Never let it be said that business travel isn’t sometimes adventurous. It is especially adventurous when you’re somewhat fearless and have no idea WTF you are doing or where you are going. That would sum up my trip to Chicago for the Pittsburgh Conference. I’m not sure when this little event took place, late eighties maybe early nineties. The Pittsburgh Conference is an analytical instrumentation show. Prior to moving it to the McCormic Convention Center in Chicago every other year, it had always been held in New Orleans. At the time, I was the Marketing Services Manager for Millipore’s Analytical Division, and was attending the show to conduct a Press Breakfast and work the booth.

But first, we had to get there and that proved to be a challenge right from the get go. The guy who worked for me, Brian, and I left on a Saturday morning so that we could go to the convention center and supervise the booth assembly.  We only had forty feet of booth space, small for us in comparison to other shows, but it was a key market for both our HPLC sample prep filters and our lab water purification systems.

I know that we were flying right after some type of international terrorist event, so it was particularly touchy going through the gate. So, here we are standing in line and the woman in front of me sets off the alarms. I’m thinking. Okay, this will be simple. The problem was that she kept setting off the alarm. First, they had her remove all her jewelry, including her earrings. She still set off the alarm. Then, her belt. She still set off the alarm. Then, they asked her to remove her shoes. That’s when my alarm went off. Why?

Maybe because I had a quarter ounce of hooch in my shoe. I remember turning around to Brian, “Hey, I need to get the fuck out of this line.”

“Why?”

“Because I stuck the ganja in my shoe.”

“Yeah, in your sock, right?”

“No, in my shoe. I didn’t have time to put it in my sock.”

He was very comforting, “Oh, then you’re screwed.”

Yeah, thanks, Brian. What a pal. I was at the point of no return, however. The woman had finally cleared the security check. It was my turn. After all that sweating, I cleared it the first time. Don’t ask me why I didn’t set off alarms, but the best part of all was that Brian did. Yeah, sometimes I love payback, man.

The flight was pretty uneventful and it was, as unusual as it sounds, right on schedule. We got to Chicago and got settled into the hotel. Then, we headed over to the McCormick Convention Center to check on the progress of the booth assembly, and go through a dry run of the press briefing. The booth looked great so far. There were no problems there. But I have to tell you the worst thing about working with tekkies is that they just don’t get what kind of material to present to editors. These guys were writers, not chromatography scientists. I can’t tell you how many times I tried to drill that into their heads before the trade show. Now, I was at the trade show going through the dry run and they were editorializing again.

It started with the first guy. He started his portion of the presentation and made it so complicated I wanted to just tell him to STFU and let me do it. I remember telling him to stop, and then I told him if he went into this kind of an explanation half of the editors in the room would stand up and walk out. I remember saying, “Just tell them in layman’s terms what the products do and the benefit to the customer.”  That’s all they need to know. Every editor in the room would be given a package of detail, a copy of the presentation, and access to one-on-one discussions with the scientists in the room while they ate breakfast. Still, they insisted on cultivating what I like to call the deer-in-the-headlight effect.

After two hours of this torture, Brian and I headed out to dinner with Ed Black, the sales manager from Analytical Chemistry magazine. Ed was one of my best friends even though we were on opposite ends of the political spectrum. He was a true conservative from Georgia, now living in Connecticut. His wife Lynn was an airline stewardess, and she was just an awesome person. She was so funny and quick witted. We were close enough on the friendship scale that I’d go to Connecticut and spend the weekend. We had one rule: He and I never discussed politics. But that didn’t mean we didn’t jab each other good naturedly once in a while. We surely did.

I remember we got home in the early morning hours and we were wasted. Nevertheless, we had a free day Sunday. The only thing we had scheduled was a three o’clock review of the hospitality suite set up and a meeting with the convention center support staff. Brian and I made plans to go to this great flea market we saw in the local paper.

Our second close call: WTF were we thinking?

Brian and I ate breakfast and immediately hit the road. We hailed a cab and told the driver where we wanted to go. “Are you sure?” I guess I was kind of puzzled by his question.

“Yeah, we’re sure. Let’s go,” was my response.

When the driver had gotten us to our requested drop off point, he turned around and said to me, “Are you sure you want to be here? I’m not sure I should leave you here.”

We looked around. It looked perfectly fine to us. I replied, “Yeah, we’re good.”

I paid the driver and he drove off. We started heading down the street toward where the flea market was supposed to be when we saw this gang across the street with baseball bats. Yeah, that was comforting. The fact that they were looking at us was also comforting.

So, Brian and I started walking. “Can you see that they are walking with us across the street?”

“Yeah, Brian, I can see that.”

“You know, we’re dead meat.”

At that point, we started looking for somewhere safe to hide. Brian first suggested the church. I thought that might be a bad idea. Aside from the fact that I hadn’t been in a church for about a hundred years and was afraid of it collapsing, it didn’t seem like there was any action going on there and the doors might be locked. So, we started looking for any open stores we could find. We were sure we’d be safe there. Brian found, of all places, a hat shop. We talked about it for a few minutes, then the two of us broke into a hell-bent run and managed to get ourselves into the shop safely. We explained to the shop keeper what was going on and he started laughing.

“This isn’t a good place for you two. Don’t believe everything you read in the papers. This may be an ordinary flea market, but this is not a safe part of town. The gangs don’t bother the shopkeepers, but they like to victimize visitors to the city.”

He was a really nice guy. He called a cab for us and told him to pick us up at the back of his shop. As fate would have it, the driver was the same guy who had dropped us off. When he saw us, he laughed.

“I told you, man, that I couldn’t figure out why you wanted to get out here. I don’t even like driving in here.”

We sat in the back seat and, once we were safely out of there, Brian and I started laughing. “How many days are we here for?”

I looked at him. “We’re here through Wednesday, why?”

“I can’t wait to see what other kind of trouble we can get ourselves into,” he responded.

When I was going to school at both Aquinas and BHCC , I had a great Pontiac GTO. I loved the thing. It was mint and it was a teal blue. Okay, so it had a few problems, not the least of which was the driver (that would be me). This is the infamous car that I unwittingly parked on my front lawn.  After a day of partying at school — and I mean partying — I drove that thing home. This was when the old Thompson Square elevated train station was still intact. I have no freakin’ idea how I negotiated all of those poles on the way home, but I managed to get there without cracking the thing up. Then, I kind of missed the curb, wound up on the lawn, turned the car off, went inside and passed out. About two hours later, I heard this unbelievable banging on my front door and I dragged myself down the stairs. It was my friend who just happened to live next door.

“What are you doing with the car on the front lawn? Your mother’s walking up the street from work.”

“Wow,” I said, “did I do that?”

“Well, it sure wasn’t me. It’s your car, and you’re the only one home at the moment. But if you don’t hurry up and move it, someone else will be home and you’ll be dead meat.”

I handed her the keys. “Here. You do it. I obviously was in no condition to park it then, and I’m not sure I’m much better now.” I shut the door and went back to bed. Needless to say, she moved the car onto the street in front of the house just in time, and put my keys back in the mailbox.

We had plenty of fun in that car. The trunk was a virtual wet bar. Everybody kept their party shit in my car because I had a car to myself. It wasn’t my mother’s (she never drove a car). It wasn’t my sisters’. It was mine, and it was the group party vehicle. I had one friend I absolutely hated to drive around in that thing because she was a lightweight when it came to drinking and I was terrified she would let it fly all over the inside of the car. Then, I pictured the warm weather setting in.

Luckily, she had a drinking pattern. She’d start with beer, then move on to whiskey sours. What a freakin’ disgusting combination. I can’t drink either one, so the thought of combining them was more than nauseating. If you paid attention to Karen, she could suck down about three whiskey sours after a six-pack, then she’d pass out. We figured we had about an hour from the time she passed out until the time she started hurling. (I used to call her Yakmaster Plus.) So, we’d time our leaving the event carefully, laying her across the back seat. Then, we’d drive to our school parking lot and roll her into the grass near the bushes. (And I mean roll.) She’d wake up, get sick for an hour or so, so we’d listen to the radio or nap ourselves. Then, we’d retrieve her and bring her home and tuck her in. In the three or four years I owned that car, I managed to keep it yak-free.

