With a plethora of information .... we sit and 'Hope'

Woke up today without a job again.... kind of getting used to it now. Although all the years of being involved in the construction home build and design 'industry' makes it a bit weird ... I used to be working at this time of the day. Now the housing bubble has burst, and its probably a good thing it did for many reasons, I can now sit and ponder where this world is heading.... really isn't this something we all should do on occasion? Just maybe the unemployed Americans are having a chance at thinking outside of the box for moment or two, or three.

I know for me I have been paying much closer attention to events, politics, statistics, and in general seeing things a bit clearer since my life has been 'simplified' by being jobless. Not that I didn't always wonder about the big picture, I did and have since childhood. I guess being born during the hideous year of '67 with the chaos of that time, the grim Vietnam war, the distorted Nixon years, and onset of advanced mindless materialism I must have been imprinted subliminally.

As a child my questioning nature was a nuisance to my parents, grand parents, and siblings. I asked 'Why' , 'how come', 'do I have to', pretty much all day everyday. I needed reasons, explanations. The old 'because I said so' just got me angry and prone to temper tantrums. I was sent to my bedroom at least once a day. My dad fielded many of these questions, sometimes patiently, some times with a red face with enlarged blood vessels bulging across forehead. My mother wasn't so patient and often threatened me with a hairbrush and would chase me into my room.
Early questions were innocent enough like, "how come I cant come fishing with you?", or why do we have to go church? its boring!". Later the questions became more like 'I wont's'... "I am not going to wear this stupid suit", my dad insisted that my brother and I wear these just awful suits to go to church, they itched, they were scratchy, they fit like a cardboard box, and they were incredibly embarrassingly ugly. I think the design of these suits was a form of torture. Well my dad sometimes would finally get frustrated, hell I can sympathize with him now, I frustrate myself daily.
I remember being a constant nuisance to my CCD instructor, for none of this religion stuff made a bit of sense to me, and still doesn't. The 'parting of the Red Sea' for one seemed to be particularly outrageous idea. In a class of a dozen or so adolescents I am sure order is hard to keep, especially when being questioned as such by me. " So the tide came in?" I asked, ohh no, Moses parted the sea with his hands .... 'Right sure guy' was my attitude. And with that he sent me out of the class to not get the cookie and zyrex drink reward for surviving these ridiculous, preposterous stories. That day my bother and I told Dad that we werent going back to CCD, and we never did.
And what is zyrex anyway? It sounds evil and tastes as it sounds, highly artificial. I remember going to a friends house and he would make what we called 'blood' by mixing zyrex and milk together, it made you want to puke. I notice today there is no zyrex on the store shelves, I guess that either its half life wasn't as long as expected, or they found it caused kidney and renal failure.

In Junior High school there was no ending to my questions, and my frustrations from not receiving them or from being heckled by my class mated caused me to rebel. To rebel I befriended the fattest, smelliest, and least popular class mates. This only caused me more problems, most of these kids were frustrated due to there unfortunate position in our youth cast system. I remember one 6th grade friend, Jimmy Warren, he came from 'the sticks' or Lincolnville center. He had all the qualities of a rebel friend... he was huge like huge 250 lbs, smelled really bad, acne, and actually shot a Buck that year, which was particularly impressive, he even came to school with his Buck knife on him and a bloody hoody after gutting it out , to boot. Well Jimmy and I got into all sorts of trouble, I remember bringing our snow ball fight back into the classroom after recess one snowy day... Mr Andrews the principle dragged me out by the ear to be lectured. Mr Andrews was not one to be reckoned with, he was a Lobster fisherman, when he wasnt principling, huge forearms, and a weather-beatened face. I am sure they hired him just because of his threateningness.
Another time, In World geography, a teacher named Mr Dugay (and how we had fun with his name) caught on to my wise ass ways and gave me the old 'three strikes and your out' question session...."Mr Pelletier.... is Africa a country of a continent?" , I paused a bit too long in answering, "Strike one". "Question #2, Mr Pelletier... Where is Cape horn located?" I was thinking, was it the end of Africa or was it the end of South America... I know they both had Capes jutting out.... " Mr Pelletier Strike #2, last question, Mr Pelletier what is the difference between longitude and latitude?" ... oh god I thought... I never get this one right, even today I wonder why whoever named these things couldnt have had the first letters different, like right vs left, it makes it hard when its like... right vs reft.... "Mr Pelletier...3 Strikes and your out of my classroom!" Mr Dugay boomed, with a following titter from 'fellow' classmates. And he led me out of the classroom and slammed the door in my face, off to see Mr Andrews again. I never really knew what Mr Dugay 'had out of me', might have been he had big ears too.
The playground was always a mess of intimidation, coercion, and evil class hierarchy. The girls were cruel and embarrassing, the guys were all over the place either like huge or tiny in size... I remember Edwin Witham's tactic in order to avoid being beat up, he was a very intelligent 'shrimp' ... he had his Dad 'the town dentist' buy him a pair of Limber boots... these are these huge very rigid hiking boots with a heavy steel toe.... these were Ed's tool of defense, I mean get him mad and he would kick his way out of any circle of large boys, and there were plenty of bruised shins on that playground.

