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Posts Tagged ‘school’

The Breast Story Ever Told

In 1975 at the tender and horny age of 14 I spied with my little eyes a glimpse of 2 glorious female breasts. At the time they were heaving provocatively and bathed in the pink smoky light of the Palace-a-Go-Go Lounge on James Street in my hometown of Syracuse, NY. These breasts possessed my ideal demographic – human, female, and naked. Through the eyes of a lovelorn 14 year-old, these priceless ornaments were like 2 Crown Jewels perched regally on the chest of a royal subject. I took one breathless glance at those twin charms and sighed “God Save the Queen.”

 

In order to perpetuate whatever it is we’re doing here on Earth, God had to keep us reproductively interested in each other. He accomplished this with sex. Never underestimate the zeal of the organs for one another. They’re a powerful driver of action. Especially when you’re 14. But this is just a small part of the whole story. 

You may wonder what circumstances gave birth to a callow 14 year-old finding himself in a position to ogle a stripper gyrating onstage at midnight? Well the real story behind this wormhole into a forbidden dimension begins at the intersection of lust and wanderlust. Actually it began at the intersection of Wolf Street and 7th North Street where my sister Gail had an apartment.

 

And that’s where our story truly begins. But before we pick up things at the Danforth Arms Apartments, some background is needed so you may understand my journey from being a student with plenty of homework and chores to do on a quiet Sunday evening at home, to an outlaw truant drinking in a salacious eyeful of Gypsy Rose Lee strutting her fleshy stuff across a smoky stage. I don’t want to tell the story too quickly or you won’t appreciate the journey. Now that I’m 60 I know how to pace myself in elucidating a story so you’ll better appreciate it. No longer am I an excitable 14 year-old prone to premature elucidation. Read the rest of this entry »

“All Syracuse Public Schools are… Closed Due to Snow.”

“Holy holiday on ice, Batman,” exclaimed 9-year old David Hardiman, upon hearing the jolliest words of the holiday season. It was 6:30 in the morning and I’d waited breathlessly in paralytic anticipation next to the radio for what seemed like an eternity, but was probably about the time it takes for a snowflake to fall lazily to earth. This unexpected Snow Day electrified my body with ripples of sheer joy, causing me to shimmy down the hallway in a funky celebratory gyration – like the way Steph Curry does after swishing a spectacular trey.

 

Ode to Joy for this Snow Day – Well at Least Owed to Somebody I Suppose

That’s no day. I mean, that Snow Day!

For my snow day good fortune I felt a great debt of gratitude to somebody or something. This bonus day, this meteorological windfall, this unexpected gift of the Magi was way better than frankincense, myrrh or gold. It was the pinnacle of pre-pubescent happiness. And when I think of the small world I inhabited in the early 1970’s, I’m surprised I even fit into it. But fit I did, and some experiences were tailor made for me. Case in point: a sweet and dearly unearned school “snow day” – or as we called them back in the days of the Ice Capades, a “Holiday on Ice.”

 

When those cheery words “All Syracuse public schools are closed” were broadcast over the airwaves from on high, all public school pupils were elated, and all the pupils’ pupils were dilated. This eye-opening experience allowed us to see our way clear to a sensuous morning of deep, cozy hibernation nestled in our beds, followed by a strenuous afternoon of deep, snowy celebration sledding with our friends.

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As it was, we were already knee-deep in juvenile joy because the brawny forces of nature had defeated the bureaucratic powers of mandatory school attendance. Truant officers would have to find someone else to hassle today, because when afternoon came we’d be chest deep in snow drifts – and that’s no drift. I mean, and that snow drift was huge.

 

In my little 9-year-old way I realized that when mounds of the white stuff triggered a school closing, it was a kind of “white privilege” that everyone could share in equally. Snow: the equal opportunity precipitate.

 

My early Christmas present was given me by WNDR’s “Dandy” Dan Leonard – 1260 AM on your radio dial. His unctuous radio inflections are imprinted on me like a tattoo I can’t remove. The larger point however, was that there’d be no school on this fiercely-snowing, traffic-snarling Tuesday in the arctic tundra masquerading as the city of Syracuse, NY, and I couldn’t have been any happier if Marcia Brady had asked me to a sleepover. Read the rest of this entry »