Early June. Welcoming the unofficial start of Summer. Here in the North/mid/east all the seasons don’t slowly blend into one like most of our southern friends .Our season are abrupt, extreme and sometimes frightening. Winter here was brutal and the snow piled higher than cars at times. It has yet to release us from her grip as here I am on June 7 seeking desperately a hoody to help me make it thru the morning.
It was an email from cousin Jim Gill “Paul McCartney and Wings (on the radio now) remind me of our visits to Jersey.” that triggered this post. Also a call from a very old friend Jim McSherry was filled with resurrected Summers.
This topic has been covered ad infinitum yet I feel a desire to write about it. I’ve waited 55 years to finally say, “You kids don’t know how good you got it.” or “Get off my lawn you no good sons of bitches!” Social media is swarmed with the “when I was young…” cliche. Social media will always be telling us about life before the internet. I remember the set of outdated encyclopedias in our rec room actually WERE my internet. And if it wasn’t in there, then I really did walk 20 miles in the snow (actually it was more like one mile and it was only in the snow once) to the little library on Carteret avenue. I filled many reports with cut out photos and charts from those encyclopedias……and I hate to admit I also used books from the library for my primative “cut and paste” knowledge.
Todays internet brats don’t know how good they got it. But the internet is just the first in-line glaring example of how things have changed. Summer has changed dramatically as I look around now at the empty streets and playgrounds. Most kids have resorted to cyber entertainment. When we played in the Summer, we had to use our imagination. First of all our Summers were at least three weeks longer! For whatever reason the school year has definitely lengthened for todays school kids.
It started on the carpet when Jim McSherry and I would play “little army” with plastic soldiers frozen in boring poses. We don’t know where he got them but Johnny Lambert had the coolest, meanest looking Japanese toy soldiers in unique poses of death and destruction. How we yearned for those politically incorrect yellow soldiers. They were never to be found in any toy store.
There was always our pool and Kenny Gitters pool which sometimes became strange when we decided to take off our suits and swim naked. Mrs. Gitter put an end to that real quick Most hot Summer days she could be found at the end of our kitchen table playing Scrabble with our mom. They had also discovered a fabulous new drink by reading “Hints from Heloise” in the Star Ledger. It was called Iced Coffee. It was this same Heloise daily article where mom found out that we could actually eat the skin on our baked potatoes and didn’t have to throw them away with the tinfoil that they were wrapped in.
As the Summers progressed we invented new things to do and keep us occupied. One time we spent an entire Summer in our backyard creating mazes with lego pieces and watching bugs walk around in circle. It would piss us off when some bugs would just say “fuck this” and climb the Lego wall to exit our “maze of doom.”
Unfortunately for these clever bugs escape usually meant being captured again and being subject to some cruel torturous death. Being burned to death with a laser from the sun via a magnifying glass was a popular choice.
In our neighborhood the 5th of July was much more popular than the actual holiday on the fourth. For it was the day after the nightly fireworks that we would walk the sidewalks and gutters looking for “duds” Unexploded fireworks. Anything. Fire crackers, bottle rockets, the remains of a roman candle. We bought hundreds of these used explosives home and carefully unraveled them into a box. It was long tedious hours with little payoff. I ate a few crabs last Summer and it kind of reminded me of that. A lot of work with little meat and never feeling close to having my appetite satisfied.
What we did with our gunpowder harvest hardly satisfied my appetite for destruction either. I was pretty keen on destroying plastic tank models that I spent weeks building but that was usually done with gasoline. Sometimes we got lucky and were able to purchase real fireworks from the local firework dealer on Tennyson street. We would knock on this teenage kids door and barter with him. A nickel, a dime, ANYTHING for one single firecracker or bottle rocket.
We played outside. Sidestreet baseball, touch football, man hunt. We built forts in trees and under bridges. We explored the endless miles of railroad tracks that led up the dirt hill from Daniele. We hung out on the trestle
Then there were the Summers of the Gills. I had already written about this in a previous posts but these were great times. Just a few years after the passing of our father, it was good to have a man in the house again. This was Summer at it’s very best. Carefree and happy. Lot’s of pool, barbecue and popcorn. Wherever we went, we all went together. Filled the station wagon and sang songs from the FM together. It never got any better than this.
We did surrender to TV though, although it was a different monster than it is now. A huge wooden box attached to an antenna on the roof. Seven channels and sometimes eight, if we could get channel 3 to come in. Monty Python was a Summer staple on Sunday nights along with all the other mindless sitcoms of the day. Greg got us into “Dark Shadows” Saturday Night Wrestling and eventually Mary Hartman Mary Hartman.
The Day I Beat Walter Lambert In Chess
In the Summer of 72 we sat in front of channel 13 and “watched” the championship of chess between Russia and USA. This was huge when we were young. There still was a cold war going on and anything Russia vs USA was must see. At this time Bobby Fischer was still in the progress of losing his mind and didn’t allow cameras in the room where they were playing. So, for the entire Summer we sat in front of the TV and watched some guy move paper chess pieces on an upright paper board. There were sometimes HOURS between moves. It was like watching grass grow yet this is how we spent an entire Summer. This championship match had ignited a national interest in the game that we caught.
I had gotten rather good at the game and even got a book from the library. Next to Fran Tarkenton, the then quarterback of the New York Football Giants, Bobby Fischer was an absolute hero to me. I studied and envied his life and his mysterious quiet way was even more intreging.
