LYNNE, MY SAUCY SISTER

I believe our friends become like our family at some point; that is, if they stick around long enough to get tagged with the moniker of "family." I have a few long-term friends who are the sisters I never was blessed with having. Some would say I was lucky because I missed having to share my clothes, toys and secrets with someone who could get me in trouble by snitching on me. While a sister might snitch, a true friend has lips so tight nothing can pry them opened. My sisters from another mister or two/partners in crime are Lynne, Margie, Lisa, Theresa, Carol, Joyce and Linda.

We meet many people throughout our lives and some of those people have a profound effect upon our lives and destiny. Some people enter and remain with us always while others enter and exit remaining just long enough to alter the path upon which we walk. Although Lynne faded from my life for a period of time, the footsteps she left has remained with me always. I'm truly grateful to Lynne because she entered my life at a point when I needed to be saved...mostly from myself because I was hell-bent on burning the candle at both ends. My demons had led me down a narrow path of darkened, self-destruction and then I met my savior, Lynne. There are many who would disagree with me by saying Lynne fed my demons, but those people didn't see how I teetered on the edge before she came into the picture. They didn't see how Lynne saved my life by befriending me, by extending her hand to pull me away from the edge, by giving me an alternative to my misery. They didn't see my pain, but she did. She may have never totally understood it, but she saw it and was there for me.

To say I was in awe of Lynne is a severe understatement…everyone was in awe of her! She was the quintessential woman every young teenage girl dreamed of being. I remember the first time I ever saw her. When I opened the kitchen door returning home from gadding about and walked inside my house, I heard voices coming from my brother, Brian's work out room. Ever since he had come back from Vietnam with the title of Heavyweight Champion of the 7th Fleet, he seemed obsessed with the three B’s: boxing, body building and babes. My middle older brother was Mr. Body Beautiful of Bangor, Maine (a fictitious title I gave him.)  Needless to say, he spent a lot of time pumping iron so he’d have a perfect physique. And oh, how he loved the females to admire him and yes, admire him, they did! I opened the door and poked my head inside to let him know I was home and also to be a little nosy. I wanted to see what female he had back there trying to impress with his biceps and other things!

When I opened the door, standing in front of me was a vision of everything I thought I wanted to be. She was a tall, dark-haired beauty with beautiful brown eyes. (Maybe Bob Seger wrote his song Night Moves about Lynne or someone like her.) Her body was perfectly shaped and she stood confident in her hip-hugger bell-bottoms and a shirt unbuttoned just enough to show some tantalizing cleavage. Her blue chambray shirt was tied in a knot around her midriff to show off her abs. No fucking way! Did she work out also? Later, I found out she was a go-go dancer at some local nightclub and that’s how she met my brother.

She smiled at me as she eyed me up and down. I guess I passed inspection or maybe I failed because she immediately took me under her wing. I thought it was only because she was dating my brother, but opportunities like that don’t come often, so I just played it cool and went along for the ride. Whatever the reason she had for befriending me didn’t matter to me. I was just a kid, but the road I walked on with Lynne gave me an education I’ll never forget.

Shortly after meeting Lynne, my brother told her to NEVER give me any drugs. NOT EVER!!! At 14, I was already experimenting with most illegal substances, but the availability seemed to widen immensely as soon as she came into my life. Although she never gave me any hard drugs and didn't do any herself in my presence, being in her inner circle gave me the contacts to get anything I wanted. She and I would occasionally smoke a joint together, but that was more a social thing to do than it was to get high. Smoking dope for me was never really any big deal…it was just something everyone did. Adults had their cocktails as a social lubricant and the younger generation smoked weed. From where I stood, everyone appeared to get lubricated somehow!

When my brother and Lynne broke up, we continued being friends. In fact, by that time we spent most of our time together. I was blinded by Lynne’s aura, but I doubt if I had seen my role in the grand scheme of things it would have changed anything I did. I saw Lynne as my ticket out of Bangor, Maine and so when she suggested leaving, I jumped at the chance. She was older than me and was street savvy. I felt safe with her and as long as I was with her everything seemed to flow in what appeared to be a positive direction.

