My Five Stays In And Around Bean Town

I lived at five different addresses in and around Boston, from June, of 87, until September, of 93. Each one had its particulars and peculiarities that amused and oft times aggravated until that abode's welcome wore out. Then I would move once again in search of more pleasant living conditions. It was a goal that eventually drove me to give up that city with frigid winters for a metropolis deep in the south. Until that time I was finally highway bound I bounced around Boston, collecting in a little black book each stay's serving of anecdotes.

Stay One: In our apartment on the second floor at 26 Haskell St. in Allston, Mass, we bachelors three engaged in mutually accepted "funstility," a marriage of fun and hostility. Inspired in part by the antics of the british comedy The Young Ones telecast on MTV we treated one another to repartee and mild slapstick. I'd say for instance "Yea, touchdown" when the Celtics scored a basket and my roommates would pelt me with empty beer cans and tell me to go to my room. It was a grand time and we were tightly knit. We could finish each others sentences and we were in essence one happy family. But different goals and life with a capital L saw to it that we went our individual ways and the three of us left behind what was for me my most enjoyable experience in shared living arrangements.

Stay Two: I crossed the river Charles to reside Cambridge. I became a roommate with a woman named Sue, who I would later learn was raped while on acid, and a guy straight off the plane from Ireland. I forget his name. One evening soon after I'd unpacked my things my roommates had a keg party that I intentionally missed. The following morning I returned to an apartment that reeked of beer and two roommates who were both acting skittish and doing their best to not cross paths with one another. They took turns scurrying around the apartment like frightened mice. The tension was due it turned out to drunken folly in the guise of a sexual overture by the male on the night of the party. In the ensuing days the awkwardness escalated until Sue was physically shaking. She confided in me that she was stooping her shoulders because the other roommate kept ogling her breasts. But nothing happened. The days passed and the problem was swept under the rug, and there it lay with a noticeable hump. Life continued on. Then one night a short time later Sue threw her typewriter through her closed bedroom window. At the sound of the shattering wood and glass I stepped out of my bedroom to see what was the matter. Her bedroom door was slightly ajar. I called out to her and as she turned my way to slam shut her door I saw in her face a look I will take to my grave; it was one of utter madness. I tried my best to calm her calling out in a soothing voice the possibility of hope as she rendered destruction about her room. When finally she settled down enough to speak she confessed that on her ride home she wanted to drive her car straight into a highway abutment. I urged her to believe that there was help available. I'm not sure if I ever convinced her because I returned to my room without her vocalizing acceptance of what I offered. A couple of days later I moved out.

Stay Three: Still in Cambridge I moved into an apartment a block away from a YMCA in Central Square. I had two roommates, both of them male. One was balding and spent his weekends handing out Left centered pamphlets and gathering with anti government protesters. He also introduced me to Cafe Bustelo and an appreciation for strong coffee. The other roommate was effeminate and gay. He blushed a lot, took long showers, and was frequently engaged in hushed telephone conversations. The apartment was dark and every night around 10:00, our neighbors above us dragged across their wooden floors heavy furniture. It would take them several minutes to finally settle on a spot and cease the dragging. This was also the apartment in which I was introduced to cockroach infestation. You'd turn on a burner on the stove and out they would scurry. The more I thought about it the more I had to admit that the over all dirtiness of our apartment verged on squalor. In a few short months it sent me seeking a place with cleaner conditions.

Stay Four: Back in Allston, I took a spot in an apartment whose only common room was the kitchen. The living-room had been converted into a fourth bedroom to cheapen the rent. We each got a shelf in the refrigerator and there was a small black and white television on the kitchen table. At first all was ducky. We each carried on independently of one another. Two of us worked days and two were late night rock and rollers. This factor would later lead to my eventual departure. Of the two rock and rollers Sharon was tightly wound and given to sliding notes under my bedroom door rather than speaking directly to me. One note complained that I went to bed too early and therefore infringed on her peace of mind to do her vocal exercises in her room aside mine. Another note demanded that the culprit who had stolen the bread off her shelf should confess and pay restitution. A similar demanding note under the bedroom door of Barry caused him to churn so much in anger he vomited. The loaf of bread it turned out was placed on the wrong shelf by Sharon's boyfriend. The problem was Sharon was blind to everything in the refrigerator not on her shelf. A couple more notes under my door led me to search for a living situation without any roommates.

Stay Five: I scored a basement efficiency on Lee St. in Boston. It was behind a Dunkin Donuts and many were the nights fragrant with their appealing sweetness. I had a hot plate and I was for the first time in my life living on my own. My landlords granted me washing machine and dryer privileges and I had an easy chair and a reading lamp. There was also child's size desk in my room that the owner assured me had served him well in his years in college. I never could get comfortable while seated at it. I slept naked on a futon and one morning when I sat up my scrotum landed on an undulating centipede. The tickle shot me wide awake. But life was good. I enjoyed being on my own and beholden to no one. It was a delicious freedom and I reveled in it until I made my mind up that I was sick and tired of New England winters. I gave my landlords notice. Two weeks later I moved out and was on my way to Atlanta.

