home coming

A friend took her daughter shopping for a homecoming dress

    Boy did  that trigger a memory!!

    I was a freshman at Lake View High School.   Homecoming was approaching.  I had no idea what that was about.

    After being clued in, I thought it might be fun.

    So I asked a girl to the dance and festivities.

    Now, I don't do anything a normal person would do.  I have my own unique style.

    My folks had  ordered a pizza from Biasetti;s on Ashland and Irving.  I was sent to pick it up.  That was a big thing in our household because money always seemed tight.

   Now at  age 15, it should not be a problem for me to walk 3 blocks, get the pizza, pay for it, and come home.

    I was walking down Irving Park with the pizza when I saw Mary Jane.  She was also a freshman at Lake View.  We had a couple of classes, or maybe homeroom, together and I thought she was nice.  I think her parents owned a hardware store on Ashland but I am not sure about that.  Hell, I am not sure about anything that happened past yesterday!

    So we stopped in front of a hamburger joint called the Patio and talked.

    After a few minutes of chit chat, I shifted the pizza and worked up the courage to ask her.

    So I did.  But she said no, because her father would not allow her to date until she was 16.

    Then she looked at me and asked what I had in the box, which was tucked neatly under my left arm.

    I told her pizza from Biasetti's. 

    She said I should not carry a pizza like that and I responded that I always carried it like this, trying to make it seem like I was some kind of bon vivant.

    We parted ways.  I continued home.

    When I got there, I laid the pizza on the table and my dad opened it.

    All the pizza was crammed into one side of the box.  Plus it was cold.

    "What the hell?"  were the only words out of his mouth.

    I don't recall ever being sent for pizza again.

    And I never asked Mary Jane out when she turned 16.

    But it all came back to me when a friend said she took her daughter shopping for a homecoming dress.

Peace and Love

        Especially Peace