The Smell of Beer

It was 3:30 when I walked through the front door from school. Mom was still asleep on the couch and beer cans were still on the coffee table, the house reeked of beer. I reached for the air freshener and sprayed all around the whole house. My sister Bonnie came through the door minutes after me, heading straight for our bedroom throwing her books on her bed she then headed for the kitchen where I was standing with the air freshener.

We had 30 minutes to race and get all the cleaning up done, ridding the house of all my mother's empty beer cans before my dad got home, presenting a spotless house on his arrival. As usual, we kicked into gear without a word. Bonnie grabbed a large paper grocery bag from under the sink that I stood in front of ready to wash the dishes my mother didn't wash during the day. Bonnie quickly headed for the front room without waking my mother. We didn't dare wake her because the longer she slept the soberer she would be when my dad got home, thus making a more peaceful evening. Bonnie quietly picked up all the empty beer cans off the coffee table and headed for the back door as I got busy washing up all the dishes and wiping down the table and sweeping the floor.

When my mother and father met right before the end of the war, my father was just about finished with his navy duties when he would come into town on leave, together they would go out to the famous nightclubs on Geary Street in San Francisco and party until the places closed. They would be joined by my momother'srother, his wife and some new friends they made. Together they would listen to big band music and drink highballs until the party was over and time to go home, it was all a part of the celebration at their ages.

After the war, my father married my mother taking on two children of hers from a previous marriage. Then soon afterward my sister Candy was born. After countless nights of partying with the neighbors and waking up to people sleeping on the floor, beer cans all over the house and my mother drunk beyond belief, with young children making their own breakfast, my father woke up one morning and said loudly "THIS IS ENOUGH!". He kicked the neighbors out, woke my mother up to take care of the new baby girl who was being watched by my older brother and sister and proclaimed his new rules. He'd had enough of drunken nights and the feeling of doing wrong by his children and loudly told her "NO MORE DRINKING, THAT'S IT! No more booze was allowed in this house ever again after that morning.

From that moment on my father stuck to his words, he never touched another drink the rest of his life or smoked again, nor would he ever even be in the presence of anyone that did, but my mother was unable to live up to his standards.


Bonnie made the climb over our neighbor 6" chain link fence on her way to empty the day's beer cans that lingered in our house. A deal was made with my mother and the neighbor allowing her to dump the remains of her drinking in exchange for cash they always needed. I dried the freshly washed dishes then put them away, Bonnie and I took turns vacuuming each day. Laundry needed to be put away and now since the house was clean mother needed to wake up to start dinner and once again be a normal happy family.

The sheer panic I always felt when walking home from school not knowing what was to be expected, became second nature to me and my sisters. We together assumed the responsibility not knowing when this all came about. Was it an unconscious action on our part not wanting any trouble with my father seeing my mother drunk, or if at some point we were told to do my mothers work. It was never clear to me until this day, nor did I know that our family was so different than the others around us. It was never talked about.

I can still recall at least two occasions when my father found beer cans and this lead to a brutal fight with my mother who was turned over the kitchen sink where my father bitterly screaming at her. She was crying while he proceeded to pop open the cans and pour them one after another over her head while yelling at her. Those were the times I wished he were dead and wrote: "I hate my father" on my pillow case with ink one morning during one of these fights, as I remember well this was my first introduction to God during these times.

Despite the risk of it all, my mother still found a way to hide her beers by keeping them in my top dresser underwear's drawer, slipping one of my t-shirts over the popped top or a sock to cover it and keep it hidden from my father. This is why she would occasional come into my room and take sips throughout the night with my father unaware or wondering why she keeps going in our room and closing the door throughout the night, every night! I hated the smell of beer, most of all going too school and smelling it while in class I always worrying if others around me could smell it as well. Most of my childhood memories were mixed with this as a constant routine.

This went on for years or more until she grew sick and continually complained of back aches, then we started noticing her stomaching growing as if she were pregnant. It wasn't until I was 15 and my older sister Candy who was already divorced with 2 small children living back at home, attending to my mother while she was ill, Bonnie had since moved out living with the father of her child. When my sister Candy called me into the bathroom and asked me to help bathe my mother because she was not feeling well, then I got a glimpse of what was happening to her, seeing her that size stomach on a woman who all her life had a nice slim body was shocking to me.

Her body has wasted away, her stomach was the size of a watermelon and she couldn't have weighed any more than 90 pounds. I was sick seeing her body looking like a starved African child she had once used as an example scolding me for not eating my food because there were people who would kill to have the food I had. Here she was looking like a photo of the one's she used as in national geography as an example to bribe me from some third world country. Days later my Father's denial after all these years must have turned around and for once he saw some reality, and between he and my sister they called an ambulance and had her put in the hospital. I was only told to leave the house while they take her away, so I went to a friends house and never discussed it with anyone never knowing fully what was going on, no one ever sat me down and explained.

This was also a time I learned about intuition, it was my first introduction to seeing into the future which has been rare for me but when I do, I always remember my first experience with my mother.

While my mother was in the hospital, she had been there for about a month or more, my father received a phone call of urgency one day after work, so he and my sister Candy left me at home to babysit her two young daughters as they went to say their goodbyes to her.  I had asked the young girl next door named Janie to come over and help me because it didn't look good from what Candy had said to me before she left with my dad, "Momma may not make it through the night she slipped into a Colma," I remained calm because I had no emotion at this point about my mothers dying I didn't know what to make of it all, all I knew was it wasn't fair that I didn't get to go and say my goodbyes to her rather she heard me or not, it just didn't feel right to me deep inside. Janie would help me because I didn't feel much like watching any kids.

I stayed home and Janie put my nieces to bed, afterward, she came in the front room where I was standing, staring out the window on the front door. She put her arm on my shoulder seeing me gazing out the window she felt the pain I was going through, as I looked out the front room door window, I saw something amazing, what I saw was a plain as day, it was a digital number reading like that of a clock radio that read in bright orange letters (SAT 7:00 AM). As I starred it not knowing what it was or where it was coming from it hit me inside, and I was excited! I shouted to Janie, "My Mother is not going to die today on Wednesday, but instead she won't die until Saturday at 7:00 in the morning. I said this as I turned to my friend Janie only to see a very concerned look on her face, but I knew I was right and I was certain of it, no one could tell me any different, it was locked into me because it was inside me too, that firm knowledge that was just there it was true and I knew it.

My Father kept a vigilant post at the hospital every day and night, coming home only when it was late and he went straight to bed. He carried on every day being the best husband he could possibly be, yet the whole time they were married he never in all those years gave her that much attention, even in combined years and years and years of marriage it wasn't until she was in a coma and dying did he realize his mate was leaving him and she probably need him long time ago and his ignoring her hastened her misery and death...

He was by her side as Candy and I waited for his call fully knowing it was coming at any time, except me, I knew it wasn't coming until Sat at 7:00 in the morning. Then like clockwork at 7:03 Saturday morning the phone rang.  Candy and I standing near the phone, she picked it up and she said to me in a whisper tone holding her hand over the mouthpiece of the phone "Mommy just died at 7:00". At such a horrific time I had such a wonderful feeling inside knowing it played out just exactly as I was shown it would with the passing of my mother, needless to say, I was very mixed up at the time.

But one thing I did know is something out there knew more than me and it told me and I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt of the time of her passing. What I was clearly right before my eyes shown turned out to be the catalyst of my discovering my psychic ability inside. Developing faith in the unknown and knowing there was something out there that very subtlety showed me and prepared me back then when I needed it more and many times since. it was a big tease to entice me in understanding more of this gift. it all comes down to connecting with source and exhibiting faith in the source is how you grow it inside you. Your connections get made, you start to blend the metaphysical with the physical, so your body actually responds in unison each person is probably different and perhaps each incident is different. For me, in this case, my eyes actually saw the numbers and the date on the window like as if it were a reflection intangible but, in perfect vision to my eyes coupled with a sure feeling inside that was just pure knowledge I KNEW it was going to be that date and time she would die. Nothing could have convinced me otherwise.

Her diagnoses was "Cirrhosis of the Liver" with " Chronic Emphysema" all caused by drinking, smoking and not eating properly. After her death I went home and started the usual of cleaning the house, now it was my turn to start cooking and caring for my father who didn't even know I had been secretly doing it since I was a child to help my mom out, I was an adult child already being prepared to take care of other, which was also inline with my life calling I do believe.

Years had passed by, I never forgot this time of my life the loss of my mother at such a young age, and how it played a major role in my life in all things.

When I was later married and with children of my own, I became frantic about certain things, never wanting my children to experience the childhood I had. In some ways I tried to be the perfect mother to them, making cookies for them when they came home from school, and always having the house spotless upon their arrival. Most of all I made sure their underwears were always good smelling, for some reason that was super important to me and seeing to it they had nice undergarments, socks, shoes and clothes perfectly ironed and folded.

"Everyday was a day they may remember!" This was something I told myself daily. Something good needed to be done in case they picked "THIS DAY" to remember for the rest of their life, and my life was consumed with this until they grew and left the home one by one.