Some times known as L S DUKE

Something weird always happened or so it seemed whenever I was tripping on LSD. Sometimes it was just a hallucination, like for instance when Mr. Pasternak's nose fell off as he scolded me for not paying attention in Civics class. Or the time I was standing in line at a public snack shack and a tall and lanky black woman standing nearby eating a hot-dog looked exactly like a giant upright ant. Those visions were strictly chemically induced and were as a golfer would say par for the course. What I had in mind were more the moments when I bore witness to a realm of happenstance outside the confines of normalcy. For instance...

One winter's night in the depths of the President Carter era energy crisis three tripping buddies and I stepped inside a donut shop. We were ravenous for confectionary goods. There was an older gent manning a stool and sipping coffee and a middle aged counter woman standing at the register. It was very still and the colors were saturated and it seemed as if we'd entered an Edward Hopper painting called The Night Clerk. One of us told the woman we'd like a dozen donuts. She pointed to a red plastic latticework basket atop an adjacent display case. There were two donut-holes in it. "That's all we've got," she said. "You're welcome to them." In that moment we noticed all the empty shelves and took in what was abundantly clear: we were in a donut shop without any donuts. She had to be on to us. "Come on," said one of us to the woman. "You know were tripping. Right?" She arched an eyebrow and a wave of apprehension passed through us. Oops. We stammered "Never mind," turned around, and exited. We were soon in a fit of laughter over our silly question and the fact that reality had played a trick on us.

LSD or acid as we called it back then was two dollars a hit and quite often came in the form of a quarter inch by quarter inch paper square with an aspirin size dot in the center. There were also times when the dot was exceedingly small and the hit of acid was called Micro Dot. Sometimes the paper square was colored something other than white and had a name corresponding to the color like Purple Haze or Pink Jesus. Once in a while the paper had an image on it, usually a Disney character such as Goofy or Mickey Mouse in sorcerer garb and wielding a magic wand. Sometimes the little square was plastic and called Window Pane. Acid also came in pill form and was about one fourth the size of a Tic Tac. Orange Sunshine was barrel shaped. Purple Pyramid was the 3 D shape of its name. But no matter what the particulars of the acid the results were always the same. About an hour after "dropping" a hit the altered state fun began. And with it came the weirdness.

Franky and I were hallucinating like crazy in a world turned unbalanced and liquified when we decided to head for the safety of his bedroom. It was painted entirely black with day-glow stars and space-ships that glowed and pulsated when viewed with a black-light. It was dusk and we'd almost made it to his house when five children appeared out of nowhere. Their arms were outstretched and they called in unison, "Satan, Satan..." I plunged instantly into a Children of The Damned paranoia. Never had such evilness existed. I didn't know what to do. I looked to Franky, but he was as I frozen in place. Surely we were about to die. I could barely breathe. Then the kids german-sheppard came to their calling.

Another dusk acid had me enthralled in the mysteries of the moment while at a spot in the woods where friends and I partied. As I hallucinated and saw the world anew in pretty shapes and colors a cohort kicked apart a rotting log revealing hundreds of agitated ants. I suddenly felt all creepy crawly. The log kicker poured gas out of a plastic gallon jug onto the ants and gave it light. The flames leaped and the burning ants writhed. I squirmed in simpatico. The log kicker sloshed more gas on to the fire and the flames shot up the sloshed out gas. The top of the jug was instantly alight. He jerked the jug back towards himself to blow out the flames. When he did so gas splashed out of the jug and on to his head. And in that moment his head was engulfed in flames as if he were a human match-stick. He dropped to the ground and rolled out the flames but not before the fire had singed his hair, eyelids, and eyebrows. It was a frightful sight. I spent the rest of the night staring with due diligence into the devious flames of our subsequent camp-fire.

Years earlier. One gloomy, damp, and cold morning after the bus drop us off at the parking-lot of Kosciusko Jr. High School a friend and I each copped a hit of acid and headed off for parts unknown. About two and a half hours later after standing around shivering and waiting for the acid to kick in with no results we decided to return to school and get our money back. When I opened the doors to the school I was hit with a blast of warm air. It was as if someone flicked a switch. My legs went wobbly beneath me. I had to grab a railing in order to remain upright. I was inexplicably tripping my ass off. And so was my friend. We giggled and decided what the hell we might as well stay were it was warm. I believe that was the day I later saw Mr. Pasternak's nose fall off. And everything was fun and games.

