Of This And That In
The Old 1960s North Adamsville Neighborhood-Those Pale Blue Eyes,
Revisited -With Lou Reed's "Pale Blue Eyes" In Mind
From The Pen Of Frank Jackman
Not all
adventures in social networking lead to good results and happy endings,
although don’t blame the Internet or rather the fact of the Internet as a
communication tool for bringing people together on that. People, men and women
in serious and unserious relationships, have been screwing them up without that
technological help ever since Adam and Eve, maybe before, so back off. I have a
story to tell about how the Internet brought two fellow classmates from the
North Adamsville Class of 1964, Sam Lowell and Melinda Loring, together, how
they started out a relationship sparked by the Internet but were able to mess
things up royally as if that instrumentality never existed. Needless to say the
pair are no longer together after a short stormy affair, although they both
have subsequently admitted to me individually that they still believed that it
was written in the stars that they belonged together. But that good hope
sentiment sometimes doesn’t mean a thing if the couple couldn’t survive in each
other’s presence, couldn’t seem to connect the dots. Such situations happen
more than one might think so let’s look at how things unfolded and how I got
wind of what went down.
Despite the
sad story of Sam and Melinda, a story that Sam has bitterly called the damned
50 year never-ending North Adamsville curse that has plagued him since
childhood, I have spent not a little time lately touting the virtues of the
Internet in allowing me and the members of the North Adamsville Class of 1964,
or what is left of it, the remnant that has survived and is findable with the
new technologies (some will never be found by choice or by being excluded from
the “information super-highway” that they have not been able to navigate), to
communicate with each other some fifty years and many miles later on a class
website fairly recently set up to gather in classmates for our 50th
anniversary reunion. I had noted in earlier sketches my own successes with this
website in being able to tout a guy whose photos of my old childhood neighborhood
send me spinning down memory lane, another about an old corner boy and our
Adventure car hop misadventures looking for the heart of Saturday night,
writing a tribute to our classmates fallen in Vietnam, and in answering a
perplexing question about what I saw as my role as a commentator on the site. I
admit I had to marvel at some of the communications technology that makes our
work a lot easier than back in the day. The Internet was only maybe a dream, a
mad monk scientist far-fetched science fiction dream then as we struggled with
three by five cards and archaic Dewey Decimal systems.
I also admitted
in one of those sketches that for most of these fifty years since graduation I
had studiously avoided returning to the old town, having fully subscribed to my
own version of the 50 year curse that Sam’s railed about to me one night, for
any past class reunions but this one I had wanted to attend, the reasons which
not need detain us here. Or I should say rather wanted to attend once the
reunion committee was able to track me down and invite me to attend. Or a
better “rather” to join a NA64.com website run by a wizard webmaster, Donna,
who was also our class Vice-President to keep up to date on progress for that
reunion.
Part of the
reason I did join the class site was to keep informed about upcoming events but
also as is my wont to make commentary about various aspects of the old hometown,
the high school then, and any other tidbit that my esteemed fellow classmates
might want to ponder after all these years. All this made simple as pie by the
act of joining. Once logged in one is provided with a personal profile page
complete with space for private e-mails, story-telling, placing various vital
statistics like kids and grandkids, and space for the billion photos of that progeny,
mostly it seems for those darling grandkids that seem to pop up everywhere. Additionally, there is a section, a general
comment section, the “Message Forum” page, where one and all can place material
they think of general interest to the class as a whole. I have used that page
more than once over the past several months.
A while back,
a few months ago now, I went on to the class website to check out a new
addition to the list of those who had joined the site recently. We can use our
personal settings to be informed of that kind of information on a more or less frequent
basis. The guy who had just joined was a guy I did not know but I had seen
around the school and so I was ready to click off the site (by the way you
would have seen almost everybody in the four years you were there with one
thing or another even though the class had baby-boomer times over 500 students).
Then I noticed that Sam Lowell had
placed a comment in the “Message Forum” section about Melinda Loring and how
she had recently as a result of slipping in an indoor swimming pool up in
Epping, New Hampshire, while exercising
had broken her right hip requiring surgery. We were asked to send Melinda best
wishes messages for a speedy recovery on her profile page.
