Scene from Olympia High School - 1988

One of the saddest moments of my life was the day the Wonnacotts moved from Rochester, NY to Westchester, PA.  I actually cried on the way home after saying goodbye.  I loved the whole Wonnacott family and knew how much we'd miss them.  Their home was the most exciting place to be -- with kids coming from or going to various adventures.  Paul was able to spend a half-day with me at school (we attended different high schools) just before, or maybe it was just after they moved.  I believe this was in 1988, during my senior year at Greece Olympia High School.  We were eating lunch in the cafeteria, when Paul noticed that one of the stoners was making fun of me.  I had the typical skater hair style of the 80's at that time, with extremely long hair in the front, and almost shaved in the back.  It was a gorgeous new wave look, but largely unappreciated in my high school.  Olympia was not a preppy or new wave school -- sweat pants were more fitting than paisley.  So, a new wave haircut was grounds for constant ridicule and I had basically gotten used to it.  Well, Paul found this mocking completely unacceptable and decided to take action.  What he did next was the sort of thing I dreamed about doing many times, but never had the courage.  He stood on his chair and began a beautiful rant.  He pointed to the stoner, and said to the rest of the cafeteria, "This druggie scum is laughing at my best friend and that is pathetic.  Look at him, he's a complete loser.  He'll be pumping my friend's gas at Exxon in a few years.  We shouldn't sit around and let these stoners make us feel bad for being smart, dressing well, and trying.  They're scum, so let's say it to their faces."  After he finished and sat down, students actually started applauding.  It was right out of a Revenge of the Nerds movie or something.  I always knew Paul was fearless, but this took the cake.  You could not ask for a more loyal friend

Ehren

Summer of '93 I fell into a marketing campaign to draw college students to California to sell pest control. We were scammed into believing that we could make a bunch of money for college! Well the catch was you had to work, and you had to save the money you earned when you did work. What a load of crap! They never said anything about saving money! I mean I did make money. They say I made 10,000 dollars that summer! They, meaning the IRS! I don't know where that information comes from! I ended up back in Utah with nothing left. Still it was a summer I wouldn't trade for any other summer of my life! It was the summer my homosexual, best friend would introduce me to my future wife!

The job began with a couple introductory seminars, 24 hour crash course in pest control, and a 6 hour drive to LA, for a 700 question, state mandated test. I passed with the highest score of the group. You'd think I could pick anywhere I wanted to go after that, I would have chosen anywhere between LA and San Diego, but I didn't have a car. I had to be paired up with someone who owned a car. It turned out I would be teaming up with this guy I barely knew and we would be working out of San Ramon (45 min outside San Francisco). I drove out to CA in a van full of car-less students all of us being disbursed to locations throughout the state. We dropped off a few sales reps in LA, Orange County, Bakersfield, and finally San Francisco. I had never been to San Francisco before and after leaving Bakerfield I was beginning to wonder what the hell I had gotten myself into. After leaving LA, where the ocean literally lingers in the air, you should have seen the looks of desperate violated betrayal on the faces of the guys we left in the desert! I was seriously worried! Was San Francisco another treeless flat wasteland? I began to ask the driver 100 questions about what San Francisco was like. After telling me how great it was I began to seriously doubt he was telling the truth! Despite my worries the drive was unlike anything I'd seen in my life.