Now looking back with regrets and coming to terms with my mother's alcoholism and my father's role, both being from different eras, I can now lift my head high and say I did my best! And knowing had I not been raised in such a home, the turnout may not have been so crystal clear to me on how I was to raise my children and be the type of person I wanted to be. Perhaps making me more grateful for all I had gone through despite it all because I was allowed to raise my children better, thus replacing their pleasant memories for my unhappy ones.

Peanut Butter and Rags

My Father was always intolerant with people of color, but I was starting to see my mother was just as intolerant as he in her own ways.

One day in particular I came home to find her in her usual spot of the afternoon asleep on the sofa, sobering up before my dad got home. She was either taking a nap, watching TV or reading the magazine she liked when I would come home from schools. Her favorite magazines were Family Circle or McCall, but Hints from Heloise was her favorite part as she glanced over the pages, often reading to one of us kids the latest nifty new remedy or solution out of the; Heloise Hit’s section. One of Heloise hints she just had to try was using peanut butter on the coffee table to polish it.

Every weekend we would be busy cleaning the house perfectly because my father was home, so this was the only time I actually saw my mother quite busy with house work duties, giving my father the illusion that this was the normal way her day went. Every Saturday we would polish the maple and walnut furniture around the house. This one Saturday she decided to try out the new Hint from Heloise which was a strange one to us all, but smelled good to us kids.

The new hint was to take ”regular creamy, not nutty; Peanut butter” and use it instead of furniture polish on all your wood furniture! Heloise claimed it worked better then the expensive polishes in the store. So mother on her last visit to the grocery store bought two jars of peanut butter. One of the cheap brands, for the polishing she would have us try out, and the other more expensive brand for us to use in making our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. One jar went straight into the cupboards where all the canned good were stored, and the other went on the top shelf of the kitchen sink cupboard.

This Saturday she was anxious for us to try out this new hint she read about in Heloise. I was given the honor to try out this new discovery for the first time in our home. So I opened the jar and she gave me some old rag for spreading it around. It smelled good as I rubbed the goo all over the table then wiping up the excess with the rag and folding it over, then in circular motions I would go to town rubbing away all the excess peanut butter to make a high gloss polish on the front room coffee table.

It worked and my mother was proud her little hint was successful, not to mention the smell was by far much better than that of the chemical polish sprays of that time. This would continue on every Saturday mid morning for quite some time, then after each use the rag was stuffed back into the big jar and put back up on the shelf and once the chores were complete I could go outside and play.

Next door to us was an Indian family that had a house full of kids with a single mom that left them with barely anything to eat and to fend on their own. The mother was somewhat of a lose woman, always bringing home different men to spend the night. She was probably looking for a husband to help support her and her children, but rumors were going around the neighborhood that she was a part time prostitute going out and meeting men from the navy who had just come into town on a ship.

None of them seemed to stay long, in fact most left and never came back after the first night. The house was always untidy and unclean with sticky stuff on the floor at all times. The kids were always dirty and had a bad odor to them, and just looking at their hair you could easily see they hadn’t had a bath in awhile. Their ages ranged from 1 year to 12 years, one for every few years. Out of all of them there was only one boy, all the rest were girls.

I was young, and when you’re young none of that nonsense bothers you about them not being clean except one time when I saw “Cindy” (one of the girls that was my age) put her dirty long fingernail in her mouth to clean it, scraping it along her teeth as she licked away all the dirt embedded within them. That about made me want to vomit, for some reason that has stuck with me to this day, as I myself am absolutely intolerant of any dirt under my own nails since witnessing that, it’s just something that stuck with me and made impact on me.

Cindy had a younger sister named “Linda” her and I used to joke about our names being the same and how all Linda’s were beautiful because that’s what the name meant in Spanish. She and I were more friends than Cindy and I were, we just got along better and we seemed to laugh more together than Cindy and I ever did.

One afternoon Linda came over tapped on our screen door and asked my Mother if she could borrow some peanut butter, my mother quickly replied "sure hold on!" I was in the kitchen at the table making a peanut butter sandwich so I screwed the lid on and went to hand it over to my mother having heard the conversation at the door. I turned around to hand it to my mother when she looked over at me shook her head silently back and forth, then smiled and said “No not that one!” She then reached up and grabbed the one we used to polish the furniture with, quickly opening the lid and taking out the rags tucked down within the jar, closing it back up, then headed straight for the front door and handed it to Linda with a smile, and said “here you go!” I was astonished and mortified! She used that disgusting one we used to polish the dirty furniture with and the one that had an old rag in it to feed these poor kids next-door.

I felt so ashamed and sorry for them, and so mad deep inside towards my mother and father and how sometimes they were just crappy to people and treated some people so badly, it was embarrassing to me and I felt gutted. Not so much just because she was a friend, but because she was a person and their family was poor and I knew the kids didn't have a lot to eat most of the time.

We would always see programs on TV about the "Starving African Children" and that was used against us to make us eat our food, it wasn’t used because the had sympathy for these people nor was it used to make us appreciative of what we had when others were less fortunate than us in this world either. It was used because they were heartless people forgetting the hard times they had experienced through in the depression era, they just wanted us to finish our dinner faster.

I went to my room and thought this all over sulking in my own way but hiding the thoughts that went throught my mind in shock over what she just did. I called these people friends and enjoyed playing and talking with, walking to the candy story, eating pickles from the deli on a summer days, talking about toys and just hanging out and making clubs in the garage. I was feeling some hatred towards my parents because they were such merciless intolerant bigots before I knew this word existed. All I thought about was how they judged people and were ever so wrong about all the crap they used to try and sell me on.

In my own way I tried to prove them wrong, without me shouting it back in their face. It was my secret not theirs and sometimes they proved themselves wrong while I did nothing but sit back and laugh as they made their judgments and comments about others in the neighborhood.

I recall thinking “what’s wrong with them?" “Why are they like this?" I was always the odd ball, worrying about innocent people, which seemed to come easy for me thanks to the fine examples my parents set for me. What fine examples of bigots they were at times, only fueling my questions and observation to be called upon at later dates.

There were poor people amongst us in our neighborhood, mostly comprised of single mother's, not having the fathers income coupled with women’s wages being lower than that of a men back then, often times this alone was the cause of their poverty, just too many mouths to feed and not enough to make ends meet which left some hungry children at school during lunch time or after school let out.

Ricky Johnson was one of these kids; I will never forget the look on his face at lunch time one afternoon. I recall one day in the cafeteria 12 noon all the kids gathered to eat the lunches their moms had made. Brown paper bags lay on the table and some lunch box's with cartoons on them, thermoses poring special Kool-Aid or juices into their thermos cup lids. The smells of cheese, lettuce, white bread and potato chips could be smelled outside the building. Everyone was busy eating and enjoying their food when I looked over to the side of me and there was Ricky's big eyes looking at my food as I took a bite. He shyly looked away but soon was drawn back to my food with mouth hanging open and licking his lips as he tasted my sandwich visually. He just couldn't seem to take his eyes off my food, over and over he would glance at me eating and then quickly look away.

He was pretending to play and too busy to eat, but the truth was he didn't have anything to eat! I remember that feeling of him looking at me and me doing nothing. Here I was overweight and within the cupboards of our home was enough food to feed all his siblings. Our cupboards were always full along with the fridge and freezer, just chock full of food of every kind, and he had nothing to eat! To this day that look in his eyes still affects me I can see it right now or whenever I need to be reminded of it.

Ricky changed my life that day.


Ricky's family was comprised of 5 kids and one Mother working her tail off to support them after the father left one day following one of his drunken binges. Mrs. Johnson was a tall Black woman with a large body frame. She had a very kind face and always a sweet smile dispite her troubles and worries in life. I used to watched her walk up that hill every day rushing home from work after being on her feet all day at the hospital, with her white nurses’ uniform on and a purple sweater, walking up that hill with long very quick strides.

Her one son Ricky Johnson was my age and been in my school and classes for years since kindergarten. Ricky was the poorest kid in class, all the kids made fun of him, especially the other black kids that came from proper home and dressed even better then some of us white folks. Ricky was made fun of every day, but he was always nice, never speaking back to any of the comments thrown at him. His big black eyes bugged out of his football shaped head with short nappy hair and pieces of lint stuck to it, and most times snot crusted on his upper lip and wearing clothes with missing buttons, made him an easy target for other kids to make fun of.

I remember one day in particular when he was laughed and pointed at by all the class except me. I was in shock because that was something I have never seen before in an actual classroom. Everyone knew he was poor, but this time someone said it out loud in class most his ridiculed was done on the playground where he could easily escape it, but this time he couldn't. I remember being confused by and shocked with the teacher listening and laughing along and not saying anything in his defence but behaving like one of the brat kids. Something was wrong I could see it in his eyes.

He had lifted his leg up to cross his legs with one foot shooting straight across on his knee. He thought nothing of it, just getting comfortable in class when all of the sudden, Fred another black kid in my class that was from a very well off black family, looked at Ricky's shoes and started laughing an obnoxious laugh while pointing thus erupting the whole classroom and teacher in laughter.

What was visible to the eye was a shoe with a huge hole in the bottom and the "Corn Flake Rooster" showing through the hole. Fred laughed and laughed pointing until Ricky's face turned dark purple with embarrassment. Fred was on the floor and the class followed suit even the teacher laughed. I saw Ricky's face and the shame he was feeling, I knew he couldn't help it.