Now I knew
Sam Lowell from high school, had been a teammate of his on the indoor and
outdoor track teams, and had hung around with him, had been one of his corner
boys at Salducci’s Pizza Parlor “up the Downs” most of junior and senior years.
I had, when Sam joined the website in November of 2013 shortly after I had done
so, sent him some private e-mails and we had for a time maintained an exchange
of messages about the old days and about what had been happening since then.
Then I had not heard from him or seen anything listed about or by him for a few
months before his announcement about Melinda’s condition. Frankly I did not
recall him knowing Melinda Loring back in school although I know we both knew
who she was. I remember that we had both commented at one time back then in
some after school boys’ locker room talk that she was a definite “fox” in the language of the
hormonal schoolboy 1960s night but
“unapproachable” to ragamuffin boys like us. Sam had not mentioned to me being
in touch with her on the site in any of our communications. I also knew that he
lived in Holden here in Massachusetts and that Melinda listed her home town as
up near the White Mountains in New Hampshire. Most importantly I knew that Sam
had been with the same woman, Laura, for about thirty years. (I was not sure
then whether they were married or if so for how long or not since he never
indicated their status. I did know that he had been married twice before and
that the first one was he said “a disaster.”) So I sent him a private e-mail
message asking “what gives with you and Melinda?” and how he came to be the guy
who placed a notice about her condition on the “Message Forum” page. In return
he asked for my Internet e-mail address because he wanted to explain some
things without going on to the class site. I knew something was up.
I got more,
much more, than I bargained over the course of several e-mail and cellphone
exchanges and at a lunch where we arranged to meet to talk things over as his
affair developed for so hear me out. To start it seems that Sam was really
gung-ho, unlike me, about going to and being a part of this 50th
anniversary class reunion. He had gone to many of previous ones at 5, 10, 25,
and 40 years but last fall he had not heard anything about planning for a 50th
reunion so he, like the relatively few in our generation, what I have always
called the generation of ’68 reflecting the time when many of us came of social
age, New Age or so we thought, who are the least bit Internet savvy these days,
created an event page on Facebook
looking for interested classmates and asking if anybody knew whether any plans
were afoot. Melinda subsequently sent him a message on that event page asking
what he knew of any doings. Sam sent her back a message about what little he
knew and informed her that he was prepared to organize something if nothing was
in the works but in that message he forgot to give his name. Melinda replied
innocently enough, “Who are you?” And that was their start.
They
exchanged another round of e-mails where Melinda mentioned that, having access to her Magnet, her class of 1964 yearbook, and
she had not known him back then she had looked up his class photo, and said he
was “very handsome.” Naturally any guy from six to sixty would have to
seriously consider anybody, any female in Sam’s case, who would throw that
unanticipated, unsolicited comment a man’s way especially since she sent her
class photo as well. He shyly (so he said) returned the compliment and made
comment about her pale blue eyes from a photo on her Facebook homepage. (Sam by the way had long before “lost” his
yearbook as had I and we had made jokes about their whereabouts. I did not tell
him mine was at the bottom of the Neptune River thrown there shortly after
graduation in a fit of hubris, and a desperate need to shake the dust of the
old town from my boots.)That got them started on what would be a blizzard of
e-mails over the next several weeks but just then got them together via Facebook as he “friended” her and she
accepted.
They began by
telling each other about what they had been up to over the last 50 years. Both
agreed after the first couple of exchanges that Facebook with those hungry eyes prying eyes was not the place for
their messages and so they exchanged their Internet e-mail addresses. At first
they wrote of the obvious stuff about work histories, educational
accomplishments, and relevant facts about who they hung around with, and who
they didn’t, back in school. Stuff that was easy to discuss since they had a
common pool of knowledge about people, places and events from the old days.
Melinda told
Sam that she had been a professor of education at various colleges after a number
of years in public school education in various locations in Massachusetts and
Connecticut, most recently at the University of New Hampshire and was still
plodding away at that profession. Sam in return told her of his rather more
checkered resume as he had done many things over the years, including teaching,
but was at this time a lawyer working mainly out of his house on appeals cases
and had been for the past few years. He also kept referring to a period in the
1970s after he had done his military service when he had been what he called a
“vagabond.” Melinda, who confessed to having been rather more conventional
during that “generation of ’68” time that Sam kept referring to by
characterizing herself as a “worker bee,” was intrigued by Sam’s reference and
kept questioning him about its meaning. He deflected her comments, saying he
would go into that more if they got friendlier (which let Melinda to make a
“flirty” remark which Sam would not reveal to me). During these early e-mails
they both would press the issue of what to do about organizing a reunion.
