| Ăŕđîëüä Ęîííîëëč Harold Connolly | |
| Ďîĺçäęŕ çŕ Îëčěďčéńęčě Çîëîňîě The Journey for Olympic Gold ăëŕâű 19 | |
Chapter Nineteen
Saturday night with the July, Bostonian humidity hanging
like a stagnant wet pall
over the city, Steve and I went up to our friend Oscar’s
Asgeirsson’s house for dinner.
Though he was a year behind us, we got to know Oscar at Taft
Junior High School. He
also came up to Ringer’s Playground and for a younger kid he
could kick a football and
hit a baseball pretty well. After Steve and I went on to
Brighton High School and I began
to put the shot, we practiced in the park where Oscar
learned the shot technique. He later
became a top shot-putter at English High School. Oscar,
whose name was an
Americanization of his real first name Asgeir, had straw
colored hair, which fell in
perfectly straight streams on his face, was the tallest of
the three of us, at six feet two, and
at 190 pounds weighed about ten pounds less than I did.
Having inherited the taciturnity
of his Icelandic ancestry, “Osk” never spoke much until he
was sure he had something
worthwhile to say. The three of us palled around together
and frequently were in each
other’s homes.
After graduating from high school, Steve worked at the Sears
and Roebuck
warehouse; Oscar had finished his senior year at English
High and had a summer job as a
dye mixer in a ballpoint ink factory; and I had completed my
freshman year at Boston
College. Complements of my uncle, Senator Jim, I was working
summers for a state
traffic engineer surveying roads and counting cars around
the state, but on weekends the
three of us frequently hung out together.
However, things were to change. Oscar had been accepted to
the freshman class
at Boston College, he was coming out for track to join me in
putting the shot, and in five
days Steve was off to begin Marine Corps basic training in
South Carolina. His surprise
enlistment for the Korean War, which had begun only five
months earlier, and his
imminent departure occasioned Oscar's mother's invitation to
dinner, an evening I always
enjoyed at Oscar’s house. No one could match Mrs.
Asgeirsson’s halibut dinners.
She and her husband immigrated to the United States before
Oscar was
born, and after five years they managed to buy a small red
brick house in a pleasant
neighborhood. Their goal was to see that their only child
received a college education.
Oscar had never visited his parents’ native land but often
talked about the trip.
“Some day when I’ve saved the money, I’ll make a trip to
Iceland. I’ve got plenty of
relatives to stay with. I could even get a job with my uncle
who owns a fishing business
or with my other uncle who’s the President.”
“He’s what?” I inquired, surprised.
“The President.” Oscar responded.
“President of what?” I asked.
“Iceland.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No, you can check at the library. His name and mine are the
same: Asgeir
Asgeirsson. Actually, that’s why my parents won’t go back to
visit. Sometimes they
seem to be real homesick, but they don’t want people to
think that they came back only
because my dad’s brother became the President.”
“Then why do you have to save money for the trip? Why
doesn’t your uncle send
down a plane for you or something? Or why doesn’t he make
your father an ambassador
or give him a job at the UN? Your dad wouldn’t need to be
gone to sea all the time.”
“You don’t understand. My father has always been a
fisherman, and that’s what
he wants to do. His brother happens to be the President,
that’s all. It’s a very small
country and everyone knows everyone else.”
For our last Saturday together before Steve's departure, we
decided to go to the L
Street Bath House in South Boston, where we went frequently
because of it's great beach.
Unfortunately it was an uncharacteristically chilly day for
July, not a particularly good
day for the beach, very few others around, and the tide was
nearly all the way out. Oscar
had brought his camera, and we goofed around taking
photographs of each other posing
like body builders with the new muscles we were acquiring
from our weightlifting.
“Come on let's hit the beach before the tide goes all the
way out,” I called over
my shoulder, starting for the surf as Oscar shot Steve's
final pose.
After a long run toward the deeper water I stopped at knee
depth and looked back
to see Oscar approaching with Steve in close pursuit.
"Let's go deeper,” Oscar said and started to walk ahead of
me.
"You go ahead. I'll wait for Steve. We'll follow you,” I
responded looking back
for Steve who was shivering as he slowly approached. By the
time he reached me, Oscar
was about 20 yards ahead starting to stagger from left the
right strangely.
“ Now what's he up to,” Steve said looking at me with both
of us thinking it was
some kind of a joke.