“Skillet” was the nick name Fred gave him and Ricky hung his head whenever Fred called it out to him. "Hey Skillet" Fred would shout in front of everyone, "Did you eat your corn flakes today?" Laughter would always ensue because everyone saw the hole in Ricky’s shoe he had patched up with an empty box of Corn Flakes that day and no one would let him forget. Fred had a hatred for poor blacks that represented him in a white man's world, but Ricky didn't know anything other than poorness and hunger. Unlike Fred whose parents had good jobs and nice things, dressed nice and had a beautiful home.

Later that same summer after my mother gave the poor kids next door the dirty peanut butter, Ricky came over to my house when my mother wasn't there; he was probably more hungry then I could comprehend at that age. He too knocked on the screen knowing it,s day time and my father wasn't there or he wouldn't have made it up the stairs, with his rich chocolate Skin and dusty looking hair. I answered the door and said “Yea Ricky what's up?: He said humbly "Do you have any peanut butter I could borrow." Remembering what my Mother did a few weeks before when asked that same question, and fully aware that the power was in my hands, because she wasn't there to dictate the outcome. I said to him “Hold on,” then walked to the kitchen opened the cabinet and reached up and pulled the Crunchy Skippy out and walked into the front room opened the screen and said, "Here you can have it we have another one" He smiled and said “Thank you!”

I was a rebel from way back wanting a change in the way things were done from the old. This was my little way of making up for Ricky staring at my sandwich and Linda from next door getting the Peanut butter with the rag, and never being able to react. My mother later on that week needed to buy more peanut butter because as she put it us kids made pigs of ourselves and ate the whole jar too quickly.

I softly smiled inside like I have done before when seeing my parents make fools of themselves and having that feeling inside that comes from doing something so opposite of what you are taught when you know what you were taught was wrong. Little did they know that their teaching me to hate others of color and difference was going to actually do the opposite and make me colorblind, and who ever knew Peanut Butter could taste so good.

The year was 1971 Daly City California.

It was summer time school was out and not long before it would be starting back up again. Nothing so far had been constructive or exciting for me. No siblings were left at home to fight with any longer, it was just me! Me the TV and all the spare time a teen could have, which left nothing much to do but masturbate and eat in excess out of boredom.

My usual friends were all gone for the summer. Busy on vacations for some, but really most of them were being sent away to some Pacific Island to learn the culture their parent left behind, or as a form of punishment for the previous school year grades and their bad behavior in general.

The one thing they learned in their parent's native country during the summer was respect, something that was getting harder and harder to come by or even found in the American school systems or culture much anymore. By this time corporal punishment was already starting to be removed from the school systems. Little did we know at that time, most of us would grow up to wish it was still in place for our own children attending school. Never being able to foresee the end results and how society, in general, would completely forget what the word “Respect” actually means anymore.

All my friends, whose parents came from foreign countries, were now themselves being raised in America as first generation Americans and for the most part starting to lack that humility that their parents had come here with. So for them, a good humbling was way over due and nothing does that better than a coconut husk broom right to the side of the head or an Island jute sandal whack on their rear end when they displayed the more American attitudes to their elders.

I lived close to a Navy & Marine Military Housing unit just a few blocks away. This area had grown with the constant influx of military personnel and their families from the Philippines and the American Samoan Islands for over the past few years, the cultural demographics were rapidly changing since my parent moved into this all-white, middle-class neighborhood build in the early 50's right after WWII and with the help of changing economy.

The neighborhood now was racially comprised of an eclectic mix of all races and cultures. My house was the second house on the bottom of the last block of Oriente St. American Indians, Blacks, Irish, Swedish, Polish, Scottish, Chinese, Japanese, Greeks, Arabs, Filipinos, and Samoans lived next to one another. Added to that list were, Catholics, Mormons, Muslims, Black Muslims, Baptist, Lutherans, Buddhist along with a few run of the mill Christian old ladies with pointy eyeglasses and their hair in buns and anything else you could throw into the melting pot of this great country. These were our neighbors, living across the street, next door and up and down the blocks of the neighborhood I walked every day.

With this mix of cultures, the kids that walked my streets, (many of which were my age), were the first born in this country. Explaining why summertime was so boring the older I got. Most of my friends were now being sent to their family’s homes in these faraway places their parents came from. They needed to learn more about their families and the cultures that were left behind in hopes of keeping the traditions of the fathers alive in them, despite the impediments that brought the parents here in the first place.

I had friends from each category of the list of cultures and loved learning about the difference in them all. Visiting them in their homes and experiencing their cultures first hand. My best friend was a male by the name of Neil; he was a big 6'2", 250 pound Samoan that lived around the block. After school, he would call me and invite me to come over his house (because his parents both worked) he was left alone to clean the house and prepare dinner. Every time I went over there he was peeling green Bananas and Taro, or boiling eggs and opening up a can of Corned beef, which was their staple dinner nearly every night. There was always a big bowl or plate in the middle of the table with Boiled Green bananas (which tasted like a potatoes with a tinge of sugar on it) and along side were dozens of hard boiled eggs shelled, Taro root which also tasted like a starchy potato that had dashes of grayish purple speck all through it. Lots of starch, lots of protein and many yummy coconut ridden deserts were always there in his home. The best part is, I got to sample all of them.

During the 1970’s it was popular to wear your hair in big Afros emulating the black panthers, a rebellion to such old hair styles that people of color would wear hiding the true nature of their nappy curly hair instead of conforming to white men styles by chemically treating it to make it all straight. The newer styles were their way of truly saying “We're black and we're proud”.

It was all the fashion even white people wanted their hair in a “Fro” and the bigger the Afro the cooler you were. Make no mistake, the size mattered on the coolness meter which was popularized by such shows on TV ‘Link Hayes’ from the Mod Squad fashioning his ever so popular “Big Fro” and round sunglasses. No one was cooler than him.

Small Fro’s meant you were still conforming! Just like that of the hippy who grew his hair and beard out as a protest to society, a walking billboard if you will, saying in short “don’t judge me” hair is just hair I am still the same as you on the inside under all this hair. A short buzz cut does not make a man respectable, the man under that hair does. So was the same with the Afro hair style in some respects, it was a societal rebellion in the form of hair. A way to say to society “I am a Black man let me be who I am naturally instead of you trying to make me white which I will never be”, and doing so in a non-confrontational way.

At this time size did matter when it came to hair, as it showed your commitment to that movement and your contribution to changing society just like it did for the counterpart the Hippy long hair movement. A twelve inch afro not only said, it shouted, “I ain't takin yo shit anymore white man, I am my own man and not yo slave any mo!” Thus almost equating the nearly unspoken admission, (whether they knew it or not) the smaller your fro was, could have meant you might be still clinging to the insecurity you harbored inside to the white man.

Samoans hair was very similar to black hair, but was much denser and had way more texture so this was a very welcome style among many races that had unmanageable hair like this, that did not conform well to previous white hair styles which called for an array of constant chemical treatments and forms of torture just to fit in with the rest.

Neil’s Fro was cool especially when he wore a dashiki; it made him look like a black man who belonged to the Black Panther movement. I was all too proud to be his best friend, with only one exception, and that was whenever my father was around.

My father was similar in character to “Archie Bunker” minus the humor and the funny facial expression. He was way more in your face proud racist type, something you would probably have seen in most southern states as norm pre 1960's. Although I never saw a white cone shaped hat or robe in his closet, he was by all definitions a certified non-card carrying racist who had an unexplained hated for all black people. He would never allow me to hang around any black people whatsoever or anyone that looked black, he made that perfectly clear all the while growing up. We all knew never to allow any black person in our house, and no black person ever dared to step foot on our stairs in the front. He had always made snide comments to them whenever they were outside making sure they fully understood who was welcome and who wasn't and that he had a gun and was more than willing to help clean up the neighborhood if he so felt the need.

Neil looked too much like a black man and since that was forbidden and he knew, it was just an automatic response while we kept that watchful eye open, looking for him at all times wherever I was, it didn’t matter I kept my constant guard up because I was in a constant rebellion of him.

This was once tested out. I being completely naive to the rational of my father’s hatred I never even considered that Neil who was from Samoa his family one hundred percent Samoan could pass for a black man! To me he was of another race he was a pacific Islander he had no black blood in him so in my own innocent way I didn’t see it coming. Neil and I were going to walk to school together like we always did but this one day my father was still home.

He usually left early in the morning and was gone way before I left for school. Neil came over to borrow our angel food cake cutter, which was the closest thing to a afro fork used to comb big afros. Neil walked up our stairs and knocked on our door. My father answered the door. I was in the kitchen looking in the front room when I heard the knock not thinking anything of it my father opened the door and all I saw was my father’s shocked face and 6 foot 2 Neil standing in the doorway with an African Dashiki on asking if Linda was home.

My father’s face was red and full of anger as he slammed the door in his face then turned to me and said: "Why are you hanging around niggers?" I said back "He isn't a nigger he's Samoan" with a smirk on my face because I thought it was funny. Then the words he uttered next I have never forgotten.

