Suprise Me

(Old Albany Post Road) is a dirt road and will forever be that way. There is an Old Road Society in town, and members are militant. Old Albany is their prized project. Read More

Allons! the road is before us! It is safe–I have tried it–my own feet have tried it well–be not detain'd! Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten, and the book on the shelf unopen'd! Walt Whitman. Read More

14 years old, out of braces, in contact lenses…I had arrived! The ugly duckling had blossomed. 1967, my first summer in High School Division at the National Music Camp (now the Interlochen Arts Camp) and I thought I was BIG STUFF! I got to wear powder blue knee socks, designating HSG, no longer red socks… Read More

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. Read More

I’ve always been vain about my hair. When I was born, I was pretty much bald, but as a very young boy, I had bright, curly locks of almost white blonde hair.  My parents had also had bright blond hair as children, though by my birth, they had both had become brunette as they aged. As with most… Read More

Facial expressions, body language, joviality, and many gestures can go a long way. Read More

Belle Potocsky and Zalman Beckenstein were married in the “old country”; Bialystok, Poland (part of Imperial Russia) in 1902. I have a dress that Grandma wore to a ball when they were courting. These were not “shtetl” Jews like in “Fiddler on the Roof”. They were educated and erudite. My grandmother’s dress is a beauty,… Read More

Social hierarchies are quick to develop in junior high, and from day one Diane is Queen Bee. Girls copy her, lobby to be her friend. Boys stare and whisper and grunt. Without question she is the most desired, the most alluring girl in seventh grade. Read More

What was it like for my neighbors to have an FBI agent knock on their doors in December 1970 and ask questions about me. Read More

We took Driver’s Ed during a free period in high school. Since I was in choir, took PE for two years, then a semester of typing, I didn’t have any free periods until second semester of my junior year in high school. I was already 16, so I was 16 1/2 by the time I… Read More