the chair

 Senior year in high school I had a girlfriend, Marge. We talked about this and that and one day she started complaining about how her new apartment lacked a decent chair. She had been living in a nice house in northern Bergen County but now, after her parent's divorce, she had to move to a garden apartment in Hackensack. One thing she missed was having a decent armchair.

I was walking home from school and I spied a nice old-fashioned chair lying at the curb for refuse. I jumped to the occasion and brought the chair to Marge's garden apartment. Marge was thankful and said "I'm sure Mom will love this chair!

An hour passed and I was home doing my homework to the sound of Dan Ingram. For some reason my father was mowing the front lawn. A late model Chevrolet Nova drove in front of the house. It stopped and Marge got of the car, went to the trunk and struggled to pull the chair out. 

The next second, a comely lady got out of the car and my father rested the lawnmower. He looked surprised. They had a chat. Mother yelled, "Mr. Mustache you better get down here!". I ran to the curb just as Marge scurried to the passenger side of the car and it was off. Mother said I shouldn't give people trash from the street. 

After that my father teased my mother. "That Mrs. Golbfarb is a nice-looking woman", he'd say at dinner. 

"You better keep away from Mrs. Goldfarb" my mother would retort.

As I recount this story in my dotage, it occurs to me that Mrs. Goldfarb could have thrown that chair in her apartment bin. She didn't have to come to our house. She wanted to check out the family of that new boy.💁

Top 100 records

I remember the first time I discovered that radio stations did end of year lists featuring the top records of the year I was a passenger with my brother driving the Ford Fairlane. We were listening to WABC and were trying to guess which Beatles record would be no. 1. I guessed She Loves You because it was the no. 1 record for several weeks in March. It was quite a surprise when Louis Armstrong's Hello Dolly came out to no. 1. 

1965 was also an interesting year, I predicted Downtown by Petula Clark and much to my surprise Satisfaction was no. 1 that year. Apparently, millions of kids bought the record to hear the dirty lyric that was supposedly censored from radio play that summer. Ballad of the Green Berets was no. 1 in 1966 and Lulu's To Sir With Love got the honor in 1967.

By 1967 though, the hip kids were listening to albums and hearing album cuts on FM. The era of teenagers and AM radio was coming to an end. Woodstock killed classic AM radio. 

The town drunk

 

When I was eight years old the folks took me to a football game at Hathenrock High School. My older brother played clarinet in the band, so in the support of him and the local high school we all sat in the bleachers and watched Hathenrock play Paramus High. 

It was a fun game, highlighted by the Paramus half-back who ran the wrong way and scored a safety for our team. At the game an older man kept standing up and shouting "Rah rah Paramus" in the middle of the home team stands. I asked my mother who he was. 

"Oh, he's just the town drunk. Don't pay any attention to him",   I was informed by dear Ma ma. For the first time in my life I met up with a town drunk. I was so proud of my home town. We had a swell hospital, a swell high school band, a winning team, and our very own town drunk. 

The bicycle rack was good

 Here's an anecdote from my other blog which is about my time as a Junior Leader in the 6th grade. 

I missed Woodstock

https://hardtimesmrmustache.blogspot.com/2019/08/i-missed-woodstock.html

Mr. Leech

On rare occasions as a high school student my father would invite me to go the museum where he worked. Perhaps my mother wanted to get rid of me during my school vacation or perhaps my father wanted to instill in me the joys of being an adult in the working world.

I did get a walk around the place and got to see an expert art restorer, Mr. Leech, at work. He had a painting and he was working with a cleanser and seemed to make the colors much brighter.

On snowy days when the buses weren't running I remember him calling the house. He lived in the Garden State like us and he was probably calling to ask dear old dad for a ride. He must have been in his eighties and I could hear his raspy German accent. Like all people who answer the phone and realize it is an unwanted call I had a distinct joy in my voice as I said, "Dad, it's Mr. Leech!"

Mr. Leech had a special cake he gave us every year. It was called a "poor man's cake" and apparently it was a vestige from the war when butter and eggs were not available. We ate it every Christmas.

I asked the old man why he gave us this treat every year. "It's because I always give him his check the day before pay day". The advantages of being an accountant.

Editor's note: Now available is my first Kindle book.

Snow days

Here is a post about being a kid and getting a snow day.