As introverted and retiring as I am now, I was much more so back in 1975.
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View Dave Ventre's profile
As introverted and retiring as I am now, I was much more so back in 1975.
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...although the time shifts of DST have been regular occurrences my entire life, only since 2012 have they become somewhat important to me.
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The storms began as I left her house with her kiss still on my lips, and grew in ferocity as I drove south along the Turnpike.
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No one had ever gotten married at the station before.
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We are yet mired in anxiety.
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But for a long time, being an oblivious sort of person, I, um, sort of forgot about it.
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We were now very lost, and out of time.
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I inadvertently found myself in the business of selling hot merchandise.
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My family has had a few feuds, but they were long ago and I only heard of them as rumors and legends when I was very young. One involved a marriage deemed unsuitable for ethnic reasons, resulting in disowning of a daughter and lifelong estrangement of grandkids from grandparents. This prompted my Dad to say,…
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I'd like to say that it was a summer out of a Ray Bradbury tale...
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Like any kid, I banged back and forth among various “what do I want to be when I grow up?” fantasies.
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My home town was home to a large, and now defunct, youth organization.
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STILL cannot post comments on other people's stories, so...
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I was not at all nervous; my fear of flying, like so many of them, developed later.
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I STILL cannot post comments on other people’s stories, so…. Comments on “Favorite Teacher” prompt. Educator of the Year – Remembering Milton by Dana Susan Lehrman A very evocative tale for me…my grade school had a Milton of its own, although he was the shop teacher, not custodial staff. Mr. Crawley never got full peer-to-peer…
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Behind the counter were two very attractive, serious looking women in crisp white lab coats...
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I, in the throes of the Dunning-Kruger Effect*, decided that it was obviously the bike that was blocking my path to Über-ridership.
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"Dave Ventre? Did you have Dr. Edwards at FDU?"
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"My latest attempt to post a comment the normal way yielded a new error message"
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This might have been a lesson learned, though.
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Having never had a pot experience that was either pleasant or memorable, I just stuck to tried, true and non-felonious ethanol.
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Commenting Problems Update
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Commenting the only way I know how....
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(Please note: I am actually reading, and wish to comment upon, other Retrospect writer’s stories. But for some reason, since early August I am unable to reply to anyone’s stories but my own, no matter where I log in from. I also can’t even reply to other writer’s comments. All I get is a 503…
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(Please note: I am actually reading, and wish to comment upon, other Retrospect writer’s stories. But for some reason, since early August I am unable to reply to anyone’s stories but my own, no matter where I log in from. All I get is a 503 server error. Until and unless this changes, I will…
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Santiago Calatrava's Milwaukee Art Museum is one of the strangest buildings I have ever seen or heard of.
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"...the chimera of Security"
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This story makes more sense if you know a little about the mechanics of riding a mountain bike. Think of a catcher getting set for a pitch, or a tennis player preparing to receive a serve. Picture their posture. Knees bent, elbows bent, hinged at the waist, maybe swaying a bit. They are loose,…
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Hi, fellow ‘spectors, I’m working my way through the backlog after a 4-5 week down time (long story…and I am not sure what it was about). The only thing I have apropos to this prompt is: https://www.myretrospect.com/stories/veni-vidi-ego-erravi-male/
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His favorite athlete was Rocky Marciano.
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One of the birthdays I remember best was not one of mine.
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Fact is, my whole family was sufficiently fractious and dysfunctional that generational differences were swamped by more direct issues.
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As far as I know, no ban has ever been imposed on any book that I wanted to read in the place and time that I wished to read it.
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Looking outward, unseen and unheard, I take solace knowing that for a while at least, I am safe.
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This upset me terribly.
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One day, in my late teens, at a family wedding, Mom was drinking as she usually was back then...
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They were always readmitted, though; Dave seemed unable to hold a grudge.
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In Copper Harbor, we always stay at the King Copper motel.
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That August, Veronica walked out on me.