I had a problem a lot on the playground, I would us alienation as a tactic against my fellow class mates. Like I said I made friends with the unsavory, one example was making friends with fellow aliens. With a few of these oddball sorts we would play games that would be threatening to our classmates who were learning to be 'cool'. Like in the 6th/7th grade my 'friends' and I played "sesame street" I was Ernie, and John White was Bert, and so on.... now this really aggravated our classmates. Sesame Street is so passe' in Junior High... only freaks would play this.... well it worked, it caused me to be threatened everyday. The threats started in the cafeteria right before recess, and then out onto the black top for playground the threats would bloom into full on war... The Sesame street freaks against everyone else. I remember two times being so glad Jimmy Warren was my 'friend' he could bear hug someone with their head in his stinky armpit until they wilted. But on several occasions he was missing or suspended so I would have to fend for myself. Mike Gilbey a fat kid who I always ended up having problems with ... he somehow could play ball sports better than me and it was always him over me as to who was not 'on the bench' ... Well 'Gilbey' took a liking to pushing me down on the snow and ice one day on the recess blacktop, and calling me 'Pellequeer', which would get my ears red. I warned him using the Dugay, three strikes your out ... "dont knock me down Gilbey", so he trips me again... "don't trip me down Gilbey" so he trips me again... I got up and when he went to trip me again .... Pow ! I punched in the nose and blood splattered all over the ice... he went running to the Playground supervisor who ended up being Mr Dugay, and off the the Mr Andrews I went. Actually Mr Andrews was sympathetic and said that Mr Gilbey had it coming to him.
Well I will spare you the details of the day Sesame street and characters Ed Witham, Gilbey, Jimmy Warren all went to war... It was grim and bloody.
Thinking about team sports, how I never fit into that stuff. I guess it might have been that we moved a bunch when I was a kid and my talents were never recognized through the obscurity of not being recognized. Or maybe it was because the coaches kids always get to play and like in Little league baseball there are only 9 players and when the coach has four kids... well that means only 5 spots. I know that it was unfair though, when I moved to Camden for 5th grade I was the #1 pick on the little league team 'Rotary', but again the coach had a bunch of kids and they had friends so I sat on the bench. On day I got my big chance and got to pitch. Well with all 'last minute notice' ' on the spot' things I totally choked, walked like an endless inning of players. Back to the bench, and then if lucky to play 'out in right field' , I got to know the expression 'out in right field' pretty early on in my team sport career.