I had driven from NY to Utah, visited half the states in the U.S. I had never seen a landscape so beautiful! California's colors were so vibrant I felt as if I might have lived my entire past in black and white. When we finally arrived in San Ramon, relief flooded my brain. The poor saps we left in Bakersfield were like kittens bagged and drowned in the river and I just wanted to forget them. This place was beautiful!
Our apartment complex had a pool and hot tub. It was awesome! 5 apartments were dedicated to 20 new Terminex sales reps. Ehren was by far the friendliest, most outgoing, social aspect of our sales force. He was like a kid who had never experienced defeat. He had no sense of self consciousness, he had his hands in and on everything, he controlled all conversations, and like a child with A.D.D. couldn't sit still for two seconds. It was remarkable to me that as soon as we met he wanted to go explore a neighboring town because it was the home of super model, Christy Turlington. I had no problem with that! It was really nice, the trees and landscape of the town were fantastical, the roads were narrow, the canopy created glimmering lines of sun light. We were in Danville. We found an outdoor cafe and had lunch. It was great, our chemistry was electric, I was so glad my new roommate and friend was normal!
"I'm gay," he said.
"What!" I replied
I realized he had been trying to tell me this for a while but had taken forever to get to it! And there it was! We had been having lunch, the weather was perfect, the atmosphere was great, I wasn't going to let him ruin what to this point had been a great day!
"Since we're going to be sharing a room together I thought you should know that I'm gay."
He went on to try and assure me that he wasn't interested in me, blah, blah, blah!
I didn't give a shit if my new roommate was gay! I didn't even care that he shared a bedroom with me. All I cared about was that he didn't tell any one else! I wasn't homophobic, I was homophobaphobic. I was afraid of the guys who were going to freak when they found out! So we made a deal. If I was going to be his roommate he couldn't tell anyone that he was gay! Okay, Good!
"You are so freakin lucky, I'm your roommate!" I said after that. At the time we were working with 100% all return mormon missionaries. Ehren was the only non-mormon of the group, and I was probably the only one who wouldn't care. It was like a jew in Nazi-Germany asking a soldier for a good hiding spot.
Ehren wasn't gay with that lispy gay limp hand feminine crap, he was just eccentric with a lightning style compulsive personality, but you would never know he was gay, just from talking to him. So I actually enjoyed being his friend!
It wasn't long before Ehren and I were the top sales associates of our area. We began to really enjoy our position within the company. We became very close friends with several of the sales reps. This led to all kinds of great contacts! We had a friends with relatives in Santa Cruz. Well that wasn't so great. We went down late one night without telling them we were coming. They wern't home so a couple of us tried to sleep in the hot tub and a couple slept in the car and a few slept on the ground. It was raining! One guy's girlfriend had parents that owned a marina at Yuba lake. We took an inboard boat out, where we all took turns driving, skiing, wake-boarding. We discovered you could literally flip around 180 degrees on this boat going 50 miles an hour. We only did it once! It was painful! We ditched the boat on what i think was an island. The wide mouth to a creek with cliffs on either side, was perfect for rock climbing. The rocks were straight vertical and if you fell 20-30 feet you fell in the water. We eventually ditched the boat and followed the creek up a worn canyon 1/4 mile coming upon a 30 foot waterfall, which emptied into a beautiful deep pool. It's like a mystical place in my memory, diving off that waterfall, pulling 1 and 1/2 perfect dives from higher up than the tallest high dive at BYU. Ehren was with us on all our adventures, he was a joker, a stud, a player, he flirted effectively with all the girls, and everyone liked him, or envied him! No one had a clue!

