On This Date in 1998

Actually, JoAnna told me today that this is her last week at work since she has vacation through January 5th. It will be interesting to see what turns up for her. So far she hasn’t done much investigating, but then this time of year, between Thanksgiving and New Year’s, is not the best time to conduct a job search. Not that she has anything to worry about. 

The possibility of reduced family income, at least temporarily, hasn’t put a lid on our Christmas shopping. Yesterday JoAnna and I spent $650, although that amount did include a birthday present for Eddie (a large X-wing Star Wars toy) and a couple items for Al and Cyndi’s baby. We were able to check a few names off our gift list: Albert, Larry R., Christie, Larry Jr. We also bought the boys’ big gifts, a Play Station game system for Andy and a set of Lego underwater vehicles for Eddie, designed for imaginary water play. While cruising the aisles of Toys R Us, we found a 100-piece set of little toy soldiers and equipment that Eddie will just love, as well as an additional “bucket” of plastic soldiers. You can tell from Andy’s gift list that he’s no longer a little boy. He included clothes, specifically jeans and mock turtlenecks. We didn’t find any turtlenecks in the boys’ department at Kohl’s so we ended up buying him a small in men’s size. I’m sure they’ll fit since he’s fairly broad in the chest and shoulders for an 11 year old. Last week we bought presents for JoAnna’s dad and Larry and Dale. Considering that we’re still 5 ½ hours from December, we’re off to a good start this year. Shifting gears, I need to remember to get my wife something for her birthday this week. She’s given me a number of suggestions. A cookbook of Cajun recipes. A membership to Harbor Athletic Club, which, if she’s unemployed for awhile, might be just the thing to keep her active. I suppose just about anything on the Civil War will do, too. That’s the trouble with December birthdays: there’s too much other stuff going on, or at least the anticipation of things about to happen. I can see how they can get overlooked or, more commonly, I suppose, underemphasized.  

JoAnna wants to go for a walk, so I’m going to have to take a break from this letter unless I can think of something significant to write about. I’ve been in a lowkey mood lately, not necessarily lethargic or unenthusiastic or uninspired or even blah. I guess I feel I should be more excited about life right now. I don’t know how else to express it. It’s not like this family has been unproductive this year or doesn’t have anything to look forward to. Maybe it’s the warm weather that’s responsible for this puzzling feeling. Sometimes I think I’d rather see some snow on the ground and have the temperature get down into the teens every night. I’m ready to get into the proper Christmas spirit but I need the appropriate weather conditions to do so. 

Well, I’m just babbling now. Time to get some exercise and clear my head. We’re all counting the days until Christmas vacation, looking forward to two weeks of family visits. 

I’ll add a postscript while Andy practices his trumpet. That certainly won’t help my concentration. JoAnna is sitting with Eddie right now, helping him get through his 15 minutes of reading. I worked with him last night and, even though he made improvement, he still has a long way to go. He’s still very hesitant with very basic vocabulary. His inability to retain words also concerns me. If he has difficulty with a word, sounds it out or waits for Mom or Dad to pronounce it for him, and then comes across that same word in the following sentence, it’s as if the past ten or so seconds didn’t happen. He stops and tries to figure out the word all over again. 

JoAnna and I walked for 40 minutes while the boys, with our permission, watched a Christmas special on TV. A lot of houses on the route we took, through one of Middleton’s more upscale neighborhoods, are decorated with lights. The icicle lights are very popular this year, as are white lights in general. We haven’t done any decorating yet. We don’t plan to buy a tree as we’ll be gone for two weeks over the holidays. We were expecting the delivery of a wreath yesterday, but it never arrived. Saturday provided the ideal conditions for putting up outdoor lights, but once we got home from Two Rivers, there were too many “in-household” chores to be tackled. In fact, Christmas lights weren’t even on my radar screen. A mist fell all day yesterday, creating uncomfortable but not impossible working conditions. Our top priority, though, was Christmas shopping, plus we had to watch the Packer game, which almost turned out to be too much to bear, Green Bay barely squeaking by the hapless Eagles. 

I have a couple loads of laundry that are waiting to be folded and it’s time to say goodnight to the boys. 

