Wednesday, March 5, 2008
I graduated from Father Lopez Catholic High School in Daytona Beach, Florida in 1991. I was, if I remember correctly, the Vice President of my Senior class. I was on the Model United Nations and in the drama club. I spent a few months on the swim team and on the track team. I was in and out of the French club. I was in and out of detention much, much more frequently. I loved my teachers. I loved my classmates. I had a great time in high school.
When I graduated they put a plaque with my photo on it on the wall of the cafeteria, the first “Crest of the Wave” award … er … awarded. I took all the honors classes offered. I had a stellar GPA and I produced, wrote, and starred in our Homecoming pep rally. I got suspended once for lighting the door to the teacher’s lounge on fire. I had — literally — the keys to the campus and would go on weekends to help teachers with projects. Over the course of one semester I managed to methodically and surreptitiously steal each and every one of the bathroom hall passes. I was voted “Most Intelligent” in my Senior yearbook. I was the DJ for our school dances. I was the star of the theater department.
We were the Fighting Green Waves and we had a ridiculous cheer about “rolling, rolling, rolling” over the competition:
Deep down in the ocean (Deep down in the ocean!)
I heard a great roar (I heard a great roar!)
Was a mighty mighty wave (Was a mighty mighty wave!)
And it went like this (And it went like this!)
Rolly-rolly-rolly roll! (Rolly-rolly-rolly roll!)
I didn’t just love my high school. I ruled my high school.
So it was with some sadness today that I read that they’re tearing down my old school. It will soon be replaced by a Super Wal-Mart. They’re building a new school way out on LPGA Blvd. It’s an odd feeling. I no longer keep in touch with any of my classmates and I haven’t visited the campus since about a year after I graduated. But it was my high school, dammit. My parents were divorced when I was very young so I don’t really have a “home” from my childhood. Both my maternal grandparents have died and their home is not in our family any more. My mom seems to move to a new house every four or five years. My paternal grandmother sold her house in Massachusetts a few years ago and moved to a new place in Rhode Island. My dad got divorced (from his second wife) so the house where I spent my summers is now owned by some randoms. I am very much a man without a past. Now that my high school will soon be gone, there is not a single physical location from my youth remaining. That’s kind of a bummer.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
The “assisted living facility” where my grandmother lived — Indigo Manor in Daytona Beach, Florida — just sent my mom and uncle an automated form letter. It was something along the lines of, “Please tell us how satisfied you are in the care we gave your loved one.” They’re really not very bright over there.
If my mom and uncle are still too upset to do so, I’m going to be the one sending them a reply: “We were completely satisfied … right up until the day you dropped her and broke her femur, then allowed her to spend over 36 hours in agony before telling anyone what had happened. Y’know. Right before she died because of complications from the emergency surgery. Aside from that, though, you were terrific.”
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Monday, May 14, 2007
I saw this sign on A1A in Daytona Beach while driving back from my grandmother’s wake. It’s the kind of thing she would have thought was pretty damn funny.
I really can’t think of a better name for a “gentlemen’s club” on the ocean.
Friday, May 4, 2007
Anna S. Albanese
10/28/1920 - 05/04/2007
My grandmother passed away died this afternoon. I hate “passed away”. It’s so … passive. Nana was not a passive person. She was incredibly, astoundingly active. She’d been pretty limited for the last few years, but that’s not really how I’ll remember her. When I was in elementary school I used to be very proud that she was the president of the local Italian American Association. She could crochet like a mother#$@*; she was an amazing cook; she was in all sorts of women’s clubs; she had a full-time job for a long, long time after she should have been … I don’t know. She just didn’t “pass away”.
I don’t know why I’m writing this. But I hate the thought of seeing the obituary in the paper when I get to Florida. I remember when my grandfather died I hated the obituary. Hated it. My uncle (or someone) had a bunch of them laminated and made into bookmarks and I just hated the idea that a life could be summarized in two or three column inches like that. So here goes …
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Thursday, March 7, 2002
It rained in Los Angeles today.
Rain? <Princess Bride>Inconceivable!</Princess Bride>
An inch of rain in Los Angeles will cause flooding.
I grew up in Daytona Beach and spent the 90s in Gainesville, Fl. Rain was not unusual. In Daytona it rained like clockwork from 3 to 4 pm pretty much every day for eight or nine months each year. In Gainesville you could wear shorts and a t-shirt to a 9 am class in the blistering sunshine without a cloud in the sky and walk out of that class into a hurricane-force downpour. Rain was … well … if not your “best friend” … it was at least like some guy you see every day and get to know pretty well. Rain was somebody who worked in the same building as you and you saw him every morning in the elevator. Rain was “not unusual”.
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Thursday, April 19, 2001
The space shuttle Endeavour launched this afternoon. I was lucky enough to live in Daytona Beach, FL when I was a kid so I was able to see this many, many times … My mom took us to Cape Canaveral to see one of the very first launches. Incredible. Awe-inspiring. Loud.
Kinda like this.