There is a place in San Francisco called The Castro. If you've never heard of it then you are definitely not gay. One day Ehren dragged me down there, despite my complete and utter disinterest in the idea of hanging out in an all gay mecca. If we were going to go somewhere I wanted to go where there would be lots of beautiful, straight, topless women, who wanted me! Well that was unrealistic so we went to the gay mecca. Actually it wasn't so bad. Quite the contrary, The Castro was alive! It was buzzing and exotic! Almost like a freak show at the circus, I was wandering around mesmorized by the strange sights. Right there in public: lesbian couples, gay male couples, black and white lesbian couples, an asian and black male couple, lone single gay male walking down the street wearing only g-string and sneakers (No match for you buddy, even the gay people think you're a freak!) This place was fantastic. I had no idea what made a gay person gay nor did I care! To me it was like walking through a town full of midgets! I was at a carnival and it was fun! Ehren was having a blast too, but I doubt to him it was a town full of little people. To him this wasn't a carnival, either. To him this was potential! Pure exhilarating potential! This was a place he might find love. Turns out it was a place for finding love. Just not for him.
We entered Marcello's pizza (pic on the right). The pizza probably looked good. The pizza probably tasted fantastic, but It wasn't this time or the next or the next that I would make that connection. I wasn't actually interested in the pizza. All I cared about was the girl behind the counter. Was she gay? I didn't think she was. Lesbian girls typically look lesbian.
I watched her perform her job with purpose. She was in control of that counter, she had no interest in the clientelle, she had no interest in me, give me your money, here's your pizza, now fuck off, and I loved her! She was so young, right here in the heart of a gigantic city, independent, working, beautiful! I was so impressed! Despite all the experience my friends in Utah had given me, I failed, I couldn't talk to her! Not so intimidated I couldn't go on and on about her with Ehren! A week later Ehren wanted to go back to the Castro. "Umm, no, it's all you this time buddy! I'll just stay here!"
I mean I liked Ehren, hanging out with him, working with him, going out to eat, having an occasional margarita at the taco bell. (God damn!, the little taquerias in California were so good! I hated cilantro before this summer..), but I just wasn't interested in following him around while he looked for a potential boyfriend! Yes, I was selfish, but everyone else in the world hated his kind so I didn't feel too bad! Well he came back late that night really, really, excited! It was like someone telling you, they had just won a 10 thousand dollar lottery! "I got a date with the girl at the pizza place!" How had this happened? My gay friend was going on a date with the girl that I was fantasizing about! Okay, I see where he's going. He obviously was trying to help hook me up on a date with this girl, that's great, but she doesn't remember me! She's accepted to go out with Ehren, the pretty boy, conversational wonder, who can use his gay magic to sweep any pretty girl off of her feet. What if she thinks I'm ugly? Forget that! This is freakin awesome! It's a chance to go on a date with her, and that's always better than not a chance!
The very next night we were flying down highway 24 on a motorcyle.
I was driving, and Ehren, sitting behind me, delighted,(I imagine) had his hands around my waist. I didn't care, he was worth it! The air was hot, the motorcyle was intoxicating, the tunnel was a hot intoxicating dream and we awoke on the other side the crisp cool air of San Francisco was a spectacular contrast to the hot dry heat over the mountain. We sailed passed Berkeley, in and over the bay bridge, Ehren singing Simon and Garfunkle at the top of his lungs, passed the heart of the city, down to the sodom and gomorah of our country, where my future bride await. It was late! Already 1 AM. She was still working! I walked in and introduced myself. I explained to her the situation, we had a motorcyle. She didn't have a car. She wanted to go out with us but we had to make a plan. Ehren wandered off hoping to meet someone while I waited for the girl to get off work. She seemed happy that I was waiting for her and I was really happy that she was. When she was all finished closing up the pizza place the plan was, I would take her back to her place so she could get changed/showered, then I would ride back, pick up Ehren and take him to her apartment. Then we would either walk somewhere, or do the ride drop one person off then get the other! It turned out taking the motorcycle, though fun, was not convenient. She got on the back of the motorcycle. It was exhilarating! My hand on the throttle told her how I was feeling! I pulled that baby back, jetting ferociously forward down the street. The gears switched rapidly I was 0 - 60 and back to 0 down one block. We turned right and then left and right again. There he was. We told him the plan. I turned around back to Castro street, at the bottom of the hill the street was empty. At the top of the hill the light was green. I gunned it! We took off shift shift shift, SHIT!, the car at the light was still sitting there. The light was green it had been green but the car at the light was not going to go. I slammed on the break, I had time to lean and go right around passed this car, but I didn't know how. Half of my experience learning to ride a motorcylce was learned on the ride down. I was speeding straight toward doom and the only thing I could do was pray it would stop in time. I held the break hard, I skidded straight the whole way! One second before impact I turned the handle bar 90 degrees for a spectacular near miss escape, however the bike ignored me and continued persistantly on its fateful path! Crash!!! The bike stopped abruptly. We were still seated on the back of the bike, alive! I couldn't hold the bike up, I was hurt! My groin had jammed staight into the perpendicular handlebar that I just previously turned into me. I had to lay the bike down and crawl away from it. Fortunately she wasn't hurt. This poor girl a victim of my carelessness, thank god was not hurt. It happened directly in front of the pizza shop as if telling her she should never have left. The police came.
"Have you been doing any drugs?"
"No officer."
"Has he been doing any drugs tonight?" The police officer turns to the girl.
"Umm? I don't know? I don't really know him?"
Oh that's great! She totally thinks I'm on drugs!
"No," I tell them, "No," I tell her.
The hospital is only a couple of blocks away. The ambulance takes me there alone! My chance with the girl is blown! All I can hope for now is that I don't lose my penis. In fact that whole area was in excrutiating pain. My pain exagerated by the loss of a potentially wonderful night. Not to be softened by the fact that my junk would be physically examined by an obviously gay doctor. After a couple of hours in the hospital, suddenly it didn't matter, nothing mattered! The girl and Ehren magically appeared in the hallway looking for me! I was alive! My penis was attached! (just slightly bruised) and she was back! Like an overdose of morphine the pain was gone! Soon, my injuries determined to be minor, I was released. We left the hospital and walked just a short couple blocks to her house. We talked. Her name was Heather. Her middle name was Sabrina. She told me she was very picky when it came to dating guys. I told her I was picky too. We argued over who was pickier! It was like a ridiculous attempt to rationalize something, but here we were knowing nothing of each other! I liked her a lot. I think she liked me too. While I lay deserted in a hospital bed, she had traipsed alone through the city streets in the middle of the night, searching for a guy she had met only once. Finally upturning Ehren, in some gay make out park, they turned to searching hospitals for me, finally hours later finding me in a hospital bed, the hallway of the gay village emergency room! What followed was a whirlwind romance that couldn't have had a better first date story ever to be told. A story-romance that all my friends are obviously, extremely, jealous of!





"mmm mmm mmmm"

"Oooo baby"

The most beautiful hair in the world!

Her hair, coming in right behind my wife and Keri Russell was the best I can remember. I think it was her hair that possibly kept our friendship alive. I mean when we first met she was never going to let me be her boyfriend. No matter how many parties we went to or how many times I slept over at her house, it just wasn't going to happen! We stayed up late nights watching MTV, I wore her pink shiny pajamas, slept next to her bed so many times. But we never kissed! I think I tried, you know that! But she had the most fantastic hair in the world and I was content to just be her friend. I actually must have been in love with her hair because everything else about her drove me nuts. Needless to say I'm not blogging about Tally because I like her hair. What evolved out of my initial interest, was a friendship that would last for the rest of my life. For my friends who haven't met Tally I would like to introduce you. She is one of the most sensitive, caring, shy, silly, playful, and eccentric friends I have. She's like the school nerd wrapped up inside a supermodel. You would have to be an asshole to not like her, because all she's concerned with when she meets you is that she doesn't offend you in any way. Kind of like the fairy tail princess in "Ever After".

Tally's sisters, Keely and Aubrey, both who cry when they laugh, were also my friends. They are the prettiest sister trio I know.