And how was the serenade? Considering how seldom Andy practices the trumpet, he sounded pretty good. Not too many missed notes, or brassy fart sounds, although he was happy to play me a few of those noises just for laughs.

On This Date in 1998

I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving. Ours was a brief but pleasant getaway. We spent Thursday and Friday in Two Rivers. We didn’t leave Middleton until nearly 8:30 Wednesday evening as Andy had a basketball practice scheduled from 6:00 to 7:30. As a result of our later departure, we missed the peak traffic period. We encountered no delays, but then all roads don’t lead to Two Rivers at Thanksgiving.

Taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather, JoAnna and I took a walk along Lake Michigan Thursday morning, hardly needing the light jackets we wore. The lake was very calm, a slight breeze blowing out of the west having no effect on the water. Alice had most of the meal preparations in hand, so JoAnna didn’t feel guilty getting out of the house for a little while. We watched football during the afternoon, catching the coin toss controversy in the Steelers game. I suppose Dale had a few comments to make about this incident. I have to admit that it was the worst officiated game I have ever seen, both teams the victims of numerous bad calls. The coin toss, though, was definitely the low point of a game that the official seemed not to want to be at.

We ate Thanksgiving dinner at 4:30 and enjoyed the usual feast of turkey with all the trimmings. There were 12 around the table, including Cindy, her friend Mayra, and Mayra’s four brothers. After the clean up, some of the adults played cards for awhile.

The warm weather continued on Friday. JoAnna and I took another walk during the morning, stopping at Schroeder’s, a department store, for some café mocha at their coffee bar. During the early afternoon, Andy and I played catch with the football in the street in front of the Richard’s house (they live on a quiet street). Later on, at JoAnna’s suggestion, we walked to a nearby park to kick field goals over one of the goal posts. Unfortunately, all the entry gates were locked, so we couldn’t get in. I didn’t think it advisable for us to climb over the fence.



After supper (ham and scalloped potatoes – we had leftovers for lunch), we met Cindy in Manitowoc and went to see A Bug’s Life, the new computer-animated Disney film. It’s quite a visual feast, almost too much for the eyes to take in at one time and, for that reason, certainly worth a second viewing. The showing we attended was mostly parents with small (i.e., preschool) children, many of whom did not hesitate to ask their parents questions about what was happening in the movie. A couple parts of the movie seemed that they might be too intense for young kids. The initial appearance of the grasshoppers and of a monstrous looking red-and-yellow bird, was probably a jolting experience for the tykes in the audience, perhaps not so much for the shock value but rather the pounding volume of the soundtrack. It was a loud movie at times.

We left Two Rivers at 11 o’clock Saturday morning with the sun beating down on us as if were a warm Easter weekend. In fact, we saw golfers on the municipal course in Manitowoc. I was sweltering in the driver’s seat of the van, but every time I turned on the fan to let some fresh air in through the vents, JoAnna complained about being cold, so I could only leave the fan on for 30-second intervals. A few miles from home, though, JoAnna complained about being hot and opened her window.

Even though I reminded the boys that there would be no TV until the van was unpacked, I still didn’t get much help. Once I got everything put away and a load of clothes in the washer, I read for awhile. I started reading Tom Wolfe’ s new book, A Man in Full, last weekend and am really enjoying it. It’s a long book, almost 800 pages, but I’m already more than halfway through it.

JoAnna and I took a late afternoon walk, without jackets, and then went to 5 o’clock mass with the boys. Andy is now serving at mass every other month. JoAnna signed him up for this responsibility in September. Yesterday was his second time. After church we went out to eat and then spent a quiet evening at home.

Although the warm weather is still with us today, general conditions are not too pleasant. It’s overcast and I can see a barely perceptible mist falling. After eating some lunch, JoAnna and I are going Christmas shopping, the only important item on our list of things to do today.

We missed Larry, JoAnna’s brother, by seven hours. He’ll be in Two Rivers for the next two weeks. JoAnna plans to spend a few days there next week (Monday-Wednesday), as she can basically take the rest of the year off considering all the time she has put into her job already this year. She didn’t get the job offer from Tammy Baldwin and, earlier this month, gave her resignation at her current job effective at the end of the year. So now JoAnna has to do some serious job-hunting.

