Markin comment:
Well, I guess I can trust Frankie after all. Frankie, Francis Xavier Riley, my old middle school and high school pal who I have been telling one and all about in a few stories, stories that prove, prove beyond a doubt, that teen angst, teen alienation, teen love, teen whatever is not some recent invention. Hell, even we now celebrated (maybe) baby-boomers had those maladies. I would further argue that we developed them into rarefied art forms, but that is for another time.
What I have on my mind at this time is based on Frankie’s creditable story about his pre- friendship with me (with me, Peter Paul Markin) adventures in the great carnival skees night. I got kind of nervous at first when he started right off the bat about my take on his attempt to be king of the teen dance club night scene but by the end of his tale I kind of automatically dismissed his early remark as just sour grapes and a rather unreasonable bitterness about a mere passing fancy. The carnival skees story, well, it was good. Frankie good.
Like I said in the introduction to Frankie’s guest skees story I have plenty of my own carnival and amusement park stories to tell, with and without Frankie, and will, but today I am, once again, giving my space over to Frankie, Frankie straight up, Frankie in his own voice, and his story about how he fared as a budding young football star. The time of this story is, as least the heart of it, also once again just before I linked up with him in middle school (I didn’t arrive at the school until about mid-school year of seventh grade). As I also mentioned in introducing the skees story the other stories I have told you about were from later, later, when I was there as an eye witness so I can trust them a little. This one though also seems kind of, well, Frankie-like so let him take responsibility for telling it.
Note: I do not have, other than as sporting propositions (bets, okay), as a fervent youthful follower of the hometown North Adamsville High School football team, and a rooting interest in the results of the “mythical” college football national championships, have much insider information about the nature of the game on the field and so do not really know much about the inside stuff that Frankie will tell you, if he does so. You know things like how to crack block a guy across from you and not get caught by the refs, or what kind of jaw-breaking stuff to have in your hands for the close in-fighting, or talking trash about the mother of the guy across from you to throw him off his game. Kid’s stuff really. If it sounds kind of fishy to you don’t blame me, or if you, can let me know where something is off and set me straight so I can tell Frankie off.
Francis Xavier Riley comment:
Football is serious business, American-style football that is, manly football, not that namby-pamby old sod knee pants and polo shirt soccer stuff everybody else in the world calls football. At least it was serious, American serious, business in my 1950s growing-up cold-water flat in a North Adamsville tenement, Sagamore Street tenement, presided over by one Patrick James Riley, my father, but known far and wide (neighborhood, far and wide, especially Shamrock Grille far and wide) as “Boyo” Riley.
Who knows, I certainly don’t in any case, when I got my first inkling that football was indeed the serious business of the Riley quarters. Maybe a Cold War night pick-up sandlot grade school game where blessed, or half-blessed, maybe, Patrick “Boyo” Riley, cheered bloody murder from the sidelines when my oldest brother, four years older brother, Tommy (known as “Tommy Thunder” in his high school playing days for those who remember that legendary North Adamsville High name) pushed one over the goal-line.
Or, maybe, even back before memory, before football name memory, sitting in the old (now old), wind-swept, uncomfortable-seat Veterans Stadium watching, totally confused and only marginally interested, as North Adamsville duked it out with cross-town arch-rival Adamsville for bragging rights for the year on hallowed Thanksgiving Days. Or, maybe, and more probable than not, hearing the lord Boyo making another of those ill-timed, ill-advised “sneak” (sneak from my mother, blessed mother, not half-blessed, no way, Maude) bets over the hushed telephone on “Fighting Irish” Notre Dame in their ignoble 1950s black night period.
Although I cannot name that first time, for sure, I can name the time of the time of Francis Xavier Riley’s understanding of when he knew he had better make football serious business, or else. Yes, indeed it was that sandlot grade school game, that now inevitable Riley baptism game where that self-same blessed, or half-blessed, maybe, Patrick “Boyo” Riley, cheered bloody murder from the sidelines when my next older brother, two years older brother, Timmy (known as “Timmy the Tiger” in his high school playing days for those who remember that also legendary North Adamsville High name) pushed one over the goal-line. That’s where Boyo laid down the law that come next fall, that 1956 next fall, I would be getting my Riley turn to tear up that sandlot over the younger brothers of those on the field that day.
And I bought into it, bought into it heart and soul, then anyway. So, naturally, dutifully the next fall I was in passed down uniform as one Patrick “Boyo” Riley screamed bloody murder from the sidelines as I performed my Riley baptism in that sandlot grade school game, and pushed my own football over the goal-line. Pushed that football for all it was worth, moaning and groaning, twisting and turning, all one and ten pounds of me, maybe, over some guys like Fallon, McNally, and Hennigan, who would take their own places alongside Tommy Thunder and Timmy the Tiger come their Class of 1964 North Adamsville time.
