As some people may know, I consider myself an Arizonan. Most of my formative years were spent in the desert. Catholic school for most of my education until college and growing up in the family business of restaurants. But my mother and father were born and raised on the east coast in New Jersey. It was actually the place of my birth, and for some weird reason I shyed away from that part of my heritage. As I am growing older, the place has taken on more meaning for me, so much so that what little memory I do have is being replayed over and over in dreams. Dreams that have a similar theme or place that change ever so slightly with each time they occur.
My birthplace was Bloomfield, New Jersey. For the first three and a half years we lived in two different homes in the same general neighborhood (within walking distance of each other). The first was on the corner of Hickory and Sycamore street in a neighborhood where many of the homes were built by my great grandfather whom i never met. Some of the homes were taken when the state constructed the New Jersey Turnpike, but many of the homes still exist. I was going to add "oddly enough it was the same street (Hickory) that my mother grew up on", though history tells me that it was not odd at all, it was how many families lived. I visited the area several years ago, and as i have recounted at least once before in a similar post, the concrete outline of the above ground swimming pool that was erected in 1960 was still prominant in the back yard. My great-aunt's home, now inhabited by my cousins, still looking the same. There are pictures of me and my family that jog memories of those early years, but I can still remember several of them as if they happened yesterday. One vivid one was that of our pet pig, Willy, (yes we had a pet pig) running through the house and out the back door into the pool area, my mother swatting at it with a broom. I can also remember my dad taking me in the pool and bouncing me up and down and pulling me around in a plastic inflatable doughnut. My father, at this point in his life, I believed was a salesman, possibly working for Proctor and Gamble (i know that was one of his jobs), but had previously been a Bloomfield Police officer and a fireman. My godfather was the mayor of Bloomfield, Ralph Conte, a close friend of my Fathers. My mother, if memory serves me, stayed at home and raised the children (4- I was the youngest). She had worked for Bell Telephone for a while and had dreams of being a clothing designer in New York.
At some point in my first three and 3/4 years we moved out of that house into a home on Belleville Avenue. The home was marked by a bright red front door and sat upon a hill. At one point the circus came to town and was sponsored by the Jersey Jaycees (junior chamber of commerce). As a publicity stunt a trailer loaded with two elephants pulled up in front of our house and unloaded. The elephants were brought up our driveway and posed for a picture of several men trying to fit them into our barn (it seems odd now that we had a traditional barn in our yard complete with a loft). There are a couple of photos of my dad holding me while I feed one of them a peanut and a photo of the men pushing the elephant's behinds into the barn.
I could go on and on, but I know how attention spans work, so I will get to the inspiration of this post...
We moved to Arizona in the summer of 1964. I was three and a half years old. We only lived there for a short time before heading back to New Jersey. I am not sure why we moved back, maybe home-sickness, maybe a failed attempt at the restaurant business, maybe my dad didn't like working for the mines as security, I don't know, but we left. We returned to Bloomfield and stayed for a short period in an apartment while my parents looked for a home. I am not exactly sure of the time frame, but i remember attending first grade at Sacred Heart School. So, to the point...Last night I dreamed of a little deli/sandwich shop that my father would take me to get a pork roll sandwich on a toasted, buttered Kaiser roll. It seems that is was on a main street, possibly Bloomfield Avenue, but time and memory have changed that truth. My first dreams were that of my father interacting with the owner, someone he was obviously acquainted with, from his youthful years in the town. But through my years the dream has changed with the location being different, yet oddly familiar. The way you ordered, the seating setup etcetera. Thankfully the memory of the smell has remained even to this day and in last night's recollection. But last night there was a new owner of the establishment, an older, grey haired woman that was working the grill with patrons standing at the raised counter where you could view the making of your sandwich. There were rolls slathered in marinara and cheese awaiting a meat ball topping and pork roll sizzling on the grill. There was an older gentleman sitting with another in a booth and I told the lady that he was the son of the original owner, late 70's in age. She told me that he was also in a band that went around on tour that played for the likes of Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennet. While the dream was a total fabrication of my mind, there were many familiarities.
So going back to my original sentence...I may have grown up in Arizona, called it home, and told many a folk that it was where I came from, the truth is that I cannot escape my geographical DNA. I'm a Jersey boy. It is in my blood and most definitely in my dreams. Mom and Dad are gone, ties are no longer there, at least not for me. You see we moved again back to Arizona within two years. This summer some cousins are organizing a family reunion which my oldest sister plans to attend, but that is because she did not return to Arizona with us in the late 60's, she went back to Bloomfield where she attended Trenton State College. I thought about going, but I don't know any of them, not one. I remember brief interactions with some, but not enough to buy a ticket and spend a day with them. Most of the evidence of my Jersey roots are gone, leaving Arizona in the forefront where I went to school and made friends that are still around today. but the one lasting, vivid memory will always be me, my dad and pork roll on a grilled, buttered Kaiser roll.
Hopefully I will feel inspired to continue the story, there is so much to tell...
