If you grow up in a big city, your city makes the national news every day. But when you grow up in a town of about 4000 people, you are pretty unlikely to hear Walter Cronkite call out its name.

My hometown of Slatington made the national news two times that I can remember. One time was the fire, and complete destruction, of a Pfizer pigments plant just outside of town. The other was the tale of a truck crashing into an apartment house for the elderly, killing at least one resident.

I’ve written about the pigments plant before. I worked there for about four years, the time of the fire.  It was old, so old it was built with wooden pegs instead of nails.  The fire apparently started in a storage room filled with paper bags.  It happened on third shift. I, fortunately, worked first shift.  My brother, who also worked there, called me at 2am to tell me what was happening. On the national news the report went something like:  chemical plant goes up in flames near the town of Slatington, about sixty miles north of Philadelphia. Of course, Philadelphia had to be mentioned. Whoever heard of Slatington?

No lives were lost in the fire. The same cannot be said of the apartment house crash. Slatington is built on steep hills. Its Main Street is a very steep hill and also Route 873.  About halfway down the hill, the street makes a sudden right turn, a ninety degree turn. On that turn is Slatington’s famous Fireman’s Statue. Also on the turn is an apartment house for elderly residents.  If you are coming down Main you are staring straight at the apartment house, when you make the right turn.  One afternoon, a tractor trailer driver failed to make the turn and plowed right into the apartment house causing much destruction and at least one death.  We were on the national news that night as well.

It is unfortunate that the way to make the news is for something bad to happen. But, that is the nature of life.  On the positive side, the apartment house was rebuilt and still stands in the same spot, protected by metal bollards out front.  The pigments plant was also rebuilt, but closed a few years later. Pfizer paid to return that area to pristine condition right along the river. It is along the road to Lehigh Gap Nature Center. Every time I drive by I am amazed how there is no sign of the plant whatsoever!

So, I guess if the only way to make the national news is for something bad to happen, I hope Slatington is never heard from again. I’d be happy to just let it be a quiet little town, built on hills, along the banks of the Lehigh River.

If any of my Slatington readers can remember another time that we made the national new, I’d love to hear about it.

Today is my birthday. Happy Birthday to me!  If being 64, 65, and 66 puts you in your  mid-60s, then today I am entering my late 60s. Yikes! But that’s okay, because I am more happy and content than I have been in a while.  Things are going well.

67 is too old for a mid-life crisis. I know that. I accept that. For it to be a mid-life crisis I would have to live to 134! Not likely!  67 is not too old for some reflection. You are never too old nor too young for some self-reflection.  Please bear with me while I show some gratitude and share some regrets. Cut me some slack! I’m 67!

I am grateful for my relatively good health. I survived two cancers but still am very active. I am thankful that I never smoked nor done drugs. I have eaten too many Whoppers and Big Macs. Oh well. I celebrated turning 50 by running a marathon. I can’t do that anymore, but Emma and I are celebrating my birthday by running a 5k on Memorial Day. Wish us luck!

I am grateful for friends and family. My family is awesome. With three brothers and a sister and tons of nieces and nephews, I can look back on wonderful times and solid support and times I laughed so hard that milk came out my nose!  I’ve been married more than once and I even  have lots of good memories there. Those marriages gave me three wonderful children. I am immensely proud of my kids.  A few of my friends I have known most of my life. I love them. Some of my friends I have made along the way. I love them too.  Being an introvert, I prefer my own company most of the time. But my friends have always been there when I needed them. I hope they can say the same about me.

I am grateful to have been taught the love of the outdoors. I would much rather be in the middle of the woods, or on the shore of a lake, than anywhere else.

I am grateful for the addition of Buddhism to my life. It has brought me peace and, I think, made me a little kinder. I learned the value of impermanence and the wisdom of knowing that everything has a life span. Enjoy each moment before it is gone!  It made me less afraid of death because I believe I will have more lives and more adventures. At least I hope so.

I am grateful for having such a varied career path. I have had many interesting jobs. One job even enabled me to cross the equator! How cool is that!?

I am grateful for having grown up as a lower middle class boy in a wonderful little town in a wonderful time in history, the 1960s.  To have had the opportunity to live in the same times as The Beatles is awesome. And to quote them…it’s getting better all the time.

