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1117blog

Memories

Ronnie Bass was a very bright boy who looked like Alfred E. Neuman and is probably a millionaire.

Richard Bosley lived in a ranch house diagonally across the street from me and was driving a car that crashed and killed a passenger and I understand he now lives in Africa.

Howie Acker drew intricate, tiny battle scenes and one day I squirted ink on him, accidentally, and the teacher, Mr. Occupinti (did he even have a first name?), sent me to the principal’s office.

It’s weird the things I remember about school classmates. I just browsed a list of all the graduates from my class and I recalled most of the names and some odd details. It strikes me that I knew so little about any of them, aside from sparse, unrelated memories. I hope that if any of my former classmates read this they are not offended and tempted to take physical revenge on me.

There was Steve Baxter, who had a very large nose and probably still does and wrestled in the 178 pound class and would sit at the end of the bench with his large nose in a book waiting for his bout while the rest of us were sweating nervous bullets waiting for our turn on the mat.

Cathy Benke was a cheerleader, All- American type, and her family owned a lumber yard, it think it was Benke’s Building Supply. I believe I played on the Benke’s Building Supply Little League team.

Billy Bender was a skinny kid who was easily and commonly picked on by many students, including me, I am ashamed to admit. He was among a group of kids who were unfortunately victimized by many of us simply because we could. Stuart Bilsky was another common victim as was Bill Buntemeyer who always picked his nose and Billy Doukas and Donald Prosky who also was probably on the spectrum and I expect is wildly successful in IT.

Ricky Blakemore played guitar in a band with Steve Ross who also played guitar. I was friends with Ross, a chubby kid, for a time. Once the police were called because we were lighting firecrackers in his backyard. One day he hit me on the head and knocked me out although he didn’t mean to hurt me and I came to pretty quickly, no worse for the wear.

Sam Breuer was a kid who acted like he was 70 years old and as far as anyone knew, he had no personality but was bright.

Joan Bonino was a particularly homely girl who had turned particularly beautiful when I saw her at the one and only reunion I attended.

Alan Buchman was a big guy, a wannabe school hood who never quite made the grade as was William Cass.

Bruce Campbell was a true bully from a family of bullies who died a few years ago, probably of drugs.

Fred Cashman was my tragic friend who slipped into schizophrenia in his early 20s and led a troubled life.

Joe Clauss is a vague memory but I only mention him because I think I should remember more about him though I don’t remember why.

Kevin Coughlan was a wrestling pet of the coach and I was always mystified about his popularity and jealous as I was definitely a better wrestler and you can ask anybody about that.

Michael Collins had red hair and freckles, of course, with a name like Collins and I think we were friends briefly.

Mike Cullen, not to be confused with Mike Collins, was a member of our gang and we’d drive in his beat-up car, nicknamed the Ogermobile, slowing down to ogle girls walking down the streets of Hackensack and Teaneck at night, hoping for some absurd reason, that a girl would agree to a lift and then become romantically involved with us but it never even remotely happened. Mike was later in a bad car accident and then slipped into heavy drugs and rode a Harley even though his feet barely touched the ground.

Mike Danylchuck was BMOC, star quarterback, boyfriend of the cheerleader queen and the envy of all the guys, like me, and I am sorry to say that I heard he has been married three times so isn’t that a shame, Mr. BMOC who puts his pants on one leg at a time just like the rest of us.

James DeMarinas was a very thin, very good cross country runner and he died and that is all I recall about him.

I was just reading a story on the Spartan webpage about the newest members of the high school sports hall of fame and was pleased to see that Robert Fatovic was not named because I was a better player than he was although he thought he was something else and I know I sound really small and I hear he became an architect and despite my memories, probably turned out to be a nice guy.

Jode Derocco was allegedly a class tramp who gave a blow job to Tommy Syme who everyone called “Slime” and the rumor or fact passed around school like wildfire, even to those of us who didn’t really know what a blow job was.

Kevin Duffy was a pitcher on my Little League team who also had many freckles as I assume he was of Irish heritage.

Jane Feil was a beautiful and friendly blonde girl who died a few years out of high school.

Gary Fogle declined to shower very often and he was very heavy and very smelly but may very well have been a nice guy for all I know.

Pete Foody was a friend for a while and he lived on the corner of Forest Avenue across from Van Saun Park and his father was a doctor.

Michelle Gerbino was a tall, very pretty, brown haired cheerleader whose locker was next to mine and she treated me like a pet although I always wanted more.

Darlene Giampetruzzi was the school’s greatest drama queen and actress and her brother could hit a baseball 400 feet.

Pete Hynes was a good baseball player and a better volunteer fireman.

Bill Knichel did three tours in Vietnam and I saw him at the reunion and he talked like he and I were best buds even though I barely remembered ever hanging out with him and I assume his brains were thoroughly scrambled in Vietnam.

Richard Troisi was a very large boy who had more facial hair than any of us and who did not seem overly bright and brought pornographic playing cards to school.

Don Scheck was president of the class and is undoubtedly very wealthy as I think he probably slept in a shirt and tie and his hair was always perfectly combed as a high school student.

Howie Russo lived up the street and we were friends as kids but drifted apart and he died while still a young man. He always had a continuous line of snot from his nose to his mouth and he was a very good bowler and isn’t that an epitaph.

Billy Paulsen lived down the block and he was very into chemistry and had a number of pet mice.

Allen Miller was an odd duck who could never look you in the eye while talking to you and looking back he was probably on the spectrum although back then it was just considered weird by the utterly insensitive lot of us.

Mike Maresca had skin grafted on to his arm after he was badly burned in a fire when he was very young.

Bennet Leshnover I believe became a rabbi, but I’m not sure, although he was always the rabbi type.

Jimmy Labianca was president of the fifth grade class and I always thought his name Lobby Anka because everyone just called him Labianca and not Jimmy and I saw him years later and he had a huge afro after a year in Vietnam and later became a lawyer, I think although I doubt it.

It struck me that these are all one-dimensional memories and I wonder how I would be recalled.