When it continued and began to look surrealistically real,
we ran closer.
“ I, I can't control myself,” Oscar said as we came up to
him and saw a pallor of
fear and confusion across his face. Attempting to take some
steps, he fell over face first
into the water. We quickly grabbed him and lifted him to his
feet. He attempted to walk,
but his legs were twitching spasmodically; he couldn't
control their movement. “ I can't
control myself,” he repeated. “ I don't know what's
happening,” he said as we dragged
him to the shore, holding him up with his arms draped across
our shoulders. Because he
was unable to stand under his own power, we set him down on
the sand. I put our three
towels over him. Now we were all afraid.
Steve sprinted up to the bathhouse to get help and something
more to put over
Oscar to keep him warm. Our clothes were in the bathhouse
lockers. The manager of the
bathhouse called an ambulance from the nearby Carney
Hospital. When they said we
couldn't go with him in the ambulance, I gave the attendants
Oscar's clothes, name
address and home telephone number, but kept his wallet and
wrist watch. It was a
stunningly shocking and frightening feeling seeing them take
Oscar away in an
ambulance. We were at the hospital that night with Oscar's
mother. Oscar was in a coma;
he had had a cerebral hemorrhage.
At the Union Station it was hard seeing Steve off to Paris
Island. There were
about 60 new Marine recruits lined up at attention as three
uniformed sergeants loaded
them on two train cars. Carrying his little suitcase, Steve
boarded the train in his rumpled,
white, short-sleeved sport shirt and khaki pants. He
appeared apprehensive, though he
was trying his best to hide it, and somewhat lost, like a
bird venturing from the nest for
the first time. There were no tears or sentimental words,
but for six years we had always
done most things together, and few days ever passed without
us checking with one
another. It was strange Oscar not being there, and the three
of us hadn't brought it up, but
we knew that Steve had never been out of Massachusetts, and
he was going it alone after
a unilateral decision that confounded both Oscar and me
because we couldn't imagine
Steve in the toughest of the armed services. Oscar and I
were on a college path Steve that
was not equipped for, but he must have decided he had to do
something significant for his
future, perhaps something that would impress us. But we knew
that Steve was a gentle,
sensitive artist. We always figured him for art school, but
certainly not the Marines.
The day after Steve left, Oscar had surgery to remove the
pressure on his brain;
but his left side was paralyzed, and he was on the critical
list. It was three months before
he could take a step; he lost 45 pounds; his enrollment in
Boston College was postponed;
and he would never put the shot again.
For the remainder of that summer I got a new state job as a
paper picker,
ironically on the South Boston beaches. For sixty dollars a
week I walked through the
sand along my prescribed route weaving around and about sun
bathers, children's
sandcastles, and family picnics with my trusty, long,
needle-pointed stick, harpooning
papers, drinking cups, apple cores, beer cans and cigarette
butts. Every time the needle
got jammed, I cleaned it into the shapeless sack over my
shoulder. As I zigzagged down
the beach I emptied the bag into large metal barrels spotted
along the way.
One morning after covering about a quarter of my territory,
I heard someone call
my name. I turned to see Matt Boyle, a teammate from the
Boston College track team,
carrying a large picnic basket and a beach umbrella,
plodding his way through the sand,
closely followed by a woman and two girls, all carrying
blankets and towels. I waved to
him, but Matt kept shouting, “Harold! Hey, Harold!”
I reluctantly walked in their direction. Matt dropped his
cargo. “Let me introduce
you. Hal, this is my mother, and my little sister Georgiana,
and my big sister Virginia.
“I’ve told them all about you.”
Matt’s mother, a striking woman with long dark hair streaked
with gray, and his
little sister, who looked about thirteen, smiled from
beaming, bright faces and nodded
polite helloes. His older sister asked, “How do you like
working on the beach?” And I, in
the presence of the most radiant face I had ever gazed upon,
was completely tongue tied.
In a muted, halting tone, I barely mumble, “Er, ahh, just
fine.” I stared at her milky-white
complexion, framed by tumbling, shoulder length, dark brown
hair, and her eyes, upon
which I was completely transfixed, not only because of their
sparkling, direct intensity,
but also because one was clearly blue and the other brown.