But I have to tell you about the why, seriously. The why of why I bought into the Riley curse. Sure I was just a grade school kid of ten and didn’t know what the hell I wanted, or didn’t want. And, yes, before you all go off and try to psycho-analyze my behavior to kingdom come, I wanted to please Boyo. Or else. That "or else" being a boxing, or six, behind the ears, if you didn’t know. And actually football was fun, for the minute it took anyway, to find “daylight” and run like crazy, unimpeded, on that field toward that goal-line. With Boyo, and his cronies screaming that bloody murder like crazy. (I didn’t know until later, about twenty years later, that the damned fool bet, “sneaky” bet, from my mother, as usual, heavily on these games with said cronies. Jesus.)
But that’s just the obvious stuff. Here’s the boy’s-eye stuff that kept me going for more than a while. Tommy (I won’t use the Thunder part, although Markin would probably beat that nickname to death if he told the story) was beginning to make a name for himself up at the high school, even if it was only the junior varsity at first, when I started to notice how I fit into the Riley scheme of things. See, because Tommy, tough, hard, chip off the old block (of Boyo, naturally), corner boy, hell, king corner boy who else would it be, bulging tee-shirt, swivel-hipped Tommy was getting attention for his football exploits. People, old people, and others would give me the “nod.” You know the nod, right. Nothing said, just a little tip of the neck to signify that you were somebody, or related to somebody that mattered in the North Adamsville universe. And, of course, I gave that same nod back to signify that I knew that they were paying proper respect to the brother of their knight-errant. Ask Markin about it, about the nod. I think, now that I have had a good amount of time to think on it, that half the reason that he hung around me was to bask in that nod glow. Yah, ask him, although on this so-called "pre-markinian” stuff he may be agnostic. The bastard. Whatever else I swear just the nod, and the expectation of the nod, kept me on track for a year, maybe more.
There’s more though, and maybe in today’s hyped-up and pampered football world when serious prospects start getting the royal treatment at about age six this is no big deal. Tommy started to get some serious attention from my father’s cronies (there is no other way to describe this Irish mafia lot, who inhabited that Shamrock Grille like it was a holy sanctuary, and, although I didn’t realize it at the time, it was) and “cadging” an occasion drink, a liquor drink, a fellowship liquor drink from them. Yah, everybody wanted to be around Tommy, just for the rub off. And you know, I still don’t know whether all that crazy attention was good or bad. See, the idea was that they thought that he was going to be picked up by some college team after high school (he really was that good) and they would have inside information on some real bets. Of course, they all secretly or openly, were praying, if they knew how to pray, or remembered, wanted that college to be black night 1950s Notre Dame but I don’t know for a fact that they were all that choosy about what school took him.
Okay enough with the early reasons. They were all right, and sufficient, but as Tommy’s fame grew a little wider (and Timmy started making moves in that same football star direction) all of a sudden (all of a sudden for then girl-shy, but girl-interested, girl mystery charms interested anyway, me) girls, good-looking girls, some from the high school, some from I don’t know where, started showing up at the Sagamore Street cold-water flat. With cars. And with letting Tommy drive those cars. And not some dumpy your father’s car either (if your father had a car, which Boyo, like Markin’s father, usually didn’t which is probably why we both friendship connected on the car issue).
Sure the cars were a draw early, sweet Chevvies, some convertibles, a little of this and that but as I got older just having those girls around when I started to know the what’s up about girls, although there still was plenty of mystery about them, was enough. See, the girls were practically camped out in front of the house. They obviously didn’t notice or care about the crooked, jammed front door that you had to lift just right to get in the front door of the tenement downstairs. Or that paint, that paint that was desperately needed about six years before as the shingles had that weather-beaten look, that weather-beaten look that spoke of careless renters and not owner-occupiers. All I know was that there were horns at all times of the day and night, especially in summer, pushed down by nervous girls of all sizes and shapes, all foxy sizes and shapes that is.
This you will not believe but one time three girls showed up together. I asked them where they were going to meet the other two guys on the date at just to pass the time of day (and, as Tommy’s brother, to see whether they met my secret worthiness test). And one, one honey blond, slender with black Capris on, and, and , well, let’s leave it at that, plus about a hundred pounds of purring sexuality (and who caused me more than one restless night, and a few hundred Hail Marys) said, “Oh no, we’re all going together with just Tommy.” What? And Tommy, Tommy said, well, you know what he said- “What can a man do?” Yes, indeed, what can a man do. So I will give you three guesses about what kept me motivated, football motivated, when the nod thing got old.
