January 1952 began the second half of my junior year. Although I always kept expecting that the events of my life would improve, they really did not. My father still complained about my mother and me taking money from the cup which served as our home bank. We had no checking account; I’m not sure credit cards had been invented yet. Other families had arrangements for items to be placed on “lay-away,” until they were paid for and brought home. In our house, everything was truly “cash-and-carry.”
Our cash for daily use, primarily for the purchase of food, occasionally for clothing, was kept in a cup on the kitchen shelf. That January, like many before and afterwards, my father stormed that my mother or I had stolen his money from the cup. Since he did all of the grocery shopping, he knew when something was missing. Once more, he threatened to stop buying food for us. I’m not sure what the alternative might have been, but the words were emotionally abusive. Meanwhile, he saw fit to continue his gambling on weekends. It was usually cards, probably poker; he often lost several hundred dollars at a time. I never heard about his winning anything.
In my diary I continued to comment on my classes, especially my chemistry laboratory experiments and my reports, composed for my Latin class, on Roman life and culture. The orations of Cicero were the focus for this year’s translations. My love for things Roman began at an early age.
I continued to have a social life dependent upon transportation provided by a few friends, who, luckily, had cars for cruising Main Street and the avenues leading to Youngstown, where the new drive-ins were located. Weekend bake-sales were popular for ways to raise class funds for social activities; I had fun working at several sales throughout the year. My mother never contributed any products for these sales. She disliked any form of cooking; baking was at the bottom of her list. I attended the dances for the purpose of taking up tickets and observing the interactions of others.
My own romantic interests, actually “infatuation interests,” centered on Martha Smith, who was under the control of Don Castle, the guy she dated throughout high school and finally married – not happily from what I gathered, later, at high school reunions. I devoted many diary entries to recalling my conversations with her, as well as her (and my) arguments with Don. At the time, with my believing I had no chance of success, I could not understand any reason for his jealousy. Obviously, viewpoints were relative to personal perceptions.
My social participation continued to be that of a worker-bee. School-wide elections were held for students to run the city for a day. I served as the master-of-ceremony to organize the event and coordinate the gatherings for the election campaign speeches. I was disturbed, however, when several of my friends disrupted the procedure by tossing free bubble gum to the audience.
I had helped a close friend develop his own campaign speech to be elected mayor and was greatly annoyed when he disregarded our final form for an ad lib appeal for sympathy. He lost. The guy elected mayor was another close friend, an older student, who was also an amateur boxer. Anyway, I enjoyed being part of the political process.
I kept wishing events in my own life would improve, somewhat magically, I now recognize. I was busy with classes I enjoyed. I had friends whom I helped. I did not believe I, myself, needed “help,” but did desire “approval” and the “popularity” others seemed to have without much effort.
There were days when I walked across the bridge over Mosquito Creek, on my way to school, and wondered if I should make a sharp detour over the railing, but I quickly realized suicide was an unforgivable sin and no doubt my life would get better in the future. My senior year would improve, somehow. And then there would be college, somehow. My future did not depend upon what a kitchen cup might provide. A scholarship to Kent State would help. All I needed to do was keep doing what I’d always done.