compensating me for productive time lost at work because of the nature of the complaint which was the unending harassing phone calls by Oppenheimer which prevented my staff and myself from doing our work. But they didn't stop there. They decided at my attorney's behest to also award me punitive damages which in effect is a punishment for the hurt that was inflicted on my company by Mr. Oppenheimer. The punitive damage award was for $250,000.00. I thanked my attorney, I thanked the judge and I certainly thanked the jury. The judge then dismissed the jurors and told my attorney, "Okay counselor, now let's see you collect any of it." At first I was a bit angry at the judge for his closing remark to my attorney, but after thinking it over I realized that the judge didn't know that if it was up to my counselor then there wouldn't have been a lawsuit to begin with. So why should I be upset with the judge? Besides, I had more important things to attend to, like trying to find out if Mr. Oppenheimer had any assets that I could attach. From the courthouse I went back to my office muttering to myself, "$300,000.00, $300,000.00." It was very difficult to give thought to anything else. I got back into the office and checked my messages. Joy buzzed me on the intercom and asked if she could come into my office. I told her not right now because I was deep in thought. She then told me that the payroll checks needed my signature and as soon as she said that a light bulb went off in my head and I yelled over the phone, "BRING ME IN THE CANCELLED PAYROLL CHECKS FROM THE PAST FEW MONTHS."
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I went through the payroll checks that had been cashed a few months ago and found four of them that were issued to Paul Oppenheimer. He had deposited all of his payroll checks into, much to my surprise, two different accounts at the same bank. I called my attorney and told him what I found out. His first words to me were, "Steve, now you don't THINK that he is going to have any money in those accounts, do you?" I wanted to tell my attorney that if he could THINK then he might be able to up his hourly rate, but I didn't want to upset him. Of course this wasn't the proper time nor the place for me to pontificate my views, so instead I just told the "barrister" to IMMEDIATELY file the necessary papers to freeze whatever monies that might be in those two accounts and in the event that there was money in any of the accounts to have them released to his trust account as per court order. Approximately one week later my attorney called me at my office. His voice was very upbeat. I knew that something was up but before I could say anything he said, "Steve, you're not going to believe this but I just heard from Oppenheimer's bank and he has over $7,000.00 in one of the accounts." With tongue in cheek I said, "Great job counselor. Now, how do we get the money?" He said, "Wait, I'm not finished. In his other account he has more than $14,000.00." With even more emphasis in my voice I once again said, "So how do we get the money." My attorney told me that the bank, prior to releasing the money, wanted to ask the court if it would consent to giving Mr. Oppenheimer one last chance to appear in court to contest the judgment. My attorney saw no use in objecting because the bank was apparently going to file the necessary paperwork anyway, so he gave his consent. The bank received approval from the court and then sent a certified letter to Mr. Oppenheimer advising him to appear in court to show cause why they shouldn't release the monies in his frozen bank accounts to my attorney. The letter advised him that in the event he didn't show up for his court appearance then the bank would have no alternative but to release the monies to my attorney's trust account. The court date arrived as did the attorney for the bank, as did my attorney, as did the judge. The only one who didn't arrive was Mr. Oppenheimer. Approximately one hour later my attorney walked out of the bank with two certified checks totaling over $21,000.00. Now Mr. Oppenheimer only owed me $279,000.00. So thats how we purchased the hot tub and we thought that it would be only proper to name it after its donor..so we called it Oppies Tub.
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DUMPER TWO I bought my first boat in 1990. It was a 19' Bayliner. Why I bought the boat is a question that I still can't answer because my boating experiences up until that time were all nauseating, potentially disastrous and miserable beyond belief for me and sometimes for others, as you will be able to tell regarding the circumstances surrounding the naming of my boat. My earliest boating experiences were with my dad. He used to take me (or should I say drag me) to City Island, a small community just east of the Bronx on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. Once there we would board a charter boat called The Apache and head out for a day of fishing. Most of the people that boarded The Apache went fishing. Actually I was the only one who didn't. Not because I didn't want to, but rather because once the boat headed out it would normally take me about fifteen minutes to develop a queasiness in my stomach and in about another fifteen minutes my face would turn a pale green and I would then position my head over the side of the boat........and feed the fish. I used to beg my dad not to take me fishing with him but each time he would assure me that eventually I would get over my bouts of seasickness. And he was right as he usually was, because ultimately I did get over the nausea that enveloped me when I went fishing with him. And coincidentally the nausea stopped the very day that I stopped going fishing. In 1984, Joy and I along with two of our friends, Howard and Carolyn, vacationed in Captiva, a small island on the Gulf of Mexico in proximity to Fort Myers. We had two boating experiences that weekend of which the first one resulted in the naming of my boat, Dumper Two. Our second experience that weekend almost proved disastrous, but having survived it, we can now laugh about it. On our way home from Captiva we stopped in Fort Myers beach and had a bite to eat and then decided to rent a boat. Howard took control of the wheel and after we had been out on the water for a spell I asked Howard if I could drive the boat. Howard asked me if I had ever piloted a boat before and I told him no and that made him a bit hesitant to turn over the wheel to me so I then reminded him that I was paying for our "day of fun on the water" and Howard very hesitantly relinquished the captain's chair. Everything was going along very smoothly. Off in the distance we saw some people swimming in the water and sunning themselves on the beach. It looked
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inviting so we decided to dock our boat and go swimming and lay out in the sun as well. As we approached the beach in our boat we noticed that there was a pier jutting out into the water. To the side of the pier about ten feet away were wooden poles sticking out of the water and running down the entire length of the dock. Howard told me to pull our boat in between the wooden poles and the pier so that we could anchor the motorboat. As I approached the dock I started to steer the boat between the poles and the pier when all of a sudden Howard told me to slow down. This was the first time that I had ever piloted a boat. I yelled back in all seriousness to Howard, "WHERE THE HELL ARE THE BRAKES?" He shouted back, "STEVE, THERE AREN'T ANY BRAKES ON A BOAT. JUST EASE BACK ON THE THROTTLE A BIT." I followed his instructions and as I eased the throttle back the boat started to drift under the pier. Joy and Carolyn were sitting in the back of the boat when Howard blurted out at them, "DUCK DOWN NOW." It's a good thing they did because there wasn't much clearance between the water and the dock and they would have had an awful headache if they didn't duck down. Of course that's assuming that their heads would have still been attached to their bodies. At the same time that Howard told the girls to duck down he yelled out at me to push the throttle forwards. I must have pushed it too far forwards because the boat lurched ahead and slammed into one of the poles and as it did two things started to disappear real fast. One was the pole that I hit as it started to collapse into the water and the other thing that started to vanish were the people on the beach, because they gathered up their belongings and ran as fast as their feet could carry them far and away from the lunatic that was piloting the boat. Thankfully Joy, Carolyn, Howard and I were okay.......But the boat wasn't. It had lots of scrapes and dents on the side. Scrapes and dents that weren't there prior to my commandeering the boat. By unanimous vote we decided to wait until the sun went down before we returned the boat, hoping that the damage wouldn't be noticeable. In addition, by a clear majority vote it was also decided that I would turn over the "Captain's Chair" to Howard......Actually after some contemplation I made the vote unanimous. I still don't understand why they don't put brakes on boats................... I had one other boating experience the day before and what happened on that day in 1984 caused my good friend John to come up with the name for my boat that I bought some six years later. When he found out that I bought a boat, he asked me to name it "Dumper Two." And I did.....And here's why........
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The day before the Fort Myers catastrophe, we had rented a boat in Captiva at the place where we were staying. Howard asked the dock master if there were any places that he could recommend for us to go to and he replied that about an hour away there was a place called Cabbage Key. It used to be the home of an author and it was now a museum and restaurant accessible by boat. He told us that the restaurant was strictly burgers, dogs and fries, but that it was very unique and he was sure that we would enjoy it. He then instructed us on how to follow the water markers and within an hour we were docking our boat at Cabbage Key. By then we were very hungry so we went immediately to the restaurant. The motif of the restaurant was very unusual. All along the walls and ceiling were dollar bills signed and dated by the diners. Of course not every customer posted a dollar bill on the wall. As you would look around, every so often you would see someone who thought they weren't being watched take a dollar bill off the wall. I guess this enabled them to either leave a bigger tip, eat more or eat for free. The food happened to be very good and when we finished we decided to skip the museum and instead got back into the boat and started to head back to port and then that's when it hit me. I started to get cramps in my stomach. I was doubled over in pain. I had to relieve myself and quick. Howard told me to drop my bathing trunks and lean my rear end over the boat and unload in the water. But it was daylight and there were boaters all around us. I couldn't do that. Then, all of a sudden, as if my prayers were answered, there appeared out of nowhere, right in the middle of the waterway, a fishing shack. The shack had a ledge completely around it, sitting atop stilts that were about fifteen feet out of the water. Sitting along the ledge were fishermen with their feet dangling over it and their fishing lines falling into the water. Howard guided the boat to the shack and yelled up to one of the fishermen, "Is there a head up there?" The guy said yes and as I arose from my seat to climb up the ladder to the shack the pains were becoming unbearable. I knew that I wouldn't be able to hold it in much longer. I was just hoping and praying that I could make it to the bathroom. The pains had now become so intense that I couldn't even part my legs for fear that all hell would break loose, so I started to hop up the ladder. I could hear Howard, Carolyn and Joy start to laugh as I did my imitation of Bugs Bunny. I finally reached the ledge and literally started to hop across it. I asked one of the fellows who were fishing where the head was and he pointed and said it was just around the corner. I turned the corner and saw the head. It was maybe fifteen feet from me, a good twenty hops. I reached the door and opened it. The room was about three by four, if that. The only light inside the head was coming from
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the round hole in the floor that was about one foot in diameter. That hole was my target. As I pulled my trunks off I could see water below as well as a tree trunk curving underneath the hole in the floor. My swim suit came off in a flash and I immediately went into action. Nonstop for what seemed like an eternity but in reality lasted for a few minutes. I had a bad case of diarrhea, not that there's anything such as a good case of it, nevertheless mine was very bad but thankfully within a few minutes I was finally relieved......well, almost. As I was remedying my problem I noticed that something was missing from this "outhouse" and what was missing was toilet paper. I did the best I could under the circumstances, pulled my trunks up, opened up the door and did something that I hadn't been able to do recently.............I walked. As I proceeded across the ledge I noticed that the fishermen were just gazing up at me. Their fishing lines were in the water but they weren't paying attention to it. Instead they were just looking at me. Staring. It made me very self-conscious. After all, what did I do that was so unusual? Didn't these guys take a dump every day of their lives? As I turned the corner I could hear Howard, Carolyn and Joy howling with laughter. I started to yell at them. I walked along the ledge heading towards the ladder to make my way down to the boat. The more I yelled, the more they laughed. I was pissed. As I was climbing down the ladder I told them to grow up and stop acting like children. They continued to laugh. I got in the boat and Howard put her in gear and we took off with all three of them in hysterics. Finally they couldn't contain themselves any longer and Howard said to me, "Steve, when you were up there in the bathroom did you notice anything appearing through the hole in the floor?" I told him that all I saw was the water below and a tree trunk that sort of curved underneath the head. Then Howard told me why the fishermen were staring at me as well as why everyone was laughing so hard. It seems that at the base of the tree, fishing, was this kid about twelve years old. The kid felt something hit him on the head and when he looked up to see what it was..........WHAP...........he got hit again........right on his face........ It didn't take me too long to figure out that if this kid lives to be one hundred years old and if someone would ever say to him, "Do you want to go fishing?" His immediate reaction will be to bring his hands up over his head and yell out, "NO." I would imagine that he would have the same reaction if someone would ever ask him to go on a picnic in a park like setting with lots of trees....................."NO." Interestingly enough we drove the boat by the fishing shack about a half hour later
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and there wasn't a sole around............. Not even the kid who was the inspiration for the name of my boat, ............... "Dumper Two."
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THE SHRINK WHO NEEDED A SHRINK The year was 1990. Joy and I were experiencing some marital difficulties. She decided that it might benefit us if we went for professional help. Now I'm not enamored with the Psychiatric profession, if you could call it that. Think about it. How many times have you seen or read that during a trial the Psychiatrist for the defense swears that the accused is suffering from some type of emotional disorder and should therefore be forgiven for their transgressions. At the same time the Psychiatrist for the prosecution says just the opposite; that the accused was fully aware of what they were doing, has no disorders and should be held completely accountable for the crime. It happens every time. How can you call this a profession? These people aren't skilled experts. They're lying bastards preying on the public. They deceive, they falsify information, they betray, they delude, trick, hoodwink, dupe, beguile and bamboozle people. They're the lowest of the low........................I couldn't wait to see the shrink. Joy found one whose name was identical to a very famous sports personality. I'll just call him Doc. His office was less than a mile from ours. Joy and I saw him together the first time. He was in his early forties. Thin, good looking and very disheveled. On appearance you would never think that he was a psychiatrist. And after you attended one of his sessions, you most certainly wouldn't think he was one..............................But who cared? I was there for the entertainment aspect and nothing else. Of course I didn't tell my wife that.............And certainly not the Doc.............................At least not at first. We were the only people in the waiting room. The Doc was in his office with a patient. After the session ended, the Doc escorted her through the waiting room to the exit door. He offered a quick hello to us and said that he would be right back. He opened the door and said goodbye to his client and then as he started to introduce himself to Joy and I he suddenly bolted for the door once more and yelled out her name as she was walking down the hallway. He thrust his hand up to his forehead and said, "Did you forget to give me a check?" His patient then came back and paid the Doc for his services. After she left he once again welcomed us and took us into his office. One of the very first things that we noticed was that his shirt was half in and half out of his pants. The Doc was very unkempt. I thought that maybe he had a brief tryst with his patient, but that thought was quickly dispelled because I realized that he would have had a lot of nerve to then ask her to pay him too. I mean, how good could he possibly have
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been? Over the next few weeks I learned that the Doc was just your everyday basic good natured slob and nothing more. He asked us to have a seat and as we talked I kept thinking that I knew the Doc, but I couldn't figure out where I met him and then it hit me. He looked like a younger version of Colombo, the detective that Peter Falk portrayed on television. I was just hoping that he wasn't as smart as Colombo and thankfully the Doc didn't disappoint me. As Doc listened to us he had a tendency to lean back over to one side of his chair. I kept thinking to myself that his chair didn't look that sturdy and then.......BOOM........his chair tipped over, propelling him to the ground. In the succeeding three months that Joy and I saw the Doc, both together and separately, that incident happened at least once every session. That episode alone was worth the price of admission. But it got better..................... We were at the point where Joy and I were seeing the Doc separately. Joy would see him on Monday night and I would see him Tuesday evenings at 7:30. It was now seven o'clock, Tuesday night. I was sitting in my office. I was going to leave in about twenty minutes and drive over to see the Doc for my weekly therapeutic session. I picked up the phone and called him. I knew that he was in session with a client and usually when he was his answering service picked up. But not this time. Doc picked up the phone and I told him that I would see him shortly. He asked me if I had anything else to tell him because he was with a client. I said, "Yeah, just one quick thing Doc. I've got a joint. Let's you and I get stoned tonight." He replied at once, "Steve, I don't do that anymore. I'll see you at 7:30." And then he hung up the phone. It was now 7:25. I was sitting in his waiting room. A few minutes went by and the Doc's door opened and out stepped his patient and then the Doc. I nodded at his client and the Doc gave me a quick hello. He opened the door to let his patient out and after he said goodbye to her he came in and he pointed towards his office. I started to walk in the direction of it when just as I expected I heard a shuffling of feet. All of a sudden the outer door to the hallway opened and I heard the Doc yell out, "Excuse me." I turned around and there was the Doc with his hand in the now all too familiar position resting on his brow. I heard him yell down the hall to his patient, "Did you forget to leave me a check?"
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A couple of minutes later the Doc and I were sitting comfortably in his office. He hadn't noticed that I had placed the joint on his desk. He asked me the usual questions. "Did you have a good week? Are you and Joy working out your problems?" I answered yes to both questions and then I picked up the joint and lit it. The Doc looked at me and said, "Steve, what are you doing?" I said, "Doc, if you can't figure this out, then I'm going to have to find another shrink." With that I started to take a hit on the joint. I gestured with the joint towards Doc but he shook his head no. And so I took another hit and then placed the joint in the ashtray. Doc instantly grabbed it and said, "I'm just going to have one toke. I haven't smoked pot in over twenty years, so I'm just going to have one hit." I said, "Whatever you say Doc." He took a hit and then passed the joint to me. I took a toke and the Doc at that point literally took the joint out of my hand. Pretty soon it was like a ping pong match because as soon as I took a toke the Doc would then take one. And so it went, back and forth until the joint was almost finished. And if our smoking contest had been a best of seven than I would have won by default, because suddenly the Doc turned white as a ghost and he said, "Excuse me." And with that he collapsed onto the floor. He just laid there muttering out, "Steve, this is very unprofessional of me." I said, "Doc, this is the most professional thing that you have ever done." He said, "Steve, how can you say that." "Because Doc, this just goes to show that you're a real human being...............A real human being who's shit faced." "Steve, do you really think that I'm stoned?" "No, Doc. You're not stoned. You're just lying on the floor because you're tired." I then told Doc that I was putting a check on his desk for my hourly consultation fee. He was straight enough to tell me that he couldn't take it under the present set of circumstances. I told him that I couldn't buy better entertainment anywhere else so I was insisting that he keep the check. I then asked him if he wanted another toke on the joint and he blurted out at the top of his lungs, "NO-O-O-O." So there I was, sitting on a chair and right at my feet was the Doc, stretched out on the floor. I said, "Doc, why don't you sit up?" He said, "Steve, I can't move. My head is whirling around. What was in that marijuana? I said, "If I tell you, do you promise you won't tell anyone?" He said of course. I then told him, "Doc, the only thing in the marijuana is marijuana." He then wanted to know why I was able to function. I told him that it was probably because I haven't been "dry" for twenty years like he was. I was trying to have some conversation with him when he abruptly said, "What's that wire and what's that sound?" There was a white wire coming out from under the Doc's desk running along the floor and into another room where there was a
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whirring sound that the Doc was referring to. I said, "Doc, that wire is coming out from under your desk. Don't you know what it is?" He said that he didn't and he was also very upset about the whirring noise that was coming from the other room. I told him not to go anywhere, as if he could, and that I would check on it. I then got up from my chair and followed the wire into the other room. I came back and said, "Doc, this wire goes to a machine in the other room. That machine is causing the whirring sound and the machine is a smoke exhaust. He looked at me and said, "Oh yeah. That's right. That's my machine. I bought it a few months ago. Funny though, because I never noticed the whirring sound before." I said, "Doc, did you ever notice the white wire on the floor before?" He looked at me and said, "Steve, I'm all messed up." I said, "Doc, I know that, but I thought the grass would make you better." He just looked at me. I asked him if he wanted me to take him home. He said he couldn't go home because his wife would kill him. He decided to sleep in the office until he sobered up. I asked him if there was anything I could do and he just told me to shut the lights off and lock the door on the way out. The next morning, shortly after I got into my office I called the Doc to see if he was okay. He answered the phone and told me that his wife called his office last night around midnight. He told her that he wasn't feeling good. He thought it was something that he ate and as soon as he felt better he would be home. As it turned out he didn't leave his office until four in the morning. He then made me make him two promises. One was never to tell anyone what had happened that night and the other was never to bring grass into his office again. And then he said, "Steve, you know I have a feeling that you're going to cause me to seek psychiatric help." I could never do that to him. I wouldn't want that responsibility. So I told Joy that I was better and didn't need any more help. You know, that episode happened over thirty-five years ago and Joy and I are still together. I guess the Doc did a good job after all.......................