On This Day in 1998: Tuesday, March 24

Beaty Field:  The Path

The boys and I stayed up last night to watch the entire Academy Awards telecast. As the evening progressed, the boys got into the spirit of rooting for “Titanic”. At one point, Eddie announced, “I’m going to see ‘Titanic’ the next time you go.”

Even though it extended beyond three hours, I really enjoyed the show. Billy Crystal is the perfect host. I enjoyed the clips of past award winners. I thought Stanley Donen’s lifetime achievement award was the highlight of the evening.


We had some sunshine yesterday afternoon, although the temperature remained in the 30s. The boys and I took a walk to Beaty Field, Andy and I shooting hoops, Eddie ambling over to the playground area and amusing himself on the equipment . The ground wasn’t nearly as soggy as I thought it would be, considering that it was recently under water. Before returning to the house, we strolled along “the path”, throwing sticks and stones into the creek. I didn’t find much in the way of “skipworthy” material.

Beaty Field panorama

The boys played with Scottie yesterday morning at his house. While they were gone, I took a walk – to no place in particular, and then cleaned out the debris in the car, some leftover cups of soda still sitting on the shelf behind the back seat, a scattering of French fries on the floor.

Dad spends most of the day slumped in his chair in the living room. His waking moments appear to be on the decline, his lucid moments even more so. His fading sense of reality is further clouded by television and, Mom suspects, dreams. It’s not like the rest of the family ignores him, but sometimes I wonder if they could try to engage him more. But now that speaking has become difficult for him, providing him a protective environment is the best that can be offered. Ironically, I sometimes feel uncomfortable asking questions about Dad’s condition, but unless I ask, very little information is ever forthcoming.

Allegheny River in Warren, Pennsylvania, looking west from Hickory Street Bridge

I worked on our federal and state tax forms earlier today. The preliminary results are about what I expected. Due to my additional income from the University last year, we are going to owe approximately $3,000 in federal taxes. Our refund from the state will amount to slightly less than $500. Mr. Procrastinator has not yet filled out the form to have a larger deduction taken from my biweekly paychecks, something I said I was going to do last year. Your deduction amounts to 17% of your gross pay. Mine is slightly under 12% I need to boost my federal deduction by $100 per paycheck.

Tomorrow morning we begin our trek home. I don’t have a motel reservation for our first night but I have an 800 number for Ramada Inn that I plan to call later today. I’m not too concerned. I would think a midweek stayover in South suburban Chicago is easy to find. The motel’s gotta have an indoor pool, though.

Allegheny River, Warren, Pennsylvania, looking east toward Hickory Street Bridge

November 5, 1991

I drive the van to Russ Darrow as it's tune-up time.  Instead of waiting for JoAnna and Andy to pick me up there, I decided a little exercise won't hurt me, so I begin to walk back to Middleton.  Opposite Memorial High School, I see the car approach and wave my arms frantically just in case she's too focused on the road.

Advisory is scheduled to meet at Middleton and the expected confrontation over public-performance videos never happens.  Barb Huntington's feelers must be mangled.  In the meantime, Sharon wastes no time, preparing a one-page justification of this format, and I waste a lot of mental energy rehearsing nasty tirades.

I take the afternoon off and walk through a mini-blizzard to pick up the van.  The dueling Derek & the Dominoes/Allman Brother Band tape keeps me trucking.

Due to the weather, it's a quiet evening at the library.  I pack up six boxes of various reference materials for tomorrow's workshop and start to worry about the drive.

September 1, 1991

Eddie is baptized Sunday morning at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church. The family takes up an entire pew. Undoubtedly, it’s Dale’s first visit to a church sanctuary in a long time, not to mention Kim and Larry and Barb and Paul and JoAnna and Andy. It’s the lapsed Christian contingent. The rite takes place after the singing of the processional and baptismal hymns – all verses of both. Andy accompanies Barb, JoAnna, and me to the front of the church. Without a hymnal or a bulletin insert, I have no clue as to what is going on. When it is time to make the presentation, there is an uncomfortable moment of silence. Someone finally hands me a program and I made the proper response. Pastor Risher assists Dad, whose hesitant reading of the Order for Baptism is so unlike his assured style before retirement.

