PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

The summer of 1976 began a little early, on Monday, October 13th, 1975, just before, say eleven am, at which time I had decided that I no longer wanted to attempt to write ghost stories, murder mysteries, and science fiction (attempts at which had provided one of my nerdish activities since early in my eight grade year).  I thought I had fallen in love (I had not, not really; that was coming in the following July), and, upon rejection by the person I thought I loved, I---walking home from school (having earned all of my credits except Senior Civics, I was free to leave the high school grounds after the last Civics class of my day).  The walk home was about a mile long and, like Wallace Stevens (who was then unknown to me), I composed the thirteen lines of a truncated sonnet to express what I thought was an endless love.

The summer of 1976 ended at 11:59pm on December 31st, 1976, in the home of the guardians of my First Beloved and Best Friends, Cerulean.  Cerulean's guardians (eldest sister and her husband) were absent at a Watchnight service at their church, so Cerulean and I spent the last couple of hours of 1976 together.  We had spent the actual summer almost inseperably, much to my parents' dismay.  Bringing me into the c.b. community of our local channel twenty-two, Cerulean had helped me find the appellation Starwatcher (which, years---decades---later evolved to Starward as it is now), which immediately freed me from my mundane name, the verbal bullying that had accompanied my name since sixth grade, and allowed me to escape the shadows of my parents, Lloyd and Betty.  Cerulean and I had been separated, on Thursday, September 9th, 1976, when I was forcefully transported, by my parents, two hours northeastward, to the small college campus where they left me, entirely alone, for approximately ten weeks.  I had returned for the long Holiday break on Tuesday, November 23rd, of 1976, and Cerulean and I had immediately resumed our friendship.  Now, in the waning hours, then moments, of 1976, I knew that this great summer season, which had encompassed far more time that a normal summer, was about to end.  In less than forty-eight hours, I would be transported back to the campus again.  The last song of the evening, before midnight and the New year, on the top 40 local AM radio station that we listened to was Dance With Me by Orleans---a song that, even now, causes a deep emotional response in me. 

I was not mature enough, then, to understand all of the aspects of the gift Cerulean had given me, by helping me to, and being the first to acknowledge, the name, Starwatcher.  Although I had felt virtually abandoned at the campus, and had feared (with no reason at all for the fear) that our friendship might have been impaired (and it was not!), I had been made secure, without even realizing fully, in my identity as Starwatcher; and that had protected me during the previous term at college.  In the Dining Hall, certain Seniors (the few who still ate on the Meal Plan) were accorded a measure of respect at their tables, at which underclassmen, especially freshmen (if admitted), were only permitted to speak if spoken to, and were not expected to engage in any kind of questioning or questionable discussion.  I sat at a table presided over by a Senior whose quiet demeanor concealed a towering prejudice and hostility to anyone that he found to be different from himself.  Thus, while admitted to his table and seated their silently, I often heard my interests pilloried---Milton's poetry, the serial muders ascribed to Jack the Ripper; and, above all, my interest in the citizens band radio.  Like many of his peers, this Senior enjoyed a particularly subtle strategy of belittling, which consisted of telling any particular freshman, "I'm sorry, I have forgotten your name."  How many times in the previous term I had received that remark from his mouth---as he cut his Reuben sandwich with a knife and fork, because handling it with his hands was too proletarian, or some such.  But the name he pretended to forget (and, given his academic standing and ability to retain information, it was a pretense) was my mundane name, a name for which I had stopped caring months before.  I had never, ever, disclosed Starwatcher to him; Starwatcher was not available for his belittling, and his smug request for a courteous reminder of who I was, which was, in his view, a mere freshman who had been charitably admitted to the elite company that gathered at his table.  I did not know, on that New Year's Eve in Cerulean's house, that, in less that, in eight days, being criticized by the several upperclassmen at that particular table for stooping to an interest as vulgar and common as "c.b. radio," I launched into a most eloquent defense of my friends as compared to these self-righteous hypocrites with whom I took my meals; but no longer, going forward.  I resolved never to eat with them again.  I knew they always arrived at about 1:30 and 6:15pm (the Dining Hall ceased serving at 2 and 7pm); so, even if I had to eat alone, I began to show up at about noon and 4:30 pm, and found out that a good many of my freshman neighbors in North Hall ate at that time, without the presence of Seniors to "preside" over us.

But that was yet ahead of me; and now, in the last few moments of New Year's Eve, listening to Dance With Me, I had a sense that the Summer of 1976 was not only ending; but, also, receding, although I now realize that was an illusion.  The Summer of 1976 was not receding, it was sealing itself to me.  What I have become today, what constitutes and defines Starward was first planted, and began to thrive, between October 13th, 1975 and December 31st, 1976.  That gift would not be wrested from me by an arrogant Senior at college; nor by the collapse (in our vicinity) of the c.b. community in the Summer of 1977.  None of the adversities of my life---mostly minor, two or three major---could wrest it from me.  The joys that Cerulean's words and smile had given me, the joys traced out by the glide of Cerulean's feet, unshod and sheathed in that midnight blue---and warm, fragrant---softness, have remained with me to this very moment, nineteen minutes into 2023.  Tonight, just before midnight, I listened to Dance With Me once more; then Frampton's Baby, I Love Your Way (from his album, Comes Alive)---songs that evoke, for me, the presence of Cerulean, my Best Friend and My First Beloved.

Starward

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