Why Mom Smoked (eBook)

People

Dad was a cigar chomping sales and delivery truck driver. He was stocky and weathered, with wispy white hair claimed to be from “Swedish ancestry.” He spoke in a deep, gravelly voice that caused the earth to shake to its core. A characteristic of Dad’s vocalization was that almost every word in an utterance was unintelligible—as if he had his mouth full of mashed potatoes—except for copious cuss words that were clearly both intelligible and vitriolic. To his credit, I never heard him drop the “F-Bomb.” To say the least, Dad’s speech scared the stuffing out of Rich and me. Overall, Dad was rather gnarly.

We did not see much of Dad during weekdays as he left for work very early and arrived home in the evening “dead tired.” He was twenty-plus years older than Mom. His health was in decline, and he had suffered several strokes and heart attacks by his early sixties.

Dad subsisted on comfort foods cooked with lots of bacon grease and salt. Back then, everybody kept a coffee can on the back of the stove, right next to the big cardboard canister of salt, and collected bacon grease for flavoring.

As was common for Kensingtonians, Dad made a few bucks “on the side.” He drove for the bakery products division of a major brewing company, and his route took him to Delaware. At the time, Delaware had no sales tax, and tobacco products were priced cheaper there than in Pennsylvania. Dad took advantage of his delivery route to buy the cheaper tobacco products, and he bought his company’s beer at an employee discount.

On Friday nights (traditional blue-collar pay night) and Saturday mornings, Dad sold the tobacco products and beer from the trunk of his car and also “took book” (a term for unsanctioned off-track horse betting).

Sometimes Dad bartered with neighbors. For example, he would exchange a six pack of beer or a carton of cigarettes for a television repair.

Dad was proud to be a union member and a member of a prominent fraternal order. Although at the time I did not understand what those affiliations meant, he told me they “saved our a****” a few times. From childhood-through-young-adulthood, Dad was mischievous and constantly in trouble for something. He dropped out of high school to join the navy. In older adulthood, he was described as “devilish.” One can clearly see the genetic transmission from Dad to Rich and me.

Dad’s proper name was “Lewis.” His nickname was “Lew.”

Mom was a petite woman with curly brown hair and glasses. She met Dad, then a dairy products deliveryman, when she was in her late teens and residing in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Mom grew up during the Great Depression and was the oldest of four siblings. She and her siblings were raised by her grandmother, “Nan,” to be introduced shortly.

Mom did not have much of a childhood as being the oldest, she was saddled with the care of her younger siblings. She had also grown intolerant of the deprivation of the era and was deeply affected by the military death of her brother. Dad’s attention thus held a special appeal for her. Following a short courtship, they married and quickly relocated to a different state.

Mom was proud of her graduation from “Business School.” Her career choice resulted in many years of employment as a bookkeeper in the insurance field. She was bright and would have done well as an accountant. I credit her business and finance skills for our family’s success in living off our parents’ modest salaries, debt-free, and for our eventual relocation to New Jersey.

A complicated person, Mom was as quirky as could be. She had a lot of anxiety and was easily amped-up. Like an inflamed boil begging to be lanced, it was as if she set the stage for Rich and me to set her off. Of course, we usually did goad her to break the nerve racking radiating tension but then paid the price. Oddly, seemingly contradictorily, the synergy of Mom’s fortitude and amazing grit counterbalanced her challenges.

Mom’s voice became shrill when she got angry. If she was really mad, we would get a “smack talk.” During a smack talk, she would say a word and then smack. She would continue the process until she got out a whole sentence or paragraph. Grinning or snickering on our part would result in a prolonged and intensified barrage. A few smack talks are featured in the anecdotes.

Based on the norms and practices of the time, overall, it is fair to say that Mom loved us and did the very best she could parenting us. As I reflect back to some other neighborhood moms, all considered, affectionately, I am confident Rich and I can truly say we had a really good mom.