Anyway to keep in tradition with my other posts about friends, I have to tell a little story, right. A snow storm had dumped a couple feet of snow on the roof of Tally's house. I was, being the athletic, stud that I am, going to shovel that heavy snow off their roof for them. Well, Dressed in Tally's mom's moon boots I used a 6 foot ladder to climb up to the roof. Standing on the very top of this a-frame ladder my shoulders were just even with the gutters. I had to escavate large heavy mounds of snow to clear a hole for my ascent. When that was done I put my hands up on the roof and jumped off the ladder, doing a push up, arms straightened, all my weight on my hands, elbows locked in, legs were still dangling, my hips were against the gutter and I was suspended! The next move would be impressive... like a gymnist on a highbar, I swung my feet out away from the house, the shift in balance my head would lean forward and I would pull my knees up onto the roof in one gracefull swoop. As soon as I swung my feet out away from the house, the icy surface under my hands betrayed me. Both hands simultaneously slipped right off the roof, my face struck the rooftop with a violent blow, my nose tried to grab the gutter as a last ditch effort to stop my fall, but it was to late. The physics of motion took effect as my legs swung back under me, my nose still clinging desperately to the gutter began to rip off. I was falling now, my body now horizontal, my back facing the ground. Crash! Dead center of my back, I hit the ladder. My hyperextended body bounced flailing the rest of the way to the ground. Oh my god, my nose! Is it still there? Is it still attached!
"Tally, my nose, my nose, look at my nose!?... Damn it, Keely!, Aubrey!, stop laughing, that f'in hurt!"
As it turns out my nose healed without even a trace of the near amputation. But the memory persists. It's the story that they remember most, and love to laugh at when I see them. It's been a long time but hopefully soon I will see Tally's beautiful hair, Keeley's red faced, teary eyed hysterical laughter, and Aubreys beautiful, well she's just beautiful, again!



Tally reminded me today that the reason we met this transvestite bartender was because we missed the last ferry out of NY and ended up spending the night.


Here's a letter from Tally from 1993! (Pic on right) 15 years ago. Holy crap that was a long time ago. The drawings were awesome, especially the colors! I put some more recent pictures to hide the text because I didn't want you to be bored to death trying to read it! Ha Ha If you want to read a more interesting letter I posted a link below from a letter from Keeley. Same year! My favorite part she says... Here's a poem for you, it's not as good as the one you wrote me, or maybe it is I haven't written it yet. http://pwonnacott.tripod.com/images/KPage1.htm

My best friend!

My wife says, "I'm so glad you're obsessed with Greg right now! Could you pay attention to me!" Man if I had a dollar for everytime I heard a girl say that!

Greg Eric Heidi, some girl and a parent on steps in Villanova

When I was 15 I had a best friend named Greg Anderson. Our relationship was based on pure thrill seeking adventures! It was like Wonder Twin powers activate! When we got together it was all about adrenaline. Of course in order to be ready for adventure we had to be fit. We would exercise rigorously. I mean we would go running after dark in the pouring rain, we would stay up all night and then go play 3 sets of tennis. Then the adventures... we would ride our bikes with toilet paper to tee pee the houses of people we knew, even if it meant a 10 mile bike ride to get there! We frequently swiped my parents car, even though I was still only 15, and then take it for joy rides. We made up a secret club in a secret hiding place where we plotted ways to attack or sabotage David Morey. The only day I ever visited Greg in his high school cafeteria we nearly instigated an all out cafeteria riot between the heavy metal kids and the mod squad.

The next year we had drivers licenses but no car. Our good friend, Chris, had parents who, unwisely trusted us! Yes Chris' mom was very trusting. I remember never being restricted from being alone with Chris in her bedroom, where I learned a thing or two. What? I'm talking about music! Anyway I was leading up to... they let us use their car! Not just once but all the time! So one day Chris, Jeanine Greg and I pushed the boundaries and we went to Lake Ontario. That wasn't enough so we went to Niagara Falls. On the way, being as we were in such a playful mood, I abandoned the drivers seat and jumped in the back with Chris and Jeanine. No big deal we weren't going too fast and Greg deftly slid across from the passengers side to take the wheel. Not a stunt to be performed by amateurs, Greg and I were in top physical condition! Since Chris and Jeanine weren't in on our little prank they were, needless to say, terrified! So coming back from Niagara we did about 100 on a two lane road swerving around car after car to get home by dinner. It was simply Greg's presence that prompted this adventure! Greg was not only there for me in adventure he was there for me with advice on relationships as well. I was in love with two girls. One because she was my best friend and the other because she had the cutest cheeks (looked like a chipmunk) Well Greg had three girlfriends at the time juggling quite skillfully, probably wondering what my problem was. I would have been terribly sad to be losing such amazing friends accept I was still traumatized by the time Andrew Schwendiman wanted to compare our junk to see who was the most endowed and now I just had to get out of this town! Sorry I'm sitting here with Greg and were talking about stories so I was editing a couple things and will probably be editing again later when I get an anonymous post and find out it's Andrew.