The car with an extra-special talent

I mentioned earlier that the car had a few problems. One of those problems was a leaky driver-side window when it rained. The rug was constantly damp and it was highly annoying. But I inadvertently found a way to turn that into a positive. Not only did we drink in this car, but we smoked a lot of weed in my Pontiac back in those days. Never let it be said that we didn’t push the party envelope.

One day I dropped the lighter and couldn’t find it. I pulled the car over to look under the driver’s seat and lo-and-behold found a marijuana seedling farm under my seat growing in the the ever damp carpet. It makes sense. A lot of seeds were dropped in the GTO. Nobody vacuums under the seat (at least nobody in my world). I’m lucky I vacuumed the car at all! I mean, these things were impressive. At first I thought I was hallucinating, but I certainly didn’t have any blotter acid with me that day. I rubbed my eyes to be sure I was actually seeing what I thought I was seeing. And I was. Needless to say, my little farmer friends and I carefully extracted these gems for further cultivation.  It was at that moment that I decided not to fix the leak. Ever.

That parking thing again

About a year later, I was coming home from a long night out drinking tequila shooters somewhere on Route 9 in Framingham. It must have been two in the morning before I got home. In Medford, you can only park on one side of the side streets (or at least that’s the way it was back then). Unfortunately, I was too wasted and tired to do something as trivial as try to find a legal parking space. So, I parked the GTO on the opposite side of the street, risking a ticket.

About an hour after I fell asleep, we heard a huge bang outside. My mother tried to wake me up. I rolled over and told her, “Don’t worry about it. Some idiot’s car probably just got totaled.”

Yeah. Now, who could that idiot be?

If I were on top of things, I’d remember that I’ve signed up to teach three cooking classes in the fall. Apparently, I’m decidedly not on top of things. So, I guess it’s a good thing that I at least look at my mail. I got my catalogue and found out about my cooking classes when I saw my name printed in it. One is The Complete Pasta Course. The other two are Some Like It Hot and Tapas: The Little Dishes of Spain. Great. Now all I have to do is figure out what I’m teaching and I’ll be all set. (Of course, the classes have to meet minimum registration requirements and they haven’t been since the economy went into hibernation. Don’t think these will fly either. Time will tell.)

I often think about how I learned to cook. I know I’m pretty good at it, but I have to admit that I’ve never been to school.  I learned to cook from watching three people: My grandmother, my dad and my mom. That pretty much sums up my education in this arena. I also have a lot of memories surrounding food and smells. One of the things I used to love to do was congregate at my grandmother’s in Everett after Sunday Mass. My grandmother would have a pot of gravy and meatballs on the stove. Now, let me clarify this “gravy-sauce” thing. My family doesn’t call red sauce “spaghetti sauce.” We call it gravy.

It wouldn’t take long for us to start mucking up the works. Before you knew it, someone would grab some Italian bread and start dunking it into the gravy. Then, we’d start eating the meatballs. My grandmother would have to run out to the kitchen to protect Sunday dinner and, boy, did it annoy her that we were depositing breadcrumbs into the gravy. You thought she’d never shut up. When she started speaking Italian, we all knew we were in real trouble.

Another memory I have about my family involves ravioli. We’ve been eating homemade ravioli at all major holidays for years. It was my dad who used to make the raviolis. We’re talking no machine here, not even a crank.  All the dough was made by hand, rolled out by hand with a rolling pin, cut into neat circles with these great aluminum drinking glasses we used to have, and then stuffed and assembled by hand. I have a very vivid memory of my dad laying a large sheet over my grandmother’s bed, and my dad would neatly lay out all the ravioli on the bed as he made them. Invariably, he would make “The Papa,” a giant ravioli that we got to cook and eat on the spot. It’s a funny thing about this memory. It’s like I’m in my grandmother’s room right next to her bed. I remember exactly how her room was set up.  There are ravioli on the bed, and I can look right out her door and see my dad in the kitchen making more.

It’s a very vivid memory, and I have it at the weirdest times. I lost my dad at an early age, but the memories I have of him are very much alive. At any rate, when my dad died, my mom took over making the ravioli. Now that my mom’s gone too, both of my older sisters have picked up the holiday ravioli making.

My sister’s Christmas eve bash

Now here’s a family tradition. My sister Mamie hosts a Christmas eve open house every year, and has been doing this for more than twenty years. The evening starts about 6 p.m. and people keep coming and going right up until the early morning hours. In keeping with Italian tradition, the emphasis on Christmas eve from a food perspective is seafood, so my sister serves things like octopus salad and smelts. When my mother was alive, my cousin Richie would always ask, “Hey, Auntie Frannie, you making calamari pie this year or what?” She always did, and she always made extra so people could take some home. Now that my mom’s gone, my sister carries on the tradition using her recipe. Of course, logic will tell you that not everyone wants to sit around eating octopus and smelts — particularly small children — so there’s always the traditional meat balls, roast beef and ham for the less adventurous eaters in the family.

Most of the people coming to the open house are on my mom’s side of the family, not my dad’s. My dad’s sister Phyllis used to come every year before she passed away. I’ve recently met a lot of Della Piana’s on Facebook. We know we’re related, but we’re not sure how. Regardless, my mom’s side of the family is huge. I have a lot of cousins. My mother’s brother, my Uncle Tony, had fourteen children. He used to joke that he had sex with his wife only fourteen times, but she got pregnant every time. And his children now have their own children and grandchildren. It’s a great way for us all to catch up with each other.

The little kids love it because there have to be fifteen or twenty kinds of cookies for them to gorge themselves on. There’s a small cookie tree that gives them access to cookies and candy canes. Eye leve. No permission required. No waiting. Hey, it’s Christmas.

The inevitable Ying-Yang

Of course, food can evoke some ugly memories as well. I’ve had my share of both. Some of the uglies have been doozies. Let’s start with what I like to call the granddaddy of bacterial contamination: Tofu. Yeah. I will eat it as soon as the package is open. If it isn’t used all in one foodie event, it’s trash. I never save it. If it comes in hot and sour soup, I eat around it because only Buddha knows how long the restaurant has saved it for. (Of course, there’s so much vinegar in that soup that it probably wouldn’t matter much anyway.)

On this particular night, I ordered Chinese food for Beth, Thalia and myself. We went to a place called China Wok in Beverly. We’d lived there for about seven years, so we were familiar with the place. I was the only one who didn’t eat tofu that night. I was also the only one who didn’t get sick. So picture it: Two bathrooms. Two yakkers. Ugly. Okay, I’ve got this thing about vomit. Know what I mean? To have two people yakking at the same time in two bathrooms didn’t leave me much of an option for going to the bathroom myself. Of course, Thalia was done after several hours, but Beth is never that simple. No sir.

Beth got so sick that she nearly dehydrated. She ended up in Beverly Hospital for a freakin’ week. It was amazing. They ran blood cultures and all kinds of other tests. She couldn’t even eat for the first few days she was there. As a joke, I managed to get some yellow tape that said “Toxic Waste” at work. I snuck into the hospital room while she was sleeping and taped up her bathroom door. The nurses were laughing like hell when I returned a few hours later. It was no joke. She couldn’t leave until she could eat, and she couldn’t eat until the end of the week. Then, they released her with anti-nausea medication. Exactly one week later, the exact same thing happened again and Beth ended up in Beverly Hospital for another week. They never actually came up with any reason for this bad health event other than the tofu. Thankfully, it didn’t happen a third time.

