***You Can’t Go Home Again, Can You?

 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman, Hullsville Class Of 1964

No he, Peter Paul Markin, would not be going after all, not going to the scheduled 50^th Anniversary North Adamsville Class of 1964 reunion to be held at the swanky Adams Hotel Deluxe over Thanksgiving weekend.  Apparently that holiday weekend a very usual occasion for such events across the country, a time when old-time rooted families might still gather together in the old hometowns or just to take advantage of the generally taken long weekend. He announced the news to me, to the candid world as he called it (or me) in his usual odd-ball historical literary snarl, something that I have grown used to, grown to deeply discount, to block out okay, so maybe I did not get the full import of his screed. I had met Markin, let’s eliminate the “Peter Paul” since nobody, except his mother, and I think he said his first wife, first of three, Anne, when she wanted to taunt him to do something, some task he did not want to do, and she mercilessly went after him with that three-name moniker attesting to why wife number one did last the course, down at the Surf Ballroom in my hometown of Hullsville the summer after we graduated from our respective high schools. We met while pursuing the same young woman (then called a girl but we have learned a thing or two since then) on the dance floor while the great local cover band , The Rockin’ Ramrods, played the Kingmen’s Louie, Louie and we practically sparred to get her to dance with us. For the curious since we have very different versions of the way things went after the dance she subsequently dumped us both in turn (me first) but our friendship remained and hence I can say with a straight face that I do not have to listen to all of Markin’s screeds to get whatever historical or literary point he is trying to drive home. The only different from the days when we first met, and officially could not do so, is that when he has something on his chest that just will not stay submerged we talk it over at some local watering hole and I can get a couple of shots under my belt as he rants on.    

That spot these days, the days since we have both returned to the Boston area and have re-ignited our old-time friendship that as we lived on different coasts faced periods of inactivity, is Jimmy’s Bar & Grille over in Centerville a few miles south of the respective towns where we grew up, and about thirty miles from downtown Boston if anybody is asking. We had been talking about the old days, the old high school days when we had met, and that is where we started cutting up old touches about how we met down at a rock and roll dance at the Surf Ballroom in my hometown of Hullsville mentioned above. But our friendship, close or faraway as times changed, lingered on. Now in the great scheme of things, the great mandala of life out in the real world such a decision as Markin made naturally would take a back seat to serious matters like the fight against war and pestilence, the struggle to keep body and soul together that preoccupies most minds most of the time, and being mindfully thoughtful about the three great tragedies of human existence-hunger, sex, and death. (Jesus, I now remember too that I did, once again, get mad at him when he started that  Peter Paul Markin thing that only his mother and, I think, that one prissy ex-wife called him, like he was some Mayflower swell rather than to the “projects” born)

Notwithstanding those heavy precedent- takers, no, emphatically no, Markin would not be going back to his old hometown that weekend to see the old gang. See the old gang collectively for probably the last effective time that clan would be able to gather on a significant occasion what with death, disability, forgetfulness and just plain fright at the idea of a next time taking their toll. That the next significant milestone, the 75^th, assuming that the mania for oddball celebration years like 30^th , 45^th , and 60^th , or worst 38^th ,48^th or 68^th has no taken root they would all be at or approaching ninety-three. A very scary thought, the thought of holding a reunion at some assisted living site or nursing home. No thank you then either he can safely be quoted as saying that night as well.

Strangely, and I quizzed him on the subject that night, several years before, I can remember Markin telling me, that  under the influence of some old town family members passing he had returned to North Adamsville after many years absence. As a result of roaming around the old neighborhoods, around the old memory sites, or places that triggered memories he had exhibited a spurt of old town patriotism, some old bleeding of school colors red and black, some old time nostalgia for sacred youth places and quirky roots memories. More, a fervent desire to put together some occasion, not necessarily a tradition-filled full-blown official reunion like has been done since Horace Mann’s time, maybe before, but a collective gathering of those in the area to mark the passing of time, mark some memory mist youthful occasions and, frankly to gather some information, insights, observations on what they had been through back in the day, back in those hectic angst and alienation-filled school days.

Markin had told me at that time, and we had had several good laughs about his answers, that he had actually answered (patiently answered, believe me, unusual for him when it is not his own project), extensively answered a series of questions posed through an Internet classmates site by the chairwoman of the Class of 1964 45^th Reunion Committee (see what I mean by odd-ball year celebrations) to her fellow classmates about a whole range of questions. And no, he would not be going, did not go to, had had no intention of going to that odd-ball year reunion unlike the 50^th that he was really aiming at with his answers. You know the usual suspect questions about work history, family history, any distinctions creditable to old North, and the role played by the old school in keeping you off the streets, off welfare and out of prison (sorry). He waved those questions off out of hand in maybe a sentence, no more. After all three divorces, a checkered work history, and half a dysfunctional family not speaking to you for many years, and maybe wishing you were in jail can be summarily written off with few words.