Years later. I had a classic bad trip. Some forty minutes or so after I dropped the two and a half hits of acid I felt that emptiness in my stomach that announced a heavy trip ahead. Soon I was down the rabbit hole and the world was oozing and wobbling all around me. I made the mistake of looking into a mirror. In doing so I discovered what CIA operatives had known for decades: You can easily break the mind of someone unstable with hounding questions and a liberal dose of LSD. My subconscious was my cruel and viscous interrogator that night. As it howled at me I saw before me in my reflection every vile sin I'd ever committed. I looked on in horror as my face morphed into ever more hideous grotesqueries. With herculean effort I pried myself away from my reflection. But it was too late, for I knew with every fiber of my being that I was more putrid than a rotting corpse. And the night had just begun. In the horrific hours that followed I screeched at myself and ran a gauntlet of hallucinated ghouls and demons. The experience left me shellshocked and jumpy for many years to come. And although it was heavy price to pay for chemically induced wonderment I still look back with fondness on those years of hallucinations and weirdness.

9

Size queen

My penis is small. It is while flaccid about the size of my thumb, though thicker in girth. For most of my life I bore that fact with shame. In the school gym locker rooms of my early puberty I changed quickly never doffing my under-shorts or taking showers after play and exertion. I settled for the discomfort and stink of dried sweat rather than the scrutiny of friends and foe. No one would see my penis, or so I vowed.

While engaging with the world however my word was not easily kept. For the time always arrived when I had to drop my drawers or pull down my zipper. And no matter the reason, I knew shame. Be it a doctor holding my testicles and telling me to cough. Or the sudden freeze and dribble at public urinals when regardless of my bladder's insistence the close proximity of another's arrival turned off my water works. And worst of all as I was soon to learn was the shame inherent in my sexual awakening.

Her name was Kelly and we were both fifteen when she took me by the hand one chilly night and led me through the woods to an improvised bed, a pile of fragrant autumn leaves. Up until then I knew barely more than spin the bottle kisses. A parking-lot was nearby and its humming lights illuminated us with a flat white glare. She was by kiss-and-tell accounts an easy lay and I knew she was initiating me into the world of coupling at the behest of my best friend Peter. Soon enough Kelly and I were reclining in the gathered leaves, exchanging tongues and groping. I fumbled at her buttons and the clasps of her bra and suddenly before me she lay half naked. But I was not erect. So when she reached for my belt buckle I stilled her hand. "What's wrong?" she asked. But I could not speak and felt my cheeks flush red. There was no way out. I gave up. There is no other way to describe it. I was utterly defeated and let go of her hand. As she reached into my under-ware I was worlds away. And I replied near tears with a wordless mumble when she asked me once again what's the matter.

In the ensuing couple of years I knew no moments amorous. Although I longed after several cute classmates I did not pursue or make plain my affections. For the memory of my limp floundering with Kelly kept me mute.

Then as a Senior in high school I met Linda while drinking under age at a local lounge named the Dial Tone. I was in my liquor lubricated self charming enough to win her phone number. My subsequent call to her elicited laughter and acquiescence when I answered "go to a motel" to her question, "What shall we do on our first date?" The following Saturday off we went. As Linda undressed in the motel bathroom I turned off the lights, stripped down to my under-shorts, and got into bed. My breathing was shallow and I was both excited and tense with dread. I need not have been. For Linda turned out to be a tender and tutoring lover. She removed my under-shorts and did not recoil at my size or semi arousal. She treated me gently with head to toe kisses and I surrendered my virginity to her in the missionary position in several minutes time.

I learned through Linda and subsequent lovers that though at the lower end of the spectrum I was while erect of average size. But the knowledge did not appease me. I was as a boy blue in the face over a lollypop I could not have. I fumed in want of a bigger dick. And shame ruled me.

Three decades on in a bid to finally rid myself of my oppressive feelings surrounding size I went to a nudist retreat. I walked naked among my familiars with myriad body shapes and sizes and I saw penises relative in size to mine. And then one night as I luxuriated in the camp ground hot-tub I was joined by a woman who had undergone a mastectomy. And as I gazed upon that serene woman with one breast and witnessed her self acceptance I found myself and my shame suddenly foolish. She was in those moments my teacher. I knew then what it was to embrace one's own humanity. And in the many days that have followed I have thought of her whenever I've found myself once more nearing that vestige of size shame.