Ah, but we’re not done yet! One other messed up food event happened with the charming and delightful Miss Headcase. You remember her! Turner’s Falls? Photography? Yeah, that headcase. Not this one. Her sister Janet visited from California once and we drove down to Newport, Rhode Island for the day. We decided to eat at a place called La Forge Casino.

Miss Headcase ordered steak. I cannot for the life of me remember what Janet and I ordered.  So anyway, we’re eating when all of a sudden, I look up and Miss Headcase is seriously choking on a piece of steak. I mean, this is no joke. Everything I learned in my CPR class was coming true. She finally pushed herself away from the table and started moving around the restaurant holding her throat. Janet, I have to tell you, just kept eating.

I finally caught up with Miss Headcase right near the kitchen door. Thinking wasn’t an option at that point. I grabbed her as best I could, pulled her back, and did the heimlich. I figured I had one shot. It worked. Just as the executive chef was walking out the kitchen door, Miss Headcase chucked a piece of steak right onto his freakin’ shoe. It was absolutely the perfect ending. It looked like a comedy act, frankly.

Vacation? Well, let’s just say that vacations are a thing of the past these days. Okay, so there are the yearly visits to the evil mother-in-law, but that stops this year. Our August 24 foray into hell will be cancelled, at the suggestion of Beth’s therapist. Frankly, I’m relieved. The thought of having to deal with the mess left behind after that trip was not pleasing me. We went there about four months ago for several days and almost had to check Beth into the local looney bin to recover. It was tough at home, I’ll tell you. But that’s another post for a different day. Today, it’s all about our RV adventures!

Now, I’ve been camping. (I’ll tell you about the moose incident some day.) RVing is not camping as most people would define camping. The first time we went on an RV trip, it was just me, Beth and Thalia. We got a small Winnebago. The photo here is an accurate representation of the size. It was an easy drive, sort of like driving a U-Haul. It was great for the three of us, and Thalia got the thrill of sleeping in the bedroom above the cab with her own little television set. There’s plenty of storage space, so we managed to bring all of Miss T’s favorite tapes to play. You know, the standard fare of the day: Bear in the Big Blue House (one of my favorites, actually), Rollie Polie Olie (ever watched this one?), and of course –Scooby Doo (I happen to love “Scooby Doo and the Witch’s Ghost). She was, well, a happy camper so to speak.

Aside from the storage space that allows you to bring as much stuff as you want to provide all the comforts of home, there are other things about  RV travel that are cool. Having a fridge and a stove is awesome. You know, I have “roughed it” in Vermont with my friends and had greenheads land in my frying pan. They are disgusting. I love to cook, and I’m always elected to be the cook, but cooking is never fun when you’re fending off a swarm of fucking locusts at the same time. And greenheads do not taste good either. So, on those days when the sky is falling, it’s always great to be able to have an alternative. RV travel is also great in the bad weather. Where would you rather be when it’s pouring, inside a tent worrying about touching the sides and letting the sky in or in an RV where you can pull out toys, games and videos? That’s a no-brainer for the normal. But aside from all that fun stuff, there is one dicey little responsibility that is a bit ugly. (Naturally, it was a responsibility that fell in my column.)

Emptying the shit tank (or gray water) on one of these things isn’t for the squeamish. No sir. You know, you’ve got all these little controls and lights inside the unit and you monitor how much fresh drinking water you have and what the level of gray water is. The idea is to fill up the fresh water before you head out and keep in replenished on the road, and to find places to dump your gray water when the shit tank fills up. (The gray water also includes your shower run-off.) If you’re staying in one place for several days, you simply hook up the shit tank with the hose and leave it open so that it’s like a functioning home toilet. That’s the easy part, except the gases can sometimes smell bad and then you have to create a trap. It’s when you’re on the road and not connected that can sometimes be unpleasant because that means when you get to your destination, you have to hook up and dump what has collected in there. Just be sure the hose is connected properly, that’s all I’m saying. And gloves. Gloves are supremely important. Now, I’m not squeamish about this stuff (vomit is a bit different; it’s a phobia, I admit), but gloves are important. And make sure they fit you properly. If they are loose, it can cause all kinds of problems. Then they are just getting in the way of a problem-free connection. Campgrounds tend to look down on those who dump shit on the ground, folks. And it wouldn’t be an RV trip if you didn’t spring a leak in your hose. No sir. If you don’t have a spare (and you should), they usually sell them at the campground store. Here’s a hint: If you are renting an RV and there’s duct tape wrapped around the hose in several places, do yourself a favor and invest in one.

One of our first trips out in an RV was to Jellystone Park in Sturbridge, Massachusetts. We went there for Thalia because it’s totally geared to kids. It’s a pretty great take. I have fun with my kids, so it was fun for me too, especially since Yogi Bear was one of my favorite cartoon characters growing up! We also took a trip to Acadia National Park in Maine when Thalia must have been just a little more than three.

We spent the first two nights at Bayley’s campground in Scarborough, Maine. We would stay here several more times over the few years we spent RVing. It had lots of stuff for Thalia to do and that’s what was important. We felt it would be unfair to drag a child out on the road and expect them to sit around while we read or watched TV. We had to find a happy medium, so places like Jellystone and Bayley’s were perfect. This trip also harbors a memorable event.

We took Thalia to Pirate Cove mini-golf in Old Orchard Beach. We were making our way around the course and she was actually doing pretty well. At home we often took her to mini-golf on Route 114 (Danvers, I think) where Richardson’s Ice Cream is. She used to run around on the course stealing everybody’s golf balls. She was being remarkably reserved at Pirate’s Cove and we were happy with that. It was a weekday and the place was pretty empty. Beth and I were clowning around at one hole and Thalia kind of drifted off to the previous hole. When we turned around, she was peeing into the cup. All I remember is Beth saying, “Oh, fuck!” Then we started laughing hysterically while running after her. Thalia told us she didn’t want to pee on the grass, so she chose the cup instead.

Movin’ on up and livin’ large

All the while we were renting mini Winnies, we had been looking at Class A vehicles. They were impressive. We decided to rent one after Aaron was born. He was pretty young when we went on these RV trips. He couldn’t have been more than six months old. When you’re carrying stuff for a six-month old, you need more space. That was our logic. So we moved up to an Infinity the first time out. This was at least at 32-footer, and the cost to rent it for a two-week period varied between $1,800 to $2,000. (The cost isn’t for the squeamish either.) That’s a pretty good indication of how my business was going at the time because I was self-employed by then, happily running New Wave Marketing & Public Relations. We used to rent from a place up on Route 1 North, although I can’t remember the name of it. It was an independent operation and the owner’s name was Steve. The people who worked there were great. Then, he sold to Moturis and things went to shit. The prices went through the roof (as if a couple of thousand plus insurance wasn’t enough).

Class A’s are massive compared to something like a mini Winnie. Everything about driving them is different, but I was up for it (Beth didn’t want anything to do with these). I love to drive and I’m fearless in most instances, so it was fun for me. When you plan a trip with one of these, you do so differently. You have to worry about the height of overpasses, and you really want to stick to a 32-footer because some states forbid anything bigger on certain roads. (And yes, a bigger vehicle means…a bigger shit tank, folks.) Best of all, however, are the comforts. Let me tell you, in one of these you won’t care if it’s raining greenheads or if it’s a hundred degrees outside. The one we rented had two side-outs in the living room and master bedroom, make it huge inside. There were sofas and chairs, wall-to-wall carpeting, a big screen television above the driving area and a multi-speaker stereo system. We had central heat and central air. In short, it was like driving around in a house.

Maine was a popular destination during this time. That’s because Beth and I love the ocean. We’ve only lived in a land-locked town once, and that was Winchester. Other than that, we’ve been near water: Gloucester, Beverly, and Amesbury. Amesbury may not be near the ocean, but the Pow Wow River runs through the center of town and the back road ride to our next-door neighbor, Newburyport (which is right on the ocean), is a beautiful one along the Merrimack River.

