Michael Thomas Ford - Full Circle by Michael Thomas Ford Page B
Authors: Michael Thomas Ford
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for homosexuals to gather in the middle of Philadelphia.
Neither of us suggested that we go in. We were still not quite gay, despite the fact that we regularly sodomized one another and thought nothing of it. To actually go into The Spot, though, to join the people inside, would have been to count ourselves among their numbers, and we were unprepared for that. Instead, we hurried back to Independence Hall to see the fireworks explode in all their patriotic glory, raining red, white, and blue stars down on our heads as we clapped and cheered. In August, our parents threw us our annual birthday party. We toasted the end of our eighteenth years with the traditional barbeque, this time accompanied by bottles of Duke beer presented to us by our fathers like royal scepters being handed down to the next in line for the throne. We pretended they were our first ones, clinking them against our fathers' and manfully overseeing the grilling of the hamburgers. It had long been a sore point with Jack and myself that we had been born in August and not been allowed to start kindergarten until we were six, resulting in our always seeming to be a year older than everyone else in our class. Now, though, the additional year gave us a certain cachet, and we looked forward to perhaps being mistaken for sophomores at our new school.
It's no great revelation to say that it sometimes takes leaving a place to make you truly see it for the first time. In those last weeks of August, I felt that keenly. Not only did the people and places I'd known for nineteen years suddenly seem alien to me, but so did my life as a whole. I no longer fit, as if I'd grown too large for our house, our street, our town. Everything felt confining, designed to keep me trapped forever in that one, small place.
When the long-awaited day came, my bags and boxes were packed and ready. On Saturday, September 6, I packed it all into the 1966 Ford Fairlane station wagon Jack's father had given him as a graduation gift. All four of our parents stood on the porch of the Graces' house as we said our good-byes. Our mothers cried and our fathers shook our hands, telling us to drive carefully. We promised, hugging first our own mothers and then each other's. Then we got into the Ford, gave a final honk of the horn, and started the 200-mile journey to our new life.
CHAPTER 10
A college dorm on the first day of a new term resembles nothing so much as a sea lion rookery during the winter birthing season. Upperclassmen, appointed to oversee the operations, herd the newcomers with a practiced, weary air, while the freshmen pups tumble over one another in their hurry, all wide-eyed excitement mixed with fear of the unknown. An infectious madness surrounds the proceedings, and it's impossible not to be swept up in it. Soon things will settle into a more sedate routine, but those first few days are pure bedlam. If you are one of the fresh arrivals, you feel half-explorer, half-clown, vulnerable in your newness but determined to make your way in this unfamiliar world. As Jack and I carried our belongings into Pinchot Hall and up to our room on the third floor, we passed through a circus of sights, sounds, and smells. The voices of the Grateful Dead mingled with Janis Joplin's as Jimi Hendrix's guitar wailed behind them. Men of all kinds moved in and out of doorways, enthusiastically greeting old friends and nodding curtly at new faces. Most had hair longer than that of Jack and myself, and it appeared that growing a beard would be one of our first priorities. Peace sign posters and images of Che Guevara graced many dorm room walls, and the scent of pot was ever-present, in bold defiance of the numerous warnings we'd received in our new-student packets about the university's no-tolerance policy on drugs.
Our room was number 308. It was a double, as we'd requested on our applications, and it was completely unremarkable in every way. To the left of the door was a closet, then a long L-shaped
Neither of us suggested that we go in. We were still not quite gay, despite the fact that we regularly sodomized one another and thought nothing of it. To actually go into The Spot, though, to join the people inside, would have been to count ourselves among their numbers, and we were unprepared for that. Instead, we hurried back to Independence Hall to see the fireworks explode in all their patriotic glory, raining red, white, and blue stars down on our heads as we clapped and cheered. In August, our parents threw us our annual birthday party. We toasted the end of our eighteenth years with the traditional barbeque, this time accompanied by bottles of Duke beer presented to us by our fathers like royal scepters being handed down to the next in line for the throne. We pretended they were our first ones, clinking them against our fathers' and manfully overseeing the grilling of the hamburgers. It had long been a sore point with Jack and myself that we had been born in August and not been allowed to start kindergarten until we were six, resulting in our always seeming to be a year older than everyone else in our class. Now, though, the additional year gave us a certain cachet, and we looked forward to perhaps being mistaken for sophomores at our new school.
It's no great revelation to say that it sometimes takes leaving a place to make you truly see it for the first time. In those last weeks of August, I felt that keenly. Not only did the people and places I'd known for nineteen years suddenly seem alien to me, but so did my life as a whole. I no longer fit, as if I'd grown too large for our house, our street, our town. Everything felt confining, designed to keep me trapped forever in that one, small place.
When the long-awaited day came, my bags and boxes were packed and ready. On Saturday, September 6, I packed it all into the 1966 Ford Fairlane station wagon Jack's father had given him as a graduation gift. All four of our parents stood on the porch of the Graces' house as we said our good-byes. Our mothers cried and our fathers shook our hands, telling us to drive carefully. We promised, hugging first our own mothers and then each other's. Then we got into the Ford, gave a final honk of the horn, and started the 200-mile journey to our new life.
CHAPTER 10
A college dorm on the first day of a new term resembles nothing so much as a sea lion rookery during the winter birthing season. Upperclassmen, appointed to oversee the operations, herd the newcomers with a practiced, weary air, while the freshmen pups tumble over one another in their hurry, all wide-eyed excitement mixed with fear of the unknown. An infectious madness surrounds the proceedings, and it's impossible not to be swept up in it. Soon things will settle into a more sedate routine, but those first few days are pure bedlam. If you are one of the fresh arrivals, you feel half-explorer, half-clown, vulnerable in your newness but determined to make your way in this unfamiliar world. As Jack and I carried our belongings into Pinchot Hall and up to our room on the third floor, we passed through a circus of sights, sounds, and smells. The voices of the Grateful Dead mingled with Janis Joplin's as Jimi Hendrix's guitar wailed behind them. Men of all kinds moved in and out of doorways, enthusiastically greeting old friends and nodding curtly at new faces. Most had hair longer than that of Jack and myself, and it appeared that growing a beard would be one of our first priorities. Peace sign posters and images of Che Guevara graced many dorm room walls, and the scent of pot was ever-present, in bold defiance of the numerous warnings we'd received in our new-student packets about the university's no-tolerance policy on drugs.
Our room was number 308. It was a double, as we'd requested on our applications, and it was completely unremarkable in every way. To the left of the door was a closet, then a long L-shaped
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