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OUCH!!! I THINK A BUG BIT ME... I'm blessed with flawless teeth. Perfectly aligned with no cavities. Well after all they should be perfect and when you think about it I shouldn't have any cavities. I mean who in their right mind would buy imperfect teeth? My original choppers weren't flawless, but once the orthodontist got through with them they were okay, and if I would have seen a dentist more than once every fifteen years then I think that I would still possess them to this very day, but alas that is not the case. One day, about ten years ago, I awoke with shooting pains throughout my head. My wife immediately pin pointed the problem. She thought that I might have an abscessed tooth, so at her suggestion I made an appointment to see the dentist. As it turned out I did have an abscessed tooth but the dentist told me that he felt that one day, sooner rather than later, I would have to have most, if not all of my teeth removed due to my neglect of them throughout the years. The dentist repaired my damaged tooth and some of the pain went away, but not all of it and as the days stretched into weeks and the weeks into months, the pain grew more intense, so much so that it was unbearable. I made another appointment to see my dentist and he confirmed my fears. My teeth were rapidly decaying and the poison that they were emitting into my body was causing the pains in my head. He felt that he could save just four teeth, my eye teeth; and he didn't think that they would hold up for more than a year or two at best. My dentist wouldn't pull my teeth out because he didn't use anesthesia, just Novocain and he felt that it would be easier for me if I was anesthetized. So I made an appointment with another dentist and I showed up on the designated day for the outpatient procedure. I wasn't alone either. My wife accompanied me as did my new teeth that I was holding in a brown paper bag. I felt like a condemned prisoner being led into the gas chamber, and to add insult to injury, I was the one that was holding the cyanide tablets. Unfortunately the execution was delayed. I say unfortunately because by now the pain was excruciating. But as I was being strapped into the chair, the Dentist noticed that I had a slight cold and he told me that he couldn't anesthetize me until I got rid of the cold because once sedated there was a possibility that I could choke on my own phlegm.
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So I took back my cyanide tablets and left his office. I couldn't wait for my cold to go away due to the pains in my head, so I called my original dentist and told him my problem and begged him to pull my teeth out. He told me to come down to his office and he would do the procedure. Once in his office he gave me gas and no less than thirty Novocain shots. I guess he couldn't stand to see a grown man cry. All I remember was the sound of my teeth as he dropped them into a pail......Plunk....Plunk....Plunk. I heard twenty-four of those plunks and with each plunk the pains in my head lessened until there was no more pain and almost no more teeth. He did leave my four eye teeth in my mouth. He told me not to take my false teeth out for any length of time during the next two weeks because if I did, then my mouth would swell up and I wouldn't be able to put my teeth back in until the swelling subsided. That night I went to bed early and around three in the morning I heard Joy start to yell and then she began to hit me. Before I had a chance to ask her why, she told me that when she rolled over in bed she thought that a bug bit her on her rear end. That's what caused her to yell. Upon investigating, she noticed that it wasn't a bug, but rather my teeth that had fallen out of my mouth.....And that's what caused her to hit me. I guess that proves a point.....You should never bite the "Tush" that feeds you. About two weeks later Joy, the kids and I left for a vacation. My teeth were still sore. As we were driving I placed my dentures in a cup in order to relieve the discomfort that I was in. Around seven that evening we decided to look for a motel to bed down for the night. I stopped at a Days Inn and told Joy and the kids to wait in the car while I went in to see if they had any vacancies. The gentleman at the desk was very courteous to me. In fact he was overly gracious. He told me the price of the room and then asked me if I belonged to AAA because if I did then he could discount the room. I told him I did and started to pull the card from my wallet when he told me that it wouldn't be necessary because my word was good enough for him. I thanked him. Then he asked me if I belonged to the Days Inn Discount Lodging Club, because once again if I did, then I could get an additional discount. I told him that I didn't. He said that he would mark down that I did so I could qualify for another discount on the room. I thanked him again. Then he asked me if I worked. I was only forty-four years old. I couldn't imagine why he asked me that, but I told him that I was employed and sure enough I got another discount. I figured if this kept up, then pretty soon he
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would have to pay me to sleep there but that was the end of the questions and also the end of the discounts. Nevertheless I got a pretty good deal and when I returned to the car I told Joy and the kids what happened and what a nice desk clerk the fellow was. That's when Joy told me that he probably felt sorry for me. I asked her why and she pointed to the cup in the car. The same cup that still had my teeth in it.....
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AN AFTER DINNER HEART ATTACK... It was September. The Jewish holiday of Roshashana which signifies the beginning of the New Year was going to start that evening. It was around three in the afternoon and I was doing some paper work in my office when my receptionist buzzed me on the intercom and told me that one of my salesmen, Steve Smith, wanted to see me. I told her to send him in. Steve had been in my employ for about eight months. He was in his early twenties. A nice kid but always causing problems. The kind of problems that would cause you to want to pull the hair out of your head.....and sometimes out of his. Steve came into my office and wished me a happy and a healthy new year. I thanked him for his kind thoughts and returned to my work. Then I heard Steve say, "Aren't you going to wish me a happy new year?" I looked at him and said, "Steve, I didn't know that you were Jewish." He told me he was and that made Steve the first Smith that I ever met who was of the Jewish faith. I asked him what he was doing to celebrate the New Year and he told me that he was going over to his mom's house for dinner. I asked him if his mom was a good cook and he replied, "The best." I felt sorry for the schmuck because he never tasted my mom and Granmas cooking so he didn't have an accurate basis for comparison, but I accepted the fact that his mom might be a good cook. But in all fairness I had to make sure so I asked him what his mom was cooking for the holiday and he ran me off a list that still makes my mouth water. Chicken soup with luxion (noodles), matzo balls, brisket, turkey, potato kugel (pudding), etc., etc. I told him to bring me in some of the leftovers the next day and he told me that he wouldn't be able to do that. I said, "Steve, you won't bring in some of your mom's cooking for me?" Again he said no. I then said, "Steve, come in Friday for your final paycheck." He said, "You're firing me because I won't bring you in any food?" "It's the principle of the matter Steve. It's the principle." "You're joking, right?" I told him that this was no joke and he should seek other employment. He said to me, "Steve, I'm your fourth best sales person. Doesn't that mean anything?" "Of course it does." "Well what does it mean?" "It means that every sales person below you just moved up a notch." With that remark he asked me if he could make a call from my phone. I told him that he could. His party answered and I heard Steve say, "Hi mom. I've got a problem. I've just been fired." His mother must have asked him why and he told her what had just transpired. He turned to me and told me that his mom wanted to speak to me. She wished me a happy new year and invited me over for dinner. I thanked her and politely declined her invitation and I also told her that I was just
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kidding about having her son fired. She said she knew that I wouldn't do that. And then she said that she would give Steve some leftovers from their dinner to take into work with him tomorrow just for me. I thanked her and I wished her a very happy and healthy new year and hung up the phone. The next day I was sitting in my office reading the newspaper when my receptionist called to tell me that Steve Smith wished to see me. I asked her if he was carrying anything with him. She said that he was holding two big bags. I told her to let the young man into my office. Sure enough Steve did have two huge bags filled to the brim with all sorts of food. I took the bags from him and placed them on my desk. I thanked Steve and told him to please give my special thanks to his mom. I then told him to have a good day in sales and he said to me, "Don't you want me to tell you what my mom sent over?" I said, "No, I'll figure it out. I just want you to leave. Thanks again and have a good day." It was 8:30 in the morning. I had enough food to feed a small battalion. Thankfully there weren't any small, hungry battalions around. And if there were, then they would have had a difficult fight on their hands in order to pry away what was in my sight. I was practicing the age old concept of Darwinism................."Survival of the fittest." I picked up the phone and called in one of my employees, Paul Podhurst. Paul was my customer service manager. He was twenty-three years old and a very likable individual. Very loyal. Very friendly. Very funny. Very round. Paul was about 5'6".....Both ways. He resembled a big beach ball.....with blond hair. Paul and I had had many pig outs together, but never so early. He came into my office and saw all of this food. He asked me where I got it from and I related the story. He told me that he couldn't eat now because he had just finished eating breakfast not more than an hour ago. I then told him my baseball story and that convinced him to sit down and dine with me. The baseball story represents the epitome of logic when trying to convince someone to see things your way in a situation such as the one I was facing. I asked Paul the following question. "What does a baseball team do an hour before the game?" Paul thought about it and quickly responded, "They go out on the field and practice." I said, "Right. Breakfast was practice. Now we've got to play the game." Paul said he never looked at it quite like that, but it did make sense and so we started to enjoy the foods that Mrs. Smith sent over. I called my secretary and told her to hold all
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my calls until further notice. The first thing I had Paul do was heat up the chicken soup and matzo balls. We had two bowls apiece. It was a wonderful start to a meal that lasted a solid two hours. We had brisket, turkey, potato pudding, noodle pudding, gefilte fish, chopped liver, all sorts of vegetables, pies and cakes. When we were finished we were stuffed to the gills. Two solid hours of non-stop eating. And we ate heavy foods. We both felt ill at ease. It was about eleven in the morning. It was extremely difficult to go back to work. Fortunately I was the boss, so I didn't have to. But poor Paul did. He would have forfeited his pay for the day if I would have let him go home, but there was work to be done so he had no choice. I told him to turn off the lights to my office and close my door as he left and tell my secretary to see that I'm not disturbed. I put my feet up on my desk, leaned back on my chair and dozed off for about four hours. It was now three in the afternoon. I awoke, checked for any messages and resumed my work. About an hour later my sales manager Mark Feldman, who was Paul's cousin, came into my office and told me that Paul thought he was having a heart attack and Mark was going to rush him to the hospital. I told Mark about all the food that Paul and I had consumed earlier that day and that in my opinion Paul wasn't having a heart attack, but just a bad case of indigestion. By the way, you never got indigestion with my mom and Granmas cooking, which just goes to prove that Mrs. Smith wasn't such a great cook after all. Good, but not great. Mark went back and told Paul what I had said but Paul insisted that he was having a heart seizure so Mark rushed him to the emergency room. This was Tuesday. Around seven that night Mark called to tell me that the doctors ran tests on Paul and were now admitting him to the hospital. Mark didn't have any other information other than to say that it seemed that there was a problem. I told him not to worry about it. I was still sticking with my original diagnosis of indigestion. The next day Mark came into my office with tears in his eyes. I knew that it had to do with Paul. Mark told me that the hospital confirmed that Paul did suffer a heart attack. I asked Mark why it took so long for them to find out. He didn't know. He was very upset. Both Paul and he were cousins, Mark being two years older. They grew up together in the same town in upstate New York and both came to Florida to start a new life. They had been together all their lives and now this. It was difficult for Mark to accept. It was difficult for me too. First of all I had to reexamine my diagnosis and figure out why I didn't recognize that Paul might be having a heart attack. Secondly, it looked like I might need a new customer service
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manager because it was a stressful job and I didn't think that Paul could handle it anymore. This incident was definitely causing me problems...............and of course Paul too. Mark told me that Paul didn't want his parents to know about this. He didn't want to cause them to worry. Mark asked me my advice and I told him that he should call Paul's folks and tell them the situation and let them make up their mind regarding traveling down to Florida from New York. Mark decided not to tell them. It was now Thursday. Paul was beginning his third day in the hospital. Mark came into my office, this time with a smile on his face. I said, "What's up?" He told me that the doctor had reevaluated Paul's condition and had now determined that Paul didn't have a heart attack this past Tuesday, but did have one sometime last year. I suggested that Paul ought to give thought to checking out of the hospital and admit himself to the Miami Heart Institute where they have real doctors. Mark assured me that one of the top cardiologists was taking care of Paul. I asked Mark for the name of the cardiologist so that in the event I ever needed the services of one, I wouldn't call him. Mark went on to tell me that they were going to schedule Paul for a stress test later that day. Mark came into the office on Friday and this time he didn't have a smile on his face. Before I had a chance to ask him about Paul's condition he told me that during the stress test the doctor administering it abruptly stopped the machine and told Paul that he saw something disturbing on the screen as he was monitoring him. "What was it," I asked? Mark said that the doctor couldn't tell Paul at that time and that he would have to analyze the information because it looked like something was drastically wrong. He said that they just put Paul back into his wheel chair and took him to his room. I thought to myself that if this poor kid didn't have a heart attack, then for sure the doctor was going to cause him to have one. Now the weekend was upon us and it is very rare that hospitals will conduct tests on their patients on Saturday or Sunday. This hospital was no different than most others. Paul just languished in bed over the weekend not knowing what to expect, not knowing if he had had a heart attack last Tuesday, last year or ever. All he knew was that the doctor had said, "Something's wrong." It's now Monday. Paul was spending his seventh day in the hospital and he didn't know if he was coming or going. Over the weekend Mark had relented and finally called Paul's parents to tell them what had been going on. They decided to
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temporarily stay in New York but asked Mark to keep them updated on Paul's condition. Later that day Mark told me that the hospital was going to administer an arteriogram test on Paul the next day, his eighth day of confinement at the hospital. This test is administered by a hospital team that has equipment that takes serial Xray films and motion pictures of the heart's action. This is an expensive test. Under local anesthesia, a catheter, a long, thin tube, is inserted into an artery of the groin and gently worked into the aorta where the coronary arteries originate. The tip of the catheter is moved successively to the mouths or openings of the right and left coronary arteries and a dye is injected. The dye clearly defines the size and location of plaques, narrowings and obstructions of the coronaries. Mark said that this test would finally indicate to the doctors the exact condition of Paul's heart, arteries and the cause of his problem. It was now Wednesday, around noon. Paul had taken his arteriogram the day before and Mark was about to call Paul to find out the results when the door to my office opened and standing in front of us in living color was none other than the aforementioned Paul. Mark and I both blurted out in unison, "What happened?" Paul looked at us and said that the doctors finally determined that he didn't have a heart attack a year ago and that he didn't have a heart attack a week ago. In fact he had never had a heart attack. I said, "Wait a minute. Did they say that you just had a bad case of indigestion?" Paul looked at me and said, "Yes Doctor Steve. That's exactly what the problem was." I said, "Great. Let's celebrate. My treat. Let's go out for a buffet lunch." "No thank you," was all that I heard Paul say. About a month later the doctor and hospital bills started coming in. For eight days in the hospital with expert physician care, the bills totaled well over twenty-three thousand dollars and to make matters worse, Paul didn't have insurance. At that time it wasn't a benefit that I offered to my employees. And besides, if he would have listened to the Good Doctor Steve, he never would have went to the hospital in the first place. His total bill of twenty-three thousand dollars verified my diagnosis, which didn't have a price tag. But then again, I didn't have a college loan for medical school that I had to pay back.
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DON'T YOU EVER CALL ME AGAIN Virtually all of my life, whether working for someone or in business for myself, I always put in a twelve to sixteen hour work day. And at the end of the day my desk was never clear. There was always work for me to do tomorrow. Because of the hours I kept at work it was important to relieve some of the tension from time to time. The following story was one of those times and once again it revolves around two of my employees, Paul and Mark, the cousins who grew up in Woodbridge, New York, a small town in the Catskill Mountains. It was around eight in the evening. Paul and Mark came into my office. It was another hectic day at work which began around eight that morning. We were about to wrap it up for the day when Mark came up with an idea based on some crazy things that I had done with the telephone. Periodically I would play games with people using Alexander Graham Bell's invention. I had a feature called conference calling which would permit me to connect two different parties whereby each one would think that the other person called them. It created a lot of funny moments, especially when the two people knew each other and even more so when the two people not only knew each other, but also hated each other. Woodbridge was a very small town of no more than 3,000 people. Just about everyone knew everyone else. It was the type of town that people lived in for their entire lives. Therefore there were long standing friendships of twenty, thirty, forty years or more and equally there were feuds between families and individuals of the same duration. Mark and Paul knew many people who hadn't talked to each other in years because of their dislike for each other and they wanted me to connect them over the telephone. I had a speaker phone on my desk which enabled us to hear both parties talking to each other once they were connected. This was a splendid way to end a hard day at work so I quickly agreed to their plan. If you have the conference call feature it is very simple to utilize and it can produce hilarious results. You're only inhibited by your own imagination. You call the first party and when they answer you simply tell them, "One second please, I'll be right with you." Then you put that party on hold and dial the other person. Once that person answers you depress the hold button and the two parties are now connected. We did this for about two hours. We heard people yelling at each other over the phone saying things like, "I didn't call you. You called me." "Don't tell me I called you. You called me. Don't ever call me again." "I didn't call you. I wouldn't waste my time calling you. I didn't like you thirty years ago and I don't like you now." "Well I didn't like you either,
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so I don't know why you called me. You ever call me again I'll come over to your house and beat the crap out of you. You're a no good son of a bitch, you always were a no good son of a bitch and you'll always be a no good son of a bitch." And on and on it went. We went home that night laughing as hard as we could, with tears actually coming out of our eyes. Three days later Paul and Mark came into my office in uncontrolled hysterics. I asked them what was up. Paul told me that his mother called him that morning and told him that there was a major problem in Woodbridge with the telephone company. Paul asked what it was and his mom said that a couple of nights ago the telephone lines got all screwed up and people were being connected to other people without even dialing. She also told Paul that some of the people were connected to people that they hadn't talked to in years because of arguments that they had had in the past. She said that it created so many complaints that the telephone company literally dug up most of the streets in Woodbridge to see if they could find the source of the problem. About two weeks later Paul spoke to his mom and she said that it looked like the phone company fixed the problem because the phone lines were working properly and there haven't been any more complaints. It's reassuring to know that telephone companies can resolve problems so quickly, such as the ones that the good people of Woodbridge faced. Its also reassuring to realize that the statute of limitations on what I did has finally expired.
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I'LL HAVE A PASTRAMI SANDWICH In all the companies that I have had and with all the people that I have employed, they all share one thing in common. If a vote were taken amongst them, then they would concur unanimously that I have a few screws loose upstairs. That's patently untrue. They're not loose, because if they were, then they could be tightened. The screws just aren't there. My people were always on guard because they knew that I was capable of doing the unexpected and true to form, when they least expected it I would ultimately cause them some minor discomfort or embarrassment as when one of my people, Paul Podhurst was conducting an interview. This young black man came into our office to apply for a job as a sales representative. Paul took him into his office and started the interviewing process. Some months before I had a paging system installed in the office. I could communicate with any one individual over their speaker phone or at my discretion I could make an announcement to the entire office that would be heard over our paging system. In this particular case I chose the paging system. It was around eleven in the morning. Paul was conducting his interview and then my voice came over the system. "Attention. Attention please. All representatives of Ewing Fairchild, may I please have your attention as we are about to order lunch." Paul had no idea what I was about to do except that he was pretty much assured that he would have a difficult time maintaining his composure, and he was correct. I continued. "Here are the selections for the day. Press #1 on your phone if you want a pastrami sandwich, #2 if you want a tuna salad and #3 if you want a plate of chitlins." Through Paul's window we could see that he was doing his best not to keep from cracking up. "Then press #4 on your phone if you want a coke, #5 for coffee and #6 for an orange soda. For dessert please press #7 for apple pie, #8 for vanilla ice cream and #9 for a slice of watermelon." After Paul was finished he came back to my office and told me that the person he interviewed was quite impressed with our lunch selection. Paul told him that the owner tries to have something for everybody.