We took a second trip to Maine in a 32-footer. This time the destination was the Bar Harbor area. On the way up, we made a stop in Camden because, first and foremost, it’s beautiful. It also has Planet Toys, one of my favorite toy stores. We used to stop and get Thalia and Aaron one present each for them to use in the RV. You know, nothing extravagant. We also stayed in a great campground called Hadley’s Point. (For some reason, I could not access its web site so I couldn’t put in a link. I’ll keep trying!). On the same trip we also stayed at Megunticook RV Resort in Rockport because we had told Thalia about Andre the Seal (he actually died in 1986) and wanted her to see his memorial statue.

More than just the sole proprietor of Grim Reaper Airways

Yes, on another trip Beth proved her versatility with vehicles of size. Thank Buddha that it’s just simulated with an airplane. It was not simulated with a 32-foot RV. No siree. Motorcycles. Fine. Honda Civics. Fine. Toyota Camrys. Fine. Things get a bit dicey after that. And let me give you immediate proof. We are sitting here at the kitchen table. I am writing while Beth is using flight simulator. I heard the alarm go off and then a crashing noise. Beth then announced that she landed too hard next to the runway in Lugano, Italy. Apparently, this was a good thing since Beth had messed up and was trying to land on an outgoing runway. She would have been creamed by a huge jet. Between the sound and our laughter, Aaron figured out what was going on. “What happened? Did ma just crash land again?” Just another day of sheer hair-raising adventure with Grim Reaper.

But Grim Reaper Airways isn’t her only claim to travel fame.  Her RV adventure was on a trip to Saco River Camping Area in New Hampshire. This time we were pretty much staying put once we parked the RV. I found a great car rental deal in the area and rented a mid-sized car for the long weekend so that side trips would be less taxing on the driver (read: Me). For the moment, however, we were done with driving. Aaron had just about had enough of being on the road, so he was in his chair in the wailing mode.

Beth was outside directing me into the spot. Now, I have no problem driving these things so I was just fine. I was ignoring Aaron. For some reason, Beth was distracted by his crying even though she was outside. She wanted to be inside where he was screaming just in case he was dying or something (not very rational, but that’s our Beth). Why she thought it would be better inside was beyond me, but I wasn’t about to argue. At that point, I wanted the RV parked and Aaron picked up. She decided that she was going to pull it in. I went out to direct her. Meanwhile, Aaron was still screaming. So, if she was distracted outside where the screaming was muted, imagine how distracted she must have been inside. (And yes, you may question my judgment in allowing her to back a 32-foot RV into a space. I question it myself.)

It went sour from the beginning. I was directing her one way, and she turned the RV in the opposite direction. Even though I was yelling “Stop!” she managed to hook the bumper onto the water spigot. Then, for some unexplained reason, she put the RV into drive and almost pulled the freakin’ water spigot out of the ground. I remember running up to her door and just banging on it to get her to stop. She did. I managed to disengage the bumper from the water spigot, got in and parked the RV. The good news was that the campground equipment was fine. The bumper, was pulled out from the RV, but it was relatively minor. Luckily, I had put Beth on the driving list and I had purchased additional insurance above my own private policy. Normally a great driver, Beth would never drive an RV again. She wanted no part of that.

It didn’t matter, though. Our RVing days were coming to a close. The economy was getting tighter, and my business was sliding a bit. Our very comfortable world was about to come crashing down on us. But I’m not ready to talk about that one yet.

I said that love can make you stupid. Sex can make you even more stupid. There’s no question about that. I was going along my merry way, thoroughly enjoying my coming out party (it went on for three years, I have to tell you), and then something happened. It started at a gay bar called Darts, as I recall. I know the original Darts was, of course, on Dartmouth Street in Boston, and I believe it was in the site that Paparazzi eventually took.

I met Greg there after work one night. I can’t remember for sure who else came. I’m sure Joe must have come after work, maybe Steve, but I’m not sure. What I am sure of is that two of Greg’s lesbian friends, we’ll call them Lucia and Sal, were there. Yes, they were a couple. I can’t remember exactly how Greg met them. Maybe it was from work. Not sure. Anyway, we were sitting at a table having drinks when Lucia started running her foot up my leg. Of course, at first, I’m thinking it was unintentional and the result of shifting positions.

No such luck. When I moved my leg away, she looked at me as if to tell me she was disappointed. Greg and Sal were busy talking away about something (that’s why I think Greg knew Sal from work), so I obliged Lucia. Lucia was older than me, and I’m not sure by how many years. I think I must have been about 25 or 26 at the time. She was from Honduras, very sexy and very mysterious. While she was rubbing her foot up my leg, we were making small talk. This remained a flirting situation until the night I went to a party at Greg’s place in Allston.

On that fateful night, I chose to bring a bottle of Pernod. Looking back, I have absolutely no idea why I chose to drink that vile greenish liquid on that particular night. Now, this is not the new Pernod Absinthe that is coming out. This was the Pernod anise liqueur. A couple of shots would have sufficed, but it turned into a party of shots with three or four people participating (someone even went so far as to suggest someone go down the end of the street for another bottle). As I recall, we were drinking something else in between the Pernod shots. That’s not a good situation for me. I’m always up for the challenge. So, here’s where we ended up with this one:

The last thing I remember is swallowing a shot. The next thing I remember is waking up the next morning — at Jehova only knows what time — in one of Greg’s bedrooms with Lucia in bed next to me. She was smiling. It must have been fun. I don’t remember what sound must have come out of my mouth, but I am sure it was a real W-T-F moment. Because did Sal come to the party? Was she there? Do you know that I have no freakin’ idea to this day. Can’t remember. But I do know that the liaison did not end there.

I’m going to interject here because Greg was just so funny. I cannot put this incident in at the precise moment it happened but at some point, he got himself involved in this thing I was having. Greg was younger than me, but he was like a big brother. He was worried that I was becoming ‘emotionally involved’ with Lucia and it was just a fling for her. So, I remember that he asked Lucia just what her intentions were with me. I do not know what she said to him, but I remember that the fling continued on.

Let’s fast forward to the next snippet. We were sitting in someone’s apartment. I know it was not Greg and Jack’s apartment, because I can picture the room we were sitting in. It was on a second or third floor and it had all white walls with big windows minus curtains. It was beautifully sunny outside and the sun was just pouring into the room. I believe we were in Coolidge Corner, and I have a feeling it was probably Lucia and Sal’s place. I was on the sofa and I was on the end. There were two people next to me. Jack was on my immediate right, Sal was next to him and then Lucia was on the other end of the sofa.  Greg was on the other side of the room in a chair. That I can remember.

I can’t remember what the subject was. I can’t remember who was talking, but we were all having drinks and talking away. I had my right arm spread out across the back of the sofa so that it went behind Jack and part of the way behind Val. That’s when Lucia decided to put her arm across the back of the sofa and start playing with my hand. Okay, so here I am, with my hand right behind Sal, and Lucia — her lover — is diddling with my fingers. I froze. I wanted to move my arm away, but I froze. Then, I looked at Greg. I mean he was looking at it and he was freaking out. Quietly, of course. It was at the moment I saw his face that I just wanted to burst out laughing, but I managed to control myself.

At the beginning, I figured Sal had no clue what was going on. However, by the time I got to the arm across the sofa incident, I had to believe that she knew. She was absolutely not a stupid person. Far from it. I’m thinking that this was probably a pattern for Lucia, and Sal had been subjected to this stuff before. Greg had also been working on me, not from a guilt perspective, but because he thought I was getting involved and he knew Lucia wasn’t about to leave Sal to be with me. That, combined with how bad I suddenly felt for Sal, was one of the reasons it ended.

I know that I spent one day with Lucia somewhere in this mix. I picked her up somewhere and we spent the day hanging out. I don’t think the opportunity for sex presented itself again. It certainly didn’t on that day, and I’m thinking that was the day we mutually ended it. Lucia and Sal stopped hanging out with us. I’m not sure if Greg stopped inviting them, or if Sal finally put her foot down. As I recall, our parties continued on unabated.