Melinda stated that she did not have much time given her professional
commitments and distance from the Boston area to help organize anything from
scratch but would help out as best she could. Sam rather quickly through a
separate source that he connected with from the old school found out that there
was already a North Adamsville class website in existence as well as an embryo
of a reunion committee, informed Melinda of that, and they both joined the site
over the next few days.
That settled
they resumed their more personal e-mails. Melinda made Sam privately gulp at
first when she told him that she had been a “Glendale” girl. That word brought
back memories of a bevy of girls around school who were, well, “stuck up” with
their in-style cashmere sweaters and smart skirts and shoes and their total
distain, or so he always thought, for ragamuffin guys like him (and me) from
the Atlantic “wrong side of the tracks” section of North Adamsville. When he asked
her about that Glendale girl stuff and the social gap he perceived between them
then she replied that she had to laugh since her family was as poor as church
mice (his term, not hers), gentile poor in that lowly professional white-collar
way like ministers and such. A lot of their early e-mails were filled with such
reflections about what had really gone on in their very much white
working-class town. Sam, and Melinda too from what he mentioned to me
later, began to feel more at ease
talking to each other as they shared cyber-laughs about youthful
misconceptions.
The long and short of it was that both of them had come up the
hard way, including physical and mental abuses by parents that turned out to be
a lot more common than either of them had realized back then. They began
discussing some very personal and hard to speak of things about their
respective childhoods. In one e-mail exchange both had noted how they had much
in common after all and that they were at ease with each other in these
exchanges. They talked of becoming friends, although neither seemed to be above
being a little “flirty” (Sam’s term) along the way.
In one e-mail Sam, after having had a few
drinks that night and feeling expansive, related the following story to Melinda
to her delight if disbelief. A story that I well remember from back in the
after school boys’ locker room and so can verify the truth of what he said. In
the spring of his junior year at North Adamsville Sam had noticed Melinda
around school (they later confirmed they had had no classes together, although
having been in the same junior high and high schools for five years or so they
must have run into each other or been in the same room sometime if only the
auditorium, gym or cafeteria) and had an interest in meeting her after seeing
her around a few times.
Of course in high school, at least back then,
maybe now too, a guy didn’t just go up to a girl and start making his moves. He
got “intelligence,” found out if she had a guy already, stuff like that.
Usually this information was gathered in the boys “lav” (especially the Monday
morning before school session when all the “hot” news of the weekend was
discussed) but in this case since Sam was a trackman this happened after school
in the boys’ locker room where he inquired of two guys he knew who knew her
what she was like. Both agreed instantly that she was a “fox” but told him to
forget it because she was “unapproachable.”
Meaning low-rent raggedy guys like
Sam forget it. Meaning, as well, that Sam as is almost always true with the
young just moved on to his fantasy next best thing. And so they did not meet
then. Melinda said she laughed when he related that story to her and in their
further exchanges related lots of information to Sam about what she was really
going through back then with an extraordinary tough family life, lots of low
self-esteem, and other problems.
They both
agreed later that something seemed to
“written in the stars” for them especially after an exchange when they
had asked each other what elementary each had gone to. Melinda replied that she
had, of course, gone to Glendale Elementary (along with that bevy of girls who
stuck, and were “stuck-up” with each
other through North Adamsville Junior High and then the high school) and Sam
answered that he had not gone to a feeder school for North but had gone to a
feeder school for cross-town rival Adamsville High, Snug Harbor Elementary down
in the Adamsville “projects,” before his family returned to North Adamsville
where he also attended the same junior high as Melinda and then North. Melinda
freaked at that statement which Sam wrote about later, later after the flames
had died. Let him tell it his way, or part of it anyway something he wrote and
called A Simple Twist Of Fate:
“…One exchange, the one that matters here, involved the question of where we had gone to elementary school, she to Glendale and he to Snug Harbor. That Snug Harbor response by me brought out the fact that Melinda’s mother, Margaret, had been a swimming instructor down at the Adamsville South Beach during the 1950s summers and had during her career there saved a drowning boy. Melinda, nine at the time, had been present at the event.
