The Bostonian Abroad

Some of my earliest memories are of my first friend, Jimmy Hayes. He lived across the street on Burnside Ave. in Somerville. We used to go exploring, play pick up games of baseball, go to "John's Store" to get a bottle of Coke and a Ding Dong. Those days were magical for me. We'd play in the street all day and well into the night in the Summer time, and whenever someone would drive up our small side street, we'd all move off to the curb and yell, "ONE WAY!" In 1977, we moved away, to "the sticks", as we thought of it. Actually, it was only to Lynn, but it seemed to my 7 year-old mind, that it was the farthest thing from Somerville ever. For years after that, I would get someone to drive me back there once a year to visit with my old friends Timmy, and Jimmy, and to dirty-look Scott, who broke my watch in a fight one time. (My sister Debbie, beat him up in revenge, then beat up his big sister too!) Every once in a while, Jimmy would com...

I don't remember the specifics of a great many things. I do, however, remember where to locate these specifics when need be. And when referred to quite often, these items may or may not become permanently accessible to me, without the aid of external reference. The point is that a test does not reflect reality at all. When we are doing a job, we have access to all sorts of information-bearing devices. But for some reason, I'm sure, very powerfully laid out - full of sound and fury, signifying nothing - one is not permitted to have these devices during the test. One may only access the information stored within the cholesterol repository located in the skull of the test-victim's head. Why should we be forced to use only one memory storage and recovery device, when technology offers us so many additional options? Personally, I am embittered by my many varied and painful experiences with such traditional notions, and find them to be entirely without merit. They are obvio...

Going to be lost in words soon. Their towering importance will cast me into profoundest shadow! The words of scholars shall fill up my head to leafy suffocation! These scholars purport to know, and purport to know more than all the other scholars who came before, including the ones they quote and agree with - to a point. What comes before is always the basis of future refutation. The secret to success in filling others' heads with my words is to buld my refutation on the works of others. I'm learning! The desire is the thing. This environment is lethal to it. It isn't a direct result of the balmy climate; it's the isolation. A million or more people all isolated together. The distance from reality is stunning, and there is a limit to the amount of unreality one can witness before becoming purposefully unaware - for that is an effective way out, when stuck within the nutshell that is this place. Actually, it is an enigma, wrapped in a coconut, shoved ...

The latest round of events has me at a crossroads. I am different from the majority, and this fact is very troubling, since, in my view, the majority is heading towards irrationality on a grand scale. The events by which we measure our current history compared to our "blissful" and "decadent" past have altered the popular thought and made it reactionary and fear-based. The rage which provides fuel for current actions and opinions is most troubling of all in that the weapons of this rage are so much more serious than in previous epochs. As ever, I fear that we have disinherited our place in the grander scheme, and we are doing everything to seal our fates with those of our saurian predecessors. I suppose the only thing to do now is fret uselessly, biology taunting us to the bitter end. Or perhaps I could join the growing theocracy and, through its opiation, obviate my own consciousness? Sorry, this is as yet impossible. "Joining"is anathemic to ...

- AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am living in the unreality of a Red Sox World Series win! Something that generations of Red Sox fans have waited for, Prayed for, hoped for - and never saw! I was down at Murphy's Pub in Downtown Honolulu, surrounded by my fellow citizens of Red Sox Nation, chanting, shouting, screaming, praying, and thinking, "10 more outs," then down to "1 more strike!" When we Won it all, the entire bar erupted in unmeasurable glee, as Bostonians abroad like me, and fans from around New England and the world screamed their lungs out, hugged each other, high-fived, and, in my case, fell to their knees and sobbed like babies! Such total bliss is utterly unforgettable! I say "WE won" because I believe our hopes and dreams gave energy to the cause. We Reversed the Curse!!!!!!!!!!!!! LET'S GO RED SOX!!!!...

I told myself I wouldn't get sucked in again, but here I am, wholeheartedly in love with my long-suffering team! I've decided that I am ready to love again. I went into the NY series with the resignation that I would rise or fall with the Red Sox and I have been amazed beyond belief. Now, I stand with millions of other New Englanders, long-suffering Boston Red Sox fans all, and I hope; I believe again!!!! We can do it if we don't give up! GO RED SOX!!!!!!

In order to be tidy and somewhat well-organized, I began to place receipts of all kinds in a shoebox. Soon, the box was full, and I needed another one. Not long afterwards, I started putting other memorable items in there, such as photo negatives, a bracelet gift I had never given, an old wallet in which I had scrawled numbers of people I no longer know, the odd stone from here or there (I have the odd habit of pickinbg up a stone or two in my travels and keeping it as a token of memory), and people's business cards. These boxes piled up higher and higher, until one day my wife said she had had enough of the clutter. I had to go through these overstuffed time-capsules and figure out what could or should be thrown away. I sat down on the floor next to the kitchen trash can and set to work cleaning out the deadwood of my past. A Coke receipt from a bike trip I had taken from Lynn to Boston in 1982. An old and crinkled ticket stub to "Cadillac Man" in 1990. A r...