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Eventually I was permitted basement access, and found it a fascinating place.
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As I made that move, the brunette cutie to my right clasped her hand around my wrist and whispered "that is SO annoying!"
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I don't have any guilty pleasures
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My only company was a little Sears AM transistor radio.
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One hot summer, I built a Mount and Brungs Proportional Diluter.
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As the Covid pandemic gripped us in fear and sadness, working from home, I felt a growing need for cheerful, upbeat things.
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And then back home, me and Dad, under spooky tracks and past dangerous dogs, to warmth, maybe a snack, and my friends Dick Tracy, Moon Mullins and Rick O'Shay.
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The sun was just at the horizon. I could hear a strange sound which I could not at first identify through my thick rubber hood.
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Judging by the store I went to, I can place this story some time in the late 90s. Gina was away in Lawrence, Kansas doing some collaborative research with a scientist at KU. Of course I picked THEN to get the flu. After a couple of days, I started to feel very ill. I had…
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I had always been fascinated by the ideas of working at night, working outside and working alone.
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It was a June night of thunderstorms in central New Jersey
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It's a challenging, exhilarating drive that cries out to be done fast in a small nimble open-top rear-wheel-drive sports car, or a good motorcycle.
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This photo, snapped from atop a tripod on my old Fujica SLR, captures a pivotal time in my life.
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I broke with personal tradition and resolved to change myself
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Then the paramedics began running up the hill with stretchers and backboards. Still, no Cindy.
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I have many Halloween memories, but can’t recall a single specific Halloween from before I went to college. All I have are fragments. Sepia-tones Instamatic snaps in my mind of me and other little kids wandering in and out of the pools of light and shadow of the streets in my neighborhood, seeking candy. No…
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I don't wish to give the impression that I am compiling a screed against Perfidious Womankind...
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I have always had a fascination with obscure words and terms.
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This is more about books and reading and being a weird little kid than about any single book. I was a nerd. A geek. A prototypical Poindexter (a nickname I was actually saddled with for a time). Books didn’t beat me up the way other kids did, so I loved them with all my heart…
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Neither the nondescript stores and the black wilderness of the Meadowlands on one side, nor the dark cemetery dotted with barely visible white tombstones on the other, gave me any assistance.
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Mom used to joke that I had "the attention span of a gnat."
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One meal, though, stands out because I took pictures.
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I have always been one who prefers to deal with negative emotions by assiduously not focusing on them
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Her name was Barbara but her nickname was, for some reason, "Bool."
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Boticelli could not have painted an angel more lovely than Angela.
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My Mom decided that having a kiddy tea party would be fun.
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She stared at me, burst into tears and ran across the street and into her house. I was surprised at how powerfully she reacted.
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The problem with Jeopardy was that it ended at 12:30 PM
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The meanness of spirit, the self-centeredness, that had oozed through American society in the 80s and 90s had polluted my beloved sport.
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I needed a present. I wanted it to be special. I was as poor as the usual working-class undergraduate.
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My first thought when it appeared was chagrin
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When I graduated high school in 1974, I was a bit of an arrogant little shit.
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I'd run, trying frantically to find a place to hide, while it implacably followed me, laughing.
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A family down the block from us took in foster kids.
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Van Morrison might have done me a huge favor. He certainly didn't mean to, but some things work out for the best if given enough time.
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My extreme introvert's response was to focus on solitary sports like bicycling and track, and on pastimes that none of us could actually play.
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"You're right....with Eversharp!"
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Down there among the warehouses, trucking firms and junk yards that populated the Jersey City side of the Bay was a working-man's bar and luncheonette.
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I've heard that with a true friend, absence means little.
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The fact that she is tall, shapely and extremely attractive was not lost on me....
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The trees, bushes and brush would give me plenty of privacy to do what I needed to do.
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But I couldn't just say yes. I broke into song.
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Understand that my Mom loved all animals, and was absolute death on animal cruelty of any kind.