As one of my lesbian friends would put it, albeit most graphically, “We have places to go and people to…” Well, nevermind. You get the idea.

I’m a big fan of Mark Twain, and my favorite quotation from Mr. Twain also happens to be on my Facebook page right now. It reads:

“Religion was invented when the first con man met the first fool.”

I happen to feel that way about religion. Now, before all my Christian brethren get freaked on this statement, I’m not talking about spirituality here. I’m talking about religion. This is entirely different. To me, ‘religion’ is what man does with spirituality once he/she gets hold of it. It’s the part that mortal men (or women) play in delivering spirituality to the masses. I’ve always felt that way about religion, even when I was a kid. That is why it’s so weird that I spent nearly 14 years in Catholic school. I say “nearly 14 years” because I spent the first half of the first grade in public school. That’s because Immaculate Conception in Revere didn’t have space at the beginning of the year. So, in a nutshell, I’ve always had issues with authority and nuns and priests (mostly nuns) represented “authority.”

My sister Jo-Anne felt the brunt of my dislike of Catholic school, simply because she was already a student at Immaculate Conception once I arrived. Every time I did something wrong, she would get the call. I can’t remember every single incident, but I do remember one time when I absolutely refused to stay at the school for lunch. My house was just down the street, dammit, and I wanted to go home for lunch. It was, of course, a Friday and the absurd Catholic rule of “no meat on Fridays” was in force. See, that’s what I mean about mankind delivering religion. WTF does what you eat on what freakin’ day have to do with believing in God?

Anyway, things really began to go downhill when the homeroom nun (okay, I can’t remember specific nun names back that far). It could have been Sister Honorius. She was one of the nuns I had at Immaculate, but I can’t really remember what grade I had her in. She said, “Come on, Deborah, tell me a fish story.” I know I began my response saying, “I’ll tell you a fish story alright…”  But everything that came after that is a blank. However, since my sister was called down to the room, it could not have been very nice.

I know my sister (not ‘the’ sister) pulled me outside in the hall to talk to me and I know she was pissed. But I also know that I went home for lunch. My mother fed me (of course, it was Friday so I had a tuna fish sandwich), and then promptly delivered me back to school…with a warning. Needless to say, I ate lunch at school for the rest of the year. But I didn’t like it.

I didn’t have the opportunity to stay at Immaculate until the bitter end. My dad died and I stayed at Immaculate until we settled somewhere else. I remember that I’d get a ride from my evil Aunt Buddy back and forth to school until we settled in. As it turns out, we ended up living with my evil Aunt Buddy in Medford. That’s when I enrolled at Saint James Grammar School. (This is where I met my partner in crime, George.) I cannot remember in-classroom specifics here at all. I’m not sure what that means. I do remember one incident. I used to sing in the choir, and one Sunday my friend and I were tossed out because we were leaning over the railing and spitting on people’s heads as they walked in below us. The only other thing I remember is getting everyone to skip church and go to the park for an hour instead. See. Great disdain for authority of any type. And religion in general.

Fast times at Arlington Catholic High

I continued on in my catholic education by choosing Arlington Catholic High. My mother was thrilled. I chose that school simply because all of my friends were going there. George was behind me by a grade or two, but he also ended up going there. So did Linda. Remember her? She was my first lesbian relationship experience that I wrote about several posts ago. So, it was great. Getting there was another story. Winters were brutal because we had to take three buses to get there, one from home to Medford Square. Then, a bus to West Medford, followed by a third bus that would drop us off in Arlington Center. By the time we got there, we were freezing.

Then there was the catholic school uniforms. These were dead ugly. They always consisted of a pleated, plaid skirt. In the case of good old AC high, it was a gray, red and white combination with a white shirt and gray vest — all wool. We’d die in the summer. It was absurd. It wasn’t that I was into fashion. I hated fashion. Didn’t care much for it and still don’t. But I hated that they were trying to make us all the same. That’s what the uniform felt like.

The assumption is that Catholic school kids are good kids. They don’t do anything wrong. They don’t get in trouble. Forget that shit. We were no different than anyone else at this age. Kids were fooling around in the back seats of cars. Some were drinking and smoking. Hell, the Mayor of Medford went to Arlington Catholic and he was a party animal! At the end of every school year, we’d have to clean out the homeroom we were in for next year’s incoming class. One day we sent the mayor out the window with a rope to go get us pizza.

I remember little tidbits from Arlington Catholic, but nothing in great detail. I remember that I was put into room 101 my freshman year. Any room ending in “01″ meant it was the academically advanced class. Now, we considered the kids in that class dweebs who didn’t know how to have real fun. It also meant that everything was harder. Hard work was not on my agenda at that time. I was sure of one thing: I was determined to keep myself out of room 201 next year, and I succeeded by not doing so well in a couple of subjects…like Latin. Latin. WTF kind of life skill comes from taking Latin? None. Absolutely none. We were forced to take Latin because it was a Catholic school and the Sunday Mass was still being conducted in Latin.

Sister Ruth taught Latin. She was brutal. She had bucked teeth and the spit would really fly when she was in the process of reprimanding you. All I can remember from her (at least once a week) was, “Miss Della Piana, you’re getting under my skin and making a dent.” Yeah. I’m sure I was.

And then there was Sister Georgiana. She was big, loud and quite imposing, and she wasn’t going to take any shit from any of us. I believe she taught Physical Science??? Not really sure.  All I know is that I sat in between probably the only two black kids in the entire school — Donna Bell and Paula Mont. I can remember to  this day exactly what they looked like. They were absolutely hysterical and they would just get me going. It never failed that we got caught every time we had the class. One time our laughing really got to her, and Sister Georgiana slammed her fist down on the chalk board ledge and took the damned thing right off the wall.

Out of control at Aquinas

I ended up moving on to a two-year Catholic college. There were reasons for this that had nothing to do with the fact that it was Catholic. It also had it’s share of stupid rules that I thought were oppressive, and I was determined to change them (although I complied at the beginning). Here’s a stupid rule: We had to wear skirts or dresses as though we were secretaries already employed in jobs. Absurd. After putting up with the uniforms at AC, there was no way I was going to wear dresses and skirts.

I simply started wearing jeans and cords to school. I was suspended once for that. Then again. Finally, I remember approaching the student council and urging them to start a petition to get rid of that foolish rule. Listen, we were paying to go to this school, so why should they tell us how to dress? The fact is that we weren’t working. We were students. We eventually won that battle. I was determined to have a good time in spite of where I was, and it turned into a great two-year party.

First, it was an all-girls school and it was truly my coming of age in that respect. A group of us hung around together all the time, and I was involved at various times with three of them. Of course, none of them ever knew that about each other because they were too afraid to openly talk about it. It was not easy to be gay at that time and, frankly, it was also scary to come to terms with the fact that you might be gay. My partying went well beyond that, however.

The sleepover was one thing I remember. They had this Aquinas tradition where the students spent one night sleeping over at the school. The seniors generally got to abuse us at this little event. You know, like making us roll uncooked eggs the length of the entire main corridor with our noses. Or blindfolding us and making us brush each other’s teeth. By the time we got to this, it was really late at night and a couple of us climbed out the bathroom window and headed for my car. We had stopped at Blanchards, our favorite local liquor store (and our favorite lunch spot, by the way) and bought some rum and coke. It was the perfect time to take a break. While we were out there, someone also suggested we might want to smoke a fatty since were at the far end of the parking lot and hidden under trees. We weren’t sure how we were going to get back in, but we really didn’t care at the time.