And so, as 1958 arrives and “serious” seventh grade organized middle school football was all the talk, you expect me to now go into my own Riley legendary status. Right? And I would, except there isn’t one. See, old rugged, chip off the old block, corner boy tough (and that was tough in those days if you wanted to keep your place in front of some mom and pa variety store) Tommy and old muscle-chiseled Timmy got whatever one Patrick “Boyo” Riley (and sainted Maude) had to give in the way of football genes to his progeny. Tommy weighed in at about 210, a mean football field 210 (heck, that was a corner store hangout, beach shoreline drinking bout complete with hanging girls, off-hand barroom brawl 210 as well) and chiseled Timmy (no drink) at 195. I never weighed more than 120 (or more than 140, wet or dry it seemed, all through high school) once I made my big move at that sandlot debut I told you about before. More than that though, I had the "slows" that need no further description, and was un-coordinated to boot. Finished. So in seventh grade, the autumn “pre-markinian” (watch Peter Paul go crazy over that one like he did when he read my skeets story) seventh grade part, I tried out for the team but didn’t make it. And, funny, the old man, the old man for once did not box ears, or moan and groan about some mystical Fighting Irish lost and continued black night because I was not going to, single-handedly, save their “bloody arses” (a Boyo quote on that last part).
But still, and blame this strictly on Tommy and Timmy not the old man, the half-blessed old man, maybe, and certainly not sainted Ma, Maude, I developed a very, a very healthy, interest in girls, and kept looking for one like that honey blond that I interviewed and told you about before. (Ya, the one that gave me the restless nights, that one.) But, see, that kind of thing takes a whole different skill set. You bet it does. So when I didn’t make the team I started going book nutty. Oh sure I liked books before, and liked to read, especially detective stories (that’s where I got half the names I made up to call twists, oops, girls), but now I started to read everything and anything.
Why? Well, maybe you don’t remember, or maybe you’re just too young to know, but when we were growing up and Markin will back me up on this, christ we talked about it enough, the “beat” thing, or as Markin put it in one of his foolish stories about me the “faux” beat thing, was in high gear. What I noticed, or two things I noticed, was that the “beat” girls I saw in Boston and Cambridge looked kind of foxy (and kind of easy to get to know) and that some of the nubiles (ya, girls, I learned that one from going to the Museum of Fine Arts over there on Huntington Avenue in Boston. They had some neat Egypt stuff there too.) at old North Adamsville Junior High (ya, ya, I know just like Markin that it’s now middle school) were dressing kind of “beat.” So I started dressing (much to Maude’s and Boyo’s displeasure, especially Maude’s) beat-flannel shirt, work boots (couldn’t afford engineer boots that I would have died for), black chino pants (no cuffs, Markin, get it) and my own personal touch, what I was known for from middle school to the end of high school- my midnight sunglasses.
So with my dressing the part and my new found wisdom I started to make my moves, my “faux” beat moves, quietly at first just a little off-hand remark here or there to some girl. Most moved off, offended by something, probably the midnight sunglasses in school. But here is where psychology comes in. If I started saying stuff in a sing-song way, a really be-bop way like you’d see or hear the beat poets do, and I kept at it rather than give up after a few words some of the girls, and here is the beautiful part, some of the best looking, cutest, and brightest girls, the girls that counted started to stay around me. That’s where Markin came in, came to our school, and cashed in on my psychological insights.
And guess who one of the girls was who liked my pitter-patter, although not the first, definitely not the first with her little Catholic rectitude thing (a serious copy of Ma Maude’s little Catholic rectitude thing), my everlovin’ sweetie, my main squeeze (although I wouldn’t dream of calling her that to her face, even in private), my middle school and high one and only, Joanne. Now Markin said this thing was about football so I will see if I can talk him into letting me tell you about the ins and outs of my “courtship” of Joanne another time. Probably not, see, they, Markin and Joanne, didn’t get along, although they were always civil to each other, at least that’s how I remember it. But, maybe, I can tell you something here that will cause him to relent. Markin was sweet, sweet as a girl-shy, off-beat, hell, timid, boy could be, in middle school, on Joanne. And she was sweet on him, at least that’s what I heard. Sweet on him before I worked my be-bop in the 1950s schoolboy beat night on her. After that, strictly no contest.
As for the football. Did I regret not growing big enough to eat a house for lunch and have room to spare and also not having to work overtime to have the girls come ‘round the house like they did with Tommy and Timmy. Well, yes I did, but like Tommy always used to say- “What’s a man to do?’’ Do not get me wrong, I spend many an enjoyable granite-grey autumn Saturday afternoon watching and screaming my head off as the lads, some of those same lads that I ran roughshod over in sandlot grade school, did their business, especially that final victory over arch-rival Adamsville High in November, 1963. The thing is what they did the rest of the week? Those six periods of gym per day must have been exhausting. Those 'study' halls must have really taxed their abilities to the limit. Moreover, being fed the victor's grapes by nubile young women must have atrophied their mental capacities. Meanwhile this long gone daddy, this arcane knowledge-ladened long gone daddy, with Markin in tow, always in tow, be-bopped his way into the 1960s night.
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