Andy is surprisingly well-behaved during the first half of the church service. He acts no worse, no better than any other soon-to-be 4 year old. I don’t trust him to stay under control during the sermon, so I escort him to the nursery room. He’s been here before and has no problem when I immediately return to the sanctuary. I made a special effort not to concentrate on the sermon, preferring to daydream contentedly as a breeze entering from a nearby open window caresses my face. I browse through a virtual library of childhood images. These will have to be catalogued at a later time.

By early afternoon, the schedule of Sunday events has been changed repeatedly. A picnic at Larry and Kim’s “country estate” was the original plan. That changed to a visit to Renee’s cottage – at least for JoAnna and me and the boys. Barb Lucia calls at noon and informs me that she has other plans for the day and that Mardi has just told her that she is having a houseful of company today. So I call Renee and tell her we’ll be out to see her tomorrow and hope that we can all synchronize our personal schedules for this long-awaited reunion.

Larry and Kim both have other plans for the afternoon so it’s too late to salvage the picnic for today. JoAnna and I now have a wide-open day on our hands.

I take two walks, one on my own to buy newspapers. The second is with JoAnna and Eddie (in the stroller) for the simple purpose of getting some exercise. Our route: Conewango to Jackson to Hertzel to Pennsylvania to Buchanan to Third. Eddie is asleep by the time we finish this circuit, an amazing feat considering the condition of Warren’s sidewalks. Such infrastructure deterioration forces me to look at my adopted hometown with a more critical eye. Although the majority of homeowners appear to be concerned about the appearance of their investments, a substantial number are obviously not. Walk around Warren and you will see a lot of “painted ladies”, house whose exteriors are enlivened with a tricolor (or more) paint scheme. But in some neighborhoods, you will see troublesome signs of neglect and deterioration. Case in point: Buchanan Street from Pennsylvania Avenue East to Jefferson Street. The house on the corner of Glenwood and Buchanan exemplifies this trend: peeling paint on all sides of the structure, rotting porch timbers, faded and weatherworn roof shingles, nonexistent landscaping. Granted, this area of Warren has always been a working-class neighborhood. And, unfortunately, there are very few exceptions to the new rule along this four-block stretch. If time ever becomes a luxury in my life, I’ll plan a thorough walking tour of Warren, with an eye to grading the appearance of Warren’s buildings. 

We have pizza and beer for supper. Actually, Barb and I are the only ones who drink beer. After eating, Kim suggests a visit to the Market Street School playground. Andy loves it here; there is so much to do on the rambling configuration of wood beams, steel posts, and molded plastic that has been set up just south of the school. Unfortunately, there’s nothing for Eddie to do, not even a swing, so I have to hold him the entire time we are there. Once the boys are ready for bed, the adults play Scattergories. This game amuses me for one or two rounds, but after that I quickly lose interest. I am the first one to excuse myself to go to bed.

August 31, 1991

I wake up once during the night. A flash of lightning and the muffled sound of thunder grab my attention. Before I know it, though, I fall back asleep. When I get out of bed for breakfast, I feel that the heat wave is here for at least another day since the room temperature has cooled down only slightly during the night. I look out the window and am surprised to see that the neighbor’s driveway is wet. Obviously, it has rained, but I didn’t hear a drop.