I flipped out when I heard that information. See, I love the ocean but I live in fear of it, fear to go too far out when swimming because I had almost drowned when I was nine down at the Adamsville South Beach one summer. Typical boy story: as the ocean was rising I had spied a log, an abandoned telephone pole, and had grabbed onto it. I drifted out for a while and then I realized I had gone too far but instead of holding onto the log I decided to try and swim for shore. Not a good swimmer and just too far out I started going down. My brother who was on the shore called for help and the swimming instructor came out and saved me in a nick of time.
So what lesson did I draw from that today. Anything about fate, karma, or just plain good luck. No. I told Melinda that since we had already “met” maybe we should get together and discuss the matter more fully. And guess what, she agreed. Jesus.”
And so it
went. Somehow this blizzard of e-mails
morphed into some insipid cyberspace kindred spirit torch-bearing. Something
cosmic was driving them forward. Eventually the e-mail system became too slow
for their eight million questions for each and their attraction to each other
so the ubiquitous cellphone became their mode of communication.
So they exchanged cell-phone numbers. One cold
December night Sam, from his car sitting in an isolated parking lot, called
Melinda and they talked for a couple of hours. Laughing, giggling and being
somewhat shy while they were doing so.
Here is an e-mail that Sam sent after that
first cell phone talk:
“Melinda –Well now I
can truly say that I am “talking” to Melinda Loring and wouldn’t all those boys
in that “phantom” locker room be jealous. And rightfully so. I hope that you
got from the sound of my voice that I was, well, excited to talk to you (after
that schoolboy weak-kneed, and dry mouth, anticipation nervousness).Now we can
go easy with only one more “nervous” thing, actually meeting. I think we are
going to be okay whatever happens. I haven’t felt like this since my last
serious relationship ended about ten years. We both carry whatever baggage we
have accumulated and will discuss that but we shall see. All I know for now is
forward. BTW I am in favor of keeping our “talking” and whatever very private
for now-meaning I am not going to be “boasting” to one and all about what we
are up to-let’s say to the reunion committee or those long-ago locker room boys
as I help prepare for the reunion and come in contact with those remaining.
Later Sam”
And her response:
“Hi again Sam,
Me too, very positive
about our first conversation. You have a very youthful voice, without our
old Boston/North Adamsville accent! Felt
bad you were sitting in your car sorta late in the evening, not even haven't
gotten home; but it sounds like you have a lot of energy, jogging
very early in the morning on those "astroturf "soccer fields.
Okay, no bragging
about our pre-reunion stuff! I did mention our connecting over the 50th to
Kathy before I got that message, but will keep it private from here on in.
So much zigzagging
over our lost histories! Of course I want to hear more about your having been
chained to the White House fence! And these various volunteer groups for
assorted war victims; and especially about how you train for nonviolent
resistance and the philosophies that go with that (King, Gandhi, Thoreau &
those wonderful Irish women from the 70s & you & so many more).
Ha ha, at least we
have sound bodies, and it looks like pretty strong minds too!
Looking forward to
our chat on Thursday evening, and I hope that the 50th committee work
goes well and you have fun reconnecting with some of our classmates too!”
Along with
that new communication arrangement Melinda began to inquire more fully about
Sam’s marital status. She had been married twice for relatively short periods
but was now free and single and had been for a while although she was still
hopeful about meeting the “right guy.” She had noticed on one of his Facebook photos what looked like a
wedding ring except it was on the wrong hand. Sam quickly deflected her
question by (truthfully) telling Melinda that ring, a ring given to him by old
girlfriend who got it from her grandmother, was worn by him for symbolic
reasons which he did not want to disclose. But, no, he was not married.
And,
yes, he had been married twice when he was younger and they were both
short-lived. Sam kind of, no, he definitely fudged on that question though
saying he was “separated” from Laura in order to see which way the winds were
blowing with Melinda. Melinda accepted that explanation at face value, then.