So after I moved Greg and Eric would come to visit once or twice a year. It was great seeing Greg. In fact we were both quite happy to see each other. Greg even went so far as to dip kiss my face, with his hand, in front of the entire chearleading squad of my new high school. My girlfriend who happened to be one of them was pissed! Oh well, fuck her, she was a lousy kisser! Ha! Ha! The next time he came to visit my new girlfriend Andrea Catoia helped us sneak a bottle of Canadian Whiskey out of her house so that I could get drunk for the first time. We didn't sleep at all that night! Just ran around the neighborhood singing "nanananana batman!" We got into bed just before my mom came down to wake us up. Chris just reminded me that when she came to visit we took the train to Philly. We saw some huge posters in large display boxes at the train station. So late that night when everyone was asleep we snuck out. Drove to the train station and busted the posters out of the cases that held them. Thanks Chris you are definitely second on my list of all time companions in adventure! Anyway back to Greg!

So all that you've read is just an introduction of Greg, to prepare you for the following story. You see by the time Senior Year of High School rolled around we were pretty much professional scammers. A term that later evolved, from simply showing the ability to get away with something, to showing the ability to seduce girls into making out with us! No offence girls, but you know you loved it! So it was summer after Senior Year of High School. I would be going to first semester of college and Greg would be going on a mission to France. Well when Greg and Eric came to visit there was an electric buzz in the air. I think everyone could feel it. We weren't going to go off silently into the night. It had already been arranged that we would be going to a Youth Conference. We would have been much happier staying at home conjuring up unsupervised mischief, but as it was, we were locked into a strictly supervised rule based environment where our every move would be vigorously monitored. My mom was to be our adult chaperon. My mom was pretty easy going most of the time and I even think Greg and Eric found her to be quite pleasant. Still she was an obstacle in our way. We would be seeing lots of pretty new faces at this gathering of fertile 16 to 18 year old girls and we wanted to take every advantage! Well not every advantage. At this point in our lives, we were pretty much fully content with sucking face! Although, later that night I did get to cop a feel! Before that however Eric and Greg were caught making out with Heidi Tripp and her friend, by the warden (My Mom). We had just gotten to the dormitories at the Villanova campus and were unpacking all our gear when it happened. I wasn't present for the make out session but I was definitely impressed with Greg and Eric's maneuvering and speed. Needless to say I was just a bit peeved at them for getting caught because they had brought attention on us, and with the excursion we had been planning! It was Greg who initiated the idea that we had to do something spectacular and we began to make plans to sneak out after dark and take the van to downtown Philly! Yes the plans were deliberate and premeditated! I already had a spare key to the van that I snuck from the house before we left! The last thing we wanted now was more adult supervision! Greg assured me everything was cool, that my mom couldn't help breaking into laughter when she was trying to scold them. That was believable, Greg had a way with people. Well the rest of the day we walked around talking smack looking for girls, planning an adventure and feeling like total studs. We met pretty much every attractive girl on the campus within the first 15 minutes of being there. A rumor had spread like wildfire, no not a rumor, this was a fact, four devilishly handsome guys (Paul, Todd, Greg, Eric) were walking around campus and they were looking for only the funnest prettiest and bravest of girls to come mingle with them. Within no time we had an enlisted crew of girls ready for our adventure. So while we waited for night to come we passed the time rearranging all the furniture in our dorm room. Our room changed from a typical dorm cubicle with bunk beds into a fortress slash private clubhouse. Only a very cool hang out would satisfy. Even despite the fact that we would spend very little time there.

Soon it was dark and Parent supervisors were dutifully putting us to bed. We went straight to stuffing our beds with pillows and monitoring the hallway for adults. With far too much anxiety for adventure we stealthily flew down the hallway and outside. The girls were in another dorm so rounding them up was our first priority. It was easier than we had expected! Led by Heidi, the girls were already outside rearing to go. Unfortunately we had lost a recruit, the mission presidents daughter was the prettiest of all the girls, she had dropped out of the adventure. In a last ditch effort we scaled the building to her outside dorm room window and knocked. We wanted to give her one more chance, duh! but to Heidi's delight she wouldn't budge!
Within no time we were all situated in the van, my hand on the ignition, adrenaline pumping, not a word spoken, the engine burned in, lights still off, like just like in the sound of music, we escaped!

Downtown Philly at night! We adventured past the boat houses, down to the river, around the Art Museum scaling it's walls, across the street of fountains with giant statues of naked green women, we stopped next to some "ladies of the evening", and asked how much? "Are you kidding I wouldn't have sex with you for less than 100 bucks" I said! We drove across the city to South Street and ordered a large pizza. After which we found a parking garage and walked to the park on the river, where the old boat tours are given.