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NOT FOR DOO-DOO I had a company called Ewing Fairchild International Corporation and the following story happened there. Once again Paul was conducting an interview with a gentleman when my mind thought of a trick to play on him. Suddenly my voice came over the intercom. "Ladies and gentlemen, may I please have your attention. As you may recall it was exactly one year ago today that our founder, Bryce Ewing, perished in an automobile accident. Out of respect for our founder, will everyone please rise for a minute of silence?" The office staff working in proximity to Paul's office all rose and they could see Paul stand up as well. So did the gentleman that he was interviewing. The office staff could see that Paul was trying to contain his laughter and look serious on what was supposed to be a solemn occasion. Once again my voice came over the intercom saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, you may now be seated and continue with your work." And then Paul continued with his interview only to be interrupted by me again, about one minute later. "Ladies and gentlemen, please forgive this second intrusion but as you realize Mr. Ewing did not die alone in that tragic car crash one year ago. His wife, Mrs. Ewing, also perished. Please stand up and observe another minute of silence out of respect for our founder's wife." Once again Paul and the gentleman he was interviewing both rose and observed the minute of silence. It was even more evident than before that Paul was having a difficult time containing his laughter. Some of the office staff could see through Paul's window and as he stood at attention to observe the silence it appeared that he was sobbing, but in reality his body was pained with laughter. And the person he was interviewing kept patting Paul on his shoulder to help ease his suffering, or so he thought. And every time that the fellow patted him on the shoulder, Paul's body would start to heave a little more. After a minute my voice came over the intercom thanking everyone for their observance. At this point Paul couldn't imagine what I was going to do next so as he told me later he tried to speed up the interview, but there's only so much you can tell someone in one minute, because in sixty seconds I was back on the public address system, once again apologizing for the interruption. "Ladies and gentlemen, please forgive this intrusion. I promise you that it will be the last one of the day regarding the untimely passing of our founder and his wife. One final thing though. Mr. and Mrs. Ewing did not perish alone in that car crash. With them that day was their dog Doo-Doo, and you all know why we called him that. Yes, their dog that we all
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grew to love also perished and smiling down upon us now from Heaven are Mr. and Mrs. Ewing and Doo-Doo. Will you all please rise for a minute of silence in honor of Doo-Doo?" The office staff rose as did Paul. Conspicuously absent from those standing was the gentleman that Paul was interviewing. It was also difficult to understand how the fellow couldn't see that Paul was laughing uncontrollably and not crying. I guess he mistook the tears flowing out of Paul's eyes as ones of pain and anguish, not laughter. When Paul finished the interview he came into my office and told me that he hired the guy under very trying circumstances. He also said that our new sales representative thought that we were a marvelous company to take the time to honor our founder and his wife. But when it came time to stand up for Doo-Doo, he told Paul, "Listen, I don't mind standing up out of respect for a man or a woman, but I ain't standing up for no dog." I told Paul that we couldn't have insensitive people like that working for us. Paul understood what I meant. We had fired people before for various reasons such as constantly showing up late for work, for making misleading statements, for low productivity, but this was the first person fired for insensitivity.
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THE ART OF RECRUITING SALESPEOPLE Building up a sales organization, especially a telemarketing sales organization is a never ending process. Your ads are in the newspaper three hundred and sixty-five days a year. The rule of thumb is that you have to hire twenty people to find one that can do it properly. That's how tough of a business it is. There are many methods that telemarketing companies use to recruit salespeople. The obvious ones are newspaper advertising and referrals. From time to time we have also posted flyers advertising the position in store windows, in schools, on supermarket bulletin boards, in billiard parlors and hosts of other establishments. It's not uncommon to have recruiting contests within your company, offering prizes to the sales representatives that bring in the most new potential reps. We've also had business cards printed and from time to time they are distributed to people we see in everyday life who we feel have the ability to succeed, such as the clerk at the McDonald's window, or the newspaper delivery person, etc. But sometimes when you least expect it, not only do you recruit a sales rep, but an outstanding one, such as in the following story. I had met this fellow Jerry when I was in the insurance business. He answered an ad that I was running in the newspaper and he turned out to be a fantastic salesperson. I eventually left the company and he became a manager there only to eventually depart and become a stock broker. We had been out of touch for about ten years when a mutual friend of ours suggested that we get together. We met a few times and pretty soon he made an attempt to get me to transfer my brokerage account to his firm. He appeared to be very knowledgeable and I thought he might be able to do a better job with my account than my present broker so I switched my account over to his firm. Things were going pretty well. He had suggested some stocks to me which I profited from and I was very happy with his service. I had a difficult time breaking away from my office during the day, so on occasion he would wait for me in his office until I arrived there which wouldn't be until seven or eight at night so that we could discuss my portfolio. His value to me as a financial advisor was second to none. One morning, prior to the market opening, he telephoned me at my office and told me that he had some shares of an IPO (Initial Public Offering) and he had put some into my account. He said that the stock would open up at ten dollars and would go up very quickly that day to twenty. He suggested that I sell my shares at around fifteen bucks and make a very tidy and quick profit. Before I could say anything
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he also insisted that after I sold the stock and realized the gain that I should send him three hundred dollars for what he did for me. I was irate. And for good cause. I didn't have a discretionary account with him. In other words, I had to initiate all buys and sells myself. He didn't have the discretion or liberty to do so without my consent. I told him to take the shares out of my account immediately, before the market opened. He told me that he couldn't and that I shouldn't worry because this was a lock. The stock was going to go up right from the opening bell. You couldn't lose. And then he repeated himself when he said, "It's a lock." I said, "Yeah, right. It's a lock. Just like the first Sonny Liston, Cassius Clay fight when Liston was supposed to destroy Clay, only to quit after seven rounds. And Super Bowl Three was supposed to be another lock with the Baltimore Colts, a solid seventeen point favorite over Joe Namath and the New York Jets. The final score though was 16-7, with the Jets being victorious." I decided right then and there that I was switching accounts, but first I had to sell the position that he placed into my portfolio. The market opened up at 9:30 and sure enough the stock took off. Within an hour the stock was trading at seventeen. I didn't care at that point because I had sold it at fifteen, raking in a very nice profit. I didn't bother thanking Jerry. I just told him not to do it again. I didn't tell him that I was switching firms. He was leaving for vacation the next day and would be gone for two weeks. By then my account would have been transferred to another firm. Jerry told me that I could wait until the funds were placed into my account before sending him the three hundred dollars, but I was confident there wouldn't be any problem with the transaction so the following day I decided to send him his money. He had already left for vacation and I didn't have his home address so I sent my check to his business address along with a note indicating what the money was for. A couple of days later I got a call from Jerry's manager. He told me that he received the check that I sent to Jerry along with the note and he briefly went over its contents. I thought nothing of it, other than to wonder why anyone at the company would open Jerry's mail. Two weeks later I got another call. This time it was from Jerry. He said to me, "Steve, did you get a call from my manager while I was away?" I told him that I did. Then Jerry asked me what I told his manager with regards to the three hundred dollar check that I sent him? I told Jerry that I had told his manager what the money was for but that he shouldn't worry because I didn't tell his manager that Jerry had put the shares into my account without my permission. At that point Jerry hit the roof. He said to me that it was illegal for any stockbroker to accept a kickback from his client and that if I didn't change my story that he would lose his license. I felt terrible for Jerry. I really did. I called my attorney and asked him
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for his advice. Then I called another attorney to see what he would recommend. Both lawyers told me the same thing. Stick to the truth or I could be in serious trouble. I heeded my attorneys advice and stuck to my story, which was the truth. Unfortunately not only did the truth cost Jerry his job at the brokerage house he worked for, but it also got him banished from the industry. I had all intentions of replacing Jerry as my broker anyway, but certainly not in this manner. The bad thing about all of this was that Jerry wound up losing a job where he was earning well over $100,000 per year. Jerry was now out of a job and it so happened that I had an opening for a salesman. Before you knew it Jerry was earning about $40,000 per year with me. He was able to survive even by taking a pay decrease of $60,000 per year and of course I had no problem in taking a $15,000 increase in my pay which represented the profit that I made off of Jerry's sales. I even said to Jerry, "Things have a way of working out for the best." And then I heard a loud bang. That was because Jerry slammed down the phone and hung up on me. It goes to show you though, sometimes when you least expect it, a good salesman will come to work for you.
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UNDERCOVER FOOTBALL The year was 1997. A young man by the name of Tony Vultaggio answered my ad. Tony was twenty-four years old, a strapping 6'3" and had been married for only three months. Both he and his bride Nina could have been on the cover of any major fashion magazine. They were and are two very beautiful people. More importantly they are two very, very nice people. Tony came to work for me and we bonded from the start. He was a very hard working person, intelligent and loved to laugh. We had a lot in common. We both would work 12-15 hours per day but it seemed as if it were only three or four because the time would fly by so fast. While it is true that we worked hard, it's also true that the office was always full of laughter making it a real pleasure to go to work on any given day. For some reason Tony always tried to imitate me. He had an uncanny knack of picking up on people's habits and copying it to a tee. I also found out that he was very gullible so one day I asked him if he ever played Undercover Football with his wife Nina? He had never heard of the game so I explained it to him. I told Tony that when you go to bed at night, and if you feel that you have to emit some gas, then as soon as you do it you should pull the covers over Nina's face. If you keep her under the covers for seven seconds, then it's a touchdown. Five seconds is a field goal and three seconds or less is an interception. Tony turned to Joy and said, "Did Steve ever really do that to you?" Joy said that I did, and on more than one occasion. Tony had a big smile on his face. He couldn't wait for the game to begin. The next morning Nina drove Tony to work. I happened to be by the door and I saw Tony get out of the car and walk towards the office grinning from ear to ear. Nina was following and shouting something at him. She didn't seem very happy and I had completely forgotten what I had told him the day before regarding the game of Undercover Football. Tony came into the office jumping up and down, yelling out at the top of his lungs, "TOUCHDOWN, TOUCHDOWN, TOUCHDOWN. I SCORED A TOUCHDOWN" Nina followed him in and said, "Tony, you're a disgusting pig." Tony looked at me and with the glee on his face that only a student could relay to his teacher, he said, "Steve, I made a touchdown." I said, "Tony, you didn't really do what I think you did, did you?" Suddenly his lips curled downward and he looked at me and said, "Steve, are you telling me that you never played Undercover Football with Joy?" "Tony, if I did that, then Joy would beat the living daylights out of me." With that remark, Nina yelled out at Tony, "I told you Steve would never do that."
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And then she proceeded to beat the living daylights out of him. Just like Joy would have done to me if I would have ever done that....................
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I'LL TRADE YOU TWO BLUES FOR ONE RED It was 1972. I was managing a firm called Reserve Life Insurance Company. We specialized in Medicare Supplements. I employed telephone solicitors who would work out of my office. Their function was to call people to determine if they would want to see an insurance representative. My telephone solicitors were provided with a cross street directory which is like a telephone directory except that instead of listing people in alphabetical order, it lists them by the street that they live on. In this manner the solicitor could provide leads for my sales people within a confined area, so they wouldn't have to travel too far in between appointments. Most of the appointments that I handed out to my representatives were between ten in the morning and three in the afternoon, because we primarily worked the Medicare market which consisted for the most part of retirees. Most of the reps would return to the office between four and five and turn in any applications they wrote that day and generally cut loose and let their hair down. I had three very good salespeople. There was Freddy, Marty and Jerry, the same Jerry who later became a stockbroker. for a short period of time. The boys, as I referred to Freddy, Marty and Jerry, had all worked together prior to joining Reserve. They were three very crazy guys. I got to see how crazy these guys were when one day they came into the office after having seen their appointments for the day. I was the only one there at the time. Freddy looked at the other two guys and said, "Did you get any?" Marty and Jerry said, "Did we get any?" And with that all three boys put their hands into their pockets and took out different color pills and placed them on the table. There were blue pills, orange pills, yellow pills, red ones, purple ones. You name it, they had it. By the way, although I refer to Marty, Freddy and Jerry as boys, Freddy was in his late twenties and Marty and Jerry were around forty. I said, "What the heck are those." In unison they shouted, "PILLS." I asked them what kind of pills they were and they all shrugged their shoulders upwards. I asked them how they got them and they all told the same story as if they had rehearsed what they were going to tell me many, many times. But as I soon found out, they had been doing this for years. It seems that whenever they would go into an elderly person's home, they would ask if they could use the bathroom. Then they would rummage through the medicine cabinet and take some pills. One from this bottle, one from that bottle and so on.
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I asked them what they intended to do with the pills and together they said, "We're gonna swallow them." I said, "Are you guys crazy?" I didn't have to wait for a reply to my question because I already knew the answer. I asked them how could they take pills if they didn't know exactly what they are? They gave me a logical explanation. They told me that people take pills to make them feel better. I told them that they should then take lots of pills because they were three very sick individuals. Thankfully they were smart enough not to take more than one pill at a time. But there were many days that they would come into the office and I would hear them yell out, "Listen, I'll trade you two blues for one red." Or, "Come on, this green pill is three times as big as your orange pill. At least give me two oranges for one of my greens." They also did their best to take the same pill each day so that they could compare the side effects that each one had to offer. Sometimes I wondered if they really came to me to sell insurance or if they were working undercover for a drug company and conducting medical experiments. I was starting to get concerned for them until one day they each came into my office white as a ghost. I asked them what was the matter and they replied, "Steve, when we went to urinate this morning we all peed blue." I asked them if they were now going to throw away their pills and they said, "Of course not. We just won't take the ones that make us pee blue anymore." A logical answer.
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ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO SEE DR. RODRIGUEZ? Reserve Life Insurance Company was on the 2nd floor. We didn't have our own private rest room facilities. They were in the hallway and we shared them with the other tenants on our floor, one of which was the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW). Just about every weekend the VFW would have a party at their office and when we came to work on Monday morning there were empty beer cans in the parking lot, on the catwalk and also in the bathrooms. By the time the VFW would conclude their weekend festivities, the rest rooms were left in a very unsanitary condition. One evening while at home I felt the urge to scratch my stomach. The skin around my stomach area was extremely itchy and no amount of scratching seemed to soothe it. The next evening it got worse. Ironically I didn't have any problem during the day, only at night. At work the next day I mentioned it to one of my salesmen and he told me that I probably had scabies which is a type of lice that imbeds itself in your skin. It's usually caused by inhabiting unsanitary rest room facilities. He went on to tell me that there is a medication that will cure scabies and it is called Quell. It's a lotion that you apply to the afflicted area and you can only get it with a doctors prescription. There was a directory sign in the parking lot which listed the tenants in our building. One of them was Dr. Rodriguez. I called his office and made an appointment to see him the following day. Upon entering his office the receptionist said, "May I help you?" I told her that I had an appointment for the doctor to examine me. I thought that I heard someone snicker behind me, but I didn't pay any attention to it. The receptionist asked me if I was sure I had an appointment for the doctor to examine me. I said, "Of course I'm sure. This is Dr. Rodriguez's office, isn't it?" She said that it was. And then she told me that there was another Dr. Rodriguez in the building and she was pretty sure that it was the other Dr. Rodriguez that I wanted to see. I asked her how she knew. She then told me that this Dr. Rodriguez was an obstetrician. I turned around to walk out and for the first time took notice of the other patients waiting their turn to see the doctor. They were all female.............and they were all very pregnant..........And I was very red.....with embarrassment.