Breakfast is casual, after which there is an hour of free time before the mall opens. The boys need shoes so The Shoe Outlet, located next to the Cinemas, is our first stop. Grandma buys Andy a $35 pair of Reeboks. It takes two more steps before we find something for Eddie. I find a selection of postcards at CVS. Otherwise, I’m simply along to enjoy the company of my family. JoAnna finds a couple of cute outfits for Eddie at K-Mart. With Eddie getting fussy whenever the stroller is not in motion, I push him back out to the mall and find a place where I can sit down and roll Eddie to sleep. While waiting for the others to rejoin us, I scan the growing crowd of shoppers for familiar faces. Yesterday when JoAnna and I took our walk downtown, I’m sure I spotted Kay Schaffer talking to a man who looked to be our age, standing at the intersection of Liberty & 2nd. It appears to be the same person who favored tight skirts in high school. She looks as though she’s retained her teenage body shape. Kay always had a mature appearance, at least from the waist down, filled out in all the right places. Her outfit 23 years after high school graduation is very summery: a floral print dress that stops three or four inches above the knees. Her thighs would probably register a 6 or 6.5 on the thin-to-fat scale. And, after all these year, Kay is still hitting the peroxide bottle. From a cursory glance – although with all this description, JoAnna would question just how cursory – Kay looks very good, at least ten years younger than her age.

Every time I go to the Warren Mall, I expect to run into someone I know. After all, I figure, I lived in the town continuously from 1957 to 1968 and have been a regular visitor ever since. Only once have I encountered a familiar face, and that was during the weekend of my 20-year high school reunion. The odds were definitely stacked in my favor. And the person I saw? Tim Nuhfer, my 7th-grade locker mate and the person who always sat behind me in home room during junior high school. During this most recent visit to the mall, I searched very baby-boomer face for a flash from the past. Let’s see, 420 people in my graduating class alone, hundreds more from other classes whose faces were once so familiar. Are we all scattered far and wide? Do fewer of us have a reason for visiting Warren anymore? Are the rest of us just not shopping today?

After lunch, JoAnna and I, with Eddie in the harness, take a walk to the high school and back. It’s a trip down memory lane that I have wanted to make for years. Just haven’t made time for it. We walk the length of East Fifth Avenue to the beginning of the snake path, take the obligatory short cut, then solemnly circle the building. The once panoramic view of Warren is now almost completely obscured by a wall of trees that line the hillside. The sprawling white-brick, smoky-glassed structure has changed not at all. On the outer walls of the gymnasium are the 30-year-old letters:

WARREN
AREA
HIGH
SCHOOL

I recall the lonely summer of 1963 when practically all I did was isolate myself in my bedroom to listen to the radio and study the charts in the latest issue of Billboard, and a casual remark made by my best friend and my former girlfriend hinting at a shared secret about the letters “ARIC”. Perhaps this is my oldest memory attached to the high school.

We first walk along the sides of the high school that were and remain most foreign to me: the band room,, the choir room, the long row of shop and automotive classrooms. There is an entrance to the school here that I recall using only once, during the last weeks of my senior year, when Mike and Dody and I slept in his parents’ trailer on Sunday night and went to school without the benefit of a change of clothes or a bath. Once inside the building, our first stop was the rest room, where I probably would have killed for a drop or two of shampoo. At this time in my life, I was very meticulous about my hair, methodically washing it twice every morning, combing it into place, then sitting under Mom’s bubble-top hairdryer until it was completely dry. This missed day of routine hygiene made me feel very self-conscious about my appearance.

At the back of the school grounds, we walk up the four flights of stairs to an open area that had not been cleared when I was in high school. A softball field is located here, the diamond almost completely overgrown with weeds. It appears to be an area not even used during the school year. As we walk toward the backstop, the view of Warren opens up to us. Although the temperature is cooler than yesterday, the air is still a bit hazy. It’s not a picture-perfect panorama, and the view is still not as expansive as it used to be years ago. I remind myself to review my slides for memory-lane reproductions.

As we walk past the two classroom wings, I think back to 10th grade Health, when I spend a good portion of this boring required course staring out the windows and watching other students pass back and forth along the sidewalk on which we are now walking. I could have satisfied this requirement by attending summer school right after the end of ninth grade, a de rigueur activity for A-track students, but I just couldn’t tolerate the idea of cutting into my summer vacation. Maybe we have another one of my early acts of rebellion here, not doing something expected of one with my academic status. Instead, and this is definitely on the plus side, I was assigned to a class comprised of a rather diverse group of outcasts. Senior bleach-blond heartthrob Bob Nelson. (No relation.) The girl who sat in front of me was a small-framed, large-busted, wanton underachiever who possessed the thinnest set of lips I’ve ever seen (and still was able to use her lipstick to maximum effect.) She teased her dark brown hair heavenward and wore tight dresses that threatened to cut off her circulation if she moved the wrong way. We talked; we became acquaintances, and if I hadn’t been in the class, I would have never interacted with someone so far removed from the student types that I was tracked with.