I can see it clearly in my mind as if it were yesterday. Under his breath he answered back to me in a whispered angry tone, "You can’t tell me that ain't no Nigger, that's a nigger if I ever saw one!"

Neil and I still laugh about that one today because I guess the irony was Neil was trying to look black and he passed the big test, Frank called him a Nigger.

While walking home from school nearly every day Neil and I would innocently be walking up our street laughing making jokes and just being teens having silly fun, when all of the sudden like a stage act that was perfect timed, we would separate to opposite sides of the street. Quickly upon seeing my father’s Red El Camino coming up the street my heart would race, my palms would sweat and we would pretend to not know each other. One of us would rush ahead just so it looked like we didn’t even know each were even there on that same street together, God forbid, according to my dad mindset. Separating whenever my father was around or being on high alert at peak times knowing he was on his way home from work never sunk in to me as to how much I feared my dad. This happened so many times and I never gave it a second thought as to what this did to my friend Neil inside, being told (in so many words or less) “because you look like a black man or because your skin is darker than mine, you have to pretend like you don’t know me just for a moment!" The absurdity of this and the impact of it didn't really all hit me until later in life raising my own children and while reminiscing back, did I then begin to comprehend the hatred I had grown up around every day and what it must have been like for my friends of color.

The times were different then and racism still existed within the mindsets of most of the older folks, but my generation was beginning to step in bringing the races closer together. Perhaps a part of social programming and strategic engineering through TV shows, but whatever the case was, it was a necessary change that needed to take place and its time had come rather it was force or natural.

I had made friends with all the people of colors and didn’t understand when my father told me such things as “All Blacks stink!" "Indian’s are all dirty!" "Irishmen are all drunks!" and "Scottish men are all cheap bastards!" This left me with no choice but to see the truth and the truth was that was my father was ignorant, and a prejudice bigot! All because I had seen for myself firsthand the absolutely opposite of what he spoke of, through all my friends and experiences with them and from getting to know their families.

As a young girl of about age 7, I recall playing hands games with Kerry, a young black girl from up the street from our home. She attended a private school. Because we had limited time to play due to her not being in the same school system as I did, we took advantage on that rare occasion when she could come outside after she got home from her school. We would run around the corner to play where my parents couldn't see us play our hand games like Old Marry Mack, playing them over and over seeing if we could build up our speed each time.

Once while standing closely face to face slapping each other’s hands together singing the song and laughing, I remember thinking about what my father told me about black people stinking and having this certain smell to them that were so repulsive. So this one time while standing next to her I would take in deep breaths hoping to get a whiff of the horrible smell blacks were supposed to have, but she didn't stink to me! In fact, she smelled good, she smelled like Avon honeysuckle perfume. Her mother always bought her girly perfumes and lotions and at times I was envious of her nice girly things and smells wanting them too.

Just like when I smelled Kerry I also was astonished when I was invited into the home of some of the other black families in the neighborhood. When I first walked in I was expecting them to be dirty and stinky, but instead seen with my own eyes they were beautiful! Some were decorated with fancy “French provincial furniture” and beautiful drapes. They would even make me take my shoes off before entering inside or before stepping on their new carpet. Their homes didn't stink, they smelled clean, in fact, they were prettier than the home I was raised in and smelled better too.

This particular summer my friend Neil was away for nearly the whole summer. He had received a bad report card at the end of the school year. That dreaded stupid folded piece of blue or pink paper that came in a manila envelope that would determine if you lived to see another day or at least that’s what it felt like to me because it was never good news, it was never something I looked forward to.

Neil and I were notorious for always cutting school to go the mall or just hanging out down town San Francisco getting high and watching people. His parents were so furious with him for not receiving a good report card, that this time they sent him to the Samoan Islands as punishment shaving off his cool massive Afro to rid him of his growing American pride, leaving him feeling fat, bald, humiliated and worst off leaving me all alone with no choice but to discover a new friend who had recently moved in the house behind mine.

Jerry was his name and he was a 16 year old, a tall slender good looking, but slightly quirky Hispanic juvenile delinquent. His sister who was only 12 had been diagnosed with cancer so his parents gave her all their undivided attention and for good reason, but nonetheless leaving Jerry with nothing much to do, but try and get some attention back, if only in a negative fashion. After all, negative attention was better than no attention at all. He was neglected on all fronts; there wasn’t even time to make him any food which forced me to actually see firsthand, a human eating cold undiluted soup from a can for the first time.

Before he moved to our neighborhood he was living most his life in the Mission district of San Francisco in one of the poorest parts of towns. This was the area most of the Hispanics congregated, depending on which Latin country you were from, this more and likely determined which neighborhood you lived in. He did drugs, he drank a lot and most of all Jerry listened to his music and Jerry loved his music! To Jerry music was his escape; it was an escape from not only his poverty but the pending death of his sweet little sister in that rapidly approaching dismal future of his.

Despite the recent move to our neighborhood, Jerry kept close ties with that old Mission district neighborhood were all his friends were and that infamously ever growing, Latin beat was heard loudest, coming from peoples open windows all over the streets at any given place, down nearly any followed along with the smells of Mexican food.

He was good buddies with “Jorge Santana” who was also our age. He was the little brother of “Carlos Santana” before Carlos Santana’s became a household name all over the world. This was the neighborhood Jerry had grown up in. He sat in Carlos Santana’s garage and listened to them develop their sound never dreaming he would reach the fame he was to reach. No one dreamed this poor skinny Mexican kid would someday be one of the most revered and celebrated Guitarists of our times.

As another friend of mine told me (who went to Mission high school with Carlos Santana) She said he was such a skinny geek! No one liked him, he was a loner and he spoke no English so he didn’t even try to communicate with anyone he just kept to himself rushing home after school everyday never even giving anyone a chance to get to know him he walked around with his head down never looking anyone in the eyes.

Thank God for that! Because in his bedroom retreat and in solicitude protected from the horrors of high school, Carlos sat on his bed and played guitar his uncle gave him until his fingers bleed, and many a night fell asleep with the guitar on his stomach. It, in fact, became his best friend. I don’t know for certain, but probably to our pleasure, playing with it more than he played with his manhood.

Touching it, learning everything there was to learn, caressing it from top to bottom, feeling its every curve, feeling the pleasure it had to offer pressing it against his body constantly, slowly building up his confidence and growing into a man as they joined together as one.

I can only appreciate and imagine now, one's bitter sweet destiny. Had he been accepted into the fold at school he might have just surpassed his only friend the guitar and instead just become another drug addict in the crowd whose life ended abruptly never accomplishing what he was sent here to do with the talents he was preordained with, and so as it is written, so it shall be - "The meek shall inherit the earth!"

It was this particular summer that I met Jorge while Jerry’s parents were gone. They were busily engrossed in taking Jerry's sister to the hospital for her Chemo treatment. She was just 12 years old and had bone cancer needless to say with this situation Jerry took a major back seat.

I could see Jerry's bedroom window from my bedroom window and saw he had Male Company over, which served to intrigue my overly active, ever producing in abundance hormones! So I went outside smiled and waved. Jerry motioned me to come over. While he leaned shirtless out his bedroom window he blew out a huge puff of smoke and laughed loudly then coughed. I laughed then I climbed over our conjoined 4-foot chain link fence, knowing full well it wasn’t cigarette smoke he was smoking and the prospects of starting my day of boredom out getting stoned sounded GREAT!

Inside his bedroom, I met his friend Jorge for the first time as I was motioned to sit down in between them both by Jerry as he pounding on the mattress while taking another deep toke of the joint. We all sat on Jerry's bed and got stoned out of our minds passing the doobie around and around until it was too small to hold. Jerry then tore off the back of a book of matches, rolling it into a circle, rolling it over and over in between the palm of his hands, back and forth until the fibers broke down and softened up. Then very carefully peeling the now rolled up paper into two pieces making a nice roach holder so you could smoke up every last fragment as possible.

They kept intermittently speaking in Spanish to each other which left me no choice but to be observant and sharpen my non-verbal communication skills, watching every move in their interactions and facial expressions trying to figure out what was being said.

At this time I didn’t even know who this guy was or who he was related to, I only knew him as one of Jerry's friends from the old hood, and the only other thing I knew about him was he loved my big tits because he was constantly staring at my over exposed, over sized D cup cleavage for the few short minutes we all hung out together. As they talked he stared and I observed, I could read his thoughts and see him reaching over to my buttons ripping open my low cut blouse and I seen him leaning down slightly to place my coral shaded nipple in his mouth, licking it up and down getting it soaking wet and hard, then with his other hand reaching up The year was 1971 Daly City California.

It was summer time, school was out and not long before it would be starting back up again. Nothing so far had been constructive or exciting for me. No siblings were left at home to fight with any longer, it was just me! Me the TV and all the spare time a teen could have, which left nothing much to do but masturbate and eat in excess out of boredom.

My usual friends were all gone for the summer. Busy on vacations for some, but really most of them were being sent away to some Pacific Island to learn the culture their parent left behind, or as a form of punishment for the previous school year grades and their bad behavior in general.

The one thing they learned in their parent's native country during the summer was respect, something that was getting harder and harder to come by or even found in the American school systems or culture much anymore. By this time corporal punishment was already starting to be removed from the school systems. Little did we know at that time, most of us would grow up to wish it was still in place for our own children attending school. Never being able to foresee the end results and how society, in general, would completely forget what the word “Respect” actually means anymore.