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WIN A FREE JOB It was the mid 1970's. The country was in the midst of a terrible recession. At least I think we were in a recession. All I know is that I couldn't find a good job so I told my wife what terrible conditions our country was in. She said to me, "How come I don't have a difficult time finding a good job?" I looked at her and said, "Well, you know." That answer works all the time. So I put my thinking cap on and suddenly realized that there were a lot of people such as myself who were really having a hard time finding a good job. Then it hit me. I said to myself, why should I worry like everyone else does about not having a job? Why don't I just open up an employment agency. At least I'll have a job and hopefully people who need my services will seek me out. It seemed like a brilliant idea. I got in touch with my friend Marty, not the same Marty from the insurance business, who was also in an involuntary retirement and explained my idea to him. He loved it. He wanted to be my partner which I willingly agreed to. He said at least he could get out of the house and feel productive and not have to listen to his nagging wife. I understood exactly where he was coming from. So we went into the "employment" business. Marty and his wife put up $1,000.00 for the business venture. I didn't have to put up any money because it was my idea. I tried to explain to both Marty and his wife Roberta that they got off cheap because you can't put a price on creativity. It made sense to them and it certainly made sense to me because I didn't have $1,000.00 for a business venture. As a matter of fact, I didn't have $1,000.00. We quickly found out that in order to have a successful employment agency there were two basic requirements. Number one, it was imperative that you advertise in the newspapers because if people don't know that you have an employment agency, then in all likelihood they would never use your services. The second thing we found out about running a successful employment agency is that you have to have job interviews to send your applicants to. To say that business was slow at the beginning would be the understatement of the year. We couldn't compete with the big and traditional employment agencies like Snelling and Snelling and Marty and his wife felt that their $1,000.00 contribution had by now equaled if not exceeded my creative input into the business, which meant that they weren't putting any more money into this venture. Marty and I toiled at the business day and night and made very little headway. I
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then started to research the regulations and laws regarding employment agencies in the state of Florida. I found out something that was interesting and unique in Florida law relating to employment agencies. Most agencies charge a fee for employment to either the applicant or the company that hires the applicant, which is based on a percentage of the yearly salary. A little known law in Florida says that the employment agency can also charge the applicant an additional two dollars just for trying to find them a job. In other words if the applicant agrees to pay the agency two dollars for its services, then in the event the agency does not find a suitable position for the applicant, the agency does not have to return the two dollars. If the agency does find a job for the applicant then the applicant would then owe the agreed upon fee. I felt confident that we could get two dollars out of virtually every applicant that came up to our office. The only problem we had was that we weren't getting more than two or three people coming up to us each week. The promise of an additional six bucks which I would have to split in half with Marty didn't exactly turn me on. So I continued to think. Then the light bulb came on. I had to figure out a way to get lots of people up to our office. Why would anyone want to come up to see us for employment? Simple. We had to be different. We couldn't run the same "traditional type" ads that employment agencies so often run. We had to be different, non-traditional. The new kid on the block. The new kid with new ideas. A rebel................ And then, like a lightning bolt out of the sky, the answer hit me........... FREE JOBS. I told Marty that we would advertise FREE JOBS. The first words out of his mouth were, "Steve, you've flipped your lid. Please give me back the $1,000.00. I'll even take $500.00." I told him to relax and if he wanted his money back then I would give it to him, but at least give me the courtesy of listening to my complete idea. Thankfully he listened because if he hadn't then it would have been very embarrassing to have to ask him to lend me another thousand dollars so that I could pay him back his original investment. I don't think I could have pulled that off. And so I proceeded to tell Marty my idea. After I finished explaining my concept he said, "Steve, you're a genius." The idea was this. Place an ad in the paper saying the following"
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"FREE JOBS" Come up to our employment agency and try to WIN a "FREE JOB" Call Steve at 222-0000 My thought was that when someone came up to our office in response to the ad, we would give them a pair of dice. They would then get to throw the dice one time and if they rolled 'snake eyes', which is a one on both dice, then we would be obligated to get them a "FREE JOB." The odds of throwing snake eyes are one out of thirty-six. I also felt that whoever came up to our office was either out of work or not happy with their present job, so therefore in the event that they didn't qualify for a free job, we should have no difficulty in collecting a two dollar application fee from them. And I was right. Instead of having two or three applicants come up in a week, we were now getting twenty to thirty coming up every day and practically all of them paid the two dollar registration fee after they took their turn at attempting to win a free job. We were still experiencing a difficult time in finding jobs for people, but we did make one very interesting observation...........Most of the people who came up to our office seeking a job were two dollars poorer when they left. Now if we could only find jobs for our applicants then we could have a good thriving business. At least for now we had established a positive cash flow, due to all of the two dollar registration fees that we were collecting. One day Marty came up to me with excitement emanating from his eyes. He told me that he found an employer that had virtually unlimited job openings. We could send as many applicants there as we wished and each one stood a good chance of being hired. On the surface it sounded fantastic because up till then we didn't have any standing job orders to fill. After an applicant came in and gave us two dollars for their registration fee, we would tell them to call us back the following day for the address of their job interview. Then either Marty or I or our employment counselor would get on the phone and call businesses out of the Yellow Pages to see if they had any openings. Now we actually could send someone to a job interview.......Immediately. Of course most of the people we sent on this particular job interview weren't overly happy or impressed with the position because we never actually told them what it
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was. And for good reason. Because if we did, then they never would have gone on the interview. The only thing we told them about the opening was that it was with Loeb Seafood Company and this position would give them an opportunity to learn the business from the ground up. Then, after they came back from the interview, it would be up to Marty or me to explain to our job applicants that this position was only a temporary one while we worked on securing for them the career opportunity that they desired. Sometimes it worked......Most of the times it didn't. Especially with those people that were pursuing a career in accounting or those that wanted to be legal secretaries or just plain secretaries. As a matter of fact, no one could ever imagine the type of job opening that we were sending them on. There were many times that we would get a call from the personnel department at Loeb. The call was always about the same thing. They would ask us to screen the applicants a little better because they felt that we were sending them people who were overly qualified. It became a minor and continuing problem for us because it was very difficult for us to try to convince our applicants to accept the job offered to them by the Loeb Seafood Company...............Very difficult. The first thing that an applicant noticed when they applied for the position at the Loeb Seafood Company was the odor. It was the smell of fish that permeated the entire building. You would get used to it after a while. At least that is what we told the applicants when they informed us about their experience on the interview. After their initial interview, they were then taken to the work area where they would be performing their job......that is if they accepted the position. The work area was in one big room. One very big room. One very big room with a pool directly in the middle of it. The pool was for swimming.......But not for people......Only for shrimp. Their job was to sit in the pool with water coming up to their knees (Loeb Seafood Company supplied hip high boots) and then pluck the shrimp out of the pool that were deemed ready to go to market. These people were affectionately called, "Shrimpers." Just about everyone who came through our door at the employment agency was sent to Loeb Seafood Company to become a "Shrimper." People that wanted to be accountants, secretaries or gain employment in the marketing field of a major company were sent to Loeb Seafood Company to become a Shrimper. Those that were seeking a career in the hotel industry or had completed a course to become a
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para legal were first sent to the Loeb Seafood Company to become a Shrimper. Some of the applicants would come back to our office screaming at the top of their lungs at us after their interview at Loeb. "Do you realize what kind of a job interview you sent me on? I want to be an accountant. I don't want to pick shrimp out of a pool. ARE YOU NUTS?" It was up to Marty and I to calm them down and convince them that the job market was tight and that this opening presented an opportunity for them. And believe it or not, some people actually took the job......But not enough to keep us in business very long. As for the Free Job that we offered, the odds tipped heavily in our favor. Only one person out of seven or eight hundred who came up to our office actually threw snake eyes. It was a woman who was about twenty-five years old. She wanted to be a secretary. She was very pleasant to the eyes and she had very good communication skills. She could type in excess of ninety words a minute and she also took short hand. I told her that I would have no trouble in finding her the position that she desired...........That is as soon as the job market opened up a bit. So in the interim she became a "Shrimper."
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THE 44TH BRIGADE Marty and I had been in the employment agency business for a couple of months. The only thing that kept us going and at the same time was also giving us a little bit of hope were the two dollar registration fees that we were collecting. But in reality we both saw the writing on the wall and we knew that before too long we would have to seek other employment unless some miracle took place that could turn our business into a business. We were hoping beyond hope that we could survive because it was OUR business and we didn't relish going to work for anyone and we also enjoyed each others company tremendously. There were many days when we wanted to call it quits but invariably one of us would pull each other out of the doldrums and the day would end on a high note. One filled with laughter as well as anticipation of a better tomorrow, as was the case with the following story. It was close to four in the afternoon and it had been what had now become a very typical day for us. About twenty-five people came up to our office to attempt to win a free job and twenty-two of them left our office a good two dollars poorer. We had sent a couple of people to Loeb Seafood Company for an interview and some of the people who we had sent to Loeb the day before had either called us on the phone, screaming in our ears, or worse, came up to our office to vent their frustrations at us for having the utter CHUTZPA (nerve) to send them on an interview to be a "Shrimper." Marty and I were sitting alone in our office. The expressions on our faces told the story. We both knew that we needed a miracle to save us, and if we didn't know, then our wives would certainly remind us of it when we went home for the evening. We both needed some cheering up so that we could walk out of the office with our heads held up high, face our wives and return to our office the next morning to attempt to reverse our fortunes. Directly across the street from us was a little strip shopping plaza that had as a tenant a 7-11 store. The 7-11 store was facing us. We could see inside it. As I looked over there, I could see someone behind the counter and I could make out two shoppers in the store. I turned to Marty and asked him if the 7-11 that was across the street from us had a listed telephone number. Marty pulled out the telephone directory and found the number for the 7-11.
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As I dialed the number I instructed Marty to pick up the extension and not say a word. The phone rang and Marty and I could see the clerk pick up the telephone and say, "7-11, may I help you?" Marty had no idea what I was going to do. Up until two minutes ago, neither did I. As I heard the clerk's voice I then said in my finest southern dialect, "Is this the 7-11 down on S.E. 2nd street off of Atlantic in Pompano?" The clerk replied that it was. "This here is Sargent Carter with the 44th Brigade, 5th Battalion out of Fort Benning, Georgia and we're on the turnpike and we'll be passing your place in about thirty minutes or so son, and I mean to tell you I got lots of hungry boys with me, ya hear?" "YES SIR," replied the clerk. "Now son, we goin to need you to fix us up some grub and plenty quick. Now go git yourself a pencil and paper and I'll tell you what we need." "One minute sir. Let me get some paper to write on." "Hurry up son; I've got me some hungry young men." "Okay Sargent, what would you like?" "Okay, I needs two hundred bologna sandwiches. Put them on white or rye bread, about half with mustard and about half with mayo. I also needs one hundred fifty salami sandwiches and make them on.." The clerk interrupted me and said, "Sargent, I'm the only one here in the store. I don't know if I can do all this. I need to call my boss. Can you call me back in five minutes please?" "Okay son, but hurry up because my boys are startin to howl. The only food they've had today was the rock gut food they serve on this here turnpike and you know how awful that is, don't you son." "Yes sir. I sure do. Just give me five minutes please." "Okay son, I'll call you back shortly." Through our window, both Marty and I watched as the clerk picked up the telephone and dialed a number. We could see him in conversation as his head kept nodding up and down as if he was telling the party on the other end, okay. The clerk finally laid the phone back in its cradle and after a couple of minutes passed I once again called him up. "Son, this is Sargent Carter with the 44th Brigade, 5th Battalion out of Fort Benning, Georgia. Did you talk to your superior?" "Yes sir. And here's what he said I could do. I won't be able to make the sandwiches for you because I don't have the time, but I can put all the meats and breads and whatever else you want in boxes and they'll be waiting for you when you and your troops get here, if that's okay with you." "Well it will have to be okay son. Now you still got your pencil and paper?" "Yes sir. What do you need?" "We need about thirty pounds of bologna and twenty pounds of salami. You got liverwurst?" "Yes sir." "Then give us ten pounds of liverwurst too. We need about ten jars of pickles and three jars of mayonnaise and two jars of mustard. Give us about twenty loaves of white and rye bread. Give us also some plastic forks and knives and we'll need a couple gallons of milk, twenty big bottles of mixed sodas and some plastic cups. Throw in some pies, cakes and doughnuts. Lots of it. Also need paper plates and napkins. You got all that written down son?" The clerk read back the entire order.
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"Now son, we'll be comin through your area in about twenty minutes, so get a move on it, ya hear?" "Yes sir. I'll get on it right now." Marty and I watched through our window as the clerk began to fill one box after another with our order, I mean Sergeant Carters order. As he would fill a box he would place it near the door only to start filling another one. It took him at least twenty minutes to complete our order. There must have been at least ten boxes by the entrance to the store, some stacked one on top of the other. About thirty minutes had gone by since I had placed the call and now it appeared that the clerk was starting to wonder if the 44th Brigade had made a wrong turn or had gotten tied up in traffic. Marty and I watched from our vantage point as the clerk came to the front of the store and pressed his nose up against the window. He put his hand to his forehead and turned to his right and looked down the street which was bristling with rush hour traffic. Then he slowly turned towards his left and looked up the street, only to see the same thing. Lots of people in their cars fighting traffic on their way back home after a day at the office. Lots of people. Lots of cars. But no 44th Brigade. Marty and I were sitting up in our office observing this clerk who every five minutes or so would come to the front window of his store and repeat the gesture described above. Every time he looked up and down the street it literally brought tears to our eyes as we couldn't contain our laughter. Finally we decided to close up for the night. Marty and I had come to work that day in my car so I was going to drive him home. When we got into the car Marty said that he needed a pack of cigarettes. He asked me to drive him across the street to the 7-11. The same 7-11 that was waiting for the 44th Brigade. I told Marty that I couldn't do that because once inside the store I would burst out laughing when I saw all the food packed in the cartons standing by the door. Marty told me that I could sit in the car and he would go in by himself. I cautioned him against it because I knew that he wouldn't be able to control himself.........And I was right. I pulled up next to the 7-11. Marty was a dead giveaway because he was laughing when he got out of the car. He walked inside the store with tears actually flowing down his face. And these weren't tears of sorrow. The man was laughing hysterically. Marty is about 5'9" tall, if that. He was in his late thirties and he bore an uncanny resemblance to the comedian Marty Allen, except Marty's hair didn't have the Don King effect as did Marty Allen's. Marty was slightly portly and his hair came down well over his ears. The type of hair cut that was fashionable in the
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mid-sixties, except this was the mid-seventies. Marty walked into the store, went up to the counter and the first thing that I could see him do was to say something to the clerk, and as he did Marty pointed to all the food that was stacked up by the door. I couldn't tell what the clerk was saying to him, but suddenly Marty erupted into non-stop laughter and ran out of the store as fast as his legs could carry him. Once inside my car he could barely talk. He was laughing and crying at the same time. He just pointed towards the road as if to say, get out of here. As I drove away he finally calmed down. I asked him what the clerk said to him that made him lose control of himself. Marty said that he had asked the clerk why all the food was stacked up by the door. The clerk gave him a relatively simple answer when he said that he was just waiting for the 44th Brigade to arrive at any moment. And at that moment Marty lost control. Marty never did get his cigarettes that night and as far as I know, the 44th Brigade never showed up either.....................
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H.E.L.P. or should I say HELP In the early 1980's I opened up a company called H.E.L.P. The initials stood for Handicapped Employees Labor Pool. I decided to telemarket various products that people with afflictions either made or assembled. For instance I retained the services of an artist who was born without any arms. I paid her a fee to draw a series of greeting cards by using a brush held between her toes. The casual observer could never detect that a handicapped person was responsible for the picture on the card. The only way the end user knew that the greeting card was drawn by a handicapped individual was because they were told so by the telephone solicitor and there was also a brief biography of the artist on the back of every card. I also employed handicapped people to assemble ball point pens and to fill orders by packaging the products so that we could ship them out to our customers. You acquire a different appreciation for life when you work with people who are mentally or physically handicapped. You learn to enjoy and appreciate the simple things in life, like tying your shoelaces or feeding yourself. Or just being able to conduct your life without the aid or assistance of another human being. I also came to appreciate that people with various afflictions do not consider themselves handicapped. And the only time they want your assistance is if they absolutely cannot help themselves. Otherwise they would rather be left alone to finish their tasks without the aid of anyone else. And one of the greatest joys in life is to see the look of achievement on the face of an afflicted person. It makes you want to hold that person as tight as you can and tell them how proud you are of them and how much you love them. But every human being has their limits or their tolerance level. Sometimes I wish mine were a bit higher, but each of us is different and unique in our own ways and as I write this story I honestly wonder how the reader will interpret my remarks. I wonder how the reader will judge me. All I can say in my defense is that my family and I have always been very considerate, compassionate and benevolent to those people who are in need. The following story is a part of my life. It happened to me and I want to share it with you, the reader. One day I called up the Cerebral Palsy Foundation. I told them about my company
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and indicated that I would like the opportunity to employ any individuals that were having a difficult time finding gainful employment. The people at CPF assured me that they could provide me with an ample supply of individuals who had been stricken by this debilitating disease and were in dire need of work. The following day a representative of CPF called and said they could send over eight individuals to be interviewed for various positions at my firm. We then set up a time and day for the people to come up to my office. On the appointed day nine people from CPF showed up at the office. One of the folks was a CPF representative who made the necessary introductions. There were two people in my company that day that were helping me conduct the interviews. I took one of the applicants into my office. His name was Mark. Mark was about forty-five years old. He had a severe case of cerebral palsy. His hands were shriveled up and practically useless. He was also confined to a wheelchair. Yet, other than by looking at Mark, you would never know that he was handicapped because he had one of the greatest dispositions that I've ever encountered in a human being. He had an infectious laugh and you couldn't help but like him. I wanted to feel sorry for him but he wouldn't let me. This was his lot in life and he was determined to make the best of it. Sympathy was a word that was foreign to Mark. It wasn't in his vocabulary, but I found it difficult to get it out of mine. I had no idea what kind of work Mark would be able to do in my firm because he was so incapacitated. I didn't have the heart to tell him that because he was also so likeable. Finally I told him to call me the following day as I had seven other applicants and only five positions available at present. He understood but he implored me to hire him because he said he could outperform anyone else. At that moment I decided to put him in the telemarketing department. I thought he would make a great salesman. He sold me and I felt that he would be one of the best sales reps that I had ever had, such was his enthusiasm. My intentions were to hire someone to dial the phone for Mark. The fact that Mark couldn't hold a telephone in his hands didn't present any problem at all because we could utilize a speaker phone that didn't require you to hold the instrument. I was about to tell Mark that I had found the perfect job for him. One in which I honestly thought he would excel, when he unexpectedly said to me, "By the way Steve, if you hire me I will need some assistance from you once or twice a day." I said to him, "That's not a problem Mark. I'll do anything within my power to help you. Just name it and I'll do it and if I can't help you then one of my people here will assist you. Now tell me, what kind of assistance will you need?" "Well after I
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go to the bathroom I'll need you to clean my rear end for me, okay?" I thought about what Mark had just asked of me. We were both looking into each other's eyes. His eyes seemed to say, "Steve, please don't say no." My eyes were carefully disguising my thoughts. I finally realized what it meant to be severely handicapped. I didn't have the heart to tell Mark that I wouldn't be able to help him. I wanted to be of assistance to him in the worst way but I couldn't envision myself doing what he had asked of me. I quickly thought of the other people who worked for me and wondered if I could convince one of them to help Mark out the one or two times a day that he needed it. In the meantime I told Mark to call me the next day to see if he was one of the people selected for the job. Later that day I spoke to my wife, my sales manager and a few other people who were in my employ. They each said no to my request.........And it was a very quick no. There was no thought whatsoever given to my request for someone to come to Mark's assistance. I then offered each of them a slight pay increase if they would take on this chore. Once again, a very quick and resounding no. As a last resort I asked them to consider this. Instead of one person coming to Mark's aid, what if they all participated. In other words they could share the duties amongst them. One day one person would do it; the next day another person would help Mark. "No, no, no." Every one of my employees told me that no one in their entire work career had ever asked them to do what I had asked of them. No one. Mark called the next day and I had my sales manager tell him that he wasn't selected for the job. It was unfortunate for Mark and it was unfortunate for me and my company because I believe he would have done very well.