I wish I could remember some other names and faces. If I still had my high school yearbooks, I’d have a means to refire some of the memory cells buried deep in my subconscious.

Walking past the cafeteria, I am drawn up to a window like a piece of metal to a magnet. I peer inside and am amazed to find the tables and chairs set up just as they were in 1968. Funny thing. I can recall a feeling approaching terror at the beginning of the second semester of tenth grade when I suddenly realized that a change in lunch groups meant I no longer had anyone to sit with. Similarly, I can recall the camaraderie of the elite senior boys’ table (even though my unofficially assigned seat was at the low-status end of the cluster of three tables. But what about junior year? I can conjure up the dimmest of images, barely able to make out the forms of Mike, Mardi, and Tina. Do I also see Renee and Joan? Seems like there may have been a very happy, harmonious, and close lunch group at that time. If only I had at least transcribed all those yearbook messages. Another funny thing. Mom repeatedly lamented the loss of her high school yearbook. Now I can carry on that tune for her.

Before beginning our descent, we take a look into the exhibition area, the scene of many a high school dance as well as study halls. As with the cafeteria, this area of the school provides a tingling sense of déjà vu. The desks are arranged in the same formation, and the white and blue and gray floor tiles look as though they’ve held up well during the past 23 years. I want to be able to explore the school’s interior on this quiet day on the hill, but I make no effort to discover an inadvertently unlocked door.

We return to Grandma and Grandpa’s house via Fifth, Prospect, Division, Buchanan, and Third. Eleven years’ worth of tree growth has obscured all but a peephole of the view of Warren from the heights of Division and Prospect Streets. Again I think about all those great slides waiting to be enlarged and framed.

Unlike last year’s visit, this time around I make a sincere effort to contact old friends and arrange a reunion. Much to my delight, Renee is out at the cottage this weekend. After numerous phone calls, a Sunday get-together is tentatively scheduled. Mardi, Barb, Renee, and I will be able to catch up on the new and relive the old.

As usual, Mom seems to spend most of her time during our visits to Warren either preparing a meal or cleaning up after one. This visit is no different. No one bothers to offer her any assistance, and I get the feeling that’s the way she prefers it. She takes great pleasure in waiting on her family when we’re all together. If she can prepare daily microwave specials for Dale, she certainly isn’t going to complain about lavishing attention on her two previous grandsons and their wonderful parents. After all, she must worship the ground that JoAnna walks on considering all the changes that have taken place in my life since we met seven years ago. Her oldest son is married, very serious about and successful at his career (as evidenced by the WLA Librarian of the Year award), and has produced two wonderful children that are the envy of every grandparent.


After supper and some couchin’ time on the porch, JoAnna and I go out with Larry and Kim to see Hot Shots, a mildly funny spoof of Top Gun. From the review I read in the New York Times, I’m expecting more of a laugh riot, but the relentless zaniness in this setting starts to wear thin. I chuckle frequently but never cut loose with a full-throttle belly laugh, the minimal expectation I have for any movie with the Abrahams or Zucker name associated with it.

Larry drives us back to the house directly. Neither he nor Kim suggests that we go out for a drink somewhere. From the conversation we have in the car, it sounds as though Larry is eager to return home to watch The Howard Stern Show. We miss an opportunity to talk about Mom and Dad’s reluctance to travel to Wisconsin via any mode of transportation. JoAnna and I are attempting to lay the groundwork for a Christmas gathering with the Nelsons and Swansons, and it appears we have a major project of convincing on our hands.