So one day, it happened. In the Lamberts always open garage door, I challenged Walter Lambert to a game of chess. Nobody had ever beaten him or even come close. And he would smirk and let out a whinny laugh everytime he beat one of us and called us knuckleheads for even trying.
But as the game went on, it became interesting and a small crowd began to gather around. I knew I had him on the ropes and he was just waiting for one stupid move, like we always seemed to make, to beat us. Not only did I keep my head in the game but I actually check mated the older, the wiser, the much cooler Walter Lambert. There was a shock of silence first but then the place erupted. George beat Walter Lambert. Yes. George Hartman had beat Walter Lambert in a game of chess. In the Summer of 1972 in a small rural town off the New Jersey Turnpike where planes flew overhead to land in Newark… I had become a folk hero for a few days. I had indeed beaten Walter Lambert at chess.
For me,
I want every anticipated Summer to be good. I yearn for the sun in my face. I watch our tomatoes and flowers grow. I BBQ ribs and steak on weekends. I’ve seen a Summer moon rise from the deck. I love each abrupt season better than the next. I couldn’t stand ‘summer all the time” or rainy seasons but Summer is a great time to feel alive. There is no greater swim than body surfing on an Atlantic ocean wave. Much like George Costanza, today, I proclaim this THE SUMMER OF GEORGE!
Could you give me some smaller notes? casodex preço generico First identified in the US in 1998, PANDAS has been described by medics as a rare autoimmune disorder in children
What university do you go to? herbal equal to provigil Meanwhile, the infants of very obese mothers were found to have an increased risk of death due to SIDS and congenital abnormalities.
Could I ask who’s calling? buy rogaine foam men At least 30 people were killed in clashes across the town, a monitoring group and local officials said.
Thanks funny site methocarbamol 500 milligram tabs Footage posted on YouTube appeared to show Islamic State fighters using weapons including artillery as they battled Kurdish forces near Kobani
Children with disabilities zyvox cost in canada Two doctors who happened to be walking on the beach at the time examined him and determined that no arteries were hit.
We’d like to invite you for an interview lipitor and kidney problems “They like to be able to reference in conversation their home in New York, their home in Paris and their home in London,” says luxury broker Frances Katzen of Douglas Elliman
Who’s calling? pariet 20mg bestellen “Shoppers this holiday season are seizing opportunities to take advantage of early promotions and showing signs they may wait until the end of the season when promotions are even greater.”
I quite like cooking zanaflex 4mg dosage “But they launched a a coordinated lymphoedema network which has resulted in a comprehensive and equitable service for patients
Hello good day elocon cream cost I think it could be assumed that the same would have happened to and man of any ethnicity.
I’d like to open a business account lioresal price Wanis Bukhamada, commander of army special forces in the port city of Benghazi, told Reuters his forces had attacked with artillery several ammunition stores in camps held by Islamists late on Wednesday.
In tens, please (ten pound notes) when to have sex on fertomid The people of Missouri voted him into office and they can vote him out, if they disagree with his handling of this situation.
What do you study? arcoxia 90 mg ohne rezept I’m not looking to this game as ”Oh, I’m coming to get revenge on them’ because it wasn’t even like that when I left
I’d like to open a personal account buy metoclopramide online For Illinois, the $16.65 billion national settlement means a cash payment of $200 million for the state’s pension system, making it whole for losses sustained as a result of the risky investments
Children with disabilities 300 mg bupropion high EZ-Pay is the convenient newspaper payment plan that conveniently applies your subscription payment to your credit card or debit card.
The manager zyprexa withdrawal symptoms The risk of trading a young, reliable workhorse starter such as Porcello loomed ever larger on Friday when 32-year-old Verlander, who battled periodic shoulder inflammation and had his worst season (career-high 4.54 ERA and 223 hits allowed) in 2014, came out of Friday’s game against Toronto complaining of right triceps pain.
I’d like to cancel this standing order augmentin 875 rxlist The survey found that 56 percent of women have a favorable opinion of Clinton — the highest rating of any Democrat or Republican:
It’s OK where to buy isotretinoin in malaysia She insisted the rouble is “undervalued” considering the state of Russia’s economy and it has been “oversold”
Some First Class stamps combitic global nizagara Perinatal rates declined in 14 states, remained unchanged in 35 states and rose in only one — South Dakota — between 2006 and 2012, according to the report.
Other amount tadapox tablets in india Because both sides, Democrats and Republicans, have drifted towards very very extreme positions
Hold the line, please can fenofibrate cause high blood pressure ** Carrefour has sold a 10 percent stake in itsBrazilian business to billionaire Abilio Diniz, in a first steptowards a possible separate listing, as Europe’s largestretailer looks to raise cash to accelerate growth in itssecond-largest market.
I study here mometasone furoate cream used for lips “Placing a team in Brooklyn was a priority of ours when the league was first launched
Whereabouts in are you from? baclofen and spasticity The allegations contained in a New York court document include rampant abuse of alcohol, cocaine, mushrooms, heroin, Molly and ecstasy; solicitation of prostitutes; defecating and urinating in the bedroom; and perjury.
I’m self-employed clindamycin and penicillin He did win Sixth Man of the Year two seasons ago as the Knicks won 54 games and recorded the club’s first playoff series victory since 2000
I’d like to open a business account topamax causing kidney stones crude futures has beenexacerbated by price cuts made by Saudi Arabia and Iraq toexports to the United States and Asia as the largest producersin OPEC tried to compete for market share.
D0ZBqh https://www.quora.com/What-the-top-SEO-keywords-for-essay-you-know/answer/Alan-Smith-1772 write my essay