Summer, 1961

Nine and a half years old now and this summer I had more responsibilities. It was my job to feed my dog Whee-Zee, something I never considered a chore. I also had to take out the trash and empty the garbage. Your food scraps were put into a small metal pail that was put out every Sunday evening for the garbage men to pick up on Monday morning. All the garbage was hauled off to the pig farms in Deptford, adding to the horrible smell that would come drifting on the air down Egg Harbor Road. Taking out the garbage was disgusting; the pail would stink to high heaven, and often it would be crawling with a mass of ugly white maggots. You opened the lid, held your breath, dumped the slop and quickly covered the thing as fast as you could. I can still smell it. The paper trash would be taken down to the end of the yard and burned in a big metal drum. I wasn't allowed to set the fire yet, that would come next year, as well as learning how to mow the lawn.
When Dad was able to we would take long drives. We never knew where he was taking us; it was always "Come on, get in the car, we're going for a drive."
I think Dad would read or hear about something that interested him and he would file it away in his mind, saving it for when he had a day off, and then off we'd all go to satisfy his curiosity. One of his surprise journeys took us to the Barnegat Lighthouse on the tip of Long Beach Island. Dad wanted to climb up to the top and gaze out over the ocean, hoping to give us all a thrill. It sounded exciting. A chance to get up high and look out across the sea to the end of the earth; maybe we could even spot England over the waves. A chance for adventure! I was a disappointment to my father that day. When I went inside and stared up at that winding, open metal staircase that seemed to go on forever so high and so fragile looking, my fear of heights took over me and I just couldn't move. There was no way I was climbing those stairs to an almost certain doom. Why don't they have elevators on these things! No, I had to be content with what I could see from the ground. Mom didn't go up either; she shared my fear of high places. I would be a flop at amusement parks as well. Dad would want to go on the roller coasters and all of the other rides that twisted and turned and went up to the sky, but not me, no that was not for me. The height and the G-forces scared and sickened me, and try as I might I could never find it in myself to enjoy it. I couldn't stand the feeling of my stomach dropping out, the rickety tracks suspended on such flimsy-looking supports; no the rides weren't for me. Any thoughts of becoming a jet fighter pilot or an astronaut were dashed beyond hope, I'd remain firmly on the ground.
We continued to play war. I could go over to Robbie McWilliam's house where he and Billy Hills and Richie Hearn and I would fight the battles of World War II over and over again. Robbie had a realistic looking machine gun on a tripod, and we would take turns mowing each other down assaulting the gun emplacement in frantic plastic bayonet charges.
Mom would try to revive my waning interest in the Lord again, and I would attend Vacation Bible School over at the Presbyterian Church. We'd do crafts like making Noah's Ark out of construction paper. They'd read us stories about Jesus and his disciples. We'd go outside and play tag and other games that didn't require any equipment. We were playing a form of tag where you had to run to the church wall for safety. The big glass windows of the basement rose up above us, and Robbie McWilliams raced back towards them a little too fast, so his arms went crashing through one. He screamed in terror and in pain, and the glass flew all around me. I remember him standing there screaming; his arms had this odd look as though they were covered in cottage cheese and ketchup. Our mothers quickly scooped him up and comforted him until the ambulance arrived. We wouldn't play that version of tag anymore. I didn't develop a new found interest in God or anything, but it was fun and it was something to do for two weeks, and- there was chocolate milk and pretzels! Real creamy chocolaty elixir in small glass bottles that was really cold and really really good. The salt from the pretzels enhanced the chocolate, and I couldn't wait for our daily dose of crunch and cream. Now that was a revelation!
Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris were always in the news. By the Fourth of July Mickey had 39 home runs and Roger had 40, and the papers were abuzz with the details of their quest to break Babe Ruth's record. It seemed like a day didn't go by without one of them smacking another homer, and the Yanks just steamrolled their way through the American League. The Phillies? Oh the Phillies were just plain awful, losing107 and winning only 47. Johnny Callison hadn't developed yet, and Richie Allen was nowhere to be seen. A bad year for Phillies fans indeed.
Gus Grissom would go up into outer space and just as quickly come down without orbiting the earth, his capsule sinking to the ocean floor. Another embarrassment; it looked like we would never come close to what the Russians could do.
We would go on into the dog days of August and spend more time at the lake and riding our bikes down Chestnut hill to keep cool. The hottest time of the summer, the lazy days were here and our minds were free of school and anything else of a serious matter.
We could drift through August without a care in the world....