Dad chain-smoked cigars, and Mom chain-smoked unfiltered cigarettes. I don’t think Mom was ever without a lit cigarette between her lips and would light the next one with the previous one. I would hear her get up at night to smoke. We vehemently protested the ever-present nauseating cigarette smoke, but she was highly defensive of it and would not hear of it, let alone discuss it.

Mom’s proper name was “Dorothy.” Her nickname was “Dot.”

John: I am the author and first-person narrator, a.k.a. “Brother,” “Buster,” “That Boy,” and “Dr. Specs.” I am the older of Rich and me.

Perhaps as a child, I would best be described as “scrawny,” “anxious,” “quiet,” “serious,” “precocious,” and “studious.” I was a shy, internalizing kid who needed a lot of encouragement. My pediatrician had me on an opioid derivative “for nerves,” and B-12 shots for anemia.

Along with giving me the opioid derivative, Mom made me “special eggnog” consisting of egg, milk, sugar, vanilla, and whisky to help “settle” me down. I think I could have been a poster child for Minimal Brain Dysfunction, now termed Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

Despite low grades and academic struggles, I survived school because I learned not to cause any trouble for my teachers and to remain “invisible.” By the mindset of the educational system at the time, I suppose that I should have “flunked.”

Having just said the above, I did love learning and spent a lot of time at our local Free Library of Philadelphia branch. I recall entering that grand Carnegie Foundation-endowed classical Greek Revival building, surveying the section signs, and making a choice. Once I’d decided upon a book, I immersed myself in the wonderful world of knowledge. Miss Max, one of our block moms who will also be introduced shortly, described me as being “too smart for [my] britches.”

I was not “street strong,” but I was “street smart.” I coped by befriending the “bad boys,” known to adults at that time as “juvenile delinquents.” Although I had close ties with such boys, I knew better than to get entangled in their behaviors and kept a safe distance from them; yet we had a mutually beneficial, perhaps symbiotic, friendship.

I was bright, articulate, logical, resourceful, and crafty and served as their “attorney of sorts.” I would nonjudgmentally listen to them with empathy and understanding and would coach them in their dealings with school officials, parents, law enforcement, probation officers, child protective services workers, and other authority figures. In turn, they would protect me from bullying and schoolyard extortion. I was relentlessly teased about my eyeglasses.

My constantly exploding brain was a particular challenge in my childhood. My teachers were correct in saying that I was bored in school, but the reality was that more than being bored, I found my internal thoughts a whole lot more interesting than the mundane standard classroom curriculum.

I was fascinated with science and experimentation. I constantly sought stimulation. Sometimes my brainstorms had disastrous outcomes, a few of which will be the substance of this book.

Ironically, clinical social work turned out to be my career choice, and I specialized in kids considered learning, emotionally, socially, or behaviorally disordered. I trace my career dedication directly back to my maverick childhood friends

Rick’s proper name is “Rich” (short for “Richard”), but Mom insisted on calling him “Rick” or “Ricky.” He despised those nicknames and later in life dropped “Rick” for “Rich.” Mom also attempted the nickname “Dicky,” but understandably, he vehemently protested that moniker. Despite the enticement, I did have some mercy, so I never exploited that particular handle.

Like me, Rich did not do well in school. Neither had Dad. I guess it ran in the family. When it came to school, the big difference between Rich and me was that he “simply did not give two s****,” as Mom said in dismay. On the other hand, my anxiety caused me to spaz out and strive for achievement.

Rich dealt with school by expertly forging parent excuse notes. His scheme remarkably spanned several grades. When eventually busted, school officials determined that because there was so much truancy and “dropping out,” they were not particularly alarmed by his absenteeism. Moreover, as there was so much illiteracy in Kensington, it was thought that his notes were legitimate and typical. I believe he passed school because his teachers promoted him to avoid getting stuck with him the next school year if they retained him.

Rich was perhaps the most low-key person I knew. In keeping with his demeanor, he was subtle, smug, and coy. Like Dad, he was a person of few words, but people knew exactly what he meant. On the...