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Three-Thirty in the Park

Drew Marshall

    Morris was the most obnoxious and abrasive kid in all of Cunningham Junior High. He came to New York from Europe the year before. A freckled face bore with a nasty disposition, he already had frown lines embedded into his forehead. No one knew why Morris was so angry all of the time, and nobody cared enough to ask. We had gotten into an argument over some trivial matter and he challenged me to a fight in front of my friends. We were in the hallway, between classes.
    After strategically walking about twelve feet away from me, Morris yelled, “Three thirty in the park. Your ass is grass!”. He then quickly disappeared down the staircase. The park was the nearby Kelly Park Playground, a huge area with many different sections.
    Through some time-honored tradition, we all knew which section all fights were held.
    I had to cancel my weekly date with Terry, who’s older brother worked at Crawford’s, a discount store a few blocks from the school on Kings Highway. Aaron was employed
as a clerk, working at the cash register. Behind him were where the latest top 20 songs, those precious 45rpm singles, were located. Terry would tell Aaron what records she and I wanted, so he could put them aside for us. We would come to the store on Fridays, with money from our allowances, to purchase the hits.
    Aaron only worked there a few days a week. If the platters were sold out, Terry and I would walk a few blocks down Kings Highway to the Byhoff Brothers Sporting Goods store, which had all the top 40 singles to choose from, at a higher price.
    I caught up with Terry and told her why I couldn’t go with her to Crawford’s. She told me boys were stupid for fighting all the time. I gave her a few dollars so she could pick up a copy of Dance to the Music, by a new band called Sly and the Family Stone, and Cry Like a Baby, by the Box Tops. The Box Tops hit number one on the charts last summer with “The Letter.”
    Terry and I had known each other since grade school. A quiet and sensitive young girl, with long brown hair and brown almond shaped eyes. She was the first girl I was friends with. We related to each other as two people. It was somehow different from the awkward encounters I had with other schoolgirls.

    This was probably due to our first meeting while in the fifth grade. She sat to my left, the third seat, of the second aisle. Terry took her studies seriously and I, less so. I was curiously attracted to this introvert,
and began conversing with her, while the teacher droned on. She considered this an annoyance, and turned towards me to let that fact be known.

    The teacher saw this, not knowing that I was the culprit who provoked the disruption, and proceeded to scold the young student. To add insult to injury, Miss Sawitsky told Terry to stand up, face everyone, and apologize for interrupting the lesson.
She did so in a calm, sincere manner. Sawitsky returned to her lecture and Terry sat back down in her seat, shaking and crying.
    The class was ending and our educator gave out our homework assignment. No one seemed to notice or care about my classmates’ distress. I felt really bad and guilty. Eventually, the ice was broken between us and we became friends.
    I had been through a similar incident the week before. We were at a general assembly in the large auditorium. Nino LaTerra, the principal, or “The Terror,” as we kids called him, was laying down the law about proper behavior during our upcoming field trip. He was the only male at P.S. 153.
    Some kid I didn’t know who was sitting behind me, kept kicking my seat. After the
third time, I turned around to tell this guy to knock it off. When I faced forward,
I saw “The Terror,” pointing his finger at me. He strutted across the stage to my section.
    “YOU, THE BOY IN THE BLUE SHIRT AND BLACK TIE.” The morose man spoke loudly enough for the entire school to hear. Most of the students were wearing white shirts. I knew he was taking aim at me.
    
“STAND UP! WHAT IS YOUR NAME?” he shouted. I stood up and gave him my full name.
    “Everyone look at this boy. Look at him. Remember him. Remember his name. He is not going on the field trip because he doesn’t know how to behave properly during an assembly.”
said the bitter, late middle-aged authority figure.
    I heard the joker behind me laughing, but I was too embarrassed to move, let alone utter a sound. The following day my mother came to school in order to explain the misunderstanding. We met with the principal during the lunch break. Mom’s pleas fell on cruel and deaf ears. He wouldn’t budge and stated for a fact that he knew I was in the wrong. He was punishing me for my own good. The bald, pompous ass told my mother that I had to be taught a good lesson or else I’d be on my way to becoming a juvenile delinquent. If he let it pass, chaos would ensue and I was destined to become one of society’s malcontents, whatever that was.