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A switch clicked in my brain. I have no idea why. I looked at Gina and said “I need to do that.”
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"If I left her, if I followed my dark muse into the deep sea, there was a good chance that, one way or the other, Holly would die."
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The twin fears of failure and conflict have been a crippling problem for us.
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A sulfurous smell of decay seeped into my mask. I looked around in vain.
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Made nervous by being alone in a deserted lab building on an actual dark and stormy night, Gina, a grad student working in her lab downstairs, came up to my lab seeking company in the now spooky and very dark building.
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Smell is the sense most connected to our inner brains, to our memories and emotions
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Bookends
Prompted By Theater
/ Stories
As introverted and retiring as I am now, I was much more so back in 1975.
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I am an ACOA.
Here Comes the Sun
Prompted By Changing Times
/ Stories
...although the time shifts of DST have been regular occurrences my entire life, only since 2012 have they become somewhat important to me.
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Very Very Frightening Me
Prompted By Lightning
/ Stories
The storms began as I left her house with her kiss still on my lips, and grew in ferocity as I drove south along the Turnpike.
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“Maawidge…is a Sake-wid Institution…”
Prompted By Ceremony
/ Stories
No one had ever gotten married at the station before.
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Waking Up With Retrospect
Prompted By Retrospect Retrospective
/ Stories
We are yet mired in anxiety.
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A Rewarding Experience
Prompted By Retail Rewards
/ Stories
But for a long time, being an oblivious sort of person, I, um, sort of forgot about it.
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Slightly Lost
Prompted By Directionally Challenged
/ Stories
We were now very lost, and out of time.
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Jersey Discount
Prompted By My First Computer
/ Stories
I inadvertently found myself in the business of selling hot merchandise.
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Not With a Feud, But a Whimper
Prompted By Family Feud
/ Stories
My family has had a few feuds, but they were long ago and I only heard of them as rumors and legends when I was very young. One involved a marriage deemed unsuitable for ethnic reasons, resulting in disowning of a daughter and lifelong estrangement of grandkids from grandparents. This prompted my Dad to say,…
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If You Want Me, I’ll Be in the Lab*
Prompted By Feathering Our Nests
/ Stories
I'd like to say that it was a summer out of a Ray Bradbury tale...
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Well Meant Advice
Prompted By Changed My Life
/ Stories
Like any kid, I banged back and forth among various “what do I want to be when I grow up?” fantasies.
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I remember her funeral
Schmucks, Then and Now
Prompted By First Time Voting
/ Stories
My home town was home to a large, and now defunct, youth organization.
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Comments on “Priciest Purchase” Prompt
Prompted By Priciest Purchase
/ Stories
STILL cannot post comments on other people's stories, so...
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Rider on the Storm
Prompted By Planes and Trains
/ Stories
I was not at all nervous; my fear of flying, like so many of them, developed later.
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Comments On This Prompt
Prompted By Favorite Teacher
/ Stories
I STILL cannot post comments on other people’s stories, so…. Comments on “Favorite Teacher” prompt. Educator of the Year – Remembering Milton by Dana Susan Lehrman A very evocative tale for me…my grade school had a Milton of its own, although he was the shop teacher, not custodial staff. Mr. Crawley never got full peer-to-peer…
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Les Beaux Pharmaciennes
Prompted By Customer Service
/ Stories
Behind the counter were two very attractive, serious looking women in crisp white lab coats...
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Thunderbolt
Prompted By Priciest Purchase
/ Stories
I, in the throes of the Dunning-Kruger Effect*, decided that it was obviously the bike that was blocking my path to Über-ridership.
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DH Edwards
Prompted By Favorite Teacher
/ Stories
"Dave Ventre? Did you have Dr. Edwards at FDU?"
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My Comments on the “Procrastination” Stories
Prompted By Procrastination
/ Stories
"My latest attempt to post a comment the normal way yielded a new error message"
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That Old Hot Iron Metaphor…
Prompted By Procrastination
/ Stories
This might have been a lesson learned, though.