Lynne and I developed a strange relationship on the streets after we left Bangor. I could do as I pleased without any questions asked, but she always insisted on knowing where I was. I complied with her request because she took care of me and for that I was grateful. The streets of Boston became my new playground and Lynne became my guardian angel and surrogate mother. I watched how Lynne operated and she did whatever she needed to do with the grace of a cat to support us, but I was on a need-to-know basis so many things just weren't discussed. I complied by not asking too many questions.

Eventually, I started doing stuff intentionally to piss her off because after all I was a snotty teenager. You know how teenagers can be! I pushed her buttons often, but she rarely got angry at me. I certainly deserved a swift kick in the ass, but she never gave me one. One evening while she was "out," I got into a poker game with a group of guys who lived in the same building as us. They liked to party and so did I. When I foolishly lost all my money, I got cocky and used Lynne as a bet. When I lost, I immediately had an “Oh shit!” moment. I couldn’t believe I had done that! I really caught hell on that one, but I deserved it. Lynne graciously paid off my bet and made the winner a very happy man. I never played poker with that group again but was frequently asked to do so. Go figure!

It was a fast crowd and although I was readily accepted into it, there was an unspoken rule that no one was to mess with me in any way. I was COMPLETELY OFF LIMITS! I simply became the one who everyone liked to laugh with, hang out with and get high with. And Lynne was the one they all lusted after. I accepted my role and knew my place. I never tried to actively change it because I knew what I would be going up against. But the day did come when I was noticed first and Lynne was virtually invisible. That day immediately changed everything and my path was permanently altered once again.

I look back on my time with Lynne in those early days with many emotions. It's hard to believe she's gone now. Her Golden Years were filled with some major health problems that eventually led to hospice care and ultimately, her death. The waves of grief that consume me come at odd times and luckily most of them are when I'm by myself so as the flood gates open, I don't have to explain why I'm crying. 

Story to be continued...

THE LAST MILE

This is dedicated to Helen Evancheck who recently passed away at 98 years young on September 21, 2022. 

When I walked away there was no turning back. I knew from that point on my life would never be the same. Yes, I longed for the familiar surroundings I called home, yet that house would always remain with me no matter where I went. Running away only made the things I loved no longer a physical part of my life. I could hold them close in my mind and take them with me.

Looking back on it, I know now that my decision to leave was totally wrong, yet at the time it seemed I was trapped and had no other choice. That few weeks I spent on the psych ward after my first overdose, made me realize I had very few real friends. Each night when Wayne's mother came on duty, I would sit with her at the nurse's station and talk until I could fall asleep. We never once discussed her son or why I was on her floor. I knew she had read my chart and was familiar with all the notes written in it. What was there to discuss? I know I should have been ashamed, but she never made me feel uncomfortable. She talked to me as if she truly cared for my well-being and I always appreciated that. She was kind and gentle: warm and loving...all the things I needed most at that time.

I acted horrible during the day...defiant and always questioning authority. I refused to participate in any group therapy and used any recreation time to create weird things to decorate my room. My pride and joy were the bats I had made from modeling clay. I had painted them black with red eyes and then hung them with sewing thread from the pipe near the ceiling in my room. It seemed everything I did was aimed at getting a reaction. But no matter how outrageous I acted Mrs. Evancheck treated me the same way she treated me from the first time she met me when Wayne brought me home to meet his parents. She treated me like one of her own. 

I still remember the outrage I felt when my mother had brought me an electric razor so I could shave my legs and underarms and it was immediately taken away from me. I quickly challenged them by asking if they thought I was going to shave myself to death. Surely, they couldn't think I would try to hang myself with the cord...it wasn't long enough for that and besides hanging just wasn't my style. They never did give me a reason why they took it. They didn't have to give me a reason, so I went on being my usual obnoxious self. Why they didn't just medicate me was a mystery to me, but it probably had something to do with the fact that I would have enjoyed zoning out on some good psychiatric drugs. 