***

    I met my friends Seth Levine and Frankie Pacitto, who would cheer me on as I ventured forth to do battle with Morris. Seth and I hit it off right away the previous year and became best buddies. We loved to cut school once or twice a month and meet at Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village. We’d strike up friendly conversations with total strangers and explore the east and less glamorous west village, hitting all the famous rock and folk clubs in the bargain.
    Last fall, we spotted a buttons display in the window of a stationary store. A black button shouting; SCHOOL SUCKS, in bold yellow, caught my eye. I snatched it up for a buck and couldn’t wait to wear it at school the following day. Steve, who was much more self-aware and politically astute than your average fourteen-year-old, chose a peace symbol button and another that stated: LBJ for EX- President.
    Immediately upon my entrance into the schoolyard, I was suddenly the center of attention. I had been moderately
popular, but thanks to the SCHOOL SUCKS button, I was now the talk of the town, or at least the talk of Junior High School 234. The kids wanted to know where I got the button, if I had any more, and to assure me that I was very cool. A rousing boost to my status as an eighth grader. Inside the building I wore the button over my shirt pocket for all to see. Word spread like wildfire and by the time lunch period came around, I was summoned to the principal’s office.
    The principal, Vera Goodwin, was an old warhorse, a battle-axe of epic proportions, who ruled with an iron fist. Her stern manner and unwavering inflexibility was as legendary as her boring lectures, heard by all, over the public address system in every room of the school. Legend had it she was not adverse to slapping students in the face and spitting on them. Her heavy makeup and purple eye shadow did nothing do deter the permanent scowl on her face or change her most unpleasant demeaner.
    Upon my entrance to her office, she stiffened up, walked over to me with her hand outstretched and demanded I give her that disgusting button. I took it that she wasn’t much on small talk or the social enmities. I refused. Her assistant, a matronly type sat at her desk in the corner of the room, nervously staring at me, as though I was primed to viciously attack her and wreck the entire office.
    “Give me that button now or you are suspended from school.” she said in a hoarse tone. Her voice crackled with every word like static on a radio.
    “Go ahead and suspend me.” I shot back defiantly. If she didn’t know how to act like a reasonable, civilized human being, I would be dammed if I was going to give in to her demand. She was taken aback at my response and walked over to her assistant. They spoke in hushed tones, that I could not make out. The truth of the matter was I enjoyed school. It did not suck, but the battles lines had now been drawn. If Goodwin hadn’t made a mountain out of a molehill, the novelty if this little joke would have worn off in a few days.
    “You will not wear the button on school property. If you do I will personally see to it that you are suspended indefinitely and this will be noted as a black mark on your permanent record. This will follow you through high school, and college.” she stated bluntly, in the same arrogant tone I concluded, was the only way she knew how to speak, to exert her authority on the students of this public school.
    “Fine with me. I won’t wear it on school property.” I barked. I took the button off, put it into my back pocket, turned my back on them and split. For the rest of the week, I arrived at school about fifteen minutes earlier than usual. I stood outside the schoolyard gate, proudly displaying the button on my winter coat. By the end of the week, I was yesterday’s news, and my fellow schoolmates had shown little if any interest in me or the button. The spotlight was off me. My fifteen minutes of fame had ended.