Luckily, we did get back in without much trouble. Someone had left the bathroom window partially open, so we forced it open the rest of the way and climbed back in. Everyone was pretty much settled down in the lounge in sleeping bags. Some had already fallen asleep. But we had the munchies, so we decided to see if we could find something to eat. All we could scrape up in the kitchen was a jar of jam. Somehow, and I really do not know how we found our way up there, we ended up in the chapel where the only thing we found to eat was a bag of communion hosts. We decided that they were probably still unblessed, so it would be a minor sin. We sat down and ate damned near half a bag with the jam. They were disgusting, but we were desperate for food. The funny thing is that nobody caught on that it ever happened. We simply sealed up the bag and put it back when we were done.

We knew that some of these nuns were fully capable of having a good time. We could tell. (And I was absolutely sure that Sister Carroll was gay, even though we never confirmed it.) So, one night we had Karen’s house to ourselves because her parents were at their summer house in Kingston. We decided to invite a few of the nuns over to a spaghetti dinner. I’m not sure if we ever got to the food because we got them drunk on Cape Codders. I mean, drunk. We got them so drunk that they couldn’t even drive themselves home. We had to take them home later that night (not that we were in much better shape). One of my friends drove their car back and I drove them in my car. We literally had to open the door and take them to their rooms. Then, we were so drunk we had a hard time finding our way out. It was like some kind of ancient catacomb. We continued to be friendly with this pack of nuns, but nobody ever mentioned a word about that night. We just kind of let it slide.

Sleeping with women. Eating hosts because I had the munches from smoking dope. Getting the nuns drunk. You know, if there is a Supreme Being up there somewhere keeping notes, I could be in big trouble.

Have I mentioned my dog yet? Well, I’ve had two in my adult life. The first was Sundance.  She was a shepherd/husky mix and she was great. But my second adult life dog was something else. Her name was Simone. She was a miniature schnauzer with a great personality. I had bought her for Miss Headcase. When we picked her up, you could hold her in the palm of your hand. The photo here is not actually Simone. I wish I could find photos of her, but I can’t seem to locate them. However, this photo is pretty damned close to what she looked like. When Miss Headcase and I split, the one thing I made sure of was that she didn’t take Simone.

When Beth and I first met, Simone was jealous. The morning after Beth’s first night staying over in Melrose, Simone jumped up on my bed and unceremoniously took a dump. Just to let me know what she thought of this intruder into our lives. I had a hard time getting angry. She was pretty funny. Ah, but that isn’t the most vivid memory I have of little Simone. The one from Gloucester is even better.

Beth and I got home from work one night. We knew something was amiss when we opened the door because Simone was usually right there waiting for one of us to pat her and then take her out for a walk. Not this night. She barely picked her head up off the floor. She didn’t look very well, but we couldn’t figure out why. We looked at all the logical stuff. It had to be something she ate while we were gone. She wasn’t a trash dog. That wasn’t it. She did have a past history of eating cat shit. That was pretty disgusting, but it only took one time and she learned her lesson. She was, as they say, sick as a dog for two days. Besides, we ended up closing the door to the bathroom where the cat box was kept, and we had put a hole in the door that only the cats could get through. That wasn’t it. We knew for sure she couldn’t open the refrigerator door, and we kept cleaning stuff in a locked cabinet. That wasn’t it.

We were watching the dog trying to walk. It would have been funny if we weren’t worried. (Okay, we laughed anyway.) She literally was swaying back and forth when she tried to stand up. And forget the three stairs leading down to the kitchen. Couldn’t handle those. Now, I’m not going to lie. I think they should just legalize pot. There are many reasons for this  that we won’t go into here. That’s a different post for a different day. But let’s just say that I’m a supporter (and a party animal). I thought about this as a possibility, and immediately went for the ashtray that we hid under the living room chair when we left for work.

Seems that Simone got to to that ashtray before we did and partied on her own. Oh, yes. Ate every freakin’ roach in the ashtray. To put it bluntly, our little Simone was stoned. (And hungry, I might add. She couldn’t stop chowing on that dog food. Can’t imagine why.) The cats must have been getting a laugh out of this because they were down from the bedroom shaking their little heads at her undignified behavior. I can imagine what they were saying to each other, “Only a dog would do this.”

Okay, this is when Beth says, “Honey, you’ve got to call the vet!”

I looked at her for a few minutes wondering WTF she was thinking, then replied, “Oh, really? And tell him what? The dog ate all the roaches? Somehow, my dear, I think that might be a bad idea.”

“Yeah, you might be right.”

“Oh, I am definitely right. Let’s just go turn ourselves in instead.”

Needless to say, I did not call the vet. In fact, Simone was back to normal within a few hours. While we were waiting for that to happen, she did provide some comic moments, and we did find another hiding place for the ashtray.

I was never much a fan of business travel. I always thought it was overrated. The only good thing about it was that you kind of got to preview a place before you ended up spending your own money traveling there. My absolute favorite business travel destination? Well, it was neither Paris, nor the French countryside. It was not London. It was not Germany. It wasn’t San Francisco or D.C., although I absolutely love both places and they are probably both the only places outside of Massachusetts that I’d ever live. It was New Orleans, a place I’d probably never live.

Yes, I have a good friend who will tell you what a swill-bucket existence it is in New Orleans, and I am sure this is particularly true post-Katrina. In fact, one of the most vivid images I have in my head happens to be a huge poster in the French Quarter that displayed the differences in pay, crime, poverty rate, etc., between New Orleans and Boston. The numbers told the ugly story. However, if you are an outsider visiting New Orleans, you have an entirely different perspective because you don’t have to live there.

I may not want to live there, but partying there was a trip. You could work all damned day at a trade show, have to go to dinner with the ’suits’ at night, and you could still get some decent partying hours in. That is particularly true of the French Quarter which simply never shuts down. Leave a drink behind because you’re late for dinner? Unheard of. The bartenders in the hotels simply poured them into a plastic cup so you could finish your drink in the cab on the way to the restaurant.

There were always things going on at night. Some of the publishers would have parties on river boats with gambling; others would have buffet dinners with an open bar in their hotel meeting rooms. I preferred to hang out with my favorite sales people one-on-one because you’d actually get out and see the town. My absolute favorite sales guy was a guy named Ed from a publication called Analytical Chemistry. Ed and I couldn’t have been more different. He was a conservative from “the great state of Georgia,” and I was (and still am) a liberal from Massachusetts. We simply didn’t let it get in the way of our friendship. We never talked about politics.

Every time we’d go to New Orleans for the Pittsburgh Conference, Ed and I end up at  Commander’s Palace in the Garden District.  At the time, the head chef there was a guy named Emeril LeGasse — now one of my all-time favorite chefs. A couple of times we went to Brennan’s for breakfast and, if we did lunch instead of dinner, we loved the food at the Hard Rock Cafe. It was definitely New Orleans style food and the memorabilia in the place was regionalized as well — like Fats Domino’s piano top hanging on the wall, one of Doctor John’s outfits in a glass case above the entrance, or videos of Professor Longhair playing away in the background.

No bad food in New Orleans

Regardless of the size of the place, there is no bad food in New Orleans. If you love food, this is the place to be. I had my first alligator dish there; it was alligator sausages at breakfast one day in the French Quarter. It was a really small place and I cannot remember the name of  it. I liked it so much that I ended up having it stir fried at a Szechuan restaurant in Jackson Square and had the famous “alligator on a stick” at the French Market.

The Sheraton I stayed at on one trip celebrated Happy Hour by putting a row boat in the middle of the lobby bar filled with boiled crawfish and handing out free bottles of Blackened Voodoo Beer for the first hour. It was just awesome. In fact, Beth and I went on one trip together by train (this trip is one that deserves its own post, and it will get one down the road) and we made sure to stay at the same Sheraton.

On one trip, about fifteen of us were determined to eat at K-Paul’s. Paul Prudhomme is the grandaddy of cajun cooking. The lines outside his restaurant were legendary. They could extend the full length of the street, and you would wait for hours. As soon as we saw the line forming in the early afternoon, we pulled someone off booth duty and told them to stand in line so that we could get in when the place opened at 5:30 p.m. It worked perfectly. We ran over there after the show and were seated by about 6:30 p.m. There’s no flash in K-Paul’s. It’s rustic with family-style seating. We all got to sit together at one table, so we ordered a bucket of Cajun Martinis. I had the most amazing blackened yellowfin tuna I’ve ever had, and Paul Prudhomme was there that night. I still have the menu he signed and gave me. I also bought his first cookbook there on that trip. It’s one of my favorites.