Here we ate pizza and played on the giant cement structures, but it was getting late and the night sky was starting to change. We knew we better get back before we were discovered. So as easy as we came we were leaving to go back. Until "kkhhhkkrrr!" What was that? I was pulling out of the parking garage and the back end pinched the side of an enormous, wood, railroad tie enclosed planter box. Right before our exit I had to make a 90 degree turn around this square planter that was situated right in front of the garage attendants booth. I had not made a, wide enough, turn to allow for the back end of the van! What made matters worse was right in front of me a sign, DO NOT BACK UP! SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE! Yes, my front wheels were just past the tire spikes! We all got out and evaluated our dilemma. It was obvious we couldn't back up and pushing forward also looked doubtful. That's it! I'm just gonna have to turn the wheels away from the wall and gun it. Nervously, with everyone back in the van I gently pressed on the gas, the van creaked but didn't move, I gunned it! The van instantly lunged forward about a foot, the RPMs shot skyward, the screaming tires wailed deafeningly inside the acoustical cement structure, then like a rocket we were out of there! I wish! Actually we were stuck! Only worse than before! The back driver side tire was completely up off the ground! The weight of the van rested on top of the planter! You could feel the awkward angle of being tilted. Again we got out of the van to asses our situation! It was awful, unfathomable! We were definitely doomed to a lifetimes of punishment! All we could do now is hope God would forgive us, because we knew our parents never would! Out of desperation we decided to get the car jack out! Not really knowing what we were doing and with the parking garage attendant just looking on with amusement, we jacked the back of the van up so that both wheels were completely off the ground. With the van balancing on the jack like a fulcrum we bravely pushed the behemoth monster away from the wall! To our amazement it worked! Never before and never again will I see a car jack as severely bent as this one was. We threw it into the trash. We were free at last! Back in the van everyone was relieved to be on our way. It was 6:00 in the morning now! Villanova was half an hour away and parents were sure to be waking up. We flew back to the dormitories. Everyone vowed to never speak a word of that night! Greg and I were thinking desperately for a plan, an excuse, when we passed a donut shop. Genius struck Greg with an idea! We were going to say we got up early to go get donuts for everyone, and we got in an accident! We found a corner of the store in the back that had some damage, and we assumed we could bring people to the site to prove our story if necessary. We got back to campus and found the same parking spot on the street, where we had left the night before.

In the end, my brother Todd, who I feel terribly guilty for not including on this little adventure, turned around and unwittingly saved us! People were packing to go home, when we finally got back! Surprisingly no one even missed us. "Oh there you are," my mom said happy to have found us, "Go get packed!" It was dreadful the secret still lingering to be exposed! And then it happened! "A hit and run!" Todd was ecstatic! "Someone hit our van!" That was it! Fortunately for us, the entire length of damaged van was facing the street. Right around a bend in the road no less. It was a hit and run! Some lucky bastard sideswiped our van and got away with it. An hour, and a police report later, it was official!

This is picture I stumbled across of the van. This was taken years before the accident. Nice hair Todd

Letters from Greg! You were by far the best read! I don't know why other people in this world can't be as clever as you and I and write shit that's interesting to read! He he! How do you like my new found stuckupedness? I know I wrote you some witty, funny ass stuff because I remember laughing my ass off when I'd write to you, and I know you didn't save save any of it! That's okay, I forgive you, but I'm still mad as hell! But just like I forgave you for not writing me as often as I wrote you I will this time, for the last time, like every other time, let it slide! You're one lucky ass lame excuse for a best friend I ever had.
I won't be able to keep posting forever, because my disability won't last much longer. Eventually I'll go back to work. So enjoy it while it lasts!

Good Laugh

You know when you laugh so hard that you can't breath and you have to purposefully try to stop laughing so you can catch your breath! Oh euphoria, yes it is as good as the best drugs available. It's only happened to me a few times and this is where I'm gonna write about em.

The last time it happened was believe it or not just a week or two ago. Heather and I were having a glass of wine watching TV, after Kobe had gone to bed. Jack Ass was on and we were laughing at all their stupid antics. One interesting side note is my brother Steve actually went to school in West Chester with some of those guys. Right, you don't care, Anyway... I had seen the movie already, so when they were hiding in the bushes with a camcorder and horn, blowing the horn as the golfers were in their back swing, I wasn't prepared to be surprised. I must have forgotten or maybe it was the wine... one of the golfers got so pissed off, he put a golf ball down and was going to drive it into the bushes where the pranksters were hiding. I cringed waiting for the ball to come sailing in! Just as he was getting set to swing, the horn blew, still trying to make him fuck up his swing, knowing their lives were on the line! I think I may have shed tears, laughing at that one.

Before that was New Years eve in Dacula, GA when Shannon and Jon came to visit. It was a great night of laughter wine and fondue. Heather will never forget Jon eating giant hand fulls of the cheese fondue, after it had cooled into a large gelatinous mass. I remember It was late and we were needless to say inebriated. Jon had told a dozen fascinating stories by now and we laughed routinely at gibberish that seemed to unexpectedly leak out of his mouth. We were playing a mind game called Scategories that I was somewhat familiar with. Well I got some of the rules mixed up. We had been playing for a while and suddenly I got really excited. It seemed I had become brilliantly clever. You see I had forgotten the rule, you could only use one single predetermined letter from the alphabet. We had a list of items such as: things with tails, capitals, fictional character, etc. We had to come up with a word using that predetermined letter. If you used two words with the letter you got bonus points. So for fictional character if the letter was D you could say Daisy Duke and get bonus points. Well in my stupor, having forgotten the rule, I was amazingly coming up with double even triple words for every list item. It was unbelievable, I had words like Lemon/Lime lollipop, Peter Pan, Bread Basket. I couldn't think of any Capitals with any letter of the alphabet, but that was okay because you were bound to have a few that were blank and who cares I was kicking ass! So the timer dings! Oh Oh Oh i want to go first! I have to display my genius, suddenly I'm a victorious superstar... "Uhh, Paul none of those words start with M!" Oh my god I'm an idiot, a complete retard, All I can do is laugh violent tears of despair and humiliation! I laugh so hard recovery is next to impossible ...until finally, completely winded my wife carries me to the bathroom and I go to sleep, hugging the bathtub.