***

    Center ring was the children’s area, where the swings, monkey bars and sliding ponds heard the happy sounds of youngsters playing, while mothers shared their stories.
    A small section, isolated from the larger playing areas, where the basketball courts and a baseball diamond were located. Snow and ice blanketed the grounds today and there was not a soul to be seen.
    It was chilly and getting colder. We could see our breath in the air. The three of us stood around, waiting for Morris to show up. Frankie was willing to bet us five dollars that Morris would “chicken out.” I hadn’t been in this section for several months. Not since I went head-to-head with Frankie. He punched me in the nose. Blood gushed out from both nostrils, but nothing was broken. I immediately announced he had won. Frankie quickly apologized and we started hanging out together. We were not that close, but at least we were no longer enemies. Ritchie was usually quiet, shy, and always looked sad. I can’t remember why we fought in the first place. Morris finally arrived. It was time to end this nonsense, once and for all. It was an even matchup. Both of us were about the same height and weight.
    As I turned to face Morris, he suddenly started declaring a list of rules, and fighting protocols, to be honorably followed. I slowly walked towards him. When I was within striking distance, in the middle of his speech,
I lunged at him while sticking my foot out behind his leg. I pushed him with all my might. He fell to the ground. I jumped on top of him, sat on his chest and pinned his arms into the snow.
    Morris began grunting and groaning, trying to squirm his way free. Suddenly the absurdity of this adolescent teenage male ritual hit me. Terry’s words came ringing through my head; Boys are stupid for fighting all the time.
    I told
Morris that I didn’t want to hit him. If he
said that he gives up, I would get off his chest. He continued squirming, grunting and groaning. This guy wasn’t worth the time or trouble. I was upset with this social pariah for making me miss my date with Terry, and that anger came to be my motivating force to take him out of the play. If I could end this quickly, I still might be able to catch up with Terry at Crawford’s.
    Frankie shouted out; “You lost Morris. Give up, It’s freezing. I want to go home.”
    A minute or so later, Morris finally surrendered and said: “OK. I give up. You win.”
    As I started to get up, I was suddenly knocked backed down. Someone was pushing my head into the snow. A leg kept kicking me in my right thigh. I was being cursed at and threatened. Racial epithets were being hurled at me. “DIE YOU MOTHER FUCKING WHITE BOY!” was one of them. “WHITE DEVILS!” was another.
    Additional voices were added into the mix, shouting out similar sentiments. Punches were being thrown. I managed to break loose and wiped the snow off my face. I saw my fellow combatants on the ground and eight black kids running away from the scene. The assailants had entered from the entrance behind us, and were now running in the opposite direction, heading for one of the other exits. The park stretched on for another two blocks. The attack lasted no more than two minutes.
    No one was hurt. We dusted ourselves off . I put my jacket back on as we picked up our books. Earlier, I had traded my picture sleeve single of Gary Puckett and The Union Gap’s current hit; “Young Girl,” to Frankie. In exchange he gave me his new copy of “Just Dropped In”, another hit song by a new band called Kenny Rogers and the First Edition.

    They lay half buried in the snow, smashed to pieces. A sliver of vinyl poked through the picture sleeve, already waterlogged from the elements. Frankie stood over the broken records.
    “Fucking niggers!” Frankie proclaimed.
    “What do you expect after what happened?” Steve commented.

    We looked at each other, silently acknowledging his statement. Without another word between us, we left the park and walked the two blocks down to the intersection and went our separate ways. We all knew what Steve meant. Peace activist and civil rights advocate Martin Luther King had been assassinated in Memphis the week before.
    
    The following Monday at lunch I met with Terry in the dining hall. She didn’t ask about the fight and I felt no need to discuss it. My friend had other things on her mind. She was moving this summer from Brooklyn to Staten Island. Her dad had secured the transfer he requested from his civil servant position. Mister Lorenz wanted to be closer to his widowed father, who had suffered a stroke last year. Terry didn’t want to go, but had no choice in the matter.
    I looked upon Terry as a confidant. Being an only child, she was the sister I never had. Terry also informed me that Aaron had turned eighteen and would have to register for the draft. My classmate shared her apprehension and worry that her brother might have to go overseas and fight in the war. I didn’t really know what to say that could comfort her. For some reason I chose that moment to apologize to her for the incident that caused her to shed tears back in the fifth grade. It took a few moments for Terry to recall the exchange.
    “Oh, I was such a little crybaby back then.” she responded with a sweet smile. Then I related the incident with LaTerra and she started laughing.
    “I guess that makes us even.” was her response.
    I changed the subject and asked about the records. She gave the two seven-inch discs to me. We had a pleasant conversation discussing which singles we wanted to purchase next, while enjoying our lunch. I felt very close to Terry now, but was sad that she would be moving.
    Several weeks later, Robert Kennedy, brother of our slain president, and presidential candidate, was shot and killed in Los Angeles. Another shot heard around the world, broadcast on national television. That ended the optimistic years of wonder. It signaled the age of innocence and idealism were over. We crashed head on with the seemingly never-ending days of rage that followed.

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