The law required any drug overdoses to be sent to the psych ward for 2 weeks of observation after surviving the ER and the ICU, but many people weren't that lucky. For most the only trip they took was to the morgue! The two weeks I was on C-4 was some of the hardest decision making time I have ever had. Due to my impaired judgment and being so screwed up, I made all the wrong decisions at that time! I had no adult I could turn to for guidance.  I just didn't trust anyone that way.

So I was alive! The overdose had not been intentional...I simply was out of control and on a very self-destructive path. I loved getting high and staying high. I feared nothing...not even death itself. I slowly retreated into a silent, safe place where I no longer felt any pain. Along with feeling no pain, I discovered I also felt no happiness, joy or love. Wayne had threatened to leave me if I didn't stop getting high as if that was going to stop me! Ha! Now, he was gone and I was truly alone...except for my drugs. Somehow they had replaced everything that was good or right in my life. They dulled the pain and I learned how to live being comfortable numb. 

Lynne, someone I considered a friend, offered me a way out and I took it.  I believed that nothing could be worse than what I had been experiencing. It wasn't until much later until I discovered that things always can get worse. It only took me a few days after being discharged from the hospital to realize going back to school and trying to straighten out my life was just not going to happen like everyone else wanted it to happen. The day I left home, I took one last look at Wayne's house before I walked down my street and walked towards the interstate with Lynne. That last mile was my point of no return. As we set out on the road, I left some of my pain behind but the biggest portion was something I would carry with me until I learned how to forgive.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

-Robert Frost-

A NIGHT TO REMEMBER

Lynne and I stuck our thumbs out to hitch a ride home. We had a small walk-up flat on the fifth floor located on Commonwealth Avenue several buildings up from the Public Gardens in Boston. We'd been at the Sizzleboard in Kenmore Square just to hangout for a while. The first time I ever walked in the Sizzleboard and saw Panama Red and Acapulco Gold listed as two flavors on their ice cream menu I knew Boston was where I belonged. No, they didn't have marijuana in their ice cream. They just borrowed various names of marijuana to put on the menu as flavors. To say it was a popular idea was an understatement. After all Boston and vicinity is a huge college city and so was marijuana in 1971.

Ordinarily, we might walk home, but it had just started to snow. You know, it was that kind of huge, lacy snowflakes that stick to your eyelashes and the end of your nose before melting. A VW bug pulled over and we quickly got in the back. It wasn't until that moment that our real adventure of the evening began. Immediately both of us were handed a thin piece of rope and were told to pull them back and forth. Sure thing! We did as instructed and lo and behold the windshield wipers worked and kept the flourishing accumulation of snow off the windshield.

It seems we weren't in the car more than a minute before a joint was lit. The next thing I know we were pulling up in front of their place to do a little partying, but I had no idea where we were because I hadn't paid attention to where the driver had taken us.  Lynne gave me the nod to let me know that it was cool, so we all piled out of the car and went upstairs to their apartment. Their living room was all the way in the back of the building. Lynne and I settled into spots next to each other on the floor in front of a homemade chunky wooden coffee table adorned with a large bowl of Fritos corn chips and various drug paraphernalia. I had the munchies so I immediately started eating the Fritos and one guy lit a joint and started passing it around while the other guy put some music on the stereo.

Yes, I was only 15, but I was already very well-versed in drugs by that age. I knew my way around as well as someone much older than me so when I started noticing that I was much higher than I should be I got a little concerned. At first, I didn't do anything, but sit back and observe what was going on around me to see if I could make any sense out of the situation. The two guys seemed to be talking in a language I didn't understand. No, it wasn't a foreign language. It was one I'd never heard before. It was a non-sensical one. One that only they understood, but as I looked at Lynne, she didn't seem concerned at all by this so I assumed this was just me. This was just in my mind. Oh goodie! I'm fucked up and don't know why!  Then all my senses seemed to fade away into a psychedelic haze. Was I tripping? Wait a minute! All I had done was smoke a little dope. How could I be tripping? Everyone else seemed fine. This just didn't make any sense to me.

