Child of the Sixties

We always chose the fat kid among us (there was always just one in any group of twelve boys) to test the load bearing capacity of the ice first. We always promised to let him play. If he didn’t fall through the ice, we would all lace up and he would be allowed to play net. Such a game could last for most of a day, with players fading in or out as they got tired or hungry and fresh legs arrived. Although an attempt was always made to keep track of the score, invariably all interest in this was lost after the first 15 or 20 goals. By suppertime, nearly weak with hunger and exhaustion, since even 10-year-old boys can’t last forever on adrenaline alone, the game would come to an end, as natural as any organism running down and getting low on energy, like a clock unwinding. There was no demarcation of time slotted into periods, no accumulation of periods defining so many games played. There was not even a whistle to blow. There was just the organic engine that was the rhythm formed by the hearts and stomachs and blood of a bunch of rag-tag young boys who owed their utter exhaustion to serving no master but the god of Play. Besides, it was getting too dark to see the puck anyway.

When the Sixties blew into our small town, for a long while there seemed to be no discernible affect, just business as usual. Reports and warnings about “Reefer Madness” were disseminated by officialdom, and in their wisdom, school authorities introduced sex ed. For us boys, this consisted of a 40 minute instructional lecture about gonads, hormones and the dangerous and inevitable horrible consequences of their volatile mix. Apparently, upon reaching puberty, we were all doomed. Shame, venereal disease and of course the shame of venereal disease awaited us within the folds of every skirt we even thought about lifting. Of course the ONLY thing we were interested in was what those skirts might be concealing! It was no use pointing out to the good doctor who was providing the lecture that perhaps a condom might provide a simple form of protection from such a disaster. We were all Catholic. I have no idea what kind of instructions the girls were receiving, since they were given separate attention, cloistered in a separate classroom. For all we knew, they were probably being supplied with chastity belts, mace and holy water to ward off the likes of us boys, painted vividly by their instructor as the vile, horned beasts, akin to werewolves, vampires and of course Satan. Read more...