To quote Frank Sinatra…regrets, I have a few, but then again too few to mention. But let me mention them. I wish I had gotten more time with my daughter, Amy. Seventeen years was not enough. I wish I had been a saver and not a spender!  Too late now!  I wish I had spent more time with my dad in his last years of life. I wish some of my relationships hadn’t ended the way they did and I take responsibility for some of that.  I wish some relationships might have had a chance to grow.  But for various reasons, they didn’t. On a lighter note, I regret that I ever tried turnips. Worst food ever!

This has been my longest blogpost. I hope it wasn’t too long. It is hard to stuff 67 years into the usual length of my posts. Let me end by saying that life is a highway, I wanna ride it, all  night long.  Haha. I digress.  At 67, I look forward to at least another decade or two. Thanks for letting me share my life with you. My wish for you is that you look back, when you turn 67, and say that you are happy and content and that you had a life well lived.

 

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I’ve written before about how unathletic I am, even giving myself the title of “worst wrestler ever”.  But just because I wasn’t very good does not mean I didn’t have fun. One of my fondest memories from my junior high years was playing tackle football, without pads, with my friends on the vacant lots of Slatington.

This was certainly not organized football run by the school system nor the Booster Club. This was my friends and I having a good time getting dirty and banged up and maybe even scoring a touchdown.  No touch football. No flag football. Tackle all the way. No one ever got seriously hurt. Well…there was that one time. More on that later in this post.

I was an uptown boy. The downtown kids probably had their own places to play. We had two that I can remember. First, there was the Bell Telephone property on Second Street. We played there for a little until they built a new building on OUR vacant lot! I remember playing most of our games on a vacant lot across from Harding Funeral Home. It was almost perfect. It was a rectangle. It had concrete posts every few yards, good for calling first downs.  The negatives were an empty fish pond on one end and a wooded cliff on the other. Halftimes were spent swinging on the Tarzan swing that someone built over the cliff.  Kids today can’t play on that field because it is now a blacktop parking lot for the funeral home. To quote Joni Mitchell, “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot”.

So, banged up with cuts and bruises but no broken bones. Until. I was playing football with three cousins, Mike and Terry Burke and Jim Becker.  This time we were playing in the huge yard of a secluded mansion close to the Burke’s home. Jim was running with the ball. Terry caught him by the ankles. Jim fell onto his shoulder and broke his collar bone. We quickly went to Terry and Mike’s mom for help. I can still hear Aunt Lorna Burke yelling at us for being so careless! Kids!!  Haha! Good times!!  So, in a couple days I will be 67 and still have not had one broken bone. Yeah, I know, probably shouldn’t have said that.

Where were the places you played as a kid? Remember the good times that seem to be harder to find today?  Remember the boundless energy and thrill of an exciting future? Remember the friends you spent time with then and how you assumed they would be friends for life?  I do.  Every single day.

 

 

Yesterday I spent a rainy afternoon reading the newspaper. Not just any newspaper. The Slate! Yes, Slatington High School’s school newspaper, The Slate!  I was lucky enough to have a classmate lend me her collection of every single issue from our shared high school years. September of 1966 through June of 1970.

What an afternoon of memories, laughs, surprises, and heartbreak!  It reminded me how much I have forgotten in fifty years. I cannot recall a tennis court being installed on the school parking lot.  There are teachers I cannot recall. I guess because I didn’t have them as teachers.  I didn’t know that we had students who were pilots, magazine writers, and children of missionaries who grew up in Turkey!

While the New York Times is known as this country’s “newspaper of record”, the Slate has to be known as the newspaper of record for extracurriculars of my high school.  Football at my high school…winless in my freshman year to undefeated in my senior year.  Track, basketball, wrestling, baseball, softball were also covered. Reading the names of the stars of those sports brought back good memories but also curiosity. What happened to them after high school? Did they continue to excel in their sport or like many of us develop laziness and a pot belly?  Are band members still playing their instrument of choice or are those instruments gathering dust in an attic?