Before that, it was Rochester NY, at Church, in the men's bathroom. We had noticed that one of the girls our age, who was still quite flat chested for a 13 year old had suddenly out of nowhere sprouted some boobies. Well she was one of the guys girlfriend. We were in the bathroom, Andrew, Greg, Craig, Todd and I and we were obnoxiously going on and on about it. He seemed to be pretty happy with the new development, and though it was pretty clear at 14 being a strict church going group of boys, the grave sin that was suggested, He jokingly said, "You know, I don't know, do you want me to check?"
"Yeah," we laughed! But then someone froze dead silent and pointed under the door of the stall. There, there were a pair of black adult Sunday shoes! Some adult was sitting there taking a shit listening to every word we had been saying. Oh no! without another moments hesitation we were out of there. Once out in the hall we could stop and laugh. We felt somewhat safe but it was still nervous laughter and we were too curious to see which adult, or god forbid parent, it was that was squatting in the bathroom. Only moments later the bright red face of Carrie Sickles father emerged from the bathroom. Running partly bent over, half horrified, and completely hysterical with laughter we had to leave the church and hide in the apple orchard until we could get our wits back.

Ken Allison kicks ass!

I've had some great moments in my life and I've decided that here is where I'm going to write about them.

Ken Allison was somewhere around the age of 16 when he moved to Stallion circle, the place where I lived. He was old and he was cool. He was way cooler than Mike Miller our 16 year old next door neighbor. Don't get me wrong Mike was cool, he listened to Kiss, wore cut off sleeves, had long straight blond hair, and muscles. He was not only cool, but he was bad ass! I really envied him and hated his guts at the same time. If he hadn't have punched me in the stomach for some reason I have long forgotten I might not have hated him so much. His brother Mark was a couple years younger and he was exactly my age. I think it was having a bad ass older brother that turned mark into a bit of a brute himself. Our personalities clashed a bit, you see at the time I liked Barry Mani low and Mark liked Black Sabbath. I really think it was their influence that got me into a sort of body building frenzy myself at a young age. Well then there were fights. I remember near the woods punching mark while he held my head and tried to bang it against a skinny tree. Afterwards we both thought we had won the fight! Needless to say, I had no idea at the time how terrible my life was nor how terrible it would have continued to be had not the Allisons come to our street.


Ken Sr. and Joice Allison, the parents, were from Scotland and had the warmest friendliest voices you ever heard. When Ken yelled at his kids in that deep Scottish accent he was the funniest and strangely nicest man you'd ever heard. When their mom was firm the magic of her accent was but the sweetest firm voice in the world. When they spoke to you directly, or patted you on the head, you could not help but wish they would sweep you up in their arms. I really felt that Ken and Teddy were extremely lucky to have them as parents.

Of course in the beginning we were slowly becoming acquainted, trying to see who the new neighbors would like better, us or the Millers. Of course Ken would want to be friends with Mike(but that didn't happen). They were the same age, it only made sense. Ted was a couple years younger, and he could be friends with my brother Mike or Matt Miller (He became Mike's). It didn't really make sense that I would become close to either of them being right in the middle between their ages.

What followed were the effects of an unseen slow gravitational pull that forced us together. The Allisons had an above ground pool in the back yard where the best ever rock the boat battles were fought in big inner tubes that emptied half the pool. We had a large rectangular back yard where the best ever soccer and football games were played. Ken had a snowmobile that he would generously take us for long rides on across snow covered streets and sidewalks. On one occasion we were flying down the sidewalk on the snowmobile and a police car pulled right out to cut us off. Ken said, "Hold on, I'm going to ditch this pig!" To this day I wish I had let him, but I was too scared, and I begged him not to run. He knew he could have easily gotten away with all the snow everywhere. Even the street was covered in snow and ice we were just on the sidewalk out of respect for the Law? Yeah? Anyway he bit the bullet and took the ticket, the snowmobile was impounded. Later he told me wasn't really going to run, anyway. That was a lie, I know he would have, but he didn't want me to feel like the impound was my fault. Later he said the judge just laughed and gave him the snowmobile back and he didn't have to pay the fine. What a nice guy protecting me from feeling bad! You'd think a nice guy like that wouldn't run from cop's. But Ken was cool, he was James Dean cool, he was Han Solo cool. I panicked and missed out on the thrill ride of a lifetime.


