The Summer of Love. The Summer of Manhood. Both? Neither?

June 1970: it was a big, big year.
             "A Rite of Passage"







I was finally graduating from Saint Mark's grammar school and would become a man.

Well, maybe not a man, but I would begin a new life as a Freshman at Saint Monica's High School.



This sacred rite of passage, however, seemed to be lost on me. The other normal kids in my class seemed to know things. They knew about love and sex and English grammar. The knew about the three branches of our American government, how to spell and lots of stuff about God and Jesus and Mary and Joseph and also stuff about science.

   Me?  Uh-uh!

I had been too busy running for my life, dodging needle-tipped arrows, digging myself out of pits, surviving electrocutions, fighting off ambushes by the "Angry-Little-Man-Crew," pushing our fleet of broken down cars from one side of the street to the other, not to mention the psychological torture of the Catholic nuns at Saint Marks, and most recently, the bullying and physical torture of the "Wolf-Pack" hippie clan that repeatedly threw me over the cliffs in Malibu - TO ACTUALLY LEARN ANYTHING.

I was okay at math - accepted into the "Zero Period" advanced math program at Saint Monica's, but other than that I barely knew the difference between a noun and a verb. I was so preoccupied with ducking every time one of the kids in my class raised a hand - thinking I was going to be belted in the head - that I didn't have sufficient brain synapse to learn a blinking thing.

Why, I was so ignorant that I hardly knew where babies came from. 







It seemed my only "rite of passage" was the fact that I finally outgrew my dad's frugal invention of the infamous sugar-water, gel-concoction that attracted the mosquitoes to California.





I graduated from the hard shell helmet-look to the  dry-look with my long bangs as a junior-hippy.


The girls in my 8th grade class seemed to like my golden locks and began doting on me - you would think this was good... right?  Well, I don't think it had anything to do with any sort of romantic inclination. At our graduation party at Mike Dunagan's house the girls sat me on their lap and combed my hair as if they were 8-year-olds (in touch with there mothering instincts) playing with me like I was a doll. 

I didn't put up a fuss. It made me feel good. I enjoyed actual human contact and physical touch that didn't leave bruise marks or some kind of road rash. Though it wasn't love (other than Irene), this was the closest thing I had come to making contact with what might have looked like love.

I sat on the front steps of our Venice house, watched the world go by and surveyed the landscape - trying to take it all in.

I think the Lennons knew what love was.


I think the Blasers knew what love was.


I think the Tripps knew what love was.





My friends next door and across the street... surely Tommy and Jeffry and Joey and Ricky knew... right?







The girls in my class knew. Marilyn and Theresa and Andrea - they had to know... didn't they?











There was a normal family behind us - across the ally - the Arnolds - they knew. Right?


 (Photo courtesy of Cheryl Arnold - Miss Venice, Miss Santa Monica, and Miss LA)






So what is wrong with me? COULD SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME! I wanted to believe that what I felt for Andrea was love, but was so insecure that I couldn't utter one coherent word in her presence.

I was either retarded, like my brothers said, or I was damaged goods.  I began to wonder if I was even capable of something so grand a notion as love?

Numb! An Island! A Rock!  I had spent considerable time building a wall around my heart to protect myself - afraid of becoming vulnerable and afraid that only by being vulnerable could I know what love truly is.  "In case I need it when I get older."



Do I just blurt it out! Do I tell Andrea that I love her?  We didn't use the word in our family and I couldn't get the "L Word" past my lips.  Andrea, please, read between the lines.


I've traveled so far... I wanna know what love is. Please someone show me.



Do I let down my guard and trust my brothers? Maybe, one small steps at a time!  Take a little time and think things over. I have this mountain I have to climb.

Tomorrow, we are going to set out for another great adventure. It's always a great adventure when my family goes camping.

As usual we will cram a hundred bodies into our Ford station wagon and drive up the coast to visit our neighbor, Roger Sasson's, new property up by the Russian River.

I'm sure that I'll be perfectly safe and nothing will go wrong.... NEXT TIME "Russian River, The Man Hunt, Elephant Man and The Plague"