At this point I stood up and asked if I could use their bathroom. Lynne seemed to sense something was wrong so she tagged along with me. As soon as we were out of ear shot, she started quizzing me about what was going on. I'm not one who is prone to paranoia, but in this case, it started to rear its ugly head. All I could think of was getting the hell out of Dodge. I told her what was going on and that I needed to leave. NOW! She went back in and grabbed our jackets and we immediately left.

The cold winter air had a momentary sobering effect on both of us and then holy shit! We realized neither of us knew where the hell we were. Boston is a big place and generally, we knew our way around, but it was the middle of the night by then and we were both high as hell so we had to take a moment to regroup. We usually used the Prudential Building as a beacon or landmark because it was the tallest building and we always seemed to be able to see it wherever we were. But it wasn't anywhere in sight. Where the hell were we? Why hadn't we paid attention to where these guys took us?

As we walked and talked, I told Lynne how I felt and as best I could figure I was the only one of the four who ate any of the Fritos. They had to have been laced with some hallucinogenic drug. What a cheap trick to pick up two females and try to drug them. I wonder what else they planned for us that night. I'm so glad we got out of there when we did.

As we walked I didn't want to walk too close to the buildings and the alleyways because I was afraid of being grabbed so I walked close to the street and Lynne didn't want to walk close to the street because she was afraid of being grabbed by someone in a car even though there wasn't any traffic. And she wasn't high like I was. Weren't we a pair? The longer we walked the worse I got and nothing looked familiar. Lynne kept assuring me she knew where she was, but I knew she was lying to me. I knew she was just trying to make me feel better because I was right on the verge on losing it. We came upon a car repair garage named Hampden Automotive Repairs and we both stopped dead in our tracks. My eyes filled with tears as I looked at Lynne and quizzically asked her if we had walked that far. You see, Hampden is a small town next to Bangor where we are both from in Maine. How could we have walked that far? It was another holy shit moment. Bangor was about a 6 hour drive from Boston.

Lynne finally gave up and walked close to the street with me because she saw I was starting to really unravel. As we slowly trucked along a cop car pulled over and asked us if we needed a ride. Lynne and I just looked at each other for a second. I took a deep breath because I knew this wasn't the good time to get busted and sent home.  Actually, no time was the good time to get busted and sent home but I was high as hell and I really didn't want to get hassled by the man while I was high.  We both knew there was no way around not getting in the cop car, so we eased our way into the back seat expecting the interrogation to begin.  We were surprised when it didn't. When I noticed the two "cops" didn't look like cops at all, but two scruffy-looking hippies instead, I started wondering what was going on.  Undercover, perhaps?  Had two young yahoos stolen a cop car and gone on a joy ride?  Tonight, anything was possible!

When we weren't asked for identification or asked where we live, we knew something was wrong, but we just looked at it like a gift from the Bostonian gods from old. They did, however, ask what we were doing walking at that time of night. We got a lecture about it not being a good thing to do because women can get raped doing stuff like that. Of course, we made up some bullshit story about being at a friend's house and getting lost when we left. I guess that wasn't too far from the truth except they weren't friends. They were assholes!

When asked where we were going, we chimed in and both said we were going to Stanetsky Memorial Chapels. The two hippie-looking cops gave each other a weird look when we said that, but then said to us that they couldn't take us all the way there because it's in a different district, but they could drop us off at the foot of the bridge. We knew that was a weird place to go in the middle of the night or anytime for that matter because it was a funeral parlor.  Lynne explained that we had a close friend that worked there on the weekends and that he'd make sure we'd get home safely and he did exactly that, but only after being subjected to hearing us ramble on about yet another one of our BIG adventures.  Thank you, Kenny Goldstein for being a lifesaver!