Still Ken was older than us and he had his own life. He was awesome, he was our favorite babysitter, he took us riding on his dirt bike at Green Acres, he played soccer with us in the backyard, but it was Ted that we lived with. It was not uncommon to have Ted waking you up in the morning getting you ready and involved in his next idea for adventure or play.
Whether it was riding tricycles around the block or hooking the wagon up to a bike and strapping someone in with bungee cords, or firecrackers, he always had firecrackers, I remember one of his bottle rockets getting launched into the open second story window of an old neighbor ladies house. Of course he was always ready to go pike fishing!
It was like our own private, hidden away little fishing spot. Even though he was too young to be my friend, he was my friend. He was my younger brother Mike's age. Needless to say they were close, my mom says they were inseparable, yet we were still good friends as well, and it's strange looking back because I don't even remember my brother Mike. It's as if he wasn't even there, but I remember Ted, I remember Ted everywhere, in the raspberry patch, in the woods, at the creek in the backyard in my house. As we got older he created a game that became an obsession called gotcha last. A game I've carried onto play with my child. Basically just a game of tag that never ends. Followed up by phone calls dedicated to taunting and eventually sneaking over to his house just to tag him back and then run back home. That would be a waste because he was relentless. Ted was subtle. He liked to come up behind you and lightly touch you on the top of the head. Then he would walk away, and you knew he had just gotten you, and he knew you knew, but he was saving the taunting for later. Oh and I just remembered the best scare of my life, Ted was under my bed. Unlike your typical jump out and yell Boo!, he just silently waited until I turned out the light and walked over to the bed. When I got to the bed he gently reached out and lightly grabbed hold of my ankle! One of the few times fear has brought me to scream. He's lucky I didn't hurt him because, believe me, as I screamed I tried to stomp the crap out of whatever creature it was that had me.

All this is just a little intro into my life with the Allisons. Yes all this information is just an introduction to a very short story. It was a moment that happened one summer day in the street right in front of Ted's house. A moment that has left a photographic imprint in mind, a memory I will have for the rest of my life! I still see it in slow motion just the way it was 20 years ago... in slow motion. There were two, maybe three kids, messing with us. Ted, me, my brother Todd, and a few neighborhood kids were about to get into a fight. It was NOT a fight we wanted, and certainly NOT a fight we were going to win, but we had brought it upon ourselves! You see we had discovered you can break a branch off the crab apple tree in Ted's front yard, skewer a crab apple and then fling it half a mile down the street. So like a bunch of idiots we taunted some bigger kids that we didn't like with our new found weapons. My brother Todd always had bad luck throwing things, because he more often than not hit his mark. I distinctly remember my heart abandoning me, when one of the kids rode over, flipping down the kickstand in the street, got off his bike, and walked straight up to Todd ready to kick his ass. Time slowed down as the boys friends rode up for backup and all our yelling was not going to stop the beating that was to ensue. And that's when it happened, like a streak of light the screen door slammed shut, and he was in the street connecting his foot to the front tire of the same bike the attacker had just abandoned. You couldn't have blinked and Ken had gone from somewhere in the house to 3 steps deep into the street and that's when time stopped. I watched that bike rise up and up and up rotating into a full gainer. It was staggering trying to comprehend how kicking a bike would make it do that! How did Ken know that if he kicked the bike like that he could make it do that? Had he done that before? I don't remember what was said after that, but it wasn't much and it doesn't really matter. Those kids were gone in a flash, I never saw them again, and I was left with the most awesome feeling in the world. I don't remember if the movie My Bodyguard came out before or after this, but I remember watching that movie and thinking we have one of those.

I have friends that I would love to see again.

This picture was taken in the Arizona desert on a road trip from Provo through Vegas to LA (Sorriest Chinatown and so worried I'd never see my friends again) down to SanDiego(Ted creating the longest stretch of drama ever to be inhaled) across to Phoenix by way of Mexicali(5 minutes in poverty) up through (night clubs and drivethrough liqour stores shoplifting playboys with Melanie from church), onto the Grand Canyon over a snow topped mountain where we could have died and Ted could care less because he just wanted to go back to sleep.


This is a picture taken in front of my house Stallion Circle in Greece, N.Y. As kids we caught huge ass pike in the creek, caught snakes, turtles, shot my dads pistol in the woods, picked rasberries, had chipmunks and raccoons in the front yard tree, our cat brought home rabbits and squirells. One of my best friends in the world is that kid on the far right. We played soccer or football in the backyard everyday for years. When his older brother babysat it was the best time to be alive.

This is Johnathan Stong, one of the funnest guys I'll ever know. He's like Jim Carry and Vince Vaugn all rolled up. I'll always remember frisbee golfing in PA and standing on the edge of the dock knocking eachother into the water. Yeah he was a real sport he never let me win once! I Can't wait to see you again
Caitlyn and Jeromy and I worked together at a nice little restaurant in PA after which we spent countless nights pretending that we only live once.

Jeanine and Chris were not the friends I spent the most time with as a freshman/sophomore in High School but they were definitely the friends I had the most fun with. Juan, an exchange student who lived with us, though technically he was not our exchange student, is in the middle. I fear I will never see him again and it is truly heartbreaking.