We snuggle in bed for awhile. Both boys are asleep. JoAnna asks me for a kiss – a real kiss, not just a goodnight peck. I caress her lips gently, teasingly and before long our mouths have melted together in a simultaneous display of unbridled passion just like in the bodice-rippers. We have to be quiet, though, no heedless tearing off of undergarments. JoAnna’s initial suggestion is a relatively innocent one: high-school style making out, I am unable to restrain my hands from an exploratory mission of JoAnna’s body. My right hand slips into panties and luxuriates in the feel or her soft, furry pubic area. I stroke the area around her clitoris, occasionally inserting a finger or two into her vagina to get a better grip on her increasingly moist pleasure zone. I bring her to a rousing, writhing, though silent orgasm. Now it’s my turn to be stroked. JoAnna grasps my expectantly erect penis and skillfully returns the favor. I explode all over the bedsheets. Tonight we prove that mutual masturbation is as satisfying as intercourse.

August 30, 1991

I retake the wheel somewhere not too far east of Toledo. I feel rested but wonder how long that will last. I order a cup of coffee at the roadside McDonald’s and have to wait a couple of minutes until I have it in hand. The male counter clerk appears to be the stereotypical brother from another planet. He must be on the third shift exclusively.

The Doors-Jefferson Airplane-Buffalo Springfield tape makes wonderful company, so good that I don’t even attempt to make conversation with Barb, who’s still in the passenger’s front seat. By the end of the second hour of my second shift at the wheel, I’m craving another cup of coffee as well as some hint of daylight. The latter’s arrival provides me with a barely noticeable second wind. When I exit off Interstate 80 at Barkleyville (State Route 8 in Pennsylvania) I’m desperate for sleep. JoAnna then takes the wheel at the approach to my favorite leg of this long trip: U.S. 62 from Franklin to Warren. I nod out momentarily but spend the last 30 miles of the drive with Eddie in my lap. We pull into Grandma and Grandpa’s driveway at 9 a.m. Great time. JoAnna had told them to expect us around noon.

After unpacking the van, I attempt to round up the necessary energy for a walk downtown. Postcards on which to write down observations of this trip are foremost on my mind. It quickly becomes obvious, though, that I’m not going to make it through the morning, let alone the day, without a nap. JoAnna’s already upstairs in the guest room with the boys by the time I sack out on the couch in the living room, the TV tuned to the Weather Channel. Before dozing off, I want to know how much longer this unwanted heat wave is going to be around.

When I wake up, someone has changed the channel to coverage of the U.S. Open tennis tournament in Forest Hills. Michael Stich and Malivai Washington are in the fifth set of their match. Stich has the perfect tennis frame, but Malivai looks as though he took a wrong turn on the way to Giants Stadium. He looks to have 200 pounds of body packed into a 150-pound frame.

After lunch I walk out onto the front porch and am greeted by a blast of hot air. In spite of the heat, I’m ready to walk downtown, as the mental notes I’ve made about the visit to Warren so far start to pile up inside my brain. While the boys nap, JoAnna and I walk together. I’m content to go at a leisurely pace, but JoAnna strides along as if she is in training for a walkathon fundraiser for our kids’ education. We walked across the Third Avenue bridge, then turn left onto Water Street as the shade is more plentiful in that direction. As usual, we admire the houses on Second Avenue, especially on the odd-numbered side of the street. The red brick house with the glassed-in front porch on the southwest corner of Second and East causes an indistinct memory bell to ring inside my head. What is it about this house, I can no longer recall, except for the fact that its architecture has always intrigued me. There’s also something about a phone number: 723-6262. And watching some older girl whom I had a crush on walk into this house. In 1962? My number does seem to be imprinted here.

Walking past Market Street School, I imagine how this corner site looked when the old high school was still standing. I recall the one time when I walked inside, when Mom was taking a driver’s ed course, and how entranced the interior of the building made me feel, the dark woodwork and the high ceilings, the frosted glass sections of some of the doors, the rows of gray lockers facing each other along the hallway. When the building was being razed – it must have been during the spring or fall of 1961 – I made regular trips on my bicycle to view the destruction. I felt the spirit of so many memories flow into me and experiencing feelings that an eleven year old could barely comprehend.