The real fun started later

I never worried much about being gay at Millipore. (Well, let’s put it this way: I wasn’t worried at this time. I found that I had to worry later, once the Europeans took over.) I was pretty much out and headed for the bars after hours. Some of the Millipore revelers even came once in a while. If you’re gay, it’s not hard to find a place to party in New Orleans. A must see is Cafe Lafitte in Exile on Bourbon Street, which just happens to be the oldest gay bar in America. But things could get much more interesting than that late at night in New Orleans.

If you wanted to blow somebody’s mind, you took them to The Dungeon on Toulouse Street. The Dungeon was not necessarily a gay bar in the true sense of the word, but plenty of gay people frequented The Dungeon. This place was just amazing. Hell, it didn’t open until 10:30 p.m. Trust me when I tell you that your first trip there would amount to you walking around with your mouth open for what seemed to be hours. According to legend, the dungeon was where Prince Suleman of Turkey lured young women and prepared them for the harems of Istanbul by “psychological indoctrination, opium-induced submission and torture.”  I could spend hours describing it, so instead I’ll just rely on the link to tell the story. Besides, you get pictures.

For some stupid reason I’ll never understand, they decided to change the venue of the Pittsburgh Conference so that it rotated between Chicago and New Orleans, so the trips to New Orleans slowed down. However, on one of the final trips I made, I took Beth with me and we wrapped some vacation time around the business trip. That allowed us to take the train all the way to New Orleans. It was a blast. That story is coming up soon.

(Oh, yeah, I had a freakin’ ass kicking experience in Chicago once at this show as well. I’ll have to tell you about it some time.)

The winter dragged on. Our fifth and final cord of wood was delivered. The house was freezing and, perhaps spurred by guilt, Mr. Flashback suddenly took it upon himself to come into our house during the day when we were not there and start the stoves. Nice touch, but we were very uncomfortable with that. We felt violated, like we had no privacy with this guy working here. What really pissed us off was that his portion of the house — the workshop — was heated by propane, and we were paying pretty steep rent and freezing our butts off.

When February rolled around, it got even colder. The deep freeze made it impossible for us to have any kind of intimate relationship in the house, and we were still like little lovebunnies. We took to the Camry. I had a great 1992 Toyota Camry that became our lovenest away from our original lovenest. We’d sneak out to the car late at night, turn on the heat, crack the windows, turn on the stereo and lay the seat back. The car was parked in the driveway way back from the road, and Beth’s Honda Accord was always parked behind it. Plenty of privacy. We actually had a lot of laughs and made it a pretty good time. That car went 341,000 miles and lasted until 2003 before it died. We’ve never had another car like it.

Then, mercifully, the weather started to moderate. March and April passed with Mr. Flashback still coming in to start the wood stoves. I finally had to ask him to stop. I told him that it was a real invasion of privacy and it needed to stop immediately. He did. The warm weather brought a new set of problems. We had spiders you could saddle and ride. I mean, these things were huge. Here was Beth’s technique for killing them: She’d stand on a chair, drop a piece of cardboard on top of it, and then jump on it. Then, she’d leave it there for me to pick up when I got home. These things were so big that the cats and dog were afraid of them. They were all over the basement.  It was like visiting Aragog and his clan. I can’t believe that this guy allowed his son to sleep down there among the arachnids.

Then, Muffy (I didn’t name her) developed an odd habit. She’d jump up on the kitchen table and sit there, looking up at the ceiling for long periods of time. I used to laugh at her, and tease Beth about the cat losing her mind. Then, one day I opened the pantry door and saw that the cereal boxes had been eaten through. That was a bit unnerving. It was then that I realized that Muffy wasn’t crazy at all. She could hear the squirrels in the walls. We also had something that looked like a prairie dog running around the back yard. Regardless of whatever it was — to us it was part of the rat family. For all we knew, they could be in the house too. We began to see that the house had holes in it and that nothing really fit together structurally. That’s because Mr. Flashback must have had several flashbacks while he was building this place. No wonder these things were getting in the house.

One day, I got a frantic call at work from Beth. She was taking Simone and getting out of the house and going to the beach because Mr. Flashback was out in the backyard picking off squirrels with a handgun. She wasn’t worried about the cats because they were laying low. I called the Gloucester Police Department, told them who I was, and reported what Mr. Flashback was doing. The policeman I spoke to said that he couldn’t do that even if he had a permit. They said they were heading over and would take care of it. By the time I got home from work, Beth was back and things had settled down. And Mr. Flashback had gone home, probably pissed at us for turning him in.

Things continue to deteriorate

I have to say the summer in that house was wonderful. There were no temperature issues like there had been during the winter. We were dreading the summer because none of the windows, except for the attic room, could take an air conditioner. But we really didn’t need one that summer. We had other issues, however.  For example, Mr. Flashback was told to fix the wood stoves. He had no intention of doing that. There was still no permit hanging by the front door either. Our downstairs bathroom was a problem as well. It was made of plywood, including inside the bath tub. It was nasty and unhealthy. When we brought our first-last-security payment by, he promised he’d have the bathroom done before we moved in. It was now June or July and it was growing nastier by the day. We were at the point where we stopped using it and closed it off.

In spite of the multiple issues, we were never late with the rent. We paid as expected on August 1. Throughout the month of August, we called him about several things. He wasn’t even returning calls, and he certainly wasn’t showing up at his workshop where we could catch him face to face. I finally decided to give it up and called an attorney. He came out and met with us and we told him what had been going on. He told us not to pay the September rent, and to tell Mr. Flashback that we were not paying any more rent. In addition, the attorney was filing against the landlord so that a portion of our rent would have to be repaid.

In the meantime, the lease was up in October anyway. We had been looking around for a while. We really wanted to stay in Gloucester, but we were having a difficult time finding anything that we really liked.  The only place we found that we liked was in Beverly. We really wanted out of there badly, so we ended up taking it for October 1. The case against the landlord was still moving through the courts, and living there was not easy. One day we were putting some stuff in the car to bring to Beverly, and Beth was really aggravated at Mr. Flashback for refusing to talk to us. She began to walk towards his workshop as it was the first time he’d shown up in a couple of weeks. I yelled at her to leave it alone, but she insisted. Then it was us who got into a huge fight. What happened next was like something you see in a movie.

Somehow, the woman across the street decided to become involved in our fight. If there’s one thing you never do, it’s come in between two fighting (Italian) lesbians. She made some kind of comment about our fighting as she came up the driveway, and Beth and I turned toward her at the same time and yelled, “Shut the fuck up.” The woman immediately turned tail and left, while Beth and I burst out laughing. That was the best thing that could ever have happened because it took Beth’s mind off Mr. Flashback and re-focused her on moving.

The final day

We had help from my niece and her husband on the final day. By then, we had some kind of weird jumping fleas in the living room. We’re sure they came in with the wildlife because none of our pets were outdoor pets. The cats never went outside and the only time Simone went out was when she was walked. We never took her into the woods because we were worried about ticks. Because of the fleas, we had to leave all the carpets we bought behind because we didn’t want to bring them to Beverly with us.

We had been enjoying some party material in the back of the U-Haul truck when I remembered there was one more box of books upstairs. We ran in to get it. We ran up the first landing and turned the corner. There on the landing was a squirrel. He didn’t look any too friendly. In fact, he looked as though he was standing guard. You know, he wasn’t going to let us go upstairs. My niece’s husband turned to me and started laughing. “Screw the books. Let’s get the fuck out of here.” We laughed all the way back down the stairs. We blew out of there and never looked back.

