A family's stability in the 1950's was tied to your dad's job. A father's good, stable job could mean that a family would grow up in one community with a large support system of family and friends.
The ideal family back then was depicted in the TV show "Ozzie and Harriet" and later "Leave It to Beaver". If you had a dad like mine; tempermental, full of self-doubt, insecure and too-eager-to-please, you moved around from job to job and city to city. Back when numbers were important to me I counted 42 schools between my first and twelfth year.
The new kid in school can face the extremes of peer pressure and face it alone. He's fresh meat for the bullies, especially if a bit undersized. Or, word can spread intantaneously all over school that the new kid is a genius, a sports star or dreamy like Ricky Nelson.
That first impression is difficult to shake, even you've been taught modesty as some sort of virtue. I've had my share of both types of receptions, although I sometimes find myself Googling Pilot Rock, Oregon where I spent one idyllic spring and summer.
My first stroke of luck in Pilot Rock, setting an unstoppable favorable inertia was the visit to our home of the lady from Bell Telephone. Barely 11 years old, the youngest kid in Junior High, the lady listed me in the Teenager's Phone Book, an appendage at the back of the regular grownup phone book. I accepted the award without comment, feeling almost as if I had been awarded an undeserved Purple Heart. My mom would answer the phone, then say "It's for you", a totally new life experience. It was usually Mary, a girl that got everyone together for baseball at the park. If I hesitated, she would say "We need you. You're one of the best players." That gave me the impetus to convince my mom to allow it, even if it meant doing a certain household chore in world record time first.
Baseball is a game of mannerisms and we were serious about baseball in Pilot Rock. All of us could hold the bat like Stan Musial or Ted Williams. We could imitate every nuance of the windup of Warren Spahn or Sandy Koufax. But the daily argument was always about who was better: Willie Mays or Mickey Mantle. The world seemed so polarized: Mantle or Mays, Chevy or Ford, Nixon or Kennedy. Years later, I would learn about blacks and whites.
Physical attraction is an odd thing, sometimes defying logic. If you got wind of a compliment from a girl, you immediately became aware of that feature of your appearance or aspect of your personality and tried to enhance it.
Yolanda, a girl from the Umatilla Indian Reservation, was said to like my blonde hair, whitish from playing baseball everyday in the sun. I combed it straight back on both sides to form what was then called "ducktails". Yolanda was 14, a grown woman to me. It was said that she had a child in the 6th grade, so had missed a year of school, but none of that diminished her popularity. When we passed in the hallway, it was obvious that she was a head taller than me.
I didn't know what a sock hop was, but my mom finally relented. "Oh, just go!" she finally said. It was good thing my dad was out on the road, trying to sell tires or I never would have gone. Before I went, my mom gave me what they call a summer cut, running the the shears over my head with an attachment to keep the cut even. I literally ran to the school's gymnasium, finding everyone dancing in their socks with balloons scattered all over the floor. One of the tall girls asked me to dance till her boyfriend got there. She kept telling me "Yolanda really likes you." I gave my typical shrug. When her boyfriend finally arrived she thanked me for my efforts at fake dancing. I drifted to the edge of the room, sort of biding my time. After a few minutes, one of Yolanda's friends came up to me. "Yolanda doesn't like you anymore. She hates your hair."
The ideal family back then was depicted in the TV show "Ozzie and Harriet" and later "Leave It to Beaver". If you had a dad like mine; tempermental, full of self-doubt, insecure and too-eager-to-please, you moved around from job to job and city to city. Back when numbers were important to me I counted 42 schools between my first and twelfth year.
The new kid in school can face the extremes of peer pressure and face it alone. He's fresh meat for the bullies, especially if a bit undersized. Or, word can spread intantaneously all over school that the new kid is a genius, a sports star or dreamy like Ricky Nelson.
That first impression is difficult to shake, even you've been taught modesty as some sort of virtue. I've had my share of both types of receptions, although I sometimes find myself Googling Pilot Rock, Oregon where I spent one idyllic spring and summer.
My first stroke of luck in Pilot Rock, setting an unstoppable favorable inertia was the visit to our home of the lady from Bell Telephone. Barely 11 years old, the youngest kid in Junior High, the lady listed me in the Teenager's Phone Book, an appendage at the back of the regular grownup phone book. I accepted the award without comment, feeling almost as if I had been awarded an undeserved Purple Heart. My mom would answer the phone, then say "It's for you", a totally new life experience. It was usually Mary, a girl that got everyone together for baseball at the park. If I hesitated, she would say "We need you. You're one of the best players." That gave me the impetus to convince my mom to allow it, even if it meant doing a certain household chore in world record time first.
Baseball is a game of mannerisms and we were serious about baseball in Pilot Rock. All of us could hold the bat like Stan Musial or Ted Williams. We could imitate every nuance of the windup of Warren Spahn or Sandy Koufax. But the daily argument was always about who was better: Willie Mays or Mickey Mantle. The world seemed so polarized: Mantle or Mays, Chevy or Ford, Nixon or Kennedy. Years later, I would learn about blacks and whites.
Physical attraction is an odd thing, sometimes defying logic. If you got wind of a compliment from a girl, you immediately became aware of that feature of your appearance or aspect of your personality and tried to enhance it.
Yolanda, a girl from the Umatilla Indian Reservation, was said to like my blonde hair, whitish from playing baseball everyday in the sun. I combed it straight back on both sides to form what was then called "ducktails". Yolanda was 14, a grown woman to me. It was said that she had a child in the 6th grade, so had missed a year of school, but none of that diminished her popularity. When we passed in the hallway, it was obvious that she was a head taller than me.
I didn't know what a sock hop was, but my mom finally relented. "Oh, just go!" she finally said. It was good thing my dad was out on the road, trying to sell tires or I never would have gone. Before I went, my mom gave me what they call a summer cut, running the the shears over my head with an attachment to keep the cut even. I literally ran to the school's gymnasium, finding everyone dancing in their socks with balloons scattered all over the floor. One of the tall girls asked me to dance till her boyfriend got there. She kept telling me "Yolanda really likes you." I gave my typical shrug. When her boyfriend finally arrived she thanked me for my efforts at fake dancing. I drifted to the edge of the room, sort of biding my time. After a few minutes, one of Yolanda's friends came up to me. "Yolanda doesn't like you anymore. She hates your hair."
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Great posting Jim! Those were different times when respect for family, elders, teachers and law enforcement officials was an abundant commodity, "the age of innocence" pre political correctness.
ReplyDeleteInteresting account. I enjoyed it.
ReplyDeleteOn a different note, how would you feel if some people passed the hat and bought you and your wife a new, modern video camera, and a still camera, both with detailed instructions on how to operate them. We might even go so far as to buy you an off camera mic for videos. Mikal Fisher, RN
. . . . . .and lose our amateur status? Thanks, but no thanks.
DeleteJim
Ok Jim. I wasn't talking about anything better than modern consumer grade cameras. As it is, it is often difficult to understand the audio on your videos, and some of your photos look like they were taken by a 60's era Kodak Instamatic. Amateur status doesn't equate to shit, after all .just trying to help here...........
ReplyDelete