2001-01-10 - 23:36 MST

THE WONDERING JEW

Bank

Memories hoarded are no good to anyone I guess. At least that is how it seems to me. As an official, registered old fart, I got 'em by the bucketful.

Memory to me is like a round trip from home to a destination and back. The scenery is vastly different coming back, looking at the back side as it were. I can't recall how many times I have told about various things in old town Denver. I think I have been accurate each time -- but maybe the view is a bit different due to time of day, direction taken and changing state of my mind as I grew.

I remember being taken to two posh eating establishments, to a theater that had actual stage plays, I remember the theaters in town that had those gigantic pipe organs that were played between films. I clearly remember the cars with those narrow high pressure tires and how the street car tracks formed a narrow groove which would catch one of those tires and cause the car to swerve in the direction they were going. I not only remember watching innertube repair at the side of the road, but learned enough to be able to do it later on. I can remember how wide open the country (other than farms and ranches) was. In my first memories there were vast areas in our mountains that were unfenced. Where picnics were often had and kids hiked around. I don't recall hearing about vandalism either. I also remember that small town Denver people did not lock their doors unless they were going to be gone a month or so. Gee, I remember the three five and dime stores on the same downtown street, and the department stores which all seemed to have bargain basements -- even the high falutin' ones. I loved riding those old miracles of wood engineering, the street cars. Late night or early morning when the motorman could get up a little speed, it was fun to sit in the back and watch the front end twist first one way and then the other while the back end did vice versa. They were so well designed and engineered that there was slack where it was needed. I remember the street cars pulling trailers in the busy hours -- open cars in the summer - closed in the winter - and if I recall correctly even the head car had no heat in the winter.

I remember my first days in school as a wide eyed, believe anything innocent. The thrill of cutting with scissors, pasting, learning the alphabet formally from the teacher's additions to what I already knew. New books to read, Big Chief, lined pads of coarse paper which took pencil markings quite well. I had two usually, one to use in school and one to draw in at home.

Oh man, that despised bit of Penmanship practice. We had to do it in pencil even before we got pens.

Later on came the pen holders, sucking the oil off the nibs, inserting the nib in the penholder and thrill of thrills, sticking the pen in the inkwell at my desk and using it to actually write.

I ran into all sort of neat things, like eating the library paste, it had a taste and consistency all of its own which I among others loved.

The afternoon hops when I was in Junior high, actually getting that close to a real girl, holding her hand with one arm around. I found out that girls didn't have cooties, I figured that not all girls had them after a few mutual explorations conducted in a coal shed of all places. Beginning to carry books for a girl. And the hormone drenched years which I won't talk about -- the guys all know about how it was and the women don't or don't want to know or wouldn't understand anyhow. I think their wiring is different maybe.

Back then one tune was rolling back and forth in our country, every radio station was playing it frequently. It was played at our hops, repetitiously, sickeningly, the title was about a tuba or one of those big horns, the title was, I think, "The music goes round." A silly song, but very popular.

I remember the one ROTC ball at South High. It was very chilly weather, the gym was overheated, we boys of course in our full uniform. I think every girl had a gardenia corsage. The odor was so overpowering that we boys in groups of two or three would go outside in the cold just to rinse our sinuses. While I still had a perceptive sense of smell, gardenias made me still want to hurl.

My first lessons in driving a car, secretively administered by a fellow classmate in his Model A Ford. I had learned to ride a bicycle in a similar manner, by the time my own came to me, I was an accomplished bike rider.

Transferred to a new high school when we moved. Astray more or less, until I finally gained a friend. And then in German class, becoming acquainted with two German boys who had been sent over here to live with relatives. My first abortive case of puppy love came to a sad end. My grades weren't too good, and I wanted a car. So I quit school and went to work. What a dummy. Didn't get a car until after I was married.

I remember registering for the draft and seeing my friends go off to war, by the time they got around to my number, I was deferred because I was working on the railroad and never did get overseas like fellow Denverite Gene Amole who writes a column for The Rocky Mountain News.

The Denver Union Station was a busy, overcrowded place, unbelieveably so. There were passenger trains run by several different railroads, there were comings and goings. Mail being loaded or unloaded in the Mail cars. The Post office only sent mail by rail then, very little air mail was going out and that was trucked to the airport.

I remember every one pulling their belts up a notch when we came out on top in Germany and pushing to aid our war effort in the Pacific. I remember the women in work clothes who took over men's jobs and did quite well too.

I remember being down on 16th Street with Heather on VJ Day, what a grand celebration of jubliance that was. I remember the winter storm that caused a haylift to be mounted by the Air Force to feed starving cattle out on the plains. It was the same storm I think that brought Denver to its virtual knees. The only moving vehicles seemed to be military four wheel drives. They were kept busy taking personnel to essential jobs and picking them up later.

So, what does an old man have more of than anyone else, that is more precious than gold ? Memories. I just took a few of my memories out, polished them up, looked them over, and now will put them back in my Bank . . . . .

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