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VERY FUNNY...............VERY FUNNY Life is a roller coaster ride for virtually everyone. It's saturated with peaks and valleys. Hopefully as you mature and grow older you don't fall into the valleys with the same rate of frequency as when you were younger and just as hopefully the valleys aren't so deep. And as you age the peaks you attain will hopefully sustain themselves for longer periods of time with only infrequent and minor dips every now and then. The year was 1974. I was in a valley. Nope, let me correct that. It was a huge crater. So huge that it resembled the Grand Canyon. Joy was the sole support of our family. To coin an all too familiar clich, I was trying to find myself. I wasn't content with just working. I had the entrepreneurial spirit within me. Therefore I didn't have time to work. I needed time to think about what I wanted to do and if I got a job, then it would take away from my "Thinking" time. It sounded logical. One day I was with my friend Al. Two years prior to meeting Al I was managing a firm called Reserve Life Insurance Company. Al's mother in- law was my secretary. She told me that her son in- law was seeking work and would I mind interviewing him for a position in sales. I told her that it would be my pleasure. Al came in for the interview and we hit it off immediately. He was about five years younger than me. He grew up in Brooklyn and he loved to talk about sports and participate in it as well. We had a lot in common. I asked him a few basic questions such as what type of work did he do in the past and what was he looking to accomplish in the future. He then gave me an answer that I had no trouble relating to. He said he was still trying to find himself. I understood completely and of course I hired him. As Al and I worked together we also became friends. Very good friends. And that friendship taught me a very valuable lesson that I have tried to apply in all my business endeavors, sometimes successfully and sometimes not so successfully. The lesson I learned is that you cannot combine business relationships and friendships. A decision must be made. Either you want to be a friend or you want to be a boss. It's difficult to be both. Regarding Al, the decision wasn't all that difficult. He was a crummy salesman, so I fired him and we remained very close friends. Eventually I left the employ of Reserve. I was now in the "Thinking" stage of my life. In other words, I was a man without a job. Thankfully my wife had one, so
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conditions weren't completely out of hand...................But they were getting there. Al was also married and his wife Ellen was working but his life had turned entirely upside down. His problem was that even though he was married, his wife wouldn't contribute to the upkeep of his household. The reason she wouldn't do that was because they were separated and no longer living together. His life was a mess, so much so that I had to do the thinking for both of us. But that's what friends are for. It was a Saturday afternoon. Al and I were in North Miami Beach playing basketball in one of the school yards. After the game, we were both dripping wet with perspiration. Neither of us had enough money to buy a soda so Al suggested that we go up to his parents condominium which was just a few blocks away and we could get a drink there. When we got there, his parents weren't home. We each had a couple of sodas to quench our thirst, then freshened up in the bathroom. I then told Al that I had to head back home as Joy and I were going out that night. The next day, Sunday, the phone rang. Joy picked it up and told me that Al was on the phone. I took the phone from her and said, "How ya doin Al?" All I heard coming through the receiver was his voice in a very stern manner saying, "Very funny. Very funny." I asked him what he meant by that and once again he repeated himself by saying, "Very funny Steve. Very funny." I said, "Al, stop playing games. What the heck are you talking about?" In a thoroughly disheartened manner he said to me, "You know what I'm talking about Steve. You know. Very funny. Very funny." I said, "Al, stop with the riddles. What are you talking about?" He then proceeded to tell me what had occurred in his house only moments ago. He said, "My dad came to the table in his slippers and bathrobe in preparation for his traditional Sunday breakfast. My mom poured him a cup of freshly percolated coffee. She opened up the refrigerator and put a carton of orange juice out. As my dad poured the juice for all of us, my mom continued setting the table. She took the bagels off of the counter and served them. As my dad was cutting the bagels in half my mom got out the cream cheese, the lettuce, tomatoes, onions and cucumbers. My dad was sipping on his juice, delighting in its taste. Then I watched him as he smeared some cream cheese on his bagel. He then added a piece of tomato, a couple of cucumbers, a slice of raw onion and some lettuce. It was like watching Picasso at work because that's how precise he was in preparing his sandwich. Then as he was waiting for the piece de resistance we heard my
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mom yell out," "What happened to the lox?" "She asked me if I ate it. I told her that I didn't. Picasso, I mean my father was starting to get upset. He made my mother take everything out of the refrigerator to see if she could find the lox. When she couldn't find it, that's when my dad really got mad and he accused my mom of forgetting to buy the lox. My mom screamed back that in twenty years she never, ever forgot to buy lox for my dad for his Sunday morning breakfast. They just kept yelling at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Then they directed their venom at me and accused me of eating the lox. I told them that I didn't even know that the lox was there and if I had, I certainly wouldn't have eaten it. Anyways, they don't believe me. All because of you Steve. I don't know how you did it, but I'm convinced that you took the lox. Steve, how did you do it? And why did you do it?" "Al, why would I take the lox? We were there together in your parents apartment. When could I possibly have taken it?" "I don't know, but I think you took it." "Al, I'm sorry about what happened today, but you know your mom is starting to get on in years. Maybe she thinks she bought the lox because she's been buying it every week for so many years, but in reality she just plain forgot to get it." "Yea, I guess you're right." And with that, we said goodbye and made arrangements to meet on Monday. Now it so happens that I love lox. Basically there are two types of lox. One is called Nova, which is unsalted and the other is called Belly lox, which is salted. I prefer Belly lox because to me it has more flavor than Nova. That morning, both Joy and I had lox for breakfast........... It was Nova. But under the circumstances, I didn't think that I had a legitimate right to complain........And I certainly couldn't ask for my money back.........And I definitely couldn't exchange it for the Belly lox. I will say this. It pays to be observant because if an opportunity presents itself then you just might have to act quickly..............Like when your friend goes to the bathroom to freshen up..............
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HE'S NOT MY UNCLE SAM Both Al and I were still doing a lot of thinking. Work would have only complicated matters. I was still giving thought to what kind of career I wanted to pursue. I was now thirty years old and I was hoping that I would come up with an answer before I reached retirement age. One day Al and I were walking on 163rd street (a main drag) in North Miami Beach when we passed a store front that had the all too familiar sign of a man wearing a suit of red, white and blue with his finger stretched out as if he was pointing directly at you. The caption said, "Uncle Sam Wants You." An army officer was standing outside and he said to us, "Fellas, can I see you for a minute?" We said sure and we followed him inside. He was a recruiter for the U.S. Army. He told us about all of the benefits we could derive by joining the armed services. He made it sound very appealing. The officer told us how the army had changed through the years. One of the many changes was in allowing new recruits such as Al and I to not only serve together in the same unit, but in addition we would be allowed to choose the country where we would like to be stationed. Paris, France. London, England. Europe, Asia or the good old U.S.A. The choice was ours. Three square meals a day, lots of exercising, a roof over our heads, a monthly paycheck and a chance to visit distant places that heretofore I had only seen in my dreams. This appeared to be a once in a lifetime opportunity. And who knows, there was a distinct possibility that my service in the army could be the optimal career that I was searching for. After all I was only thirty years old and I could retire from the service in twenty years with a full pension at the relatively young age of fifty and seek other employment with all of my new found skills. The more I thought about it, the more I liked it. And the part that sold me was that I would be permitted to live off base with my family (my wife and son). Al loved the idea too, but for different reasons. By now his parents were fed up with him and his excuses for not being employed. He couldn't sell his parents on the idea that he was "just trying to find himself." His parents told him that when he found himself, then and only then could he return to their place where he was living. They made Al give them back the key to their apartment (I guess I'd have to buy my own lox now) and told him to start conducting a full time search for himself. Coincidentally, right after his parents kicked him out of their apartment; Al went on
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a diet and lost lots of weight. Of course it was not a diet of choice. Rather he had no choice. He also had no living accommodations so on some nights he would stay at the Salvation Army. The sleeping quarters were incorporated into one big room with thirty or forty cots. Most of the residents were substance abusers. For dinner they would all be served a bowl of soup and a slice of bread. And there were no refills. Breakfast consisted of a bowl of cereal and a cup of coffee. They didn't serve lunch and it wasn't on Zagat's list of recommended places. Joy thought that Al was a bad influence on me and therefore she wouldn't let him sleep at our place. Every now and then I would try to sneak him some food. But Joy was such a good cook that I would usually eat it on my way to meet him.....At least my intentions were good. The Salvation Army would only let Al stay there for two consecutive nights. So on the nights that he wasn't sleeping there he would have to find other accommodations. And he did. He was quite ingenious. He told me one day that he was going to stay at the Holiday Inn for about a week. Now this was a man without a job and without any visible means of support. He had a few dollars on him, but certainly not enough to pay for a room. I figured that maybe he applied for and received a credit card. I couldn't figure out how he could possibly stay at the Holiday Inn. I went to pick him up there one day and true to his word, he was staying at the Holiday Inn. He had a beautiful spacious room overlooking the pool with a magnificent unobstructed view..............of the sky. The question of how Al could afford a room at the Holiday Inn was answered very quickly. He would go to the Inn around midnight and lay down on a chaise lounge by the pool and go to sleep. Nobody ever bothered him and the rent was within his reach. And since Al was having a difficult time "finding himself"; the offer of joining the army was even more appealing to him than it was to me. And so both Al and I filled out some forms that were necessary to start the wheel moving. A wheel that would move us away from our non-restricted civilian existence and one that would lead us into a more restrained military lifestyle. The recruiting officer gave us some additional paperwork to take home to complete. Once we submitted it the next step would be to take an army physical and induction would soon follow. In a matter of a few short weeks we would be singing that old refrain, "You're In The Army Now." Al and I left the recruiting station with a new found attitude. It was as if all of our problems had been solved. We were going to be employed by a division of the
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U.S. Government. A company that had been in existence for almost two hundred years. A company that had an unparalleled record of never bouncing a check. Always paying its employees on time. A company that offered fantastic medical benefits, free room and board, travel opportunities, educational grants, probability for advancement and a great retirement program. And what did I have to do to fully enjoy the many benefits of a life in the army? Simple. Just hope and pray that we didn't go to war where the enemy could shoot me in the ass. Why the ass? Because at the first sound of enemy fire, then my ass is going to be the last thing that the enemy sees. And he wouldn't be seeing it for long either. I went home and told Joy about my plans for our future. Surprisingly she offered little resistance. She was ready to make the transition. So was Al. We had all decided that we would like to be stationed in Paris, France after we completed our basic training. It sounded too good to be true. Paris, the home of Bridget Bardot. Sunning ourselves on the French Riviera. Walking through the many vineyards that dotted the hillsides. Learning the native language. All I had to do was get through six grueling weeks of basic training. That was it. Just get through basic training and hope that war didn't break out. WAR!!! That was the fly in the ointment. It had already had an adverse effect on me as one of my friends was killed in the Viet Nam conflict. The United States was now quickly becoming the policeman of the world. What if a war did break out? What if I was one of the servicemen chosen to either defend our country's vital interests or protect the sovereignty of some lesser equipped nation? And then I gave thought to who the leader of the free world was. It was President Gerald Ford. A nice man. But he never got my vote for president. As a matter of fact he never got anyone's vote for president because he wasn't elected to office. He snuck in..........through the back door. Only a year before, our president and vice-president were Goniff and Scheister (Jewish words that describe people who are greedy and dishonest), otherwise known as Nixon and Agnew. Agnew was involved in kickback schemes while Governor of Maryland and when the case came to court he pleaded "Nolo Contendre", which meant that he was guilty but he wasn't admitting it. He then resigned as vice-president and Ford was approved by the House of Representatives to replace Agnew. Then Nixon resigned in disgrace and Ford automatically succeeded him. All we knew about Ford was that he played collegiate football and as a member of the House of Representatives he was very well liked. But nobody knew what he stood for. As a matter of fact he could barely stand. He was always bumping into things and falling down. He possessed the grace of a one legged chicken. The man would constantly trip over his legs and
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fall down. And this wasn't reported. This was seen on television virtually every time he gave a speech. And it was seen by millions upon millions of people......................worldwide. I started to give serious thought to what effect President Ford could have on my future in the event I enlisted in the army. All of a sudden I figured it out. I would enlist in the Army and with my luck this schmuck would accidentally trip and fall on the "Red Button", the one that would start a nuclear world war. That thought changed my mind regarding my service in the army. It would have to wait until Ford was replaced as president. If I was going to serve my country then the least I could expect was a president who possessed some degree of agility. I couldn't serve my country knowing that the man in the White House had difficulty putting one foot in front of the other. It would cause too many sleepless nights..........And I needed my sleep. I told Joy of my new plans. But I didn't have the heart to tell Al because he was so excited that he was finally going to have a roof over his head along with three square meals a day. I didn't know what his reaction would be. My gut feeling was that he would still enlist, even if he knew that I wasn't. Four weeks later I received a letter from him. The beginning of the letter said, "Dear Steve........WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?????" Another four weeks went by and this time I got a call from Al. He was home at his parents apartment. He received an honorable discharge after having spent less than two months in the army. He spent a good deal of his time in the stockade. He didn't want to be in the army and he didn't hide his feelings. The last thing that he did prior to getting his discharge was to walk into the Colonel's office and tell him, "Sir, with all due respect, this place is run by idiots for idiots." Al's anger at me quickly subsided, in part because I now had my own employment agency and I told Al that I would get him a job that had a tremendous upside potential and in addition I wouldn't charge him for the position...........Just the normal two dollar registration fee........ So I sent him to the Loeb Seafood Company...........
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ALOHA................. OY VEY!!! In December of 1982 I met John Catona. We became very close friends, more like brothers, almost from the time we met. The fact that John was a phenomenal salesman who through the years made me lots of money had no bearing on my feelings of closeness to him. He was more than a money tree to me. Much more. He was like the brother I never had. He was someone who I could share a laugh with. Someone who was as competitive as I am in everything he did. Someone who I could tell my troubles to. Someone who I could trust with my deepest innermost secrets. But more importantly than anything else, John was a "Chef Extradonnaire." He loved to cook and I loved to eat. It was a perfect match. Many of our most enjoyable moments together were spent either around a dinner table or in some way associated with food, as in the following story. John had a very good client in Hawaii. His name was Fred Tamiose and he owned the Fred Tamiose Pineapple Plantation. We were selling advertising specialty items such as imprinted pens, key tags and calendars and Fred was one of John's largest accounts. One day Fred called John to tell him that as a token of his appreciation he had just sent two crates of pineapples to him via United Airlines. John turned towards me and said, "Boss, (a nickname he gave me shortly after meeting me), a name that he calls me to this day, we're gonna be eating well tomorrow," as he explained the conversation he just had with Fred. Sure enough the next day a representative from United Airlines called my office asking for John. John got on the phone and all I heard him say was, "Okay, be right over." John hung up the phone and said to me, "Boss, let's take a ride to the airport because the pineapples are here." I told John that I was real busy and I couldn't go. And neither did John. The next day United Airlines called again and once more John asked me to accompany him to the airport. Again I told John that I just couldn't break away from the office as I was behind in my work. And once again John wouldn't go to the airport without me. A couple of days passed and United Airlines called again. This time the representative wasn't very polite. He told John that the pineapples were starting to emit an odor and he would appreciate it if someone came to cart them away. Again John asked me to accompany him to the airport, but this time I gave him a very logical explanation for not going there with him. I told him that if the odor of the pineapples was offensive to the airline personnel, then wouldn't that same odor be offensive and distasteful to us as well? John found it difficult to argue with my logic so once again he broke his promise to the good people at United Airlines by not showing up at the airport to claim his pineapples.
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About a week later John came into my office and told me that Fred Tamiose was on the telephone. I said, "So?" and John replied, "Boss, he's gonna ask me about the pineapples. What should I say?" "Simple, just tell him that the pineapples never got here." "Good thinking Boss." John went and told Fred the absolute truth. He said that we never got the pineapples. Of course Fred's interpretation of John's remark was that the pineapples never made it to the mainland. John came back into my office with a sigh of relief spread across his face. "Thanks Boss. It worked. Tamiose thinks someone pirated the pineapples. He told me that he sent Maui pineapples which were tastier than the regular ones that we're accustomed to eating." I told John that I was glad he had solved his problem and just as the words escaped from my mouth John said, "Boss, he's sending another couple of crates of pineapples today. This time we have to pick them up at the airport. It's costing Fred a lot of money to ship these pineapples and the least we can do is pick them up when the airline calls us. Okay?" I promised John that this time I would go with him to get the pineapples. Sure enough the very next day our friendly representative from United Airlines called the office asking for John. He told him that two crates of pineapples had just come in and it was imperative that they be picked up immediately because the last two crates had gone rancid and besides giving off a very foul odor, the pineapples had attracted flies and the airline had to have someone come in to fumigate the storage area. John assured him that we would be there within an hour. And so off to the airport we went. When we got there the people at United treated us as if we were royalty. They were very happy to see us arrive, and.........they were equally as happy to see us go..........especially with the pineapples. John and I were traveling north on Federal Highway (U.S. 1), the main street in Fort Lauderdale. Other than the conversation that John and I were having the only added sounds coming out of my car was that of the two crates of pineapples knocking against each other. John couldn't wait to get back to the office to eat one of them and I just couldn't wait to get back to the office when my eyes spotted a Vienna Hotdog sign, just ahead up on the right. The sign was in red and yellow. It started to make my mouth salivate. I immediately pulled off of Federal Highway into the Vienna Hotdog parking lot. The place was packed with cars. John asked me what I was doing and I told him that I was very hungry and I just wanted to get something to tide me over. I headed for the drive through. There was no one in front of me. I pulled up to the speaker box, rolled down my window and didn't
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wait for anyone to ask me for my order. I just blurted out, "We're in a hurry. Give me two Vienna beef dogs and one Vienna sausage. I want a large order of fries and a large coke." I turned to John and asked him what he wanted. He said he wasn't hungry. I couldn't take a chance on him changing his mind once we drove off, because then he would have eaten some of what I ordered so I turned back to the microphone and said, "Make that four Vienna beef dogs and two large fries and....." Before I could finish the order I felt someone tap me on my left shoulder. I turned around and there was this woman with a big goofy grin on her face standing by my car. She looked at me and said, "Sir, Vienna Hotdogs moved out about a couple of weeks ago. This is now a Hertz car lot." I looked around and for the first time noticed that just about all the cars on the lot were GM autos. I didn't bother saying anything to the woman. I just rolled up my window, looked straight ahead and proceeded to pull out of the drive thru without my hotdogs, without my sausage, without the fries and without my coke. I was still very hungry, but the day wasn't a total loss because after all I had two crates of pineapples in my trunk and if I ever had occasion to rent a car, then I certainly knew where to go.
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I CAN HELP YOU SIR.......NO THANKS, I'LL WAIT FOR HIM John had recently broken up with his girlfriend. We were both working day and night and it was becoming evident that he missed the companionship of a member of the opposite sex. So one day unbeknownst to John I placed an ad in the personal column of the Fort Lauderdale News. I ran it for a week. The ad said as follows: BIG NOSE And very little hair. But he's a great guy. He's 46 years old. He's my friend And I want to find a nice woman for him. I'm his agent and everyone will be considered. Photo a must. Send replies to: Box 22, Fort Lauderdale News I told John what I did and of course he thought that I was nuts. Meanwhile as nutty as I was he couldn't wait for the mail to be delivered to the office each day to see if anyone was responding to the ad. And boy were they ever. We were like kids in a candy store for the first time. We averaged about ten letters a day. Virtually all of them had photos. What John soon found out was that most of the photos were taken about ten or twenty years ago. And the women who didn't send photos instead sent in its place excuses. Excuses like, "I wanted to take a recent picture but my camera is broken." Or, "I just moved and haven't unpacked any boxes as of yet." The women had more excuses than Carter has pills and of course all letters that didn't have photos enclosed went to the bottom of the pile. For a period of two weeks my companys sales suffered because my crack sales person would routinely come into the office bright and early and await the mail. Then after we both previewed the letters and photos John would place them in one of three piles. The primary one was labeled the Immediate Response pile. The second grouping was labeled the I'll Call Them Next Week pile and the last set of respondents was labeled the I'll Call Them When Hell Freezes Over pile. That was his infamous third pile. Finally after John and I read the letters and looked at the photos he would go to work on the phones..............not for me though. Instead he would call the women who wrote to him and arrange to meet them at a restaurant for a cup of coffee. Most of his encounters took place during the day.............during working hours. Hence the decrease in production. But the resulting stories of his potential
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conquests seemed to be a fair trade off for his lack of productivity. John would arrange sometimes as many as four or five meetings with these women during the day. Of course John had a distinct advantage. He knew what they looked like............or what they used to look like. All they knew about him was that he had a big nose and a receding hairline. There were many times that John would walk into a restaurant and make an immediate U-turn. Usually for the same reason. Because the woman in the picture looked like she was thirty-five but in person she looked closer to fifty-five. Towards the second week some of the letters we received had the same tone to them. They usually started with, "Dear John, I was waiting for you in the restaurant but you never showed up. I hope everything is okay. Please call me because I am worried about you." John had no intentions of calling these women again, but he didn't discard their letters. Instead he just put them in his third pile..... Finally John met someone he liked. It looked like he was starting to get serious about her. As serious as you can get after seeing someone two days in a row. One morning John came into the office and said, "Boss, let's go where we can talk in private." We went into my office and closed the door. I told my secretary that until further notice John and I didn't want to be disturbed. By now John had seen this woman on three consecutive nights. John went on to tell me that he took her to dinner last night. During their time in the restaurant she had made it very clear to him that she wanted to become intimate after they finished dinner. John, being the type of guy that he is didn't want to disappoint her, so he readily accepted her invitation. She then went on to tell him that he had to have protection before she would go to bed with him. As I stated earlier John was 46 years old and he hadn't used a prophylactic in over twenty years. John then asked her if she had any with her and she said of course not. Then John asked her if she would please go into the pharmacy when they finished dinner and buy the prophylactics because he was too embarrassed to do so. Once again she said no. John told her that he just couldn't go into a drug store and ask for prophylactics. She told him that it wasn't a problem, but the only thing that John could look forward to at the end of the evening was a good night kiss. John immediately rethought his position and after dinner was completed they both drove to a pharmacy. She waited in the car and John walked inside. John walked to the back of the store, towards the pharmaceutical department and a woman behind the register said, "May I help you sir?" John replied, "No, I'm just looking around." "What are you looking for sir?" "I don't know. Just looking.