The rumors of Janick’s bankruptcy that Mom relayed to us in one of her chatty letters earlier this year have proven to be more than the latest news from the beauty parlor. Although the display windows are artfully plastered with large signs trumpeting “unbelievable” sale prices, other much smaller hand-written signs are found at the two entrances to the store. They say, very simply, “CLOSED”. Mom and Dad report their merchandise is too upscale for the majority of Warren consumers. Their prognosis would seem to point to a marketing blunder. Barb Lucia will tell me that the Bostjanicks, especially Linda, don’t know how to run a department store, a case of management ineptitude. Whatever the causes of Janick’s demise – and from an outsider’s viewpoint, I’d really be surprised to learn that the store reopened on a permanent basis – I think downtown Warren has seen the last of this type of retail establishment. A stagnant community like this can support two business districts. The Warren Mall, anchored by K-Mart, Penney’s, and the Bon Ton, is part of an irreversible trend in retailing. Downtown Warren, with its inconvenient parking, aging structures, and lack of a magnet seems to be headed for the precipitous decline that it luckily avoided when the Warren Mall first opened more than ten years ago.

Our prime reason for walking downtown is to buy disposable diapers, which is our reason for stopping at CVS. As I walk to the back of the store to a postcard display, I heard my wife call out my name. The cashier has run up and total and JoAnna has left her purse at the house. We also stop at the newsstand but there’s not even a Wall Street Journal to buy. In the mood for a cool drink, we stop at the Savoy and savor the air-conditioned air. We settle for milk shakes after being informed that the pop is flat due to some mechanical malfunction of a refrigeration unit. The shakes are delicious: cool, thick, and refreshing, although an ice-cold cake would have been a better match for an oppressively hot and humid day.

Back at the house, I sack out on one of Mom and Dad’s new recliners. I doze off for about an hour before supper. Mom prepares a light meal: cold cuts, potato salad, a plate of sliced vegetables. Afterwards, Andy and I walk to the “schoolyard”. That’s how we always referred to it. During those endless grade-school summer vacations, we played uncountable innings of waffle ball there. Except for the chain-link fence which prevented easy access, it was our back yard, especially since the house at 4 East Third Avenue has no back yard to speak of.

Andy amazes me with his strength on the monkey bars. Not even two months ago, the last time I walked him to Neshotah Park in Two Rivers, he wasn’t able to keep a tight grip as he moved from bar to bar. A couple of girls more than twice Andy’s age are barely able to maintain a 5-second hang time. Once I notice that Dale has returned home, I attempt to cut short our visit. Naturally, Andy isn’t immediately agreeable to my suggestion, but I remain persistent.

As we walk back to Grandma and Grandpa’s house, I give Jefferson School a thorough visual inspection. First of all, I neglected to mention earlier that the old schoolyard is almost completely covered with asphalt. Very little green remains. A chain-link fence now divides the play and parking areas. The building itself looks dirty; the red brick now showing nearly forty years of accumulated dirt and soot. At best, Jefferson has never been more than an example of utilitarian architecture, but now the school looks like it would be at home in a deteriorating inner-city neighborhood. The grounds are unkempt. Tall weeds have spiked through and now tower over evergreen hedges in need of a trim. One of the panes of rectangular glass in what was Miss Flowers’ fourth-grade classroom needs to be replaced. A rickety message board, nothing more than an eyesore, has been erected on the front lawn bout as far away from the main entrance as possible. It makes me wants to contact my sixth-grade class members to request donations for an improvement fund. Most would probably respond, if at all, to let the school board take care of it.

When Andy and I return to the house, we join the others on the front porch. Such a pleasant place to while away the time. Both JoAnna and I would like our next house to have this amenity, as well as a deck, at least two large full bathrooms, a two-car garage, four bedrooms, central air, separate dining room. I’m sure the list could fill up the rest of this postcard if I put my mind to it.

As 10 o’clock, my old bedroom is almost too hot for sleeping. The ceiling fan provides only minimal relief. Nevertheless, both Andy and Eddie are sleeping peacefully. JoAnna goes to bed first. I spend some quiet time in the upstairs TV room, where I nod out on the couch long before 11. I wake up at 11:30, initially unsure of where I am, then join the rest of my family in the guest bedroom.