With hub and without

Beginning in the waning years of the sixties when I was not yet in my teens our family vacationed at Hampton Beach, NH, each summer during the last two weeks of August. The first few years we stayed at a three bedroom cottage painted a milky yellow. It was named The Kay. My grandmother, Nana, who was the hub of our extended clan spent the entire two weeks with us. My aunts and Uncles who lived relatively close by in Lowell, Mass, visited us nearly every day. They did so with my cousins in tow. We had a grand time and I knew what it meant to be happy and carefree. I didn't even mind my sunburn which I got nearly every year within the first couple of days of hitting the beach. It meant I got to hang out with Nana who confessed to me that I was her favorite. She would slip me thick white peppermints and dollar bills for the penny arcades and tell me all about the joys of growing up. She would confide in me until the worst of my sunburn had passed and I was once again able to return to my family's blankets just beyond the sandy dunes.

Each morning we'd spread out those blankets and beach chairs on our spot in the sand. It lacked only an X to mark it. The adults would slather up with sunscreen and oils redolent in coconut and sun themselves. They would make idle chatter and reposition their chairs to the changing arc of the sun. My cousins and I meanwhile would play with our toys in the sand. We would do so until the heat of the day forced us to brave the waves with frigid temperatures that seemed to indicate that they came directly from the Arctic circle. We would body surf and splash each other with chattering teeth as we waited for the next big wave to take us into shore.

Lunch time back at the cottage was orchestrated by Nana. It was a good humored and chaotic affair of cold-cuts, chips, pickles, and soda which my cousins called pop. We'd eat until sated and then lounge around on the porch and play with our dog Toto until once again heading back to the beach.

Our second summer at Hampton Beach I fell achingly in love with the teenage daughter of one of my mother's friends from childhood. I was smitten with a dry throat and a throbbing chest in the immediate moments of seeing her. So moved was I I gave up my army men as a show that I too was all grown up. As fate would have it one night she was a babysitter for us kids while the adults went out on the town. I was so overwhelmed by my feelings for her I stayed in my room breathing erratically and too afraid to venture into the room where she sat doing what ever it was that big girls do. I stared at my door willing her to come to me. I did so unsuccessfully into the late hours of the evening.

My father took Toto for a run on the beach each morning. And on Saturdays and Sundays he would bring home donuts from Sullivan's Donuts. You had to get there early our father told us. A line started forming before it even opened, this donut shop that was run by old man Sullivan and his two daughters who were both nuns. Whether it was due to the nuns or not we were all in agreement, as corny as it sounded, Sullivan's donuts were heavenly.

Every four years the Olympics coincided with our vacations. In Sixty-Eight we huddled around the small black and white television and listened to my father rail about the embarrassment to our country as three black American athletes lowered their heads and raised their black gloved fists in a show of black power. Four years later Munich saw us stunned and dumbfounded by a world gone horrifically awry. Then there was Olga and Nadia and unheard of perfect tens. And we were moved by their sprite spirits into believing that the world was not so bad after all.

The summer I was thirteen we moved from The Kay to stay at a larger cottage, 5 P street, rear. It was then that I investigated what it was that adults saw in drinking. Taking an empty quart size soda bottle I filled it with generous pours of gin, whisky, rum, and scotch. Booze was booze after all. With a liberal addition of cola to the mix I drank the God awful beverage down. I was not a pleasant drunk. I was quite obnoxious. Within no time at all I was down town standing at a second floor railing and spitting on the crowds passing below. Then I weaved into a penny arcade spitting on pinball machines. The proprietor caught me by the collar. He told to stand where I was while he went for a rag. The moment he was gone I was out the door. I ran in loping and stumbling steps for 5 P street, rear. I got home tottering and said I was going to bed and went upstairs. When my head hit the pillow the room began to spin. I raised the screen of my bedroom window and stuck my head out. My father who was directly below me washing dishes watched as my vomit hit the kitchen window that was opened horizontally.

In the spring of the year I was sixteen Nana was stricken with cancer. She did not tell us however when she found out. She waited until after the last two weeks of August. She withheld the news because she did not want to ruin the vacation for everyone.

There was a void after her departure, one that none of us could fill. We still had fun, gathered and jostled one another around the cold-cuts and chips, got sunburned, and tracked in sand from outside. But Nana was gone and you could feel the emptiness. There was no longer a hub and the course of our lives seemed not as true. We continued on for several years. But then my siblings and I reached the age of majority and vacationing with our parents lost its charm. We begged off joining them.

Then some twenty years later with a sepia toned glance at our days at The Kay I rallied my family around the notion that the chance of us all vacationing together might not come again. We booked a condo for seven days. The weather was questionable through out the week with rain, scattered sun, and blustery wind. There were tensions too between us. The family fabric that had frayed over the years through private demons and miscommunications seemed ready to tear completely apart. At week's end the best I could say about the vacation was that we got through it. The afternoon following that trying week I went for a run and ruminated over all that went wrong. At the end of my run I sat on a bench and bursted into tears. That winter my mother died. The ensuing years would find me pining for those early days at Hampton Beach and The Kay when I was still innocent and wished as I told Nana more than once that our vacation could go on and on forever.