A feature in every issue was student of the month. It was interesting to read about them and their plans for their futures. It was fun to see the pictures of prom courts from the past. It was great to read about the individual accomplishments of students, from perfect bowling games to winning golf tournaments over adults. I had forgotten about the Talent Fashion Show and our annual Magazine Sale.

I mentioned heartbreak. Seeing a picture of Larry Horner on Slave Day and seeing him listed as class clown was heartbreaking. Larry was killed in Vietnam right after graduating from Slatington High.  Seeing pictures of other classmates who are no longer with us was sad.  Sad, but a reminder to be thankful for every day we are still here.

Don’t worry about my fascination with the past. I am not living there. I just like to visit now and then.  I know not everyone can look back on their high school years with joy. I think I am one of the lucky ones.  I enjoy sharing that. So, again, I am not stuck in the past. I am enjoying my present immmensely! And the future…can’t wait! Bring it on! But my nostalgic rainy afternoon was wonderful.

I end with a shout out to Nancy Haydt (Boyer) who allowed me to read her collection of memories. I’m very thankful that she is a self proclaimed saver!

 

So… shall I go deep today? Or should I go to fun memories from growing up in the best small town ever?  How about both?

Mindfulness is THE big thing today. Being in the moment. Enjoying actions, even the mundane, to their fullest. Buddhist philosophy. If you are walking, walk. If you are chewing, chew. If you are doing the dishes, do the dishes.

If mindfulness had even been heard of when I was a child, it would certainly have applied to eating potato chips. If you are eating a potato chip, eat a potato chip. Slatington’s Golden Sun Potato Chips were not just good potato chips. They were the best potato chips ever, at least between caveman times and about twenty some years ago when they ceased production.  A day that will live in infamy.

The factory, a non-descript white concrete building, sat at the corner of Church and Seventh Street at the edge of town. There were woods behind it, slate quarries across the street, and the little village of Emerald about a mile up the road.  Who would think that such a place could produce such a delightful delight!?

They came in a translucent bag. On the bag was a rising, large, smiling, golden sun. Open the bag and the immediate fragrance of the perfect combination of potato, lard, and salt hits your nose and let’s you know great things are on the way!  The chips themselves were far from uniform like today’s chips tend to be. I’m talking to you Lays! You would hope for a chip with a big grease bubble. Or better yet, one that was folded over! If you got really lucky you would find a double folded over, grease bubbled chip tucked inside another  folded over, grease bubbled chip. Oh…be still my heart!

Did I mention they were wonderful?  So there is the fun memory of a small town childhood part.  What does that have to do with going deep?   Golden Sun chips represent something deep in my soul. First the memory of a wonderful childhood. Second, finding the grease bubbled chip represents the unexpected pleasures in life like rainbows after a thunderstorm. Finally, finding the double folded, double bubbled chip is like finding that ideal relationship, where everything just fits together perfectly. Still looking for that!

So there you have it…the Zen of  a Golden Sun.  Hungry?

 

There is an obscure, but really good, ’60s song by Simon and Garfunkel. It’s called Dangling Conversation. They sing about how we go through our lives in conversation with others, but the conversations are dangling because we never talk about the important things. The dangling conversations, according to Paul Simon, are the discussions about poetry and politics, weather and work. They dangle because they are not about the real important things, the “feelings” things.

I think, while there is some truth to this, that Simon and Garfunkel were a bit naïve. Maybe it is because they were probably twenty years old when it was written. They had not yet lived a full, long life. I don’t think it is possible to go through a life without having those difficult talks. Not all conversations can be dangling. But wouldn’t that be nice!

Throughout my life I have had those talks. We all have! Well, except for Paul Simon. But he is now in his seventies, so my guess is he has had quite a few by now.

My tough talks have been numerous. I can remember sitting my kids down to talk to them about the infamous birds and bees!  Another was with my big brother Jim, when he picked me up from high school because my mom was dying. It was him again who told me that my dad had died. My brother, Jim, the master of difficult conversations.

When my daughter relapsed with her leukemia, the conversation with the doctor telling me things look very bleak.  That was hard. Very hard.  Telling my second daughter, eight years old, that her mom and dad are getting divorced and dad is moving out.  There was nothing dangling about that conversation!