Beth and I still talk about going back to Gloucester someday, but it probably won’t ever happen. Unless it has changed drastically, the school system sucks. Beth was living in a second-floor duplex that looked right out over Gloucester harbor. It was an  unbelievable view every morning. We should have just stayed there. But things like that usually happen for a reason. I guess.

About a month or so after we moved into the condo in Beverly, Mr. Flashback settled out of court. We got about $6,000 back.

Love makes you do stupid things. It’s as simple as that. I met Beth not long after my mom passed away. She was living in Gloucester and I was living in Melrose when we met.  Every self-respecting lesbian has heard this joke (written in the 80s by Lea DeLaria):

Q: What does a lesbian bring on a second date?

A: A U-Haul

There’s a reason for this joke. It’s pretty much true, at least that’s been my experience. Lesbians couple up quickly. I knew right away after I met Beth that we were going to move in together. However, after my experience with Miss Headcase, I was bound and determined to fight this urge for as long as I could. So, for a while we split our time between locations, four days a week in Melrose and three in Gloucester. We met in mid-July and I held out until October 1.

Because we both loved the ocean and because we wanted to try to rent a house, we decided that Gloucester was where we wanted to live. It was going to be a long commute for both of us: At the time, Beth was working in Quincy, Massachusetts and I was working in Bedford, Massachusetts. Beth’s commute was much more grueling because she actually had to go through Boston and further south. It was a great area, though, and we felt it was worth it. We found what we thought was the perfect place right near the Wingaersheek Beach salt marshes, on Concord Street. It was a contemporary, with lots of glass and heated with solar and house-burning — oops, I mean wood-burning — stoves.

Our bedroom was awesome. It was big and had a balcony that overlooked the back yard, which had a clearing where we used to play frisbee. Behind that were some beautiful bushes and trees, and directly behind the bushes was an impressive rock wall. It was just beautiful when it snowed.

Our landlord was a unique kind of guy, definitely lost in the 60s. We’re going to call him Mr. Flashback. He and his family had been living here, but now he was moving them above his retail shop, which was in Essex. So, he was renting this place. The only rub was that his actual workshop was attached to the house we were renting. He seemed like a nice enough guy, so we decided to take the place anyway. This was the beginning of the Nightmare on Concord Street.

An idyllic beginning turns sour

It was still relatively warm when we moved in. The first couple of months were a blast, really. The upstairs level became our little lovenest. We’d buy champagne on Friday nights and hang out up there — like all day on Saturday and Sunday. We had no children, just two cats and a dog,  and no other commitments. We were both working 9-5 jobs. We had the whole weekend to ourselves every weekend.

The Flashback family displayed some odd behavior. First, they hadn’t been able to catch their cat to take it with them. It was hanging around the house and was nasty. They actually set a trap for it on the back patio with a can of tuna fish and, when they finally caught it, the thing nearly ripped one of the kids’ arms to shreds. Lovely animal. I was glad to see it go since we had two peace-loving kitties (Muffy and Leni) and one very mellow Miniature Schnauzer (Simone) and didn’t want the thing accidentally getting into the house.

That wasn’t all. One morning we opened the shades covering the sliders in the kitchen. The sliders looked out on the back yard. We were eating breakfast one morning and had our backs to the sliders. We were talking, but then I stopped dead with a feeling that someone was looking at us. When I turned around, his children (the ones that were mobile) were plastered against the sliders looking in at us. I turned back to Beth and simply asked, “What would happen if I suddenly decided to throw you on the table and make love to you right now?” She burst out laughing. I made a mental note to talk to Mr. Flashback about this little oddity.

Then, the winter set in and it was freakin’ cold. Mr. Flashback said it would only take one cord of wood to heat the entire place for the winter. Mr. Flashback was either hallucinating or full of shit. We blew through that first cord in no time, and we ordered another and blew through that. In the meantime, we couldn’t seem to get the wood stoves to much affect the temperature in the house — we couldn’t seem to get the thermostat out of the fifties. And seriously, on the nights we’d meet in town and go out to Club Cafe, we’d get home late and we couldn’t get the house up out of the forties.

We bought -20 degree sleeping bags and space heaters, and camped out in the living room for the winter in front of Beth’s huge projection television. This room was largely glass and it was freezing in the winter. The bags and space heaters made it tolerable. On the other end of the spectrum we had the room where our stereo was. There was another wood stove in there, but the room was completely closed in except for the entry way. The room got so fucking hot that nobody could sit in there. In fact, the furniture got so dried out from the heat that we had to get rid of it because it splintered. In between we had the kitchen. If Mr. Flashback had thought to put a window in between the kitchen and the stereo room, the problem of extreme hot and extreme cold would have been solved.

We also had our third cord of wood delivered and this time the idiot who delivered it forgot to pull the tarp on top of it, and it got soaked in an ice storm while we were at work. One day Beth came home to find me atop the wood pile chipping away at it with her ice climbing pick and muttering more swears per minute than she could count. I had been at it for days and drying it out. The thing is, it never burns right after that no matter how much you allow it to dry, and this fact brought about the night I lost it.

“We’re having a chimney fire at 274 Concord Street”

One night we got home from work late after a day-long snow storm. The house was freezing. I went to the basement and got the stove going down there. It took forever because the wood was still damp, but I finally got it going. I left the basement door open in the hopes that some of the heat would rise. Then, I headed for the teeny room. There was no amount of paper or kindling I could burn that was going to get this wood going. It was just smoking and smoldering, generating no heat whatsoever. It was at this point that I lost it.

I immediately stood up and took the photos off the wall. I took out the photos and began burning the wooden frames. Beth came in and saw me and really tried hard not to laugh, but that was impossible. She decided that the best bet would be for her to get the hell away from the area, get under the sleeping bag and watch some Monty Python. I continued to burn decorative wooden items. Then, it happened. I remember Mr. Flashback’s words exactly:

“You’ll know you’re having a chimney fire because it will suddenly sound like a freight train is running through chimney.”

That’s exactly what I heard, but I was hoping that wasn’t what was actually going on. I turned to look out the window and the entire back yard was lit up orange. Beth came running in wondering just what the hell was going on. “Oh, I said, it was a chimney fire, but it looks like it’s stopped already.” Then the back yard lit up again and the sound resumed. I grabbed the phone and dialed the fire department. I simply told them there was a chimney fire at 274 Concord Street. They told me they were on the way.

Then I called Mr. Flashback, who had a unique response. When I told him what was going on he said, “Oh, well, we’re going to dinner. If anything bad really happens call us at this number.” Then, he proceeded to give us a telephone number to call in case we needed him. After he hung up, I looked at the phone in total disbelief. No real concern. No worry. It wouldn’t be the way I’d react if it were my house. The arrival of the fire trucks snapped me out of my stupor. Some of the firemen went up on the roof. About five or six filed into the house, tracking mud and snow everywhere. Two headed for the wood stoves. Bringing up the rear was the Fire Marshall.

He walked around the house for a while looking things over, then he walked up to Beth who, of course, rerouted him to me. He asked who I was and I gave him my name and told him we moved in October first. It was now January. Then he said, “I take it you’re not the owner.” I explained that we were renting and I gave him the owner’s name. He began to write it down and as he was writing a light apparently came on inside his head. He repeated Mr. Flashback’s real last name again. “Oh, yeah, I know this guy.” He shook his head. Then, he proceed to tell me that the wood stoves were installed improperly and that he’d have to fix them. They should be 36″ from the wall, not 12″ from the wall. He also told me that there was supposed to be a rental permit posted on the front of the house. Then he proceeded to ask me about the back-up heating system. I told him there wasn’t one. His response? “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” I wasn’t. He told me that he was going to be contacting Mr. Flashback. After a three-hour visit, the firemen went on their way and I proceeded to clean the house. We both called in sick the next day, and I had a cord of dry wood delivered.

Things were getting curiouser and curiouser, and the situation would soon come to a head.