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Thank you anyways." A few minutes went by and the woman once again said, "May I help you sir?" John looked at her and said that he was waiting for the pharmacist (who happened to be a man). She told John that she could help him, but he insisted on waiting for the pharmacist. Finally another customer came up to the register and while the woman was waiting on her John went up to the pharmacist and motioned for him to come up to the counter. John then whispered to him, "I need some rubbers," and the pharmacist, who must have been an M.C. comedian on the side, blurted out for all within earshot to hear, "Oh, you want prophylactics? There they are, right in back of you. Right next to the aspirin. We have rib tipped, lubricated, extra-large." In the meantime John is turning a bright shade of red. "Which one do you want sir?" It had been quite some time since John had bought prophylactics and through the years there have been many changes associated with them. One of the major changes, as John found out that day, was that prophylactics are no longer sold from behind the counter. Rather they are on display for all to see next to all the other items that are traditionally stocked on the shelves of your local drugstore. And so in some ways one could say that John got screwed twice that night. Once by his female companion and once by the pharmacist.
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MAY I HAVE YOUR SIGNATURE MR. CATONA I had a company called J.A.C. Marketing. It was named after my wife, Joy Ann Chanzes. She was raising our children, keeping the house clean, doing the weekly shopping and also working forty hours a week in the office. And with no pay. I figured the least I could do was name my company after her. It gave her a lot of prestige and it also kept my payroll taxes down. When prospective sales people came up to our office in answer to my advertising, I usually did the interviewing. One day a woman came up to our office to apply for a job. She looked very snobbish. So much so that I didn't want to interview her so I asked John if he wouldn't mind doing it. He readily agreed and ushered her into my office. I went into the customer service department and one of my employees, Harvey Mandel was there along with some other people. Harvey was in his midthirties. I'd say that he was 5'6" tall and maybe 115 pounds soaking wet. He looked like a string bean. A string bean with hair. Lots of hair. In all actuality Harvey looked like a skinny gorilla because his body was loaded with hair. Black, bushy hair. All over his arms, his chest, his legs. You would have had to hire Dick Tracy to find flesh on Harvey's body. That's how much hair he had. He even had a thick beard along with his full head of hair. The only thing you could see on his face was his nose, his eyes and his ears. Everything else was hair. I went up to Harvey and asked him to do me a favor. I gave him a blank yellow legal pad and told him to go into my office and have John put his signature at the bottom of the first page. Harvey said to me, "Steve, the page is blank." I said, "Don't worry. Just have John sign it." With that Harvey takes the pad from me and starts to leave when suddenly I grab his arm and tell him, "But first take your pants off." He yells back at me, "Take my pants off? I can't do that." I quickly took out a twenty dollar bill and handed it to him and just as quickly he started to remove his pants. Harvey was wearing red B.V.D.'s and unlike most Jewish men, Harvey was in full bloom. It was either that or he had a lot of hair there too. I don't know. But he gave new meaning to God's words that Jews were the chosen people.....At least Harvey was. As Harvey was removing his pants he looked up at me and said, "Steve, you know you are a crazy man. Real crazy." I said to him, "Harvey, there you are in your red underwear, holding a yellow legal pad with no writing on it and you're about to walk in on John while he is in the middle of an interview with a woman to ask him for his signature and you have the nerve to say that I'M CRAZY?"
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And so Harvey trotted off to see John. He walked in and asked him for his signature. John by now was used to my shenanigans and acted nonchalant as he signed his name on the blank paper. The woman took one look at Harvey, stood up and said to John that she would prefer not to work here and then she left. I often wondered if she would have stayed if Harvey was wearing blue underwear?
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DON'T ANSWER THE DOOR My company was growing. I moved to larger quarters. The move was exciting for many reasons, one of which was that I now had for the very first time my own private bathroom. I had a new large office, and off in the corner was my very own commode. It was big and spacious. No longer would I take refuge in the bathroom only to hear one of my employees yelling at me, "You know Steve, there are other people who have to use the bathroom." And no longer would I enter a bathroom only to start gagging from the odors emanating from it. Finally I had achieved success. We were in an office complex on the first floor. Entry was from the street, rather than the building. The previous tenant had installed an elaborate security system on the premises. One of the features was an automatic lock on the front entrance door. The secretary had to press a button which would deactivate the lock in order for anyone to gain admittance to our office. One day I was handling a very important telephone call when John brought a gentleman into my office for an interview. John told him to sit down and wait for me to finish my call. As I was talking on the phone the fellow got up and started to walk away from my desk. I kept up the conversation on the phone but my eyes started to follow him and before you know it he disappeared into my bathroom. I was fuming. This stranger was using my bathroom. I didn't even permit my wife to use my bathroom but this stranger was using it. I was very upset. Just as I finished with my phone call, the fellow came out of the bathroom as if there was nothing wrong. I didn't even say hello to him. I just looked at him and said, "Follow me. I want to show you something." He had no idea what I was doing or was about to do. I walked out past my secretary to the front door. I opened it and said to him, "Did you happen to see that when you walked in?" He said to me, "See what? What are you talking about?" I told him to look outside and he would understand. He walked outside and I shut the door. The door with the automatic lock. As I walked back in I told my secretary that this guy would probably start banging on the door. "Just ignore him and whatever you do, don't let him in." Then I went and told the rest of my staff the same thing. I told them to just go about their business and ignore the fellow who by now was knocking on the door. And knock he did. For about fifteen minutes he would alternately knock on the door and then ring the bell. People in my office would walk by the front door and this guy couldn't figure out why no one would acknowledge him. And we couldn't figure out why he wouldn't just go away. Finally he got down on his knees and
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opened up the mail slot and yelled through it, "THE KEYS TO MY CAR ARE ON HIS DESK." One of my employees Richard Olzewski, or Ski, as we called him, went and retrieved this fellow's keys from my office. Ski opened up the mail slot and passed the keys through it. The fellow said to him, "Was it because I used his bathroom?" Ski said to him, "Yeah. Nobody is allowed to use his bathroom. Not even his wife. He gets real upset about that." "Tell him that I'm a fantastic sales person." Ski looked at him and said, "I'm sure you are sir,................ but you shouldn't have used his bathroom.
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PETS All of our lives we have had pets, both dogs and cats. As we have found out, animals offer unconditional love. Just give them some food to eat, praise them when they do something well and pet them every now and then and youve got a friend, a very good friend for life. Weve been blessed with very good friends. And what we have found out about our friends is that they are just like humans in the sense that they all are different in the way that they relate to you. They all have their own distinct personality which separates them from other animals. Some are much smarter than others, some are friendlier than others but they all share in one common trait and that is their unconditional love for their owner(s). You can go to the pet cemetery in Broward County to visit our pets. That represents their final resting place after they pass on. When we go there we place a little rock on each of their graves. A rock you ask? Yes, because in the Jewish tradition, whenever you visit a loved ones gravesite you are supposed to place a rock on their grave to signify that they had a visitor. I told my wife and children that when it comes my time to leave this earth, then the heck with Jewish tradition; dont place no rocks on my grave, but instead place a pastrami sandwich. I mean, what the hell am I going to do with a rock? For those of you who are not going to venture to the Broward Pet Cemetary, then let me tell you about some of our pets. Chanz He was the first pet that Joy and I had. Chanz was a little mutt. Little but spiteful. Couldnt stand being left alone. Then again he wasnt so joyful when people were around him either. He definitely had an attitude. One day when Joy and I had come home from work we were met by the apartment manager who in no uncertain terms told us that either Chanz or Joy and I had to go. It seems that while we were at work, Chanz, who had the run of the apartment had torn the window shades to shreds. Well, it wasnt a difficult decision to make. Within a week Joy and I along with Chanz moved to another apartment complexone without window shades. Koko She was our first cat. We got her when she was about eight weeks old. She was a bit nervous so that night we let her sleep in bed with us. Not too long after all of us turned in for the night we heard a very distinct sound coming from Koko. It was like a clicking noise. We thought that maybe she swallowed
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something. We were about to take her down to the Veterinary hospital when Joy said that we should call our tennis instructor Connie who had three or four cats living with her. And so we called Connie, woke her up naturally, and told her the problem that we were experiencing with Koko. Connie thought about it for no more than a second and then asked us if we ever had a cat before. We told her that Koko was our first cat. Connie then said, relax, what Koko is doing is PURRING. And for almost seventeen years Koko purred quite a lot and quite loud. One day we noticed that Koko wasnt herself. She was very lethargic. She was nearing fourteen years of age and we were quite nervous so we took her to our Vet. Our Vet told us that Koko was in kidney failure and she advised us to put her down. I said to the Vet, you know putting her down is kind of final. Isnt there anything else that we could try in order to sustain her life? The Vet said that we could try dialysis for Koko. It would necessitate us to bring Koko into the Vets office twice a week for twenty minutes a session and each session would last about twenty minutes; the cost would be $17.00 per session which wasnt so bad (Im on dialysis and I have to go three times a week, for four hours per session and the cost runs into thousands of dollars). Fortunately I have insurance which picks up my tab. Joy and I had to pay for Kokos dialysis but it was something that we could certainly afford. Well, to make a long story short, Koko became like a newborn kitten and lived another 2 years. Henry Henry was a German Shepherd and far and away was the smartest animal that we ever had. Henry was born to a liter of three. We went to the breeders house and saw Henry for the first time when he was about four weeks old. Florida law says that you cant take a newborn pet from their parents until they are eight weeks old. When we saw the three newborn puppies we immediately chose Henry because he had a very big nose. He was very different from his siblings. So four weeks later we went back to the breeder and picked up Henry. We named him Henry in honor of my good friend John Catona. When John and I first started working together I noticed that he called every guy he would meet Henry and every woman Henrietta. I asked him why he did that and he gave me a logical explanation. He told me that he was very bad with names and in this manner he just had to remember two, Henry and Henrietta. So we brought Henry (the dog) home and the very next morning I went to get the paper which was delivered every day to our house and I also took Henry for a walk. Henry finished doing what he had to do and we walked over to where the mornings paper lay and I placed it in Henrys mouth and started to walk with him back to the house. Henry knew that he was doing something good because he was prancing to the house with his tail going a mile a minute. I never had to show
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Henry what to do regarding the paper again. Every morning we would go out for a walk and every morning Henry would religiously pick up the paper and prance with it into the house. Every morning except Sunday mornings. The Sunday paper is in most locales three to four times bigger than the weekday papers because of all the advertising that accompanies it so when Henry would try to pick the paper up usually half of it would fall out of his mouth because he couldnt fit it all in. Henry was also a very observant dog. Our front door inside the house had a lock and a hook. You would unlock the door and then lift up the latch or hook to open up the door in order to go out. Henry took notice of it and one day after I unlocked the door, Henry put his nose under the hook and lifted the hook up. He then moved backwards with his nose firmly entrenched on the hook and the door would open. In the future, all I had to say to Henry was to open the door and thats what he would do after I unlocked it. Henry also loved to go for rides in my car with me. All I had to say was, Henry, do you want to go in the car?, and he would go to the drawer where we kept his leash. I would put the leash on him and he would walk with me to the door. I would unlock the door and Henry would open it. He then would run to my car and wait there patiently for me to come. One day I asked Henry if he wanted to go in my car because I had to send out an envelope U.P.S. So there are Henry and I in my car with me behind the wheel and this 125 pound German Shepherd sitting up in the passenger seat next to me. The 7-11 by my house had a U.P.S drop box, so that is where I headed. When I got there I got out of the car, told Henry that I would be right back and walked the ten feet or so to the drop box, placed the envelope in it and turned to come back to the car and what I saw caused me to burst out in uncontrolled laughter. There was Henry, not where I left him but rather in the drivers seat. He had moved over into my seat, sat straight up and put both of his front paws on the steering wheel. I opened the door and asked him if he brought his license with him. Apparently he didnt because as soon as I opened the door he moved over to the passenger seat. All of our pets would sleep in bed with Joy and I. All of our pets with the exception of Henry. Henry had his own bedroom. Well not exactly his own bedroom because he shared his with our son Jarrett. But he didnt share Jarretts bed. Oh, no. Henry had his own bed and no one was allowed on it. Unfortunately Henry only lived five short years. One day he scampered down the stairs and collapsed at Joys feet. She called our Vet and since they knew us very
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well and since their office was only a mile away, one of the Vets came to our house and gave Henry mouth to mouth resuscitation. It didnt work. He was gone. We found out that Henrys life was cut short by a condition all too common in large animals. His stomach twisted and it cut off his circulation. We were told that if it had happened at the Vets office they still wouldnt have been able to save him because death is virtually instantaneous. Krisi Krisi was a Yellow Lab. Very smart and very affectionate. She used to sit on our couch with us to watch television. She wouldnt lay down like other dogs, but rather sit up. I never saw any other dog do that. Krisi also loved to swim, so much so that when we went into our pool she would follow by jumping in to it. It got to the point that you had to keep your eye on Krisi until she jumped into the pool because there were times that she would jump on us. We couldnt figure out why she would do that but then we realized that she thought that either Joy or I were in distress so she was trying to save us. Many times she would jump into the pool, swim up to us and push against us so that we in turn would grasp her collar. Once we did that she would swim to the steps leading into the pool. Devil Devil was a German Shepherd. Her parents were police dogs. When we picked Devil up, her owner showed us how her parents would react to commands, both oral and silent. Its amazing to know what can be done with a dog if you take the time and effort to train them. One year Devil went into heat. We didnt want her to spot up the house so we came up with the bright idea of putting bloomers on her. It would have been a good idea if only we had remembered that we had put the bloomers on her, but we didnt. Sometime during the night Devil let us know that she had to go out, so we let her into the yard to do her thing. When she came back inside the house we noticed a distinct odor as well as little droppings that Devil was leaving. Instead of making her nightly deposit onto the grass outside, she made it into her bloomers. We took her into the garage, took off her bloomers and cleaned up the mess. Shortly thereafter we had Devil spayed and therefore she never had to wear bloomers again. We also had Charlie, a German Shepherd, Muffin, a gorgeous cat and our present menagerie, Zoey and Binx, our cats and Sammie and Maxie our Yellow Labs. You are and were all very special, very loved and your unconditional love for us has made us better human beings.
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HELPTHEYRE TRYING TO KILL ME I went on Peritoneal Dialysis when I turned 60. As opposed to traditional dialysis which requires you to go to a dialysis center three days a week for usually four hours at a time, Peritoneal Dialysis is done in the confines of your home, at night, while you are asleep. It has to be done every night, seven nights a week but it doesnt really interfere with your lifestyle , due to the fact that you do it while you are sleeping. The one major drawback to Peritoneal Dialysis is that you are subject to infections, major infections and because of that most people opt out of Peritoneal Dialysis and instead take part in the traditional Hemodialysis which I am now on. But, I learned the hard way, the very hard way. I started to experience pains in my stomach, which over the course of a few days grew worse and worse. It was so bad that at times I couldnt even stand up. I went to my Nephrologist and he confirmed my worst fears. I acquired a major infection in my stomach and I had to be hospitalized to clear it up. Well hospitals arent new to me as I was hospitalized no less than twelve times during 2010 and 2011. There were times that I felt I should have bought stock in the hospital because I felt like a major contributor to their success. So there I am in my hospital bed and the pain was becoming excruciating. I was literally yelling at the top of my lungs. Thankfully I had a private room, not because I could afford it but because during one of my hospital stays I came down with Mersa which is highly contagious; so on all future hospital stays I was afforded a private room at the insurance companies expense. It was late at night and one of the nurses came into my room and gave me some morphine. I had never had morphine before but I was acutely aware of the drug and what it could do which was to relieve pain..but not this morphine. After about ten minutes Im still racked with pain and the nurse administers some Demerol to me which had the same effect as the morphine.no effect and Im still in pain and still yelling. Now the nurse comes in and this is all within twenty or thirty minutes and gives me some oxycontin. It didnt take five minutes and all the pain was gone. Finally I would be able to go to sleep but just as I began to close my eyes something came over me and I picked up the phone to call Joy. It
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was about one or two in the morning. Joy picked up the phone and I said, Hon, theyre coming to kill me. She said whos coming to kill you? I told her that they were going to bomb the hospital, They were serious and they wanted me dead. Joy told me that all would be well and go to sleep and she would see me in the morning. I hung up the phone and instantly got out of bed. Now I was wearing a hospital gown which is cut out in the back. So there I was walking out my door with my left hand holding my gown closed in the back because I didnt want to excite anyone. Thats the type of person I am. My room was directly across from the nurses station and all of a sudden one of the nurses yells out, Steve, where do you think you are going? I told her that I was going to go to the hospital to take Joy home at which point the nurse told me, No Steve, youre the one in the hospital. Joy is at home. Now go back to bed. I got up the next morning with vivid memories of the events of last night and to this day if I am hospitalized Im given a wrist band which states all of the medications that I am allergic to and Oxycontin tops the list.
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THE BITCH WON'T SLEEP WALK NO MORE I've had a fair amount of friends in my life and they all seem to have one thing in common........ They're all nuts. Now I don't know if it's because I have a tendency to attract people like that or if they have a proclivity to attract me, but almost all of them have been ten cents short of a dollar. And it's not because, as the old saying goes, that opposites attract. I'd rather believe it more closely resembles the other adage, "Birds of a feather flock together." Back in the early 80's I became friendly with a fellow named Steve Crown. Steve and I had some great and memorable times together and if most of my friends were nuts, then Steve was the largest Pecan in the barrel. Steve was a night owl. He rarely went to bed before four in the morning and he usually slept until noon. He liked to stay up late just because it gave him an opportunity to enjoy some peace and quiet. Steve was married and had two sons. Whenever you walked into his house it was as if you were on the set of CNN's show, Crossfire, because all you heard were the sounds of four people yelling at each other. Nobody in his house, with the exception of his wife Sherry knew how to talk in a civil tone. And of course Steve had the loudest voice of all and it didn't take much to upset him. He didn't have a short fuse. He just didn't have a fuse at all. It was two in the morning and Steve was laying down on his living room couch watching a movie when his wife walked out of the bedroom. This wasn't the first time that Sherry had gotten up in the wee hours of the morning, but it was about to be her last. You see Sherry had a habit of sleep walking, a condition she had had for many years. Whenever this would happen Steve would wake her up and she would go right back to bed. As usual, Steve woke her up..........but not in the usual way. Steve and Sherry lived in a private home and when Steve saw her sleep walking he quickly got up off the sofa and opened up the sliding glass door that led to the patio. He then very gently guided his wife through the living room towards the open door and onto the patio. Now the patio overlooked their pool and Steve pointed his wife in its direction. In less than thirty seconds Sherry took that one big, final step. The one that took her into the pool. She started floundering around, crying for help and all Steve could do was yell out at the top of his lungs, "THAT'LL TEACH YOU TO SLEEPWALK," and he walked back into the house to finish watching his movie. The fact that his wife couldn't swim didn't seem to
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bother Steve at all. Thankfully the story had a happy ending as two unexpected things were accomplished that night. First of all Sherry learned how to swim, which just goes to prove that you're never too old to learn and secondly she never sleepwalked again.