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Why Do You Think They Call It “Dope”?
Prompted By Drugs and Alcohol
/ Stories
Having never had a pot experience that was either pleasant or memorable, I just stuck to tried, true and non-felonious ethanol.
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Commenting Problems Update
Prompted By Procrastination
/ Stories
Commenting Problems Update
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My Comments on the Stories on This Prompt
Prompted By Memorable Performances
/ Stories
Commenting the only way I know how....
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Dave’s Comment-o-Rama
Prompted By Do You Believe in Magic?
/ Stories
(Please note: I am actually reading, and wish to comment upon, other Retrospect writer’s stories. But for some reason, since early August I am unable to reply to anyone’s stories but my own, no matter where I log in from. I also can’t even reply to other writer’s comments. All I get is a 503…
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The Play Was a Thing
Prompted By Memorable Performances
/ Stories
(Please note: I am actually reading, and wish to comment upon, other Retrospect writer’s stories. But for some reason, since early August I am unable to reply to anyone’s stories but my own, no matter where I log in from. All I get is a 503 server error. Until and unless this changes, I will…
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The French, As Usual, Have a Word For It….
Prompted By Do You Believe in Magic?
/ Stories
Santiago Calatrava's Milwaukee Art Museum is one of the strangest buildings I have ever seen or heard of.
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Avocation, Delusion, Masturbation
Prompted By Why We Write
/ Stories
"...the chimera of Security"
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The Rule of Three
Prompted By Riding a Bicycle
/ Stories
This story makes more sense if you know a little about the mechanics of riding a mountain bike. Think of a catcher getting set for a pitch, or a tennis player preparing to receive a serve. Picture their posture. Knees bent, elbows bent, hinged at the waist, maybe swaying a bit. They are loose,…
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Swimming Through Treacle
Prompted By Lost in Translation
/ Stories
Hi, fellow ‘spectors, I’m working my way through the backlog after a 4-5 week down time (long story…and I am not sure what it was about). The only thing I have apropos to this prompt is: https://www.myretrospect.com/stories/veni-vidi-ego-erravi-male/
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Impressing the Tough Guy
Prompted By What My Father Told Me
/ Stories
His favorite athlete was Rocky Marciano.
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Birthday Girl
Prompted By Special Birthdays
/ Stories
One of the birthdays I remember best was not one of mine.
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The One Who Got Me
Prompted By Mind the Gap
/ Stories
Fact is, my whole family was sufficiently fractious and dysfunctional that generational differences were swamped by more direct issues.
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Terror, Reified
Prompted By Banned Books
/ Stories
As far as I know, no ban has ever been imposed on any book that I wanted to read in the place and time that I wished to read it.
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Inside Looking Out
Prompted By Sleepy Time
/ Stories
Looking outward, unseen and unheard, I take solace knowing that for a while at least, I am safe.
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I Can See Your Fists So Clearly Now!
Prompted By The Eyes Have It
/ Stories
This upset me terribly.
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In Vino, Veritas
Prompted By What My Mother Told Me
/ Stories
One day, in my late teens, at a family wedding, Mom was drinking as she usually was back then...
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David the King!
Prompted By Refugees
/ Stories
They were always readmitted, though; Dave seemed unable to hold a grudge.
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It was in a shopping mall in NJ.
Superior Accommodations
Prompted By Hotels, Motels, Inns, and Hostels
/ Stories
In Copper Harbor, we always stay at the King Copper motel.
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Thank You Very Much, Thank You Very Much…
Prompted By Cheating
/ Stories
That August, Veronica walked out on me.
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A Hero in the Basement
Prompted By Basements and Attics
/ Stories
Eventually I was permitted basement access, and found it a fascinating place.
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The Sea Wolf
Prompted By Time
/ Stories
As I made that move, the brunette cutie to my right clasped her hand around my wrist and whispered "that is SO annoying!"