All my friends, whose parents came from foreign countries, were now themselves being raised in America as first generation Americans and for the most part starting to lack that humility that their parents had come here with. So for them, a good humbling was way overdue and nothing does that better than a coconut husk broom right to the side of the head or an Island jute sandal whack on their rear end when they displayed the more American attitudes to their elders.

I lived close to a Navy & Marine Military Housing unit just a few blocks away. This area had grown with the constant influx of military personnel and their families from the Philippines and the American Samoan Islands for over the past few years, the cultural demographics were rapidly changing since my parent moved into this all-white, middle-class neighborhood built in the early 50's right after WWII and with the help of changing economy.

The neighborhood now was racially comprised of an eclectic mix of all races and cultures. My house was the second house on the bottom of the last block of Oriente St. American Indians, Blacks, Irish, Swedish, Polish, Scottish, Chinese, Japanese, Greeks, Arabs, Filipinos, and Samoans lived next to one another. Added to that list were, Catholics, Mormons, Muslims, Black Muslims, Baptist, Lutherans, Buddhist along with a few run of the mill Christian old ladies with pointy eyeglasses and their hair in buns and anything else you could throw into the melting pot of this great country. These were our neighbors, living across the street, next door and up and down the blocks of the neighborhood I walked every day.

With this mix of cultures, the kids that walked my streets, (many of which were my age), were the first born in this country. Explaining why summertime was so boring the older I got. Most of my friends were now being sent to their family’s homes in these faraway places their parents came from. They needed to learn more about their families and the cultures that were left behind in hopes of keeping the traditions of the fathers alive in them, despite the impediments that brought the parents here in the first place.

I had friends from each category of the list of cultures and loved learning about the difference in them all. Visiting them in their homes and experiencing their cultures first hand. My best friend was a male by the name of Neil; he was a big 6'2", 250 pound Samoan that lived around the block. After school he would call me and invite me to come over his house (because his parents both worked) he was left alone to clean the house and prepare dinner. Every time I went over there he was peeling green Bananas and Taro, or boiling eggs and opening up a can of Corned beef, which was their staple dinner nearly every night. There was always a big bowl or plate in the middle of the table with Boiled Green bananas (which tasted like a potatoes with a tinge of sugar on it) and alongside were dozens of hard boiled eggs shelled, Taro root which also tasted like a starchy potato that had dashes of grayish purple speck all through it. Lots of starch, lots of protein and many yummy coconut ridden deserts were always there in his home. Best part is, I got to sample all of them.

During the 1970’s it was popular to wear your hair in big Afros emulating the black panthers, a rebellion to such old hair styles that people of color would wear hiding the true nature of their nappy curly hair instead of conforming to white men styles by chemically treating it to make it all straight. The newer styles were their way of truly saying “We're black and we're proud”.

It was all the fashion even white people wanted their hair in a “Fro” and the bigger the Afro the cooler you were. Make no mistake, the size mattered on the coolness meter which was popularized by such shows on TV ‘Link Hayes’ from the Mod Squad fashioning his ever so popular “Big Fro” and round sunglasses. No one was cooler than him.

Small Fro’s meant you were still conforming! Just like that of the hippy who grew his hair and beard out as a protest to society, a walking billboard if you will, saying in short “don’t judge me” hair is just hair I am still the same as you on the inside under all this hair. A short buzz cut does not make a man respectable, the man under that hair does. So was the same with the Afro hair style in some respects, it was a societal rebellion in the form of hair. A way to say to society “I am a Black man let me be who I am naturally instead of you trying to make me white which I will never be”, and doing so in a non-confrontational way.

At this time size did matter when it came to hair, as it showed your commitment to that movement and your contribution to changing society just like it did for the counterpart the Hippy long hair movement. A twelve-inch afro not only said, it shouted, “I ain't takin yo shit anymore white man, I am my own man and not yo slave any mo!” Thus almost equating the nearly unspoken admission, (whether they knew it or not) the smaller your fro was, could have meant you might be still clinging to the insecurity you harbored inside to the white man.

Samoans hair was very similar to black hair, but was much denser and had way more texture so this was a very welcome style among many races that had unmanageable hair like this, that did not conform well to previous white hair styles which called for an array of constant chemical treatments and forms of torture just to fit in with the rest.

Neil’s Fro was cool especially when he wore a dashiki; it made him look like a black man who belonged to the Black Panther movement. I was all too proud to be his best friend, with only one exception, and that was whenever my father was around.

My father was similar in character to “Archie Bunker” minus the humor and the funny facial expression. He was way more in your face proud racist type, something you would probably have seen in most southern states as norm pre 1960's. Although I never saw a white cone shaped hat or robe in his closet, he was by all definitions a certified non-card carrying racist who had an unexplained hatred for all black people. He would never allow me to hang around any black people whatsoever or anyone that looked black, he made that perfectly clear all the while growing up. We all knew never to allow any black person in our house, and no black person ever dared to step foot on our stairs in the front. He had always made snide comments to them whenever they were outside making sure they fully understood who was welcome and who wasn't and that he had a gun and was more than willing to help clean up the neighborhood if he so felt the need.

Neil looked too much like a black man and since that was forbidden and he knew, it was just an automatic response while we kept that watchful eye open, looking for him at all times where ever I didn't matter I kept my constant guard up because I was in a constant rebellion of him.

This was once tested out. I being completely naive to the rational of my father’s hatred I never even considered that Neil who was from Samoa his family one hundred percent Samoan could pass for a black man! To me he was of another race he was a pacific Islander he had no black blood in him so in my own innocent way I didn’t see it coming. Neil and I were going to walk to school together like we always did but this one day my father was still home.

He usually left early in the morning and was gone way before I left for school. Neil came over to borrow our angel food cake cutter, which was the closest thing to an Afro fork used to comb big Afros. Neil walked up to our stairs and knocked on our door. My father answered the door. I was in the kitchen looking in the front room when I heard the knock not thinking anything of it my father opened the door and all I saw was my father’s shocked face and 6 foot 2 Neil standing in the doorway with an African Dashiki on asking if Linda was home.

My father’s face was red and full of anger as he slammed the door in his face then turned to me and said: "Why are you hanging around niggers?" I said back "He isn't a nigger he's Samoan" with a smirk on my face because I thought it was funny. Then the words he uttered next I have never forgotten.

I can see it clearly in my mind as if it were yesterday. Under his breath he answered back to me in a whispered angry tone, "You can’t tell me that ain't no Nigger, that's a nigger if I ever saw one!"

Neil and I still laugh about that one today because I guess the irony was Neil were really trying to look like a black man and he passed the big test, Frank called him a Nigger.

While walking home from school nearly every day Neil and I would innocently be walking up our street laughing making jokes and just being teens having silly fun, when all of the sudden like a stage act that was perfect timed, we would separate to opposite sides of the street. Quickly upon seeing my father’s Red El Camino coming up the street my heart would race, my palms would sweat and we would pretend to not know each other. One of us would rush ahead just so it looked like we didn’t even know each was even there on that same street together, God forbid, according to my dad's mindset - Separating whenever my father was around or being on high alert at peak times knowing he was on his way home from work never sunk in to me as to how much I feared my dad. This happened so many times and I never gave it a second thought as to what this did to my friend Neil inside, being told (in so many words or less) “because you look like a black man or because your skin is darker than mine, you have to pretend like you don’t know me just for a moment!" The absurdity of this and the impact of it didn't really all hit me until later in life raising my own children and while reminiscing back, did I then begin to comprehend the hatred I had grown up around every day and what it must have been like for my friends of color.

The times were different then and racism still existed within the mindsets of most of the older folks, but my generation was beginning to step in bringing the races closer together. Perhaps a part of social programming and strategic engineering through TV shows, but whatever the case was, it was a necessary change that needed to take place and its time had come rather it was forced or natural.

I had made friends with all the people of colors and didn’t understand when my father told me such things as “All Blacks stink!" "Indian’s are all dirty!" "Irishmen are all drunks!" and "Scottish men are all cheap bastards!" This left me with no choice but to see the truth and the truth was that was my father was ignorant, and a prejudice bigot! All because I had seen for myself firsthand the absolutely opposite of what he spoke of, through all my friends and experiences with them and from getting to know their families.

As a young girl of about age 7, I recall playing hands games with Kerry, a young black girl from up the street from our home. She attended a private school. Because we had limited time to play due to her not being in the same school system as I did, we took advantage on that rare occasion when she could come outside after she got home from her school. We would run around the corner to play where my parents couldn't see us play our hand games like Old Marry Mack, playing them over and over seeing if we could build up our speed each time.

Once while standing closely face to face slapping each other’s hands together singing the song and laughing, I remember thinking about what my father told me about black people stinking and having this certain smell to them that were so repulsive. So this one time while standing next to her I would take in deep breaths hoping to get a whiff of the horrible smell blacks were supposed to have, but she didn't stink to me! In fact, she smelled good, she smelled like Avon honeysuckle perfume. Her mother always bought her girly perfumes and lotions and at times I was envious of her nice girly things and smells wanting them too.

