School

When I returned to Miami Shores Elementary for the beginning of 5th grade, I had really long hair like my idols the Rolling Stones (circa 1968). My Mom let me skip the barber shop that summer, and I was eclipsed only by my friend Brett Miller, who's hair was at least two or three inches longer than mine. I was another year from picking up the guitar, but I was totally focused on the rock n' roll look. I used to even carry a brush in my back pocket. It was 1975, so the idea of long hair on a male wasn't that big of a deal to most people. An exception to that rule was coach Gusman. He took serious offense to the look. He ran P.E. class like boot camp for kids and would often put longhairs in the girls line, or feminize our names. Gusman was a detestable character to be sure, but he was truly hated by the so called "hippies". He took great pleasure in singling out Brett and myself since we were actually liked some sports and he had to deal with us on that level. I was a pretty good runner, so he nick-named me "chicken legs". The guy was determined to make me suffer for 55 minutes every week. I would try and excell at certain activities just to piss him off.

1975 was the first year that I commited myself to completely ignoring school work and being a smart-ass towards most of the teachers. Looking back, I was just seeking attention of some sort. Maybe it was a cry for help. I started hanging around the wrong crowd and would do just about anything to prove I didn't care about the consequences. I broke my wrist playing football and got my very first cast. I had all my loser buddys sign it with the most disrespectful, disturbing things they could write. G.G. Allin would have been proud. I got sent to the principals office to explain the dirty words on my cast. When she saw what had been written about her on my arm, she closed the door, and actually made me pull down my pants, spanking me with an oversized, ping pong paddle. I laughed at first, so she put some muscle into it. She tried calling my Mother afterwards, but she was at work. My ass was pretty sore. I paid her back a few nights later by taking a dump through the mail-slot of the front door to the main office. Not very classy, but it seemed like the right thing to do at the time.

The cast on my arm (with a new coat of yellow paint to cover up the grafitti) was starting to get pretty itchy. I always tried to move my arm around somehow to relieve the discomfort. I scraped a small opening on the underside of my elbow with the knife I always carried with me. The hole looked a little bit like a mouth, so I drew a face around it to make it complete. When I went to lunch that afternoon, I decided to spoon some jello into the hole to cool my arm down a bit. After the soothing effects of the jello, I followed it with a pour of milk. Finally, I was getting the relief I had been looking for. A circle of kids were watching me feed my arm with amusement. One of the lunch guards came over to see what the fuss was about. They grabbed my good arm to escort me for another trip to the office and for some reason I reacted by hitting them in the head with my cast arm. I ran out of the cafeteria and left the school grounds. This would be the first time I ever had the police called on my behalf. I hid out under a railroad bridge near my house until dark, and snuck through my bedroom window and tried to pretend I was asleep. My Mom came home a short time later. Boy was she pissed. The next morning I had my cast removed and replaced with a fiberglass one. I was allowed back in school a week later after a counseling session between the principal, the lunch guard, and my Mother (and myself). I was surprised they even let me come back.