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“An’ it Harm None…”
Prompted By Guilty Pleasures
/ Stories
I don't have any guilty pleasures
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Aboard Ship 2 With JT
Prompted By Scouting
/ Stories
My only company was a little Sears AM transistor radio.
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She’s Got Legs
Prompted By Some Assembly Required
/ Stories
One hot summer, I built a Mount and Brungs Proportional Diluter.
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You’ll Live Like Magic
Prompted By One Song That Moves Me
/ Stories
As the Covid pandemic gripped us in fear and sadness, working from home, I felt a growing need for cheerful, upbeat things.
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Stopping by the Diner on a Snowy Evening
Prompted By Newspapers
/ Stories
And then back home, me and Dad, under spooky tracks and past dangerous dogs, to warmth, maybe a snack, and my friends Dick Tracy, Moon Mullins and Rick O'Shay.
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Cathedral Rocks
/ Stories
The sun was just at the horizon. I could hear a strange sound which I could not at first identify through my thick rubber hood.
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I Should Have Stayed Home
Prompted By Snowy Days
/ Stories
Judging by the store I went to, I can place this story some time in the late 90s. Gina was away in Lawrence, Kansas doing some collaborative research with a scientist at KU. Of course I picked THEN to get the flu. After a couple of days, I started to feel very ill. I had…
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The Wellen Man
Prompted By Snowy Days
/ Stories
I had always been fascinated by the ideas of working at night, working outside and working alone.
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Fifteen Miles to 14A
Prompted By Highways and Byways
/ Stories
It was a June night of thunderstorms in central New Jersey
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I Must Go Down To The Lake Again
Prompted By Highways and Byways
/ Stories
It's a challenging, exhilarating drive that cries out to be done fast in a small nimble open-top rear-wheel-drive sports car, or a good motorcycle.
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The FDU SCUBA Club
Prompted By Group Photos
/ Stories
This photo, snapped from atop a tripod on my old Fujica SLR, captures a pivotal time in my life.
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Does It Count If You Make It Early?
Prompted By Resolutions
/ Stories
I broke with personal tradition and resolved to change myself
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A Piece of the Action
Prompted By Holidaze
/ Stories
Then the paramedics began running up the hill with stretchers and backboards. Still, no Cindy.
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Mostly Tricks
Prompted By Trick or Treat?
/ Stories
I have many Halloween memories, but can’t recall a single specific Halloween from before I went to college. All I have are fragments. Sepia-tones Instamatic snaps in my mind of me and other little kids wandering in and out of the pools of light and shadow of the streets in my neighborhood, seeking candy. No…
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The Fruit Stand of Love
Prompted By Lemons to Lemonade
/ Stories
I don't wish to give the impression that I am compiling a screed against Perfidious Womankind...
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Veni, Vidi, Ego Erravi Male
Prompted By Regrets
/ Stories
I have always had a fascination with obscure words and terms.
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Bringing Backup
Prompted By Children's Books
/ Stories
This is more about books and reading and being a weird little kid than about any single book. I was a nerd. A geek. A prototypical Poindexter (a nickname I was actually saddled with for a time). Books didn’t beat me up the way other kids did, so I loved them with all my heart…
Read More
Just Keep Driving…
Prompted By Going to Work
/ Stories
Neither the nondescript stores and the black wilderness of the Meadowlands on one side, nor the dark cemetery dotted with barely visible white tombstones on the other, gave me any assistance.
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Hello, Darkness
Prompted By Attention Span
/ Stories
Mom used to joke that I had "the attention span of a gnat."
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A La Famiglia!
Prompted By Mealtime
/ Stories
One meal, though, stands out because I took pictures.
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The Gift That Keeps On Giving
Prompted By 9/11 Twenty Years Later
/ Stories
I have always been one who prefers to deal with negative emotions by assiduously not focusing on them
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Drunk Bool
Prompted By Manners
/ Stories
Her name was Barbara but her nickname was, for some reason, "Bool."