Just like when I smelled Kerry I also was astonished when I was invited into the home of some of the other black families in the neighborhood. When I first walked in I was expecting them to be dirty and stinky, but instead seen with my own eyes they were beautiful! Some were decorated with fancy “French provincial furniture” and beautiful drapes. They would even make me take my shoes off before entering inside or before stepping on their new carpet. Their homes didn't stink, they smelled clean, in fact, they were prettier than the home I was raised in and smelled better too.

This particular summer my friend Neil was away for nearly the whole summer. He had received a bad report card at the end of the school year. That dreaded stupid folded piece of blue or pink paper that came in a manila envelope that would determine if you lived to see another day or at least that’s what it felt like to me because it was never good news, it was never something I looked forward to.

Neil and I were notorious for always cutting school to go the mall or just hanging out downtown San Francisco getting high and watching people. His parents were so furious with him for not receiving a good report card, that this time they sent him to the Samoan Islands as punishment shaving off his cool massive Afro to rid him of his growing American pride, leaving him feeling fat, bald, humiliated and worst off leaving me all alone with no choice but to discover a new friend who had recently moved in the house behind mine.

Jerry was his name and he was a 16 year old, a tall slender good looking, but slightly quirky Hispanic juvenile delinquent. His sister who was only 12 had been diagnosed with cancer so his parents gave her all their undivided attention and for good reason, but nonetheless leaving Jerry with nothing much to do, but try and get some attention back, if only in a negative fashion. After all, negative attention was better than no attention at all. He was neglected on all fronts; there wasn’t even time to make him any food which forced me to actually see firsthand, a human eating cold undiluted soup from a can for the first time.

Before he moved to our neighborhood he was living most his life in the Mission district of San Francisco in one of the poorest parts of towns. This was the area most of the Hispanics congregated, depending on which Latin country you were from, this more and likely determined which neighborhood you lived in. He did drugs, he drank a lot and most of all Jerry listened to his music and Jerry loved his music! To Jerry music was his escape; it was an escape from not only his poverty but the pending death of his sweet little sister in that rapidly approaching dismal future of his.

Despite the recent move to our neighborhood, Jerry kept close ties with that old Mission district neighborhood were all his friends were and that infamously ever growing, Latin beat was heard loudest, coming from people's open windows all over the streets in any given place, down nearly any followed along with the smells of Mexican food.

He was good buddies with “Jorge Santana” who was also our age. He was the little brother of “Carlos Santana” before Carlos Santana’s became a household name all over the world. This was the neighborhood Jerry had grown up in. He sat in Carlos Santana’s garage and listened to they develop their sound never dreaming he would reach the fame he was to reach. No one dreamed this poor skinny Mexican kid would someday be one of the most revered and celebrated Guitarists of our times.

As another friend of mine told me (who went to Mission high school with Carlos Santana) She said he was such a skinny geek! No one liked him, he was a loner and he spoke no English so he didn’t even try to communicate with anyone he just kept to himself rushing home after school everyday never even giving anyone a chance to get to know him he walked around with his head down never looking anyone in the eyes.

Thank God for that! Because in his bedroom retreat and in solicitude protected from the horrors of high school, Carlos sat on his bed and played guitar his uncle gave him until his fingers bleed, and many a night fell asleep with the guitar on his stomach. It, in fact, became his best friend. I don’t know for certain, but probably to our pleasure, playing with it more than he played with his manhood.

Touching it, learning everything there was to learn, caressing it from top to bottom, feeling its every curve, feeling the pleasure it had to offer pressing it against his body constantly, slowly building up his confidence and growing into a man as they joined together as one.

I can only appreciate and imagine now, one's bittersweet destiny. Had he been accepted into the fold at school he might have just surpassed his only friend the guitar and instead just become another drug addict in the crowd whose life ended abruptly never accomplishing what he was sent here to do with the talents he was preordained with, and so as it is written, so it shall be - "The meek shall inherit the earth!"

It was this particular summer that I met Jorge while Jerry’s parents were gone. They were busily engrossed in taking Jerry's sister to the hospital for her Chemo treatment. She was just 12 years old and had bone cancer needless to say with this situation Jerry took a major back seat.

I could see Jerry's bedroom window from my bedroom window and saw he had Male Company over, which served to intrigued my overly active, ever producing in abundance hormones! So I went outside smiled and waved. Jerry motioned me to come over. While he leaned shirtless out his bedroom window he blew out a huge puff of smoke and laughed loudly then coughed. I laughed then I climbed over our conjoined 4 foot chain link fence, knowing fully well it wasn’t cigarette smoke he was exhaling and the prospects of starting my day of boredom out getting stoned sounded GREAT!

Inside his bedroom, I met his friend Jorge for the first time as I was motioned to sit down in between them both by Jerry as he pounding on the mattress while taking another deep toke of the joint. We all sat on Jerry's bed and got stoned out of our minds passing the doobie around and around until it was too small to hold. Jerry then tore off the back of a book of matches, rolling it into a circle, rolling it over and over in between the palm of his hands, back and forth until the fibers broke down and softened up. Then very carefully peeling the now rolled up paper into two pieces making a nice roach holder so you could smoke up every last fragment as possible.

They kept intermittently speaking in Spanish to each other which left me no choice but to be observant and sharpen my non-verbal communication skills, watching every move in their interactions and facial expressions trying to figure out what was being said.

At this time I didn’t even know who this guy was or who he was related to, I only knew him as one of Jerry's friends from the old hood, and the only other thing I knew about him was he loved my big tits because he was constantly staring at my over exposed, over-sized D cup cleavage for the few short minutes we all hung out together. As they talked he stared at my breast, as I observed. I could read his thoughts and see him reaching over to my buttons ripping open my low cut blouse and I seen him leaning down slightly to place my coral shaded nipple in his mouth, licking it up and down getting it soaking wet and hard, then with his other hand reaching up kneading and pinching my nipple on the other breast as I moaned. Mysteriously all the rest of my clothes suddenly found their way on the floor I then was jolted with an electrical current as I felt a hard sharp pain of penetration in my already overly wet pussy! Come to think of it I didn’t mind that thought of his one bit.

Man, I was fucked up and already horny, carried off into a fantasy as we all sat in his bedroom blitzed! I didn’t learn who he was until after he left when Jerry told me "You know who that was?" I said, “Um no just Jorge?” He said “NO, that was Jorge Santana, Carlos’s little brother, I and him have been friends for a long time I played the Congo’s sometimes for his band when we would get together. It then hit me, but even still I didn’t know if I could believe Jerry 100% until later on when his album came out and I saw his picture on it, it was him alright!

Jerry and Jorge met in grade school. Jorge, with the help of his Big brother Carlo's recent fame, went on to form his own band called (Malo) who at the time unbeknownst to me, were busy working on a new album and song “Suavecito" that was released 9 months later and went on to become a one hit wonder. Jorge's new band and claim to fame took up much of his days, which left little time for his buddies, leaving behind his old friends from the hood that summer and Jerry was one of them.

Being out of his old neighborhood and us both having the love of music in common, I became Jerry's only friend in his new environment and he was momentary, my only friend too.

We would have never met under normal circumstances but the truth was the only reason we met was because I lived directly next door to his aunt Yolanda who got Jerry’s family to move in closer to them. Yolanda was more like a girlfriend to me but was old enough to be my mother. She tried so badly to fix us both up, but we just became hangout buddies instead. I just was not attracted to him one bit, even in my most desperate moments of yearning and high hormone levels I looked to him more as a cousin if anything. His auntie Yolanda would later divorce her husband and married Tito Fuentes the famed San Francisco Giants Baseball player.

This exact day I was babysitting for a Hippy woman with two small children who had just recently moved across the street from our house. Every once in awhile she would hire me to come over and watch the kids while she went to the city to have lunch with her husband or shop in San Francisco.

I was bored, so invited Jerry to come hang out with me at her house. We sat around while the young children took their afternoon nap. Wasting time flipping through the many porn magazines and softcore books with pictures of naked couples in different positions they seemed to have an endless supply of.

I knew from previously babysitting for her where the stash of porn was and it was in their bedroom so we ended up on their bed smoking a joint and looking at all the eye candy. Moments later Jerry tried his best to get me to make out with him then eventually into my pants but I wasn't interested because I wasn’t attracted to him. From being so aroused Jerry ended up turning over and laying on his stomach. He didn’t know I knew, but he was embarrassed about the bulge in his pants and I didn’t tease him about just instead acted like nothing happened. I sat; he lay on these hippies bed which was the new trend of just a mattress on the floor covered in an East Indian bedspread that reeked of incense as they too smoked pot every day and always tried to cover up the smell by burning incense.

As we waited we lit up a joint. We talked and laughed and then Jerry asked me to give him a massage if nothing else, so I agreed to that much. After I was finished and Jerry’s boner went down we went back into the front room to watch TV, waiting for Joanne to come home from her afternoon lunch in the city to release us from our boredom in her home.

She finally arrived, paid me and out the door we went. Not knowing what to do next, but anything was better than doing nothing inside a house on a nice summer day. We were in the process of walking past my house on the way to his, when all of the sudden he stopped dead in his tracks, eyes bugged out and said excitedly “Do you hear that?” I answered back “hear what, what am I supposed to be hearing?” I was really thinking in the back of my mind he was just stoned. He said “Shhhh.. listen. I can hear music coming from the Cow Palace, don’t you hear that bass!?"