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IT'S SEVEN O'CLOCK...............GO TO YOUR ROOM Steve's mother in- law's name was Carla. Of all the meshugana friends I have ever had, Steve was definitely Commander in Chief. And if Carla would have been my friend, then she would have been second in command. She put up with a tremendous amount of abuse from Steve and the only way I can rationalize it, is that she wasn't dealing with a full deck. Not even a pinochle deck. I mean there were an awful lot of cards missing. Now you must understand that when I first met Steve he wasn't a kid. At least not chronologically. When I first met him, he had just turned forty. Forty, going on twelve. And I'm being generous. Carla lived about a block away from Steve and Sherry. One day Steve called Carla at her place and said that Sherry needed to see her right away. Like a dutiful mother, Carla came right over. Steve was looking out his window, awaiting her arrival. When he saw her walking towards the house he opened up his window and brought over a hose that he had hooked up to the sink in preparation for his mother in-law's visit. As she approached the front door he turned the hose on and saturated her. And of all the pranks that Steve played on his mother in-law, this one by far was the funniest, most innocent one of all.......But the following one was probably the cruelest. Carla couldn't afford to live by herself anymore so she asked her daughter if she could move in with her. Steve's immediate reaction was a negative one, but finally he consented. Steve converted his garage into a bedroom for Carla. On the day she moved in he let her know she was to go to her room at seven each night. Steve was emphatic in his demands. He reasoned that he would only entertain a minor disruption to his life and if he could keep his mother in-law out of his sight from seven at night until seven in the morning, then the thought of having Carla move in would be tolerable to him. Steve also felt that there had to be a "breaking in" period. Sort of like when you bring home a new puppy. Except Steve didn't exhibit the same amount of patience that a dog owner would. Steve made sure that Carla was house broken the very first night. Everyone had finished eating dinner around six thirty and they were all in the living room watching television. As soon as the clock struck seven, Steve told Carla to say good night to everyone. Carla did as she was told and got up from her
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chair, said good night to everyone and walked off to her room. Steve was following behind her and as soon as she entered her room he quickly closed the door and put a combination padlock on it. Carla yelled out, "What are you doing?" Steve told her that he padlocked the door and he would let her out at seven in the morning. Once again Carla yelled out, "OPEN THE DOOR BECAUSE I'VE GOT TO GO TO THE BATHROOM." Steve yelled back, "CARLA, I TOLD YOU THAT YOU HAD TO BE IN YOUR ROOM BY SEVEN. YOU SHOULD HAVE GONE TO THE BATHROOM BEFORE. IT'S TOO LATE NOW. YOU'LL HAVE TO HOLD IT IN UNTIL THE MORNING." Carla pleaded with Steve to let her out, but he wouldn't give in to her wishes. Promptly at seven o'clock the next morning Steve unlocked the door and let his mother in-law out of her room..............But by then she didn't have to go to the bathroom anymore.
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THE HELLS ANGEL'S MOTORCYCLE GANG It was around nine in the evening. Joy and I were watching television when we noticed a light from the street shining into our living room. I peeked out through the blinds and I saw a police car parked in my driveway. I walked outside and I was confronted by a policeman who asked me if I was Mr. Chanzes. I replied that I was and he asked me if the motorcycle gang had left and did they do any damage? I said, "What motorcycle gang?" He then told me that his department received a phone call from me, no less than ten minutes ago stating that the Hells Angel's motorcycle gang was terrorizing my house. I said, "Officer, unfortunately someone has just played a cruel, practical joke. I don't know who it was, but I can assure you that everything has been peaceful around our house." As the officer left I walked back into my house wondering who would have played a joke like that and the one name that stuck out far and above the rest was.........Steve Crown. I got on the phone and called Steve. He thought what he did was hilarious......Only I wasn't laughing. I told him that I would get even and the only way I would stop is if he cried out "Uncle." That's when he started to do his imitation of Winston Churchill. Because all I heard him say was, "NEVAH, NEVAH, NEVAH." It was now ten at night. Steve finally did say uncle, although it took him six hours to do it. At four in the morning his white flag finally went up, but not before scores of people visited him. I had various restaurants deliver food to his house. Just about every cab driver in Broward County came to his door to give him a ride to the airport. Every locksmith, every plumber, every electrician, every alarm company. They all showed up at his house for emergency repairs. I went through the yellow pages and called any service company that made house calls. Finally, at around four in the morning, my phone rang. It was Steve. Now Steve was a good sport with regards to my shenanigans. He could take it as well as dish it out, but he said that it ceased to be funny when the coroner came to remove his body. He then uttered the magic word. "Uncle."
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THE HAWK There's an expression that is used to characterize people who are a bit ditzy or not all there and the expression is, "They're out to lunch." Well I have a friend by the name of Patty who is not only out to lunch,............but breakfast and dinner as well. His real name is Patty but if you saw his nose then you would know why they call him The Hawk. The Hawk is a Philadelphia boy, living there most of his life, except for six months when he came to live with Joy and I. To say that The Hawk is different from most people would be the understatement of the year. I mean do you know anyone who tips toll booth collectors? The Hawk does. Do you know anyone who goes to the barbershop two or three times a week? Yep, The Hawk does. Joy and I made arrangements for The Hawk to fly down to Florida and stay with us for a spell. The night he arrived was one of the most memorable nights of our lives. I had a gizmo about three inches by six inches that operated off of a remote. I planted the gizmo in Pattys room, plainly out of sight. Eventually Joy, I and Patty said goodnight and went into our respective bedrooms. We peeked out our bedroom door and waited for the lights in Pattys room to go off, signifying he went to bed. Thats when the fun began. I pressed the remote and all of a sudden in Pattys room we heard, Get the fuck up. The light in Pattys room went on and immediately thereafter I pressed the remote again and we heard, You lazy bastard. With that Patty ran out of his room and went into the kitchen. Joy and I were bent over in laughter. We came out of our bedroom and asked Patty what was all the commotion about. He told us that someone was outside his bedroom window shouting obscenities and he was going to get a knife, go outside and scare the intruder away. Joy and I couldnt contain our laughter and eventually we told Patty what we had done. The Hawk put the knife back into the drawer and went back to bed.he didnt share our humor. The Hawk is a major gambler. Hell bet on anything. Hell bet if the sun will come up tomorrow, how many times youll go to the bathroom, total number of points scored in a basketball game, etc., etc. You name it and hell bet it. One time he was given the name of a horse that couldnt lose. Patty told all his friends about it and before you know it he had a small fortune that they all had given him to place a bet on the horse. Keep in mind that The Hawk has been betting his entire
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life on sure bets and you can count how many winners hes had on your fingersand youll still have ten fingers left. Anyways, The Hawk is off to the track in his brand new CadillacWell, not exactly brand new. It was ten years old but The Hawk just bought it. As hes driving he notices that he needs gas. He pulls into a station that had a few cars ahead of him. Time was growing short. He had to make it to the track. He looks across the street and sees another service station; only this one didnt have any customers. The Hawk pulls out of the crowded station and heads across the street to the empty station. He rolls down his window and says to the approaching service attendant, Fill err up. The attendant says, Sir. With that The Hawk says, Dont sir me, just fill err up. Once again the attendant tries to say something and this time The Hawk says, If you dont fill this fuckin car up Im gonna smash your head into my windshield. With that the attendant fills up the Cadillac, The Hawk pays him and naturally gives him a tip and then The Hawk proceeds to the track. But he didnt get very far. About a block from the service station The Hawks car began to sputter. You see the reason there wasnt anyone at that service station was because they only had diesel fuel. The Hawk never made it to the race track, the horse won and Patty had to pay about one thousand dollars to have his tank flushed. The Hawk met this girl Sherry in San Francisco. Patty liked her and after Sherrys mother passed away and left her three million bucks, why Patty liked her even more. She moved in with Patty for a few months. Then The Hawk had a bright idea. Why not retire to Mexico. Sherry wasnt a dummy. She wanted to know how The Hawk could retire to Mexico if he wasnt working. Patty told her not to confuse him with facts and off they went to Mazatlan, Mexico and had a home built for them. The Hawk was living the life of Reilly. He would go out every morning and golf with his buddies. After golf they would go to the 19 th hole for lunch. Then they would settle down and play cards until five or six at night. Patty would go home, tired from a hard days retirement and grab a sandwich and go to bed only to repeat this process the next day and every day thereafter. As I said, Sherry was no dummy. She wanted to know when The Hawk would have some time for her. Pattys reply was always, Hon, Im tired. This went on for almost a year when finally Sherry kicked Patty out of the houseBut he didnt leave quietly. No, not at all. Somehow, someway The Hawk convinced Sherry to give him $500 a month in alimony. That lasted for well over two years before Sherry stopped paying him.Well, I told you shes no dummy Patty has a girlfriend..at least she thinks shes Pattys girlfriend. She gives him money every so often so he can feed his gambling habit and in return he goes up to her house to play lets hide the bologna. One day she asked Patty why he
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never takes her out to a restaurant or a movie and Patty gave a classic reply, Its not dark enough. Patty recently underwent a minor operation whereby he had to be sedated. His girlfriend asked him if she could come to his hospital room when he came out of recovery and once again Patty issued a quick response, which was, Why the fuck would I want to wake up and look at you..and she still lets him come to her house and she still gives him gambling money. Amazing. Patty grew up in Philadelphia and was boyhood friends with John Catona. They came to Florida together and through John I met Patty. The best way to describe Patty is that he was an accident going to a place to happen. Wherever you found trouble, then you probably found Patty. He was a miniature version of "The Terminator," a potent character popularized by Arnold Schwarzenegger. Yet as vicious as he could be, he was also one of the nicest people you could have as a friend, and besides, if Patty was your friend then you knew that no one would ever dare bother you. Patty is about 5'6" tall. Very lean, trim and powerful. His nickname is the Hawk, because his nose looks like a bird's beak. Long and curving downwards. He didn't mind being called the Hawk, but you could never call him shorty, which was a reference to his height. He couldn't stand anyone calling him shorty. He'd clock you for doing that. He'd put your lights out. And he didn't care who you were. He was a bartender at the prestigious Boca Raton Hotel and Country Club in Boca Raton, Florida. Its an expensive and luxurious resort that accommodates very rich and famous people. A Sheik from Saudi Arabia along with his entourage was occupying two complete floors at the hotel. They had been there for two weeks and their tab was already well over a hundred thousand dollars. They had intentions of staying another two weeks except one day the Sheik got Patty real mad and all hell broke loose. Well, actually all hell didn't break loose.................but Patty did. The Sheik and some of his Sheikettes came down to the bar for a drink. Patty was on duty that day. There were a lot of people around the bar. It was very hectic. Patty was doing the best he could to see that everyone was being waited on as quickly as possible. The Sheik was growing impatient. He yelled out across the bar, "Hey shorty, how about some drinks?" Now Patty could be in a crowded football stadium with 75,000 fans standing on their feet screaming at the top of
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their lungs for the home team, but if anyone said the word shorty, Patty would hear it. Well this wasn't a stadium with 75,000 screaming fans. It was just a bar with maybe thirty customers in it. Patty heard the word shorty and immediately started walking towards the Sheik. Patty looked at the Sheik and he said to him, "Excuse me. What did you say?" The Sheik said, "I asked you for a drink." Patty then said to him, "No, no. What did you say before you asked me for a drink?," and the Sheik responded, "All I said was hey Shorty, can I have a drink? Why? Don't you like it when people call you shorty?" And then the Sheik turned around to the people near him and started to laugh. Before the Sheik knew what had happened, Patty put his hands behind the Sheik's head and slammed his face onto the bar. That move broke the Sheik's nose. Patty continued his assault on the Sheik. Each time he slammed the Sheik's head onto the bar, Patty would yell out, "Now Sheiky, what's my name?" The poor Sheik couldn't talk. Well he wasn't really poor. As a matter of fact he was very rich, but nevertheless he still couldn't talk. He was a bloody mess. The Sheik left the hotel the next day. He never paid his bill and the hotel didn't press him for the money. They were just glad that he didn't sue them. As for Patty, the hotel management fired him that night. Patty asked them if they would give him a good recommendation. They just saw what Patty did to the Sheik. They didn't want a repeat of the event, so they assured Patty that they would only have nice things to say about him to any prospective employer. Patty then went and got a job as a bartender at the Palm Aire Country Club in Pompano, Florida. The Palm Aire was also an exclusive resort that was known worldwide for its health spa. People such as Jackie Gleason and Elizabeth Taylor used to frequent the place from time to time. One night Patty was tending bar. It was very crowded and a man sat down at Patty's station and very politely and in a barely audible voice asked him for a beer. Patty looked at him and said, "Excuse me, but ain't you Paul Newman?" The guy said that he was. With that Patty says to him, "Now listen. You can't walk in here and whisper to me, can I please have a beer? You're Paul Newman. I want you to talk like you're Paul Newman. What I want you to do is this." And with that Patty slams his fist on the bar and yells out, "I'M PAUL NEWMAN AND I WANT A BEER." "Now let me see you do that Mr. Newman." And just a few moments later there was Paul Newman, slamming his fist on the bar, yelling out at the top of his lungs, "I'M PAUL NEWMAN. LET ME HAVE A BEER." Paul Newman made a lot of new friends that night. He bought a couple of rounds of drinks for everyone and enjoyed himself until the wee hours of the morning when the bar had to finally close down.
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WHAT DO I LOOK LIKE, A VALET? One evening Patty, John and I were going out to dinner at the 15th Street Fishery, located in Fort Lauderdale on,.........that's right........................15th street. Patty was a compulsive gambler and on this night he had bet a few hundred with a bookie on his favorite baseball team, the Philadelphia Phillies. On our way over to the restaurant Patty was listening to the game on the radio. The Phillies were trailing in the game and each time they made an out Patty's voice would rise, uttering one obscenity after another. Patty was upset for a couple of reasons. First of all he hated to see his team lose and secondly he also hated to part with three hundred dollars. Three hundred dollars that he didn't have in the first place. But a lack of money had never stopped Patty from gambling before. Somehow he would always survive, probably because he could be a mean son of a bitch and no bookie would dare threaten Patty with bodily harm if he didn't pay up. I could visualize the bookie telling Patty, "Don't worry; if you can't pay me this week, then you can pay me next week. Don't worry." And Patty didn't. John was the driver on that particular night and as it turned out we were lucky that he was. John to this day will never let anyone valet park his car because of the way some of them drive, so when we arrived at the restaurant John drove around until he found a place to park. Most of that night John and I were alone at the dinner table because Patty was hanging out at the bar watching the game on television. Every now and then Patty would come to the table and utter a curse word because his Phillies were losing and then he would return to the bar to continue watching the game. Dinner was over and the Phillies were about to come up for their last turn at bat in the bottom of the ninth inning. They were down by three runs. There was still a chance that they could pull it off. As a matter of fact there were two chances that they could do it. Slim and none, and slim was half way out of town. I had to go to the men's room and Patty was in a rush to get to the car so he could hear the final inning on the radio. John said that he and Patty would get the car and they would meet me out front. When I walked outside I saw both John and Patty by the valet stand. When they were walking towards the car they noticed that there was a television next to the key rack. Patty asked the attendant if he could watch the last inning of the game and the fellow said sure. In the meantime the attendant had gone off to retrieve a
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car for one of the restaurant patrons and that left John, Patty and I standing by the valet counter. To the uninformed, you would think that we were the valet attendants. Meanwhile the Phillies had one man on base and there was one out. They were still in the game. Patty's eyes were riveted on the screen when this couple walk out of the restaurant and come up to the valet stand and hand John their ticket. John says to them, "Which one is your car?" The guy told John that he had a blue Cadillac. John then turns to Patty and says, "Hawk, this guy and woman have a blue Cadillac. Go get it for them please." At that moment Patty went crazy. He yelled out, "WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK I AM, THE VALET? LET THEM GET THE FUCKIN CAR THEMSELVES." And with that Patty lifts up the board that had the keys to about fifty cars on it and he throws it to the ground, sending the keys flying off in different directions. The guy who gave John the ticket for his car was standing there with his mouth wide open in disbelief and then John yells out, C'mon, let's get out of here before the cops come." We made it to our car and hightailed it out of there. As we were peeling out of the parking lot, Patty turns on the radio only to hear the Phillies make the third and final out and lose the game. The Phillies lost the game but they could return and play again the following day on the same field. Patty not only lost three hundred dollars but he also forfeited the right to return to the 15th Street Fishery.........Most people that run afoul of the law have their picture positioned and hanging in the post office. Not Patty. His picture is on display in a restaurant................. ..................................And by a valet stand.
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IS THERE ANY NAME THAT I CAN USE? I had just opened up a telemarketing firm called DuPont Specialty Company, Inc. I hadn't been in business for more than a week when one day as I was walking through the sales room I overheard John talking to a prospective customer. John, to his credit, was always very innovative, especially when it came to making sales. As I passed by his desk I heard him say into the phone, "You know, DuPont. A name you can trust." I liked the sound of it. It had a nice ring to it. It sounded classy to me. I immediately called my printer and ordered a new set of stationery and envelopes. They looked just like this: DUPONT Specialty Company, Inc. "A Name You Can Trust" The business was doing very well. I had about ten sales people working for me and while I had only had the company for a couple of months, it was apparent that I would soon have to give thought to expansion. That's a problem every business person should have. Then one day I received a letter from an attorney who represented a company that bore a name similar to mine. The name of the firm that he represented was E. I. DuPont, DeNemour. The attorney for E. I. DuPont stated in his letter that if I didn't cease and desist from using the name DuPont Specialty Company, then he was instructed by his client to proceed with civil litigation against my firm. I went to see my attorney and he told me that E. I. DuPont had no legal right to stop me from using my company name and slogan. I felt gratified to hear that. And then he wrote a letter to E. I. DuPont's attorney stating his opinion in the matter. About two weeks later the attorney wrote his own letter of opinion to my legal advisor. And his opinion hadn't changed one iota. His client was ready to proceed with a lawsuit if I didn't cease using the name DuPont Specialty Company. It seemed grossly unfair. I had applied for and received an occupational license from the city and county that I resided in to open a business under the name I chose, and in addition the state of Florida granted me corporate status for the name DuPont Specialty Company, Inc. I was irate. So much so that I decided to take on E. I. DuPont and its high priced lawyers.