From our eyes leveled on
each other's, as she stood before me in her proper dark
one-piece bathing suit, that in no
way diminished her stunning figure, I estimated that she was
just about my height
“Matt has mentioned your name a few times before,” Virginia
continued in a
talkative mood, while the rest of her family was setting up
their picnic. I wondered if she
sensed my awkward discomfort and was trying to put me at
ease. “Would you like a
drink of lemonade?” she asked.
Suddenly I was aware of standing there in dusty chino shorts
without a shirt.
Fortunately holding the big, unsightly, tar stained, canvas
bag marked with black letters
“THE PROPERTY OF THE CITY OF BOSTON” draped over my left
shoulder made the
different size of my left arm less apparent. Though I was
learning to tolerate bearing my
left arm to strangers, I was very uneasy before this girl.
“No thanks. I’m sorry, but I have to get back on the job.
The boss will be coming
by any minute, and he doesn’t like to see his pickers
talking,” I explained, said goodbye
and resumed moving down the beach.
A week later I met Matt at a summer track meet where we were
both competing.
He invited me to his girlfriend’s birthday party. “You’ve
met Lois, I’m sure. She and her
family live in a small apartment, so the party will be at my
house Sunday night at seven.
Try to come, really. Ginny said she’d like to see you
again.” Those words sent me
soaring, because I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about
her.
The following Sunday, embarrassed because it had taken me so
long to get there, I
arrived at 8:25 and rang the bell of the old-fashioned,
asphalt shingled, two story house.
Matt opened the door:
“Hey, Harold. I was beginning to give up on you. It’s great
you made it.
Everybody’s having a swell time. Let me introduce you to
some people you might not
know.” Matt introduced me to about a half a dozen guests;
some of whom I recognized
from the Boston College campus, before he steered me towards
his sister surrounded by
four of his college classmates.
“And here’s Ginny; you know each other. I’ll leave you with
her. Sis, would you
show Harold around? Lois and I have had only one dance
together all night -- see you a
little later.”
He quickly rejoined the others. I knew I should say
something, but Virginia’s
radiance and those eyes again blocked my efforts to speak.
She was wearing a close
fitting black satin dress, a single strand of delicate
pearls, and heels, which made her even
taller than I remembered from the beach. The subtle changes
only added to her natural
beauty. Just as the silence grew painful, Virginia saved the
situation. “Matt didn’t think
you’d be coming when you weren’t here by eight. Did you have
difficulties finding our
home?” Her question loosened my tongue
“No, that was no problem. It’s just that I don’t have a car
and getting here by
streetcar and bus took much longer than I expected. I guess
I’ll have to buy a car soon -
taking buses everywhere seems to take forever and I’m always
late.”
Someone called Virginia and she excused herself to go change
the records on her
phonograph. One of the boys started to talk to me about
sports and the others drifted
away. I was disappointed Virginia left and fell into an
obviously mutually disinterested
conversation. After a few strained minutes, the guy asked if
I was interested in a bite to
eat. I told him I had eaten at home; he shrugged his
shoulders and walked away. Not
quite knowing what to do next, I remained standing off by
myself from the main group at
the crowded party and began to regret having come after all,
when Virginia turned up
again.
“Why aren’t you dancing?” she asked.
“I’m not much of a dancer, that’s all.” I dreaded having to
ask her. “Back in high
school, in my sophomore year, we had a coed PE unit where
they taught us some foxtrots
and waltzes.”
“Oh, that must have been fun.”
“For some maybe but - as a matter of fact, I always used to
lag behind hoping the
boys would outnumber the girls. Luckily for most of the
lessons, I was right, but
sometimes the teacher noticed me and pushed me towards a
girl.”
“Imagine to have to be pushed towards a girl-what a
torture!” Virginia was
laughing. “You’re too shy. I’d really like to find out how
good a dancer you are.”
I could never tell her how torturous dancing truly was for
me, but she had me
cornered. I asked her to dance; and while she started
towards the middle of the floor, I
fought the recollections of the embarrassments of the high
school dancing classes. Every
time the teacher prodded me to go over to a girl and ask her
to dance, I flashed red. Then
after she agreed, which they were required to do, I avoided
looking directly at her face
and concentrated on the Herculean effort or raising my left
arm up sideways, groping for
her fingertips with my half-closed, left hand as I
reluctantly placed my right hand above
her left hip. She, however, had to be the one who finally
took my limp hand into hers;
and I became very much aware that she knew and either felt
repulsed or sorry for me.