The street I lived on was Oriente and the cross street was Martin. Martin went a few blocks up, then right into the back parking lot of the Cow Palace. The Cow Palace was and still is a big coliseum built originally to hold the Grand Nationals livestock shows. Over time, and since the 1960’s such famous bands just to name a few included the Beatles and the Rolling Stones who all performed big concerts inside the Cow Palace. Up to this time, it was the biggest place closest to the San Francisco metropolitan area, that could hold such crowds that accompanied these big headlining internationally renowned bands.

All round the back of the parking area were stables, small corrals, and very large sheds which were used to house the livestock and the feed while the Grand National were going on in the Month of October.

I listened intensely then I too began to hear the music he was talking about if ever so faintly. I said to him “I can hear it now, what do you think it is?” He said back with the utmost confidence and a grin on his mug, "I would recognize that sound anywhere, it’s the Doobie Brothers!”

It was a June 1971 and the Doobie Brothers were playing at the Fillmore that weekend. I guess not quite big enough at this time in their career to merit playing the Cow Palace that could handle the larger crowds. The Fillmore was still a happening place to see anyone perform and all the greats could be found any weekend at the Fillmore, it was by no means a step-down.

Jerry could think of nothing at that moment other than the two of us walking over a few blocks to where the sounds were coming from. He was convinced we were about to see the Doobie Brothers face to face, I was prepared to meet a great garage band that covered the Doobie Brother sound because garage bands in at this time were to be found everywhere in San Francisco everybody and their brother wanted to cash in on the rock n roll scene.

We headed towards the back of the Cow Palace walking towards the parking lot through all the ice plants that grew alongside the small slope. Sliding down on our backsides saving us a big walking trip all the way around. Quickly approaching in the back we passed all the corrals and sheds the musical sounds were becoming more distinct and with each step we got closer, the music grew louder and louder pointing the way to the exact point and shed the music was coming from.

We snuck up behind one of the sheds that our ears told us was the place the music was coming from peeking on the side we instantly saw a man in a semi shiny gray suit get into a green Jaguar and spin off rapidly.

The music had come to a stop, but picked right back up after we heard a male voice count out loud “One Two Three.”

I think possibly Jerry was right; his ears didn’t deceive him after all. We were on the brink of standing right next to the “Doobie Brothers” practicing for the big concert in a few days or someone that sounded exactly like them. I had all their albums and couldn't’ believe it was actually them right here loud and clear, within just a few steps away and no one else except Jerry and I were there to witness this event that would become in the future a thing of the past.

Jerry was gutsy and wanted to walk right into the semi-closed door to the shed, but I pulled him back by his jean jacket on his first attempt. I was scared of the unknown and maybe even afraid of the disappointment I’d soon be feeling. I was thinking if it was really them, then they might get mad at us for bugging them and shoo us off like adults do to pesky teens. But the urge to see them up close took me over too, so we both went forward heading towards the shed door.

Jerry took the lead and I followed behind as he glanced quickly sticking his head through the door. IT WAS THEM! It was them! It was actually them! I was looking right at all of the band members, recognizing them from the previous album covers I had bought.

Seeing our smiling faces full of excitement the lead singer motioned for us to come in then said: “Come on in!”

They had just finished up the song they were playing and stopped playing for a moment to ask us a few questions. They introduced themselves by name one by one and when they finished we introduced ourselves and told them we just lived around the corner and how Jerry heard them playing. Jerry so proudly said with the innocent boyishness showing through as he smiled, slightly pinkish with excitement he said "Man I would recognize the base player anywhere" then let out a nervous giggle, which made them all smile and even more so the bass player.

I seen that the lead singer was staring at me then said to me "hey I like your hair!" I just as proudly, but nervously told him giggling, “Oh thanks, I cut it myself.” To which he replied: “then I guess I'll have to have you cut mine then." He had long hair parted in the middle down to his waist, mine was down to my waist but cut in the ever fashionable layered “feathered” cut, that was shorter on top and long at the bottom.

I was beaming from ear to ear just shooting the breeze with the lead singer about hair styles feeling like the moment was lasting forever and that it was all a dream when all of the sudden we heard a car drive up outside in front of the door. The engine turned off, the car door slammed and in walked their manager with his hands full of paper lunch bags he had just driven off to buy when we saw him leaving.

With paper sack lunches for everyone in hand he walked in and instantly dropped face. He was not expecting to see us and he was pissed off! One look at us he was in shock and immediately started yelling at Jerry and to GET OUT! "What are you guys doing here? Then turning to band members and said in an angry bossy voice, "They’re not supposed to be in here, what’s wrong with you guys! This album is not even cut yet and you’re letting people listen?" Fuck! Now we’re going to have to move your location so more punks like them don’t just pop in and hear your fucking new song and before word gets out you’re here.”

His face was all scrunched up in pain he was mad as hell at both of us and the band as well, but they never once said anything back in rebuttal. He was their boss and the music they were playing was going to be off their new album and he didn't want anyone stealing the songs that were sure to be hits or at least this was his excuse he was tell all of us within ears reach. While yelling at us he held the door open after putting down the bags then pointing repeatedly, motioning us to get the hell out as quick as possible. We managed to look over at the band and say goodbye and catch them smile and wave back at us before heading out that door we came in with smiles on our faces.

Although it was a brief encounter it was one I will never forget and I’m sure Jerry never did either. It was like meeting a band backstage after a concert, but we had one up better on everyone else our age seeing and talking to them in person. ALL ALONE, however, brief it was!

The guys in the band were all very nice to us and treated us like we were neighbors coming by for a visit adding to my current held belief that famous people are just people, they shit, they fart and they do all the same and feel all the same things we all do as humans.

We walked back to our homes going back and forth over and over still in disbelief about what we had just experienced bearing huge smiles from ear to ear! “Nobody is going to believe us after we tell them this story,of,” Jerry said. We both knew it was true and in all reality that’s all that mattered was us seeing them, never mind the rest.

As soon as that album was released Jerry and I ran to the record stores to buy it, listening to each song and remembering all that took place from the moment he first heard the faint sounds of the base guitar to the final walking away with smiles on our faces like we just had the fuck off our life. Smoking a cigarette, chins up, flipping our long hair back, feeling more confident than we did before it happened; we were “Super Bad Ass!”

For a summer that started out in absolute boredom and filled with envy of my friends vacations in far away Islands and images of then sipping on coconut juice from an actual coconut while basking in the sun next to palm trees all the while nibbling on mango and pineapple Kabob skewers, my experience would be something they would now be envious of.

And as for my best friend Neil, he came back excited and jealous to hear my story wishing he had done better on his report cards so he could have experienced it too. He spent the remainder of that summer walking around pulling on the front of his shirt to hide the man boobs he developed and feeling self-conscious sporting only a bald head where his once prize-winning fluffy, full Afro stood out in a crowd. His parent punishment worked, he was now humble.

To this day whenever I hear any of the Doobie Brothers songs, it takes me back to that day as clear as if it were yesterday, especially when I hear the song “Old Black Water” which was the song they were playing right before we walked in never knowing the title until after the album was released. It always brings a faint smile of remembrance to my face hearing it, it makes me reminisced of Bell Bottom pants, Afro's, Shag hairstyles, smoking pot, the smell of incense and the term pass the Doobie, bro. This turned out to be the best summer a teen could have.kneading and pinching my nipple on the other breast as I moaned. Mysteriously all the rest of my clothes suddenly found their way on the floor I then was jolted with an electrical current as I felt a hard sharp pain of penetration in my already overly wet pussy! Come to think of it I didn’t mind that thought of his one bit.

Man, I was fucked up and already horney, carried off into a fantasy as we all sat in his bedroom blitzed! I didn’t learn who he was until after he left when Jerry told me you know who that was? I said “No umm Jorge?” He said “that was Jorge Santana, Carlos’s little brother, I and he has been friends for a long time I played the Congo’s sometimes for his band when we would get together. It then hit me, but even still I didn’t know if I could believe Jerry 100% until later on when his album came out and I saw his picture on it, it was him alright!

Jerry and Jorge met in grade school. Jorge, with the help of his Big brother Carlo's recent fame, went on to form his own band called (Malo) who at the time unbeknownst to me, were busy working on a new album and song “Suavecito" that was released 9 months later and went on to become a one hit wonder. Jorge's new band and claim to fame took up much of his days, which left little time for his buddies, leaving behind his old friends from the hood that summer and Jerry was one of them.

Being out of his old neighborhood and us both having the love of music in common, I became Jerry's only friend in his new environment and he was momentary, my only one too.

We would have never met under normal circumstances but the truth was the only reason we met was because I lived directly next door to his aunt Yolanda who got Jerry’s family to move in closer to them. Yolanda was more like a girlfriend to me but was old enough to be my mother. She tried so badly to fix us both up, but we just became hangout buddies instead. I just was not attracted to him one bit, even in my most desperate moments of yearning and high hormone levels I looked to him more as a cousin if anything. His auntie Yolanda would later divorce her husband and married Tito Fuentes the famed San Francisco Giants Baseball player.