During this period they began discussing meeting in person somewhere for
dinner. The long and short of it was that after a blizzard of calls they
finally arranged to meet for dinner in Portsmouth and discuss things. But
before that meeting Sam had a pang of conscious, had to tell Melinda what the
score was about Laura. Hell, let him tell the story the way he wrote it in an
e-mail just before they were to meet:
“Hi Melinda –Well we have been on a roller-coaster
so far and we have not even met in person yet. That is what is so surreal about
this whole thing that had developed between us. That business from last night
about me tracking your record down got me thinking though. Kind of has forced
my hand about something that I had intended to bring up tomorrow as the first
order of business to clear the air and give our friendship a proper footing. I
was struck by the way you said you have been honest with me and that got me
motivated to write this now instead of wait until tomorrow. I have, unlike you,
not always been honest in the past. For example, not to brag or anything like
that but to deal with the honesty question, a couple of times way back I have
had five girlfriends at one time so there was no way I could be honest and
juggle all that. So I was lying to beat the band. I have gotten better and
tried to be honest with you and have been doing so. But sometimes you can be
honest and still omit things and that is what this e-mail is about. I take it as
something that we will work through as we go along and I hope you agree.
You know as well as I do that we both
carry a lot of baggage, busted marriages, affairs, and so forth. On the other
hand we are both old enough to have whatever level of friendship we want from
just friends to an affair because we both as far as I know have no ties that
would prohibit that. And even if we did in this day in age we could still have
whatever relationship we wanted. As long as we both have our eyes open and know
the score. That “know the score” part is what I want to talk about. It is
nothing bad but it is a complication. And even if we decide to be just friends
it is part of what is unfolding. I have decided to do the rest of this as a
narrative so here goes.
Up until a few weeks ago for the past
ten years or so since the end of my last serious relationship I was just
rolling along writing, doing legal work, doing politics, playing golf and all
the rest. Doing all of that while living in the same house as the woman that
was my last serious romantic relationship, Laura, who is still my closest woman
friend. I have known her for over twenty- five years and about twenty years ago
we bought this modest house in Holden. As time went on though we had, as
couples will, our problems until about ten years ago we decided that it wasn’t
working. But we both wanted to keep the house (and the cats, Willie Boy, my
Willie Boy and her Sasho) and be friends (I won’t go into all of that but you
can ask me about it). So that is what we did. And nothing wrong with that
people make such arrangements all the time. And so time moved on. I did my
thing-she did hers and we do things together. For example we still go out to
Saratoga to Laura’s family for Thanksgiving and Christmas since I don’t have
family that way. Stuff like that. At some level we have deep affection for each
other but it is just easier and more comfortable to be friends.
Then out of the blue you came along.
You know how we “met” and all so I don’t need to go into that but what happened
is that I was not sure where we were heading (at one point if anywhere) and so
I made a point of keeping that information to myself. Remember I made a point
about just concentrating on us and not on other baggage stuff. Part of it
obviously is that if we were not going anywhere then such information didn’t
matter and if we were then that would just be an awkward situation that we
would deal with. That is what a lot of my concern about expectations, the way
we have met and all of that has been about. I have told her about you in
general terms (the only way to put it since we still have not met) and since
this whole thing has been topsy-turvy that is where things stand right now.
If all of this seems like too much then
so be it-but as for me I still say forward- if you don’t that is okay and we
can work on some other way to be friends. I think we both strongly want to be
friends and should be damn it if that is what we want. Later Sam”
That issue
momentarily resolved they met at a fancy restaurant in Portsmouth, restaurant
of her choosing since she knew the area. Sam was attending a conference in
Portland, Maine so that town was symbolic half- way point. They met and some
spark began right from the first, hands touching and smiles glowing immediately
as they chatted away like two magpies. Maybe it had been that they had gone to
the same high school together, maybe it had been the same tough growing up poor and hungry
profiles which they exchanged, maybe it had been the six million things they had in common
like an interest Russian literature and history, maybe it had been their
connections in the education field, and maybe knowing Sam it had been Melinda’s
pale blue eyes but a spark had been lit. They agreed that after fifty years of
“missing” each other they had to play the thing out.
