Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Ted Capella went to Erie - not California

ERIE, Penn. - The romantic in me really wanted Ted Capella to have ridden off in a convertible on his way to California when he left 5th grade.

But Mick Olson says he's sure that Ted headed to Erie, Pennsylvania and in fact visited him during our senior year. I hope I was right about the convertible anyway. If not, that would shatter my illusions completely.

Remembering what went on in high school (and before) is more than tricky, it's like trying to recover data from your Commodore 64 computer (referred to as either a Commode Door or a $100 doorstop). I had one of those beauties in the 1980s when I started my consulting business and it paid for itself. Well, for $100 bucks it didn't take long.

(Well, see, there goes my mind drifting instead of staying on task. I was talking about memory, wasn't I?)

I came to Lakewood in March of 1958, I believe, just in time to catch the last couple of months of Edna Anderson's 4th grade class where I met my first Lakewood buddy (Randy Carlson) who sat behind me and taught me how to draw an airplane. (I draw them the same way for my granddaughter, who thinks I'm an artist, but she's seven...)

The very first day of school we went out for recess - something I had never heard of. Catholic elementary schools in Brooklyn didn't let kids loose for a minute during the school day. And when the whistle blew to go back in, well, I just kept swinging away, amazed that school could be fun.

But a tall teacher, angry looking like Sterling Hayden-with-a-hangover, one Mr. Hawkins, came over and took me by the arm up to my classroom (his squeeze really hurt) and I was in the doghouse with Edna for the rest of the day, my first day. Randy Carlson, the artist, had his own little run-in with Hawkins another day, sticking a hand puppet out the window of one of the buses as we were leaving to go home. He used the puppet to chime, 'Hello Hawkeye,' a nickname that Hawkeye (oops, Mr. Hawkins) didn't find amusing.

But we'll let Randy tell that tale of terror another time - or at the reunion.

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The following song came via one of our classmates who said she was a little leary of actually sending it to everyone. But I think most of us can relate.
  • They both need IPods
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