This exact day I was babysitting for a Hippy woman with two small children who had just recently moved across the street from our house. Every once in awhile she would hire me to come over and watch the kids while she went to the city to have lunch with her husband or shop in San Francisco.

I was bored, so invited Jerry to come hang out with me at her house. We sat around while the young children took their afternoon nap. Wasting time flipping through the many porn magazines and soft core books with pictures of naked couples in different positions they seemed to have an endless supply of.

I knew from previously babysitting for her where the stash of porn was and it was in their bedroom so we ended up on their bed smoking a joint and looking at all the eye candy. Moments later Jerry tried his best to get me to make out with him then eventually into my pants but I wasn't interested because I wasn’t attracted to him. From being so aroused Jerry ended up turning over and laying on his stomach. He didn’t know I knew, but he was embarrassed about the bulge in his pants and I didn’t tease him about just instead acted like nothing happened. I sat; he lay on these hippies bed which was the new trend of just a mattress on the floor covered in an East Indian bedspread that reeked of incense as they too smoked pot every day and always tried to cover up the smell by burning incense.

As we waited we lit up a joint. We talked and laughed and then Jerry asked me to give him a massage if nothing else, so I agreed to that much. After I was finished and Jerry’s boner went down we went back into the front room to watch TV, waiting for Joanne to come home from her afternoon lunch in the city to release us from our boredom in her home.

She finely arrived, paid me and out the door we went. Not knowing what to do next, but anything was better than doing nothing inside a house on a nice summer day. We were in the process of walking past my house on the way to his, when all of the sudden he stopped dead in his tracks, eyes bugged out and said excitedly “Do you hear that?” I answered back “hear what, what am I supposed to be hearing?” I was really thinking in the back of my mind he was just stoned. He said “Shhhh.. listen. I can hear music coming from the Cow Palace, don’t you hear that bass!?"

The street I lived on was Oriente and the cross street was Martin. Martin went a few blocks up, then right into the back parking lot of the Cow Palace. The Cow Palace was and still is a big coliseum built originally to hold the Grand Nationals live stock shows. Over time, and since the 1960’s such famous bands just to name a few included the Beatles and the Rolling Stones who all preformed big concerts inside the Cow Palace. Up to this time, it was the biggest place closest to the San Francisco metropolitan area, that could hold such crowds that accompanied these big headlining internationally renowned bands.

All round the back of the parking area were stables, small corrals, and very large sheds which were used to house the live stock and the feed while the Grand National were going on in the Month of October.

I listened intensely then I too began to hear the music he was talking about if ever so faintly. I said to him “I can hear it now, what do you think it is?” He said back with the utmost confidence and a grin on his mug, "I would recognize that sound anywhere, it’s the Doobie Brothers!”

It was a June 1971 and the Doobie Brothers were playing at the Fillmore that weekend. I guess not quite big enough at this time in their career to merit playing the Cow Palace that could handle the larger crowds. The Fillmore was still a happening place to see anyone perform and all the greats could be found any weekend at the Fillmore, it was by no means a step-down.

Jerry could think of nothing at that moment other than the two of us walking over a few blocks to where the sounds were coming from. He was convinced we were about to see the Doobie Brothers face to face, I was prepared to meet a great garage band that covered the Doobie Brother sound because garage bands in at this time were to be found everywhere in San Francisco everybody and their brother wanted to cash in on the rock n roll scene.

We headed towards the back of the Cow Palace walking towards the parking lot through all the ice plants that grew along side the small slope. Sliding down on our backsides saving us a big walking trip all the way around. Quickly approaching in the back we passed all the corrals and sheds the musical sounds were becoming more distinct and with each step we got closer, the music grew louder and louder pointing the way to the exact point and shed the music was coming from.

We snuck up behind one of the sheds that our ears told us was the place the music was coming from peeking on the side we instantly saw a man in a semi shiny gray suit get into a green Jaguar and spin off rapidly.

The music had come to a stop, but picked right back up after we heard a male voice count out loud “One Two Three.”

I think possibly Jerry was right; his ears didn’t deceive him after all. We were on the brink of standing right next to the “Doobie Brothers” practicing for the big concert in a few days or someone that sounded exactly like them. I had all their albums and couldn't’ believe it was actually them right here loud and clear, within just a few steps away and no one else except Jerry and I were there to witness this event that would become in the future a thing of the past.

Jerry was gutsy and wanted to walk right into the semi-closed door to the shed, but I pulled him back by his jean jacket on his first attempt. I was scared of the unknown and maybe even afraid of the disappointment I’d soon be feeling. I was thinking if it was really them, then they might get mad at us for bugging them and shoo us off like adults do to pesky teens. But the urge to see them up close took me over too, so we both went forward heading towards the shed door.

Jerry took the lead and I followed behind as he glanced quickly sticking his head through the door. IT WAS THEM! It was them! It was actually them! I was looking right at all of the band members, recognizing them from the previous album covers I had bought.

Seeing our smiling faces full of excitement the lead singer motioned for us to come in then said: “Come on in!”

They had just finished up the song they were playing and stopped playing for a moment to ask us a few questions. They introduced themselves by name one by one and when they finished we introduced ourselves and told them we just lived around the corner and how Jerry heard them playing. Jerry so proudly said with the innocent boyishness showing through as he smiled, slightly pinkish with excitement he said "Man I would recognize the base player anywhere" then let out a nervous giggle, which made them all smile and even more so the bass player.

I seen that the lead singer was staring at me then said to me "hey I like your hair!" I just as proudly, but nervously told him giggling, “Oh thanks, I cut it myself.” To which he replied: “then I guess I'll have to have you cut mine then." He had long hair parted in the middle down to his waist, mine was down to my waist but cut in the ever fashionable layered “feathered” cut, that was shorter on top and long at the bottom.

I was beaming from ear to ear just shooting the breeze with the lead singer about hair styles feeling like the moment was lasting forever and that it was all a dream when all of the sudden we heard a car drive up outside in front of the door. The engine turned off, the car door slammed and in walked their manager with his hands full of paper lunch bags he had just driven off to buy when we have seen him leaving.

With paper sack lunches for everyone in hand he walked in and instantly dropped face. He was not expecting to see us and he was pissed off! One look at us he was in shock and immediately started yelling at Jerry and to GET OUT! "What are you guys doing here? Then turning to band members and said in an angry bossy voice, "They’re not supposed to be in here, what’s wrong with you guys! This album is not even cut yet and you’re letting people listen?" Fuck! Now we’re going to have to move your location so more punks like them don’t just pop in and hear your fucking new song and before word gets out you’re here.”

His face was all crunched up in pain he was mad as hell at both of us and the band as well, but they never once said anything back in rebuttal. He was their boss and the music they were playing was going to be off their new album and he didn't want anyone stealing the songs that were sure to be hits or at least this was his excuse he was tell all of us within ears reach. While yelling at us he held the door open after putting down the bags then pointing repeatedly, motioning us to get the hell out as quick as possible. We managed to look over at the band and say goodbye and catch them smile and wave back at us before heading out that door we came in with smiles on our faces.

Although it was a brief encounter it was one I will never forget and I’m sure Jerry never did either. It was like meeting a band back stage after a concert, but we had one up better on everyone else our age seeing and talking to them in person. ALL ALONE - however brief it was!

The guys in the band were all very nice to us and treated us like we were neighbors coming by for a visit adding to my current held belief that famous people are just people, they shit, they fart and they do all the same and feel all the same things we all do as humans.

We walked back to our homes going back and forth over and over still in disbelief about what we had just experienced bearing huge smiles from ear to ear! “Nobody is going to believe us after we tell them our story” Jerry said. We both knew it was true and in all reality that’s all that mattered was us seeing them, never mind the rest.

As soon as that album was released Jerry and I ran to the record stores to buy it, listening to each song and remembering all that took place from the moment he first heard the faint sounds of the base guitar to the final walking away with smiles on our faces like we just had the fuck off our life. Smoking a cigarette, chins up, flipping our long hair back, feeling more confident than we did before it happened; we were “Super Bad Ass!”

For a summer that started out in absolute boredom and filled with envy of my friends vacations in far away Islands and images of then sipping on coconut juice from an actual coconut while basking in the sun next to palm trees all the while nibbling on mango and pineapple Kabob skewers, my experience would be something they would now be envious of.

And as for my best friend Neil, he came back excited and jealous to hear my story wishing he had done better on his report cards so he could have experienced it too. He spent the remainder of that summer walking around pulling on the front of his shirt to hide the man boobs he developed and feeling selfconscious sporting only a bald head where his once prize-winning fluffy, full, Afro stood out in a crowd. His parent punishment worked, he was now humble.

To this day whenever I hear any of the Doobie Brothers songs, it takes me back to that day as clear as if it were yesterday, especially when I hear the song “Old Black Water” which was the song they were playing right before we walked in never knowing the title until after the album was released. It always brings a faint smile of remembrance to my face hearing it, it makes me reminisced of Bell Bottom pants, Afro's, Shag hairstyles, smoking pot, the smell of incense and the term pass the Doobie, bro. This turned out to be the best summer a teen could have.