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The Devil is in the Details
Prompted By Dating
/ Stories
Boticelli could not have painted an angel more lovely than Angela.
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A Memorable Birthday
Prompted By Anniversaries
/ Stories
My Mom decided that having a kiddy tea party would be fun.
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The Word
Prompted By In Trouble
/ Stories
She stared at me, burst into tears and ran across the street and into her house. I was surprised at how powerfully she reacted.
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What is “late for school?”
Prompted By Quiz and Game Shows
/ Stories
The problem with Jeopardy was that it ended at 12:30 PM
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Club MTB
Prompted By Cliques and Clubs
/ Stories
The meanness of spirit, the self-centeredness, that had oozed through American society in the 80s and 90s had polluted my beloved sport.
Read More
“Turn up your radio”
Prompted By Remembering Radios
/ Stories
I needed a present. I wanted it to be special. I was as poor as the usual working-class undergraduate.
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A Regular Ray Bradbury
Prompted By The Twilight Zone
/ Stories
My first thought when it appeared was chagrin
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Part of the Union
Prompted By Working
/ Stories
When I graduated high school in 1974, I was a bit of an arrogant little shit.
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Bad Moon
Prompted By Cold War Coping
/ Stories
I'd run, trying frantically to find a place to hide, while it implacably followed me, laughing.
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Names Have Meaning
Prompted By Inequality
/ Stories
A family down the block from us took in foster kids.
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My Brown-eyed Girl
Prompted By Concerts
/ Stories
Van Morrison might have done me a huge favor. He certainly didn't mean to, but some things work out for the best if given enough time.
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Mario!
Prompted By Big Fan
/ Stories
My extreme introvert's response was to focus on solitary sports like bicycling and track, and on pastimes that none of us could actually play.
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Kindertotenlieder*
Prompted By Advertising Jingles and Slogans
/ Stories
"You're right....with Eversharp!"
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The Evil Luncheonette
Prompted By First Memory
/ Stories
Down there among the warehouses, trucking firms and junk yards that populated the Jersey City side of the Bay was a working-man's bar and luncheonette.
Read More
TBI
Prompted By Reconnecting
/ Stories
I've heard that with a true friend, absence means little.
Read More
The Exploding Lab Bench
Prompted By How We Met
/ Stories
The fact that she is tall, shapely and extremely attractive was not lost on me....
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Egrets in Morning Sunlight
Prompted By Hello Darkness
/ Stories
The trees, bushes and brush would give me plenty of privacy to do what I needed to do.
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Wherein She Learns That I Am Fine With Making a Public Spectacle of Myself
Prompted By Embarrassment
/ Stories
But I couldn't just say yes. I broke into song.
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Even I Have Limits
Prompted By Good Trouble
/ Stories
Understand that my Mom loved all animals, and was absolute death on animal cruelty of any kind.
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A Single Track Mind
Prompted By Finding Your Tribe
/ Stories
A switch clicked in my brain. I have no idea why. I looked at Gina and said “I need to do that.”
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Deepest Dive
Prompted By Close Calls
/ Stories
"If I left her, if I followed my dark muse into the deep sea, there was a good chance that, one way or the other, Holly would die."
Read More
Letter from the 21st Century
Prompted By Letter to My Younger Self
/ Stories
The twin fears of failure and conflict have been a crippling problem for us.
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Lost and Found
Prompted By Close Calls
/ Stories
A sulfurous smell of decay seeped into my mask. I looked around in vain.
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Pizza and a Bad Movie
Prompted By First Dates
/ Stories
Made nervous by being alone in a deserted lab building on an actual dark and stormy night, Gina, a grad student working in her lab downstairs, came up to my lab seeking company in the now spooky and very dark building.
Read More
A Certain Cachet…
Prompted By Fragrant Flashbacks
/ Stories
Smell is the sense most connected to our inner brains, to our memories and emotions
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