That burning, humiliating, awkward situation became even
more unbearable because of
the strain to my shoulder, caused by the unfamiliar position
of my arm, but I could never
let her know how uncomfortable I felt.
I never told my teachers about my predicament and never
asked to be excused
from the dance course. I did not want to run away from it. I
felt if I started to run from
problems, I might find running easy, and I would end up
ducking everything. Besides,
there was the other boy in our class whose right hand was
practically a stump. I heard he
had lost his fingers under an electric saw, but I never
spoke to him. When we exchanged
glances I wondered what he thought, and I tried to estimate
how many times a day he
suffered even greater anguish - certainly every time someone
extended the greeting of
shaking hands. He had not excused himself from dancing and I
wouldn’t either.
Virginia waited slightly piqued by my monetary hesitation
lagging behind her as
we headed for the dance floor. I knew very well, as she did
also, that it was the man's
polite role to take his partner’s hand and lead her onto the
dance floor. Though my heart
was racing with excitement that she wanted to dance with me,
I was momentarily
petrified with fear that once she realized the scope of my
handicap this unattainable
beauty would withdraw from my life as rapidly as she had
appeared. She reached back
for my right hand, and with a little tug I was up beside
her. As we turned to face each
other, I hurriedly wiped my hands on my jacket so they
wouldn’t feel clammy, and
somehow my left hand gently found its way into her slender,
soft right hand.
“O.k. Let’s give it a try,” she said leading me through the
first few steps before I
regained some composure and took the lead on a few steps
myself. She seemed to enjoy
teaching me; and as I relaxed and got more into it, I was
never happier.
When I returned home from the Boyles' house, I was in love.
I wanted to ask
Virginia for a date; but I was too afraid of rejection to
call her. She may just have been
playing the perfect hostess. Certainly she must have had a
steady boyfriend; I had to find
out. I thought I’d first get a sense of my chances from her
brother. The following week in
class I asked, “Matt, what do you think, would Virginia even
consider going out with me
to the movies?”
“Sure she would,” said Matt, “at least I think so.”
With Matt’s reassurances, I mustered up the courage to call
Virginia. From that
first date we began to see each other regularly. Coming home
one night late after our
fourth date, I found my mother still awake, which was not
unusual. I tried to be quiet so
as not to awaken my sister asleep in the living room, and I
crept into mother’s bedroom,
where she was reading in bed, to say goodnight. After seeing
Virginia a couple of times,
I had told my mother a little about her. She knew about my
first real girlfriend, and
asked, “Did you have a good time?” She must have seen it in
my expression.
I couldn’t resist saying, “Mom, I’ve met the girl I’m going
to marry.”
For a moment she looked at me over the top of her book, and
then replied,
“Harold, I don’t think so.”
Hurt, by what I then perceived as her total lack of
understanding, I said, “Good
night,” and went to bed.
To get from Commonwealth Avenue to Dorchester, I had to take
a streetcar, a
subway train and a bus. By bus and subway, Virginia and I
rode from her home to down
town, and after the movie the same route back. After our
dates, I returned home to
Commonwealth Avenue by bus, a train and the streetcar.
Taking out Virginia for two
dates a week meant bouncing through 20 different public
transportation vehicles. My
attention became increasingly directed toward used car lots.
Steve’s friend Paul Bruder,
a motorcycle and hot rod racer, gave me free of charge,
two-weeks of driving lessons,
and through the mercy of St. Christopher I passed the
driver’s license test. With the
temporary driving slip in hand, I took an evening out for a
bus trip over to Uncle Jim’s.
He knew every used car dealer in Somerville and Cambridge.
If anyone could help me
get a car, it was Uncle Jim.
I had finished my second year at Boston College, had scored
some points for the
track team in the shot put and discus, and was still
striving to find out how much of an
athlete I could be. I had no idea what profession I might
follow after graduation, but in
the back of my mind I remembered my high school English
teacher's remark to my
mother that she believed I would make a fine teacher.
A series of rapidly unfolding, life altering occurrences was
sweeping me along:
my sister had received a full Scholarship to Emmanuel
College, a women's Catholic
University in Boston; my father was permanently hospitalized
in the Northampton
Veterans Hospital; I hadn't yet proved to myself that I was
worthy of being called an
athlete; I had fallen in love and was thinking about
marriage, but first and foremost I
needed a car.
Copyright © 1999-2002 Harold Connolly |
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