And so they
did meeting for dinner many times, going to Washington together for a few days,
and fatally winding up at Melinda’s house in New Hampshire one night, one cold
night, one night when the wine flowed and, well, you can figure it out. But for
Sam, almost from the start there was always that nagging lie about his
relationship with Laura (and also the need to lie to her about his whereabouts
on many occasions when he was with Melinda) which as time went on he began to
kind of half tell Melinda about.
Needless to
say Melinda, a woman according to Sam, who was serially monogamous and sought
exclusive possession of her men became furious about Sam’s more complicated
relationship with Laura. As Sam gave more details to Melinda while both
developed strong feeling of affection for each other Melinda more and more
pressed the issue of Sam’s fully leaving Laura. He would hedge, saying he
needed more time. Then Melinda’s pool accident and subsequent surgery occurred
and hence the notice provided by him on the site.
That is
where I entered the picture and contacted Sam. But as I learned from Sam later
as things unwound this recovery time was also a time when Sam, who would go up
to New Hampshire frequently (telling Laura he was helping out an old
classmate), to help Melinda out around her house, take her to appointments and
get her out of the home felt more like a care-giver than a lover. He made what
became the fatal mistake of telling Melinda that change in feelings and she
because furious despite her condition. Here is the fatal e-mail which Sam
claimed was a “love letter” and Melinda declared in no uncertain terms sounded
like nothing but a closing argument, a way out for him:
“Dearest Melinda -Where have those hands grabbing at each other across
the table in delight/need/want at Moxy’s (and elsewhere) gone. Where has your
hand grabbing my arm while walking outside of Rudi’s (and elsewhere) and me
glad to have you do it gone. Where have the little stolen sweet kisses of
Portsmouth parking lots gone. Where have those endless phone calls where we
hated to sign off talking about great adventures ahead gone. Where have those
roundabout hours of blissful silliness gone. Where have those shy but
meaningful moments when our feelings for each other blossomed gone. I could go
on with a million more examples when were on the same page and were relaxed and
confident about our relationship and where it might head but you get the idea.
I sensed from this e-mail that you are beginning to get the feeling like
me that you/I/we are not in a good place these days. Think about the first time
at Newburyport in precious December and last week. I had already spoken about
this last week and now I think you sense that too from your side. Our talk
today where we got all theoretical about the future without any sweet talk kind
of epitomized that. Frankly, and you can speak for yourself, I am unhappy with
the drift of things now. I/you/we spent too much time thinking about the
future, future plans, about the relationship itself and not enough about how to
get out of the rough patch we are in. How to get the romance back and just
relax with each other. Why don’t we take
a step back, maybe two, today and tomorrow and think about things we can say
and do when we meet on Thursday to break the impasse. Why don’t we step back
and just forget about the future for a little bit and just think we are
“dating” for right now with all its sense of mystery in the now with no future
goals. Or maybe that we should think about just being friends for a while. I
always want to be friends with you that is for sure. These are only
suggestions. The main thing is that you/I/we think about this and not rush into
a blizzard of e-mails. This rough patch requires thinking not writing-
From a guy who misses those delighted hands across the table, that
grabbing hand on my arm, those endless funny phone calls waited for in
anticipation and nervousness, those sweet shy stolen kisses, that bubble
silliness when the outside world didn’t matter for a bit, those intimate moments
when you and I both blushed a teenage-like blush at how close we were, those
all night talkfests, those candles flittering in the dark, serious Melinda and
Sam just being foolish and off-guard, the kindnesses we did for each other just
because we were special to each other, the sense that our thing was written in
the wind, and lots of other things you remember as well as I do. Sam”
See Sam also
told me he was getting cold feet about his future with Melinda who was talking
more and more about them living together. Shortly after Melinda had recovered
enough to be able to drive on her own they agreed to meet one night for dinner
in Newburyport and discuss where they were going. That night the sparks flew,
there were acrimonious arguments, and finally Sam walked out furious at some of
the things Melinda said. That was the last they saw of each other in person
although there were a few bitter e-mails and cellphone calls before Melinda
closed the curtain
down on the affair. So there is the story, the sad story and no happy
ending.