Well then there was soccer which I didn't start until I was in 8th grade... I think that's like 5 grades or so too late, and basket ball too. Unlike most kids whose parents make sure their son or daughter are prodigy ball players my parents really could care less. My Dad never was much of a team sport guy. His early years as an only child whose parents were french Canadians, father a shoe mill security guy, and a stay at home mom that didn't drive insured a sort of non team player start out. He did play tennis and ski jumped in a catholic high school appropriately named Saint Dominic. My mom.... she was definitely not a sport person choosing music, piano, singing.I guess I really took on after my dad, I liked to fish, hunt, ski, and do adventure things like snorkel down deep into the ocean, try to follow my dad in his dive equipment as far down as I could hold my breath, see the weird bottom covered with huge kelp, and get freaked out, swimming to the surface. I used to want to go fishing in the early spring, before the snow had melted. Or I would put my ski suit on and pretend to ski in the back yard... I think this is what we all call 'passion for something'.
We used to get really excited when our cousins Chrissie and David came over, and to this day I can only think it was because the unexpected always happened. For example, when Phil and I were like 1st and 2nd grade, maybe younger, the cousins came to visit us when we lived in Pownel Maine, my dad worked at the 'tard' center Pineland there.... yes I know this is not nice, but its what we called it then, staying truthful to history. David thought it would be a riot to put me in a baby carriage and send me down the hill. I was game , so I loaded in and with a mighty shove, and he was 8 yrs older so it was a pretty good wind up... down I went, which was good until I hit the culvert at the bottom, and the carriage came to a complete stop, with me spilling out, on my face.... imagine a scene from 'Jackass' where they do this stuff with the red wagon.... except put a 7 yr old in the cart.... well I know I cried bloody murder, and Aunt Barbara got very angry with David.
The 'tard' center was always a recreational zone for Phil and I , it was boring in Pineland, except for a few exceptions.... we would ride our bikes down the hill to the place and ride around and see if we could get a reaction from the patients, which usually happened quickly... we would maybe get chased by a few, which was fun, we could always get away on our one speed bikes, but we looked at it as adventure, I thing frighteningly looking at these unfortunate patients as if they were zombies, which some of them kind of acted like with moaning, and strange walking patterns.
If we couldn't scare up a few patients then we would go to the cafeteria and see if there was any money in the candy machines, or if the guy that ate the cigarette butts out of the ashtray was at work. One time we found a complete set of clothes in front of my fathers office, underwear and all. We wondered where this naked zombie was, with a shiver. And if this all was not happening we would maybe do some fishing in the pond there, and catch stocked trout, or go home and wander around the many old farm building, maybe find some old windows to smash out... how we could get in trouble.In later years I found tormenting, teasing, and torturing my sister to be pretty much a good time. One day ,when we lived in Portland, Maine, my brother and I had a sled run going in the woods, a luge of deathly possibilities.... we had the start off of the 'head wall', we didn't know if it was possible to make the first bank without going out of the track... so we found Danielle, who was a likely test pilot, she was oh 5 yrs old , and we knew lighter, and unskilled, so if she didn't blow the bank.... it was safe . I think my bro and I knew this was maybe not such a great idea when we launched her with a shove, she accelerated down the head wall, and as we held our breath in a horrible expectation, she flew into the first banked turn... and up the bank and over it right into a huge very solid oak tree, and there was a sickening snapping sound. Now we got to play ambulance, my sister cried and screamed in pain as we ran down the hill with her on the sled bouncing around. Finally a big friend of ours carried her the rest of the way to the house. My mother hearing the screaming knew that we had hurt our dear sister; broken femur.
My sister was fun to torment, because she would act like a caged ferret, she would hiss, scream, bite, throw things, threaten to kill with knives. At a very early age she learned the craft of impalement. I teased her having her chase me around the table, until she picked up my mothers very sharp and pointy sewing scissors and threw them, with a very and solid throw .... one tine in my forehead, one in my cheek... she missed my eyeball... I was the one screaming now; she was two years old.
This sort of torment and associated hatred went on for years, right up to high school. My sister got better with knives and I remember once teasing her until she had me backed up against the family stereo record player as it blaster some Black sabbath tune.... and she had a huge steak knife and I seriously though I was going to get gored. Somehow I escaped... but Danielle learned that there were other ways than violence.... she could spy on me, find out when I was doing something 'illegal' and then tell on me to Mom. This was very effective, no longer could I trust her, she was dangerous, and would find ways to get me in trouble, or embarrass me. One time she spied on me and a friend John. We had made a tree house where we would hide our stash of cigarettes and beer. Danielle snuck up the ladder one day and found out what we had hid... and told the parents....She was no longer to be trusted, and not worth the risk to tease any longer, so I guess from this point on I saw teasing her as pointless and counter to my own existence... from then on we have gotten along.
The moments I remember on the 8th grade teams were, always getting a chance to play either when our team was really winning or really losing. One time playing a soccer match 'at home' I got thrown in off the bench... we were losing really badly, it was muddy, I had no cleats.... I think as I remember my dad gave me a choice that year of a pair of 2nd hand skis or a pair of cleats... I took the skis. Well of course I fell down and couldn't get a foot on the ball... got really mad and at the end of the game gave 'their team' the finger as they left in the bus. My mom saw this and got really mad, and said I was grounded.... oh how I got grounded...
So off to my bedroom when we got home. I thought to myself, this sucks, I am bored and hell with it I am running away. So I got a back pack with some items, and threw it out the window.... lowered myself out and headed off into the wood. I think it started raining like immediately and within a mile I was soaked. I made it like 2 miles on foot in the graying evening rainy darkness to a field that I used to go hunt grouse with my father in and sat down in the soaking rain.....This sucks, I'm hungry, and I'm going home, to hell with running away.
I guess this started the running away phase of my life. In Junior High I made friends with this guy Aaron Henderson. We had things in common like hunting, fishing, skiing, and running away. Aaron had a step-father ,Lenny, a really short swede, who was maybe the reason he ran away too. I remember Aaron always had the endless list of chores to do after school which was a real disruption from doing the things that we wanted to do after school, like go fly fishing, steal tobacco from the drug store, make bombs, steal liquor out of our parents liquor cabinets... which usually was god awful. Like in my house, apricot brandy, and at his house triple sec, or port wine, or some mixer alcohol.... drink this stuff with a huge 'joint' of rolled whiskey tobacco and see how long you can stand or ride your bike. Oh yeah one especially grand day after Aaron stacked the endless cord of wood for Lenny we escaped ... after grabbing a old dusty bottle of wine off a shelf in the basement near the wood pile at his home. Our plan was to drink this at a river where we knew of some big 'sucker fish' that we could blow up with some homemade bombs. Well this was all fine until I had to go home drunk.... riding my bike home with this evil tasting wine sloshing around in my belly got me some sick. I got home to find out that I was grounded again for being late.

Well Aaron suffered a similar fate , on returning home Lenny was there to meet him, he was injured, and angry, plus he smelled the stink of the wine on Aarons breath. Evidently Lenny was injured by the hastily stacked wood pile which collapsed on him. Aaron was in big trouble.... and his punishment was a weekend of indenturement to Lenny which meant no fishing this weekend.

more on this story later....