Joe, My Childhood Bestie

Joe, My Childhood Bestie

Me & Joe - must have been taken our senior year....

In 1957 I was deemed worthy of entering the 3^rd Grade. The just completed West Hills Grade School opened for business less than a mile from my house. My new teacher was a man, Mr Zaccaria. He was my first male teacher. But the more significantly that was the year when I met Joe. Joe was very friendly and always open to doing things. He would talk freely and openly about most anything. He had a certain street sense about him that you typically did not find in white suburbia. I had never met anyone like him. He was a hard guy not to like. He was Italian and his father was a builder with a reputation for building quality homes. He had built some of the homes in the neighborhood next to ours. Joe's father was a self-made man. He didn't have much formal education and came across as rather gruff but he was no dummy. Joe lived up the hill on the edge of Rollingwood in a house his father built. It was the nicest house of anyone I knew. Joe and I became close friends and remained so through high school and beyond.

I began spending almost as much time with Joe as I had with Jimmy. These were days when kids went out on their own. Heck if I spent too much time in the house my parents would tell me to go out and play. I typically would go over to Jimmy's house and just knock on the door. Joe's house was further away, a few blocks up the road so it was common for us to meet at Jimmy's. I don't know when Joe's dog Major came into the picture but he was a German Shepherd, and very protective. I loved dogs but I was afraid of him. All the times I was over at Joe's I don't recall ever petting Major but I do remember always being aware of where he was. Because of Major I always called Joe before I went over to his house and usually asked if Major was out. When I got to Joe's house I always had a plan as to what I was going to do if Major came at me. Major was kind of his father's dog as I remember and he did whatever Joe's dad said, so if Joe's dad was around I tended not to worry. However, there was never even one incident with Major so looking back I don't see why I was so afraid of him. Guess I was just being a wuss, some might say I still am one... Joe's family had another dog, I remember his name as Buttons – Joe you can correct me if I'm wrong. I really liked Buttons. He often went places with us. He had a bad habit of chasing cars. He did it a lot. I worried every time he did it but I never saw him get hurt. I don't know how he survived all those years.

Joe's house sat on a large lot with at least an acre, maybe two. His lot had a small pond that we ice skated on in the winter and one of those above ground pools. We played a game we invented in that pool called Sea Hunt. We named it after a TV show that starred Lloyd Bridges. Lloyd had been “black listed “ for awhile and this was sort of his comeback project. He played a character named Mike Nelson who was a scuba diver. Mike somehow got involved in all these adventures underwater. As the plot developed, he would inevitably run into trouble while underwater and need something to help him resolve his problem. It could be a special tool, a crowbar, or even a speargun, but always something. Incredibly he always seemed to have whatever it was he needed. Every show seemed to contained the line “Luckily I had my” – whatever he needed. I found myself watching the program waiting to hear that line. Anyway we made up a game where one of us would drop something in the pool and let it drop to the bottom. Then the other person would have to dive down to the bottom to retrieve it. But, before they did they would need to explain the reason they were going after the object using the “Luckily I have my...” line. It seems rather silly now but we seemed to find it entertaining back then. I know Joe remembers it too because a few years ago after we reconnected he mentioned it to me.

Although we sometimes went to each other's house we often met at Jimmy's and we often played ball just around the corner on Nursery Road. The end of Nursery Road was our local baseball field, well, it was actually a road. Because we were playing on the pavement our baseballs got beat up quickly. We would have to tape them up. We played with a taped up ball most of the time. Nursery Road was straight, had few cars driving on it, and most importantly had no sewers along the section where we played. Meriden, my street, had a curve and sewers on the straight parts. Sewers were trouble because the ball could and would frequently would roll down into them. When one did we'd have to pull up the sewer cover (if we could, they were heavy) and climb down into them to retrieve the baseball.. Sometimes they'd have a bunch of water in them, Plus there was no guarantee that you would even find the ball as it might get buried in “sewer stuff”. Recovering a ball from a sewer was not a fun task, plus it took a bit of time.

Russ and Pat lived on the corner of Nursery Road and West Hills Road so we played in front of their house. West Hills was the street Jimmy and Joe lived on but had lots of cars driving on it. As we got older we started hitting the ball further and the ball would sometimes go far enough to reach West Hills Road. Once that started happening the guy playing the outfield would have to check for cars before we could hit. The woman who lived in the house across West Hills at the end of Nursery would take any ball hit into her yard and not give it back. We made a rule that anyone who hit a ball into her yard regardless of how it got there was out. Of course if she was around it was more than just an out, it meant game over!

Joe and I did just about everything together – we rode our bikes to and from school when we were young. We used the same bus stop for Junior High and High School. In the summer time we'd hang out at Jimmy's and when we had some cash we would go across the main road at the end of our neighborhood and get an ice cream soda at Kresge's. Kresge's was a kind of five and dime department store chain that later was renamed K-Mart. The store had a soda fountain and we would get something and check out the girls working the counter and talk about them on the way back. I'm sorry to say that many of our comments were less than flattering as were the nicknames we made-up for them. We were just Junior High school kids, what would you expect?

Joe's family seemed to hardly ever use the living-room. That was different because that was the most used room at my house. As I recall they had plastic covers on the couch in that room. Joe's middle sister, Ann, taught us to dance in that room and that dance lesson is pretty much the only time I remember doing anything in that room.

When we were in high school Joe and I would sometimes double date. Joe's birthday is something like November but mine is in February so I got my license almost a year before Joe did which meant that for awhile we were dependent on me driving. This was a bit of a problem. I had license but very limited access to a car. My family had one car and 3 potential drivers. My Dad needed the car for work and he was often working Saturdays too. My parents let me use the car as much as they could but they would often need to use it on Saturday evenings. My Dad used to say that that car was never at home. It was always being driven by someone. With Joe it was the opposite, had access to a car (his family had two) but no license. During this period, for something like the Prom, Joe's father let us use his car, trusting me to drive it.

Joe often had trouble getting his father to agree to a reasonable (that would be our definition of reasonable) curfew. I remember being at Joe's house when Joe asked his father what his curfew was going to be that night. It was early, maybe even earlier than our dates. Joe started pleading with him and his father told us he'd play pool against the both of us for an hour of curfew a game. If we won Joe would get an extra hour and if we lost he'd lose an hour. He basically beat the pants off us and soon Joe had to be home before we were even going to pick up our dates. His father finally relented and gave Joe a little later curfew.

Joe and I had many adventures together all through those school years. During that period of my life I spent more time with Joe than anyone else. I don't remember ever having a fight with Joe or even being mad at him, it seems like we just always got along. As I look back it seems like we hung out together everyday. I suppose that's the very definition of a best friend.