So it goes. On and on. Dangling conversations interspersed with the difficult ones. Life. I guess the very last difficult conversation will have to do with end of life stuff. But that can wait…for a long, long time.

Well this was a downer post!  I am going to end with some happy conversations, the ones we should have more of! Dad, I’m getting married!! It’s a girl!!!   You got accepted to the school you wanted!!!   You are going to love semi-retirement!!!

That’s life. A mix of good and bad. But we wouldn’t appreciate the good if we didn’t have some bad. We wouldn’t learn from the bad if we didn’t have good to compare it to.

The very naïve, Paul Simon, also wrote this song, also about avoiding the difficult parts of life: I am a rock, I am an island, and a rock feels no pain, and an island never cries. C’mon Paul! Get in the game! Life, and all its responsibilities, is pretty damn awesome!

 

 

 

Woke up. Fell out of bed. Dragged a comb across my head.  Apparently, that  is Paul McCartney’s morning routine.

What is important to you when you wake up?  What are the first things you think about? Is it that hot steaming cup of coffee you are about to taste? Is it how good that hot booming shower is going to feel? Are you thinking about what to have for breakfast? Or are your concerns a little deeper than that? Are my kids ok?  Do I really have to go to work today? What does my day have in store?

In about three weeks I am turning 67. So, sometimes, my first thought is that I made it through another night!  Another night of tossing and turning and getting up to pee.

We all go through our morning routines. That routine launches us into today’s adventure. Will I laugh, today, so hard that I pee my pants…just a little?  Will the drive-up lane at Dunkin Donuts be too long to stop?  Will I cry today? Will I suffer some type of indignity or loss?  Will the people I love be happy and productive?  Will this be THE BEST DAY EVER? A little shout out to Spongebob there!

We go through our days…the laughter, the tears.  Every day, in at least some small way, is different than the last. Every day is a gift.

What is important to you at the end of the day? What do you think about as you close your eyes?  Did I do any good today? Are my loved ones happy?  Did I eat too many unhealthy foods?  Did I exercise enough?  How will I sleep tonight?

As  you all know, I am a huge Beatles fan. I am ending this post with something from them. It is something we can sing to our small kids. It is something we can sing to the love of our life. It is someting we can sing to ourselves. Golden slumbers fill your eyes…smiles await you when you rise…sleep pretty darling do not cry…and I will sing a lullabye.

I know this particular post has more questions than answers. But that is a purpose of my blog. To get people to think about their lives. I hope I acccomplished that today! Good day, Sunshine!

 

Remember that old Sixties song by the Association?  And Windy has stormy eyes…that flash at the sound of lies…and Windy has wings to fly…above the clouds…above the clouds!  A great song, though in hindsight the lyrics are maybe a little silly.

But what got me thinking about that song?  Look outside, if you are in the Lehigh Valley!  It is windy yet again! Almost every single day…it’s either windy or strongly breezy.  It is making a nice warm spring day into more of a fall day.  Is it just here? I have readers in Michigan and Georgia and Florida. Is it the same for you?

Don’t get me wrong. I love wind. It has always been my favorite weather. Wind makes you feel alive! Wind challenges you when you walk! Wind feels great blowing through your hair! OK, I can no longer attest to that last one. But, it also feels good cooling a hot scalp! There is a limit, though, to my love of wind. A winter’s day in a deep and dark December is not the time for wind. I much prefer a Summer breeze. It makes me feel fine, blowing through the jasmine in my mind!  Last few sentences…two more songs!

It is not just me who is confounded by this change in the weather. Others have remarked about the number of windy days or the consistent strength of the strong breezes.  I am sure there is a logical and scientific explanation for this new weather pattern. Maybe it is climate change. But, even though I am a lefty liberal, we can’t blame everything on that! So what is it? The world spinning faster? God blowing out birthday candles?  The muse to write more songs about wind?

Here is one thing I know for sure. We have no control over it! So if you head outside today hold on to your hat, keep you car in your lane, and sing out loudly as you walk or drive. Maybe a little Kansas…all we are is dust in the wind! Or when all else fails…some Earth, Wind, and Fire! Enjoy your day!

