Picardy

Picardy Place, later Picardy Street, is shaped like the letter “T” but laying down. In the picture, it’s slightly down and right of center.

You cock it with the handle and then “fire” a single chuff of air. A hand at the end of the barrel would feel the air but 12" farther out you’d hardly notice. Regardless, it made a nice loud “Bang!”

Terri is the middle child in our family. That’s her in the light-colored coat and hat in the foreground.

Two years later, he would have a heart attack. I vividly remember him on the bathroom floor in his underwear and Mom shooing me out, “Get ready for school.” The ambulance took him away as I rode off to school not knowing.

The Rock began in a tool room in the back of Bebop’s garage. It was three backyards and two fences from mine.

Family is like this; it stays with you no matter what.

There is much truth in the movie. The dialog, the attitudes, the laws, the houses and decors of the two sides of this story are all spot-on. I saw and heard nothing that jarred me out of that era.

I was a terrible student.

I rarely did homework but somehow slid by with Cs and just barely advanced from grade to grade. What homework I did was driven solely by fear of a teacher’s wrath but, over time, my skin grew thicker with each passing year. “Homework time” was spent alone in my room with doors shut as I worked on hobbies or reading Science Fiction.

On Saturdays, Dad would sometimes go to the hospital to see a couple of his patients. And sometimes he would take me along.