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My attorney felt that I could beat them hands down and he was elated that I was a man of principle. He said that if I prevailed in court then the other company would have to pay my attorney's fees. I was charged up and ready to do battle. Then my attorney told me that it would cost me approximately $50,000 to defend myself. So much for principle. I was in the marketing business. I always felt that one of the major keys to success is to get the attention of your prospect as quickly as possible. Get their interest peeked and they'll listen to your spiel. And I felt that one of the best ways of getting their attention is by the very name of your business. It should be something different. A name that indicates "Grandness." A name that gives the impression that you're a huge company. A name that provokes thought. A name that is not only distinct but one that has a hint of familiarity to it. DuPont had that ring to it but I had to give it up. But finally I came up with another name. I called the state of Florida and they told me that it was available and I could incorporate it. I called the county and city occupational license bureaus and they too approved my new business name. I then applied for incorporation and within a week of the demise of DuPont, I had a new corporate entity. One that was more majestic in stature than any that I had had in the past or for that matter would ever have in the future. My new company was called:
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THE U.S. BUREAU OF RECORDS, INC. Within a month business was booming. I was sending out thousands of letters a day to residents throughout the United States, giving them an opportunity to purchase recreational gift ware. Those people that were interested would call my office and speak to one of my sales representatives to inquire about my offer and then it was up to my reps to close the deal. Once again business was going great, but in the back of my mind I kept wondering if I was going to get another letter from some attorney telling me that I couldn't use the name I had chosen for my business. But this time I didn't get a letter..................Instead I was paid a personal visit by a member of the FDLE (Florida Department of Law Enforcement). He literally stormed into my office and demanded to know why I was deceiving people by telling them that my company was the U.S. Bureau of Records. He read me the riot act and then after he calmed down I pointed towards my occupational licenses that were hanging on the wall and then I showed him a copy of the Articles of Incorporation that the state of Florida had sent to me which gave me authorization to use the name U.S. Bureau of Records, Inc. He looked at me with complete amazement. This tough talking guy who just a minute ago was threatening me, all of a sudden turned very timid and he said, "You mean that the state of Florida said that you could use this name?" Once again I pointed to the paperwork. He scratched his head and walked out. About two weeks later my wife called to tell me that she just had a nice visit from a member of the F.B.I. Joy said that he wanted to talk to me at his office regarding my new company. I called him up and made an appointment to see him. We sat across the table from each other. He was very professional, very courteous. He wanted to know why I had chosen the name U.S. Bureau of Records and I then explained my reasoning. He asked me to explain in detail the operations of the company. After I had finished enumerating my companies marketing plan, the agent looked at me and said, "Steve, you're not doing anything wrong. As a matter of fact I think it was ingenious on your part to come up with the name for your firm. BUT, because we constantly receive complaints on your company for no other reason than the name you are using, I will always have to maintain an open file and continually investigate you in order to satisfy my superiors. Now, let me make this clear. You're not in violation of any laws. None whatsoever. But every
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time we get a complaint, then we have to investigate. So the choice is yours. You can stay in business using the name U.S. Bureau of Records or you can utilize your marketing skills and come up with another, less offensive name." I gave some thought to calling my attorney to fight this bureaucratic quagmire that I had fallen into, but after some prudent deliberation I realized that $50,000 would only be a down payment on this case. Once again principle gave way to reasoning.
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JAMES "BURNELL" BELL So you the reader can have a better understanding of my friend Jim Bell, let me describe how I have listed him in my telephone directory. I have the usual fields of information in there such as name, address, city, state, zip, phone, etc. I also have one field titled "Children." When you look up Jim Bell in my telephone directory you will see the following comments in some of the listed fields. Name: James "Burnell" Bell City: Kingman State: AZ Children: He keeps looking up in the sky for the stork. Every now and then as we travel the many "highways of life" we meet someone who leaves an indelible impression on our minds. During my life I have met a few people who fit that pattern and one such individual is James Burnell Bell, or Jim. I first met Jim in 1987 when he came to work for my company, Ewing Fairchild International Corporation. At the time Jim was 25 years old, or so he thought. He was a former high school and college football player out of Colorado. He was big and strong and very likable.........and also very gullible. In addition he was a very hard worker who rose through the ranks to become a sales manager at my company. We still to this very day maintain a close relationship, even though Jim has since moved back to Arizona. Prior to moving to Florida, Jim grew up in Golden, Colorado, which was famous for producing Coors Beer. He was a motorcycle cop and he was probably the only one in the history of Golden, Colorado who got a severe reprimand for doing his job......................At least that's what Jim says, but you be the judge. Jim had gotten up on the wrong side of bed one day, as we all do from time to time. He was on his motorcycle and had come to a stop at a red light when this car pulls up to him. The driver rolls down his window and says to Jim, "Officer. I don't think that my speedometer is working properly. Would you please do me a favor and follow me and then I'll signal you when my speedometer says that I'm doing thirty miles per hour. Then you can tell me the actual rate of speed that I am traveling." Without hesitation Jim said that he would do it. The light turned green and the guy starts to drive off with Jim right beside him. Suddenly the driver of the car turns to Jim and says, "Officer, my speedometer says that I'm doing thirty miles per hour. What is my actual speed?" "Sir, you're actually doing thirty-five and this is a thirty mile per hour zone. Pull over." The driver did as he was told and Jim gave him a speeding ticket. The fellow then registered a complaint and Jim received a reprimand. Jim still can't figure out what he did wrong.
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In 1988 Joy and I moved to a larger house. We sold our former home to Jim. He was jumping for joy because this was the first house he had ever bought. And I'll never forget the day he came back from the bank after applying for a home loan. He was a bit despondent. I couldn't figure it out and the first thing that went through my mind was that he was turned down. I asked him what was the matter and he replied, "Steve, the bank officer told me that I was 27 years old." I said, "So?" "But Steve, I only thought I was 26. I don't know how I misplaced one full year." I told Jim that I truly hoped he did well in his position as a sales manager because I knew for sure that he could never be my accountant.
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WHAT IF I DIDN'T HAVE ANY MONEY? Jim and I both lived in the same community of Coral Springs, a relatively small sized city ten miles west of Fort Lauderdale. One day Jim had to bring his car into the repair shop and at the end of the day he asked me if I would give him a lift home because his car still wasn't ready. I told him that not only would I take him home, but I'd also take him out to dinner. After we finished eating I asked Jim if he wouldn't mind dropping over at my house for an hour or two so we could play some video games. Now Jim was aware of the reputation I had of inviting some of the guys over to the house to play video games for an hour or so and ultimately that hour lasted until the wee hours of the morning. Since Jim didn't have a car, he couldn't risk the possibility of such an event happening. I told Jim that we would just play a few games and then I would take him home, but my reputation had preceded me and he said no. I told him that if he couldn't at least come to my house and play a couple of games with me then I wasn't going to give him a lift home. He thought that I was bluffing, so I got into my car and drove off........without Jim. The next morning Jim came into my office and told me that he couldn't believe that I left him stranded at the restaurant. I asked him how he got home and he told me that he called a cab. And then Jim said to me, "Steve, what if I didn't have any money on me? Then I really would have been stranded with no way to get home other than by walking at least five miles." I said, "Jim, in a case like that, all you have to do is give the cab driver a bogus address. One that is two or three blocks away from your house. When the cabbie pulls up to the address you gave him, simply open the door and run like hell. By doing that you will have caught him off guard and he won't know what to do. And if you do it at night when it's dark outside, then he'll lose sight of you very quickly and you'll be home free." Jim just kind of looked at me rather oddly and then went back to work. About three weeks later, a couple of my employees, Mark and Paul, who lived with Jim, came into my office hysterical with laughter. They said, "Steve, you're not going to believe what happened to Jim last night?" They went on to tell me that he was all right but he was going to be a little late today because he just went to bed. I excitedly said, "Just went to bed? What do you mean he just went to bed? It's eight o'clock in the morning. He's supposed to be at work. Doesn't he value his job?" Then they told me what seemed to be an unbelievable story, and if it would
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have happened to anyone else, then I wouldn't have believed it. But it didn't happen to someone else. It happened to Jim Bell and that's why I knew it was true. Mark and Paul went on to tell me that Jim was at a bar last night and he had one drink too many. Actually, the way they relayed the story to me, Jim probably had ten drinks too many. In any event Jim was pie eyed, inebriated, and just plain drunk as a skunk as they say. What made matters worse is that he had gone through all of his money. He had no way to get home. But then a light bulb went off in Jim's head as he suddenly remembered the conversation we had had not too long ago. Jim then called a cab company and did what I had jokingly told him. Well, he almost did what I had told him. When the cab driver pulled up at the address that Jim gave him, Jim jumped out of the cab and ran. He did that part correctly. The only problem was that Jim gave him his actual address and when the cabbie pulled up to it, Jim bolted from the cab and ran behind the back of his house and laid down on the patio in a drunken stupor. It was around two in the morning. Now the cab driver bore no resemblance to Albert Einstein, but then again he didn't have to. He simply called the police and told them what had happened. Shortly after the cabbie called them, the police arrived at Jim's house with no intention of ever finding the person who committed the mishap. But they had to file a report and follow up on the cab drivers story so they walked behind the house and much to their surprise, sitting on a chaise lounge sipping a beer and watching television was Jim. The cabbie yelled out, "THAT'S HIM," and with that Jim started to run. One of the cops screamed out, "Stop or we'll shoot." Jim stopped dead in his tracks. All the excitement woke up Mark and Paul and probably the neighbors as well. The police took Jim to the station and put him in a holding cell for a few hours, just until he sobered up, and then they released him and the matter was settled. When Jim came into work later that day I asked him what made the cab driver decide not to press charges against him. It seems that the cab driver felt that only a drunken person would do what Jim did, so he didn't want to cause him any further embarrassment and he dropped all charges. As Jim left my office he said, "Steve, do me a favor. Don't give me any more advice.
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YOU'RE UNDER ARREST Trouble had a way of following Jim. Especially when he least expected it. And when he had done nothing to deserve it. One of those times sticks out very vividly in my mind. It was a typical work day except for the fact that I had ordered a cake so that the office staff could join in and help celebrate Jim's birthday. Everyone was enjoying the day, especially Jim. Suddenly the festivities took on a sour tone when a policeman came into the office and asked to speak to Jim Bell. As soon as Jim identified himself he heard the officer utter those frightening words, "You're under arrest." It took everyone in the office by surprise. What was just moments ago a celebration of a very happy occasion had instantly turned into one of horror and disbelief. The officer told Jim to lean against the wall and put one hand behind his back. Jim did as instructed. Then the officer proceeded to read Jim his rights and after that the policeman took out his handcuffs and attached one to Jim's wrist. As the officer was placing the handcuffs on him, it suddenly occurred to Jim that he had no idea why he was being arrested. He turned around to question the officer, but by now the officer was no longer wearing his uniform. At least he wasn't wearing his policeman's uniform. He was wearing a different uniform. His normal uniform. And his uniform consisted of a G-string and nothing else. I had hired a male stripper to pose as a cop. Jim turned red as a carrot and started to run through the office trying to flee from the cop, I mean stripper. The only problem with that was that one of the handcuffs was attached to Jim's wrist and the other cuff was attached to the stripper's. And as they both ran through the office, the stripper in his G-string was singing happy birthday and Jim was yelling, "STEVE, I'LL GET YOU FOR THIS."
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WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR HAND? I have a tendency to get bored with whatever Im doing..except making love. It has no bearing on how successful I may have become, because I know that Im going to become bored. It has happened time and time again. Well, one day I was sitting in my office, very successful and very bored. I started giving thought to what I would like to do.and then it hit me. Why not become a Concert Promoter. And so I had a couple of people in my office do the necessary due diligence and before you know it I was ready to book my first act. Now I didnt want to book just any act before if we didnt sell a lot of tickets then Id be in serious trouble, so I went after major acts. I subscribed to an entertainment periodical which lists what venues various artists or groups would be playing and I saw that The Beach Boys were scheduled to perform in Orlando, Florida. I was a couple of hundred miles south of Orlando so I thought that as long as The Beach Boys were going to be in fairly close proximity then maybe they would entertain the thought of playing in Fort Lauderdale or Miami. I got the name of their manager through Pollstar and we opened negotiations. It was exciting. Faxes being sent back and forth. One of the faxes said that I had to furnish food for the group prior to the show and amongst everything else they wanted M & M candy. No problemBut without the red ones. Everyone in the office was excited..except the person I chose to pull out the red M & Ms. Well, we were about ready to sign the contract when I got some bad news. The groups management new that I was not only a novice promoter but that this was the first time that I ever booked an act, so they decided to go with someone else. I was pretty down and I decided not to tell anyone just yet.
There was a club not too far from my office which featured a female piano player. I saw the advertisement for her in the newspaper. I told most of my staff what my intentions were and they thought that there was only one person that was fit for this job and that person was Jim Bell. I told Jim that it looked like The Beach Boys were a certainty and I needed an opening act for them. I told him about the female piano player and that I wanted him to go up to see and evaluate her for me. Jim felt honored to be put into such a position of trust and he readily accepted. As you probably can guess by now, I didnt quite tell Jim everything.
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And so off Jim went. I lent him my car and my cell phone so we could stay in touch. A couple of hours later, having not heard from Jim, I placed a call to him on my cell phone. No answer. I tried again and again for some time but he didnt pick up the phone. Suddenly I got a call from one of my employees, Mark, and he told me that Jim was fine but he doesnt want to speak to me..and he didnt. He didnt speak to me for the next three days. He came to work and performed his duties but he wouldnt say boo to me. Finally when he did speak to me he said, Steve, I walked into the club. The female piano player was already playing. She was pretty good. I ordered a drink, looked around and thought something was wrong but I couldnt quite figure out what it was. Then I realized what the problem was and as soon as I did this fellow sitting next to me puts his hand on my thigh and I said to him, What are you doing with your hand? He then asked me to dance. Steve, you sent me to a gay bar and I dont think thats funny. Im still laughing as I write this story.
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I KNOW A GOOD DEAL WHEN I SEE ONE I'm sixty-seven years old and I've never worked for anyone in my life for more than two years. As my own boss I've never had a business for more than four years. I might add that I've had plenty of businesses and most of them have succeeded, so it's not that my businesses have failed. Quite the contrary. It's just that I have a tendency to grow impatient and yearn to try different things so I either sell my business or wind it down. It was the mid 1980's and I had just finished winding one down. I had decided to take a breather for a couple of months before deciding what my next venture would be. But I still needed an office because it's very difficult for me to think at home. One day John saw an ad in the paper that offered two free months rent. The ad said that there was office space available ranging from 150-15,000 square feet and the small offices were renting out for $125.00 per month. John also wanted his own office so he told me to call the number listed, make an appointment and go see the premises and take two offices, each with 150 square feet. I told John that I wasn't the best of negotiators and that he ought to go and rent the space. John didn't want to hear me say that. He said to me, "Steve, there's nothing to negotiate. Get two small offices. We're each going to pay $125.00 per month and we're going to get two free months rent apiece. There's nothing to negotiate. Now go call the guy and set up an appointment." I told John that he's making a mistake, but he didn't want to hear any of that so I made the appointment. I went and saw the space and when I returned to the office John asked me how I did. I told John that I made a fantastic deal. Almost too good to be true, but I know a good deal when I see one. I got John's adrenalin flowing and he said, "See. You were afraid to go and you wound up making a super deal. I'm proud of you. What did you wind up taking the space for?" When I told him, he hit the roof and raised his voice a bit. "$7,500.00 A MONTH? ARE YOU NUTS? HAVE YOU FLIPPED? What space did you take?" I told John that the guy made me a great offer on the entire second floor, all 15,000 square feet. Normally it would rent out for $12,000.00 a month. I got it for almost half price. Then John asked me a relatively simple question. "Steve, what are we going to do with all of that space?" I didn't have an answer. John immediately called the landlord up and told him that I had been released recently from a mental institution and that I was only supposed to rent two small spaces and that we couldn't take the entire second floor. The landlord understood
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and shortly thereafter we moved into our own little 150 square foot offices. But I kick myself in the ass because deals like that don't come around very often....................If only I could have figured out what to do with the space.
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PASS ME SOME WATER.....AND LOTS OF IT About three or four years ago my Aunt Lorraine and Uncle Aaron came down to visit us. One day my Aunt asked Joy and me if she could prepare dinner that evening. Without batting an eyelash we said yes.........................That was our first mistake. My Aunt asked us if we liked pepper steak. Joy and I had never eaten pepper steak before but I wouldn't tell my Aunt that. I simply told her that it so happened that pepper steak was one of our favorite dishes. She then told me that her pepper steak was unlike anyone else's.......And boy was she right. I watched her as she prepared the steaks. She lined them up and sprinkled a little pepper on them. Then some salt. Then some more pepper. Then a touch of garlic powder. And then the pepper again. Just when I thought she was finished, she turned the steaks over and repeated the process. Pepper, salt, pepper, garlic powder and pepper. Then she opened a jar of pepper corns and started to insert them into the steaks. One pepper corn after the other was inserted into them. On both sides. Her finger would reach for a pepper corn and then push it into the steak. About twenty pepper corns on each side. After a while my Aunt Lorraine looked very much like a Con Edison worker. She just substituted the steaks for the streets of New York as she bored into them. Once again she insisted that I had never tasted anything quite like her pepper corn steaks................I was starting to believe her. We put the peppers, I mean steaks on the grill and within ten minutes we were gathered around the dining room table ready to feast on what my Aunt Lorraine had prepared. The steaks smelled absolutely delicious. Almost too good to eat. Hindsight being twenty-twenty, I should have listened to myself, but instead I cut into the steak and placed it in my mouth anxious to savor its flavors. That was my second mistake.....................But as with everything else that happens in life, you try to make the best out of any situation and this one was no different. You see most doctors will tell you that you should drink eight glasses of water a day.................I had eight glasses with just one meal.
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YOU MUST BE PRESENTABLE In all my business endeavors we never had a specific dress code and for two good reasons. First of all, I live in Florida and it gets real hot here. Secondly I have never had a business where you meet your prospects or customers. All of our work has been done on the phones, so dress codes werent a top priority. Joy and I had just come back from a vacation in New Orleans and this was our first day in the office since returning and I was wearing a tee shirt that I bought in the Big Easy, when the phone rang. It was a potential job applicant and after interviewing him on the phone we both decided that the next step should be a person to person interview. I told him that he could come in right now but he said that he was just getting off from work and he was a little dirty as he was a garage mechanic. Immediately I let him know that his appearance was paramount as everyone here wears a tie and jacket. So he said that he would then go home, shower and put on his suit. I said fine. About two hours later my secretary calls me and tells me that the fellow is here for an interview. I came out to get him. He looked very presentable in his three piece suit but as soon as he saw me he bolted for the door, never to come back again. I dont understand why. I mean I was dressed. Not quite as good as he was, but nevertheless I was dressed. I had on sneakers, shorts and the shirt that I had bought in New Orleans which said, WHO FARTED Also on the shirt were blotches that looked like doo doo. Some people cant take a joke.
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BEND OVER PLEASE.........THIS WON'T TAKE LONG Besides lawyers, overpaid ball players, insurance companies and broccoli, I'm also not overly fond of doctors. It's a known fact that you should never get sick on a Wednesday, unless of course you're on a golf course because that's where they can be found on that day. But some doctors are nice and one in particular has a medical practice in the community where I live. I went to see him for the first time about four years ago, because I was due for my annual physical which I religiously take once every four or five years. Just like a patient has to get to know the doctor, it is also true that a doctor should get to know the patient, otherwise a person could draw the wrong conclusion or for that matter not know what conclusion to draw as illustrated in the following story. I went to the doctor to get a complete physical. An EKG, x-rays, blood work, etc. The last test happened in the privacy of the doctor's examining room when he told me to drop my pants. I watched as he put a glove on his hand and then he told me to bend over and breathe in deeply. The doc went digging for gold and as quick as he started, that's how quick it ended. He instructed me to pull my pants up and then I turned towards him and said, "Doc. Approximately how much is this physical going to cost me?" He said it would be around $250.00, to which I replied, "You know doc, for $250.00 I should be entitled to more than five seconds of pleasure."
THE END
I HOPE NOT
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It Never Rained in The Bronx

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It Never Rained in The Bronx

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IT NEVER RAINED IN THE BRONX

True, humorous stories From a real life Meshugana