 

It’s always fun to compare my daughter Emma’s experience in high school today with  mine fifty years ago.  She is a sophomore at Parkland and fifty years ago I was a junior at Slatington.  Here is a huge difference. Today they call them specials and I think we called them electives. I am talking about the classes you take more for fun or in the school’s eyes to make you a more well rounded individual. These are the classes that if you don’t get a good grade, you can still get into college.

At Parkland, today, you get a literal catalogue of classes you can take. They may range from Parenting to Female Writers or from Web Design to Conversational Greek! There are literally well over a hundred choices. We pretty much had shop, home economics, art, and music. I would have mentioned physical education, but everyone had to take gym.  I was in College Prep, in high school, so I can’t remember having any electives. But, that was a long time ago.

In elementary school, we all had to take art and music. In junior high, they added shop for the boys and home ec for the girls. Yes, we were not very enlightened back then.  In junior high we still had to take art and music.   For those readers from Slatington, remember these four junior high specials teachers? Mr. Kester, Mr. Jones. Mrs. Evans. Uh oh. I am blanking on home ec in junior high.  Help me, classmates!

By the time we made it to high school, I guess the school figured that we had our lives all planned out. They divided us up by career focus. That was crazy! I’m 66 and still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up!

Some teacher names from high school. Mr. Trettel, Mrs. Rossi, Miss Dixie (yes, Dixie) Driscoll. Mr. Lesh. Mr. Scarseletti, and Mr. Jones again.

I think it is interesting, though, that these so-called electives truly were important. They taught us our strengths and weaknesses. I still draw stick figures for people. But I remember some students who excelled at drawing. Ruthann Klase comes to mind. If these classes didn’t exist, a student might miss out on a potential career, or at least a good avocation.  The students with excellent music skills (again, not me) were identified in these classes and hopefully encouraged to explore it further.

I am all for a well rounded education and I think I got one in my years of attending Slatington schools. But, I must admit, seeing that Parkland catalogue of specials makes me very envious.  On the plus side, how often are you going to use Conversational Greek anyway!?

 

 

Well, as far as I know, there never has been a Slatington Fair. But that could have been a good Simon and Garfunkel song title! Who knows where Scarborough is anyway?

No, we didn’t have a fair back in the sixties so we had to develop other ways to amuse ourselves.  Remember, Slatington was, and still is, a town of about 4000 people. We are not Bethlehem with all of its fests. We are not Allentown with the Great Allentown Fair and Mayfair (at Cedar Crest College this year!).

The closest actual fair we could go to was the Lehighton Fair. It had rides and entertainment. But it is probably better known as the place to see “girly” shows long after other fairs had banned them.  At least that is what I am told! I was a minor!

So, no fair.  But we did have the Lions Club Carnival. It was located on Church Street (our street with no churches) between Arts Bar and the Neff House. I remember saving up pennies for weeks ahead of time just for the games of chance. And, of course, there was plenty of good food including Smitty’s French Fries.   I lived within a block or two of the carnival, so I was there every night. Good times!

We also had church socials to look forward to. Yes, it was certainly a simpler time. Our church, St. John’s UCC, was famous for its peach festival. Since then I noticed that other UCC churches also have peach festivals. I am not sure what the connection is between the UCC and peaches. Maybe it was the founder’s favorite fruit! Ah, yes, not much beats a delicious, juicy peach. But I digress. My favorite part of the church socials/festivals was the inevitable cake walk. A group of people would line up and walk in a circle while music played. When the music stopped, depending on where you were standing, you would win a cake.  The excitement! Be still my heart!  I did once win a banana cake!

I think there was also a community picnic for the people that lived on Kuehner Hill. But that was the swanky part of town, and I was always a non-swanky. To this day, I wear my non-swankiness with pride!

I am not writing about the Walnutport Carnival. Not because it is not in Slatington, but more because it brings back horrible memories.  It was at that carnival that I tried to impress a girl by eating ten ice cream and waffle sandwiches in a row!  I succeeded in the goal of eating the sandwiches, but not in impressing the girl. Apparently she did not find throwing up in public an attractive quality. Go figure!

That’s enough fun memories for today. The sun is shining brightly in Schnecksville. Time to head outside.