What he did respond to were more thoughtful questions about dreams and ambitions (Jesus, right up in Markin’s wheelhouse), disappointments, thoughts on mortality, and most importantly, questions directly related to the old days like what did you think of certain school clubs, sport teams, school dances (particularly the annual Fall Frolics and the Spring Follies), and several other school- specific events that I have forgotten about and I did not think important before I decided to write this screed, He went wild, went crazy, “stopped the presses,” he said. He wrote sketch after sketch, some long, some short, about the school dances, his wall-flower status before he got his courage up, his girl shy courage, at some last dance trigger moment. About his lackluster running career, and the stellar performances of his running mate, Bill Brady, and their mutual jock-inspired devotion to the football team neither could ever come close to making. About his befuddlement over the segregated, boy-girl segregated, bowling teams, the vagaries of the mythical Tri-Hi-Yi, the inanity of white socks and white shorts for gym garb, the sex question, circa 1960 and the role that Adamsville Beach played in resolving that question. Endlessly as well about corner boy life in about twelve varieties, the place of rock and roll in the teenage universe then. Fluff but answered.

Here is the beauty of his answers though, the beauty of Markin really. He answered, or he told me he answered everything put before him by that relentless chairwoman, even making stuff up if he did not remember, or could have cared less about something back then, like Glee Club or the Chess Club. Here was the best one, and I can attest to this one because I was actually present with him that night down at the Surf Ballroom at one of those frequent rock and roll dances we both attended. He felt compelled to write about the senior year Thanksgiving Football Rally in 1963 held the night before the game against the hated cross-town rival blue and white Adamsville High since he really did bleed Red Raider black and red around the football team. He wrote this long screed that several people thought was an excellent description of the event, said that it had brought back some nice memories especially from someone who remembered so many details. Of course as you now will know this sketch was made out of whole cloth since he was not within twenty miles of the event, although he defended himself by saying that he had gone to the 1962 Thanksgiving rally and said if you have if gone to one rally you have gone to them all. That’s Markin                                 

Some answers though were actually thoughtful, another aspect of Markin as well, his beauty if you will. He movingly, if briefly, wrote about the John F.  Kennedy assassination that cast a dark shadow over that senior year, over the fresh breeze brought down that Camelot represented in his mind and that I had also felt bereaved by down in my hometown. About missing out on the Great Books Club because they were, uh, nerds, about the odd-ball class photographs, before and after, about some teachers, English teachers I think, that he sent delayed kudos too, about his love of the sea (me too). About like I said before, dreams and ambitions. The best one, at least the one I remember him showing me at the time was simply entitled, A Walk Down Dream Street, which dealt with Billy Brady and his habit, penniless, no cars, no girls, sitting on the granite steps of the high school on warm, sultry nights talking about their dreams for the future, their jail-break from the unhappy homes they came from, about how they were going to do this and that to make their marks in the world. Small dream stuff as he recalled, but dreams, nicely written, with the virtue (if it can be called that) that he, they, actually did do that talking as Billy confirmed when I met him for the first time a few years ago.         

So you can see that Markin was clearly at peace with himself and ready to go to that reunion based on that box full of memories. Moreover, Markin had put together his own survey at that time looking for more in-depth information although that project kind of died on the vine due to apathy, poor response from classmates, and his own need to push on to a more pressing project at the time. Last year in another spurt of old town devotion he pulled that survey together with much better results since he really worked hard to contact, through the beauty of the Internet, as many classmates as possible working off of the 1964 Magnet yearbook.

Then one night in December, as we sat down at Jimmy’s, the local watering hole I mentioned that we frequent of late, he laid out to me the reasons why he was not going, could not possibly go, what did he say, oh yeah, he empathically could not go. Later I got to thinking about his long trail of reasons and came to agree with his conclusions. You know things having been alienated from his family, from the old town for so long he would not know anybody and would feel uncomfortably shy in that situation, especially since his long-time companion, Sarah, had refused his request to go to the reunion with him. Reasons along that line.  

Here is the kicker though. One that I would not have thought of now but knowing Markin back in the day would have had no trouble believing then. As part of the build-up to the reunion the reunion committee had put together a class website on the Internet. One way or another Markin got cyber-friendly with a woman classmate whom he did not know in high school but admitted (to me and her) that he had had a going-nowhere “crush” on back then. One thing led to another as they compared notes about their lives, interests and desires. That “one thing led to another” wound up with a face-to-face date, then several others, then under the satin sheets (yeah, this is definitely old days Markin, no question). But back up a minute-remember Sarah the longtime companion (and a woman who I would have grabbed in a minute if she had ever left Markin but she never did). That, in the end, that not wanting to be the “other woman” left that woman classmate no choice but to call off the short affair before it got too serious, and too complicated. Of course, since Markin wanted to burn both ends of the candle the break-up was horrendous (another Markin trademark, unfortunately) and so there was nothing but ill-feelings between the pair as a result. An emotion that I agreed would not be dissipated by reunion time as Markin also feared and so he made his unworthy decision that put all the other reasons in the shade.            

When I thought about Markin’s reasons, especially that bombshell last one later (although I would not have cried had he left Sarah because I would have been there to pick up the pieces so some things between us haven’t changed-damn), I found that my recollections of that night’s conversation, maybe not quite the way he put the matter but close, followed under our agreed upon common sign that, unfortunately, you cannot go home again.