Musings & Thoughts for Wednesday, June 14, 2023, or: Then…and Now

It’s early afternoon here in Lithia, Florida, on Wednesday, June 14, 2023. It’s a hot – and getting hotter – day in the Tampa Bay area; the current temperature in my neighborhood is 90°F/32°C (but feels like 98°F/36°C) under partly sunny conditions. There’s no rain or stormy weather in the forecast, but it’s going to be a scorcher outside – the expected high will be 93°F/33°C. So, no midday walk for me. I’m not fond of hot, humid weather, and unfortunately, I’m stuck living in a state where hot and humid is the rule and not the exception.

Tempus Fugit: Remembering Tuesday, June 14, 1983

Since I’m still in Let’s Remember Things from 1983 mode, I figured I would write a bit about Tuesday, June 14, 1983, which was – in real life – my penultimate day as a high school student at South Miami High School, and is the day that serves as the A-story’s setting in my novella Reunion: A Story.

Obviously, I don’t remember every detail of that day with 100% accuracy. If you asked me, for instance, what we had for lunch on that day, I’d have to reply, “I have no idea.” I also can’t remember what I wore to school, aside from a cheap imitation Army fatigue jacket that I’d gotten (as a present from my next-door neighbor Russell Alger) at the now-closed Jet Army-Navy store on Bird Road and SW 96^th Avenue and that I wore frequently to school, starting from my first day as a 10^th grader.

What I do remember, of course, are:

• My deeply conflicted emotions about graduation. To be honest, I was not ready, emotionally or psychologically, to start “young adulting.” My mom had not saved a single dime for my college education, and even though I had already applied for part-time jobs at the then-newish Miami International Mall, no one had hired me. I had not discussed college with my guidance counselor, Ms. Pamela Anderson, nor had she ever brought up the topic, so I had no idea about applying for Miami-Dade Community College, Pell Grants, or student loans. I also wasn’t among South Miami High’s best and brightest outside of my journalism or chorus classes, so I did not expect to get any scholarships to help with my tuition
• Taking one final rather than two. If I recall correctly – and perhaps I do not remember my dates accurately – on Tuesday the 14^th the schedule for finals was Second and Fifth period. In the 1982-1983 school year, my second-period class was Mixed Chorus II, and my fifth-period class was Art. Because Ms. Owen, our choral director, had been offered a new job elsewhere (just as her fictional counterpart, Mrs. Quincy, in Reunion), we didn’t have a final exam in chorus, so that meant I only took one test – I don’t remember what it was like – for art class with Miss Lemo
• Lugging my then-new and still intact DeCapello 1983 yearbook around from class to class and getting as many “last inscriptions” as possible from fellow students and favorite faculty members. Many of them – particularly the teachers – dated their contributions, and because I was looking at quite a few of them that bore the “Tuesday, June 14, 1983” dateline when I wrote the first version of Reunion back in 1998, I had convinced myself that this had been my last day in South Miami as a student. Nope. I would have known better had I made a more careful examination of my yearbook – which suffered extensive damage when one of the kids who rode the same bus as I did (I don’t remember his name, but he was a Marielito with mental health issues) grabbed it from my hands as we were on a busy thoroughfare and threw it out the window. Even though the driver stopped the bus, got out, and retrieved it from the road, it had been damaged not just from the impact of hitting the pavement, but a few cars ran over it before the driver picked it up and brought it back on board the bus.

Overall, I was sad that my high school years were ending on such a bittersweet, discordant note. I wasn’t thrilled – like many of my classmates surely were – that commencement was only a few days away. For the kids who had concrete plans – getting a job right away, starting college in the fall, or joining the military shortly after graduation – the end of the school year was a blessing. For me, it was like looking down at an abyss – and feeling as though it was looking back up at me.

And at home, things were not that great either; my mom was dating Joe Bubenik, a retired pilot with an authoritarian bent and a severe drinking problem, so life beyond the South Miami High campus was not particularly great, either. Joe did not – thankfully – live with us; he split his time between a house he’d bought in Sebring (not that far from here…it’s maybe an hour away as the car drives) and the townhouse next door to our “left” (west, since our block faced north). He was the kind of alcoholic who would start drinking at 6:30 AM, and he was unbearably bossy, foul-mouthed, and occasionally violent. A tyrant, you might say.

So, no. I don’t recall being terribly happy on June 14, 1983.

On Writing & Storytelling

Yesterday was not a productive day, at least as far as my novel-writing endeavors are concerned. I know HOW I want to start Chapter Ten, at least in terms of knowing where the action is going to take place and who is in the scene. My problem is not related to ideas or plot points; it’s more a matter of the actual writing of the opening line of the chapter. Do I start, for instance, the scene with a line of dialogue? Or do I go and describe the location in which the scene takes place? I can’t decide!

Ugh. And people who are not writers – or even readers, for that matter – think I have it easy because “all I do all day is write.”

I am not going to abandon this project. I’ve already written nine chapters – a prologue and eight “real” chapters – and spent too much time and energy to just throw up my arms in frustration and quit. At times, though, I do wonder if all this stressing over wordcounts, whether the dialogue is engaging or the characters believable, or if the story is any good will be worth it once I finish and publish Reunion: Coda (or whatever the final title of the novel ends up being).

Well, que sera, sera.

Right now, my focus will be on getting Chapter Ten started. So, I’m going to take a “mental health break” and rest for an hour, maybe two, then resume my writing duties for the day.