So this other lady, I think her name was Agnes, but I could be wrong took me to lunch and some other places where I bought other souvenirs.
Back at Carole's place, Carole thought it would be find to show me around her town. I saw a lot of buildings I would never remember now. I think one was Con Ed. Buildings didn't impress me. One night we went to play Bingo. I'd never done this except in school or at home. This was so different. She showed me how to use the chips and how to stamp the cards with an ink stamp. After that we went back to her place.
The next night she wanted to go to a party. I believe it was in NY. It was a birthday party and I had no clue till we got there whose birthday it was. It was a famous popular singer of the time. I asked her if she knew him well. She said she didn't know him at all.
I asked what we were doing there and she replied she just wanted a peek inside. I let her drag me in, only protesting a little. I figured we'd get thrown out quick. There was a big pile of wrapped presents on a table. We, of course had none to add to the pile.
She told me to look at a painting on the wall. While I was looking I could see her reflection in the window. She picked up one of the presents and took the tag off it. She quickly wrote her name on the new tag she took from her purse and stuffed the box on the table. I was shocked.
We had just crashed a famous guys private birthday party and she had done something even worse.
It was Easter weekend and Carole took me to an Italian friends home. They fed me and we talked a lot. The lady's husband was a former Hell's Angel member. He said he was reformed. I believed him. He was a loving father to his children from what I could see. We talked a lot about trains. He was a collector of model trains and I loved the real ones.
One of the things I ate was a dish made with eggs and veggies and sliced peperoni and cheeses. It was baked in a big pan. It was delicious.
Somebody took me to Yonkers. I may have just taken the train on my own. I wanted to look at the shops there. I found a Gimbal's department store. There wasn't much in there I could afford to even look at.
I did find my way to a section where they sold old coins and paper money. It was real stuff, not fake for the tourists. I bought a one dollar bill that was one of the old "big" bills. It wouldn't have fit in a wallet at that time or today. Mom loved it when I gave it to her.
The next day something really weird happened. First there was a strange call and Carole's mom answered it. She said it was for me. I thought maybe Mom had called. It was Jim and he was angry as all hell.
It seems that the place I had played bingo was one that his Mom went to all the time. I didn't even think she knew what I looked like. I didn't know where he was from except I thought he'd said once he was from Long Island and I was nowhere near that.
He screamed so loud on the phone, calling me all kinds of nasty names and they could hear every word he screamed. I hung up and I was so embarrassed. I told them about him and that I wanted nothing to do with him. I don't know if they believed me or not but I cut my vacation short and went home.
Partly because I was so embarrassed and partly because Mom also called that night. The bastard had called there and told mom I had willingly participated in orgies with him and others. He described all the things he said I did with him. Mom was shocked and put Dad on the phone. She told me Dad cried. I was a virgin and nobody believed me.
I went home and back to work. I tried to forget it all. I was still singing but it wasn't the same. I would never live down the embarrassment or the shame. I had done nothing and still nobody believed me.
I did go back to New York but at different times. It wasn't the first time I'd ever been there and it wasn't the last.
I thought I was getting fat because I'd started to gain back some of the weight I'd lost before. You can see in the pic of me with the bird. I was no longer skinny. My jeans were tight. Weight has always been a problem with me. I've always hated when I was fat and worried about getting fat when I was thin.
I started taking a diet aid called Prolamine. Nobody knew at the time what that would do to you. It wasn't helping much. Dad was feeling sorry for me. He said I wasn't eating enough. I'd work all day and sometimes into the night. I'd come home and crash on the couch and not want to eat anything.
Dad would actually cry and say he'd been cooking all day just for me. I was guilted into eating it.
Then he started bringing home chocolate covered mint drops. Brach's made them. they were a large ball of minty sugar covered in chocolate. He brought them home just to tempt me.
Later I would come to understand that maybe just maybe, he wanted me fat so no one would want me and I'd stay home all the time.
What I didn't know until years later was that supposedly Jim was calling up every few days and giving Dad hell because he claimed I was calling him up and begging him to take me back.
I don't know when I would have had the time. by then I was doing two shifts at the factory 3 days a week and going to college classes two or three days a week because I was working nights and on the weekends it was singing at the bar on both nights. I sure didn't have a cell phone in those days and I wouldn't use a pay phone when there was a perfectly good phone at home.
No, I was not calling him at all. And Yes, I was still a virgin.
I started taking twice the number of Prolamine that the package said was the right dose. The fattening meals kept showing up when I got home from work. The bags of chocolates were placed in my room, just in case I wanted them.
One day I couldn't remember if I'd taken the Prolamine so I took it again just in case. That made 4 pills when I should have taken only one or better still none.
My heart started beating a mile a minute. I felt like I was dying and worse still, that I deserved it for being so stupid in my choices.
I made my way to the phone to call for help but it rang just as I lifted it up. It was Jim screaming more obscenities at Dad who he thought he was talking to because I hadn't said a word. I hung up and waited a second or two. I figured I didn't have anytime to waste. I picked it back up and dialed the operator. There was no 911 in those days.
The ambulance pulled in just as Mom and Dad were coming home. I think Sue was with them but I'm not sure. I don't think she was home when all this was happening to me but even if she had been I would never have made it to the trailer to get her.
They hauled my butt into Glens Falls Hospital. I think Mom went with me and Dad probably followed. They probably left Sue at home so there was someone there with the animals. She must have been terrified.
At the ER they pumped me chock full of valium until my blood pressure came down. It wasn't till it reached acceptable levels that they let me sleep.
In New York State, at that time if you overdosed on anything they stuck you in a low grade nut ward for a week. It was the law. Not only had I overdosed on Prolamine but they found curious scars on my wrists. They thought maybe at some time I'd tried to slit my wrists. Mom explained to them that they were burn scars from my job of lifting out those hot racks of baked pilots. I don't think they quite believed her.
In the morning when I woke up I started to sit up but a nurse rushed in to take my vitals. I was not allowed to get up till she did that. It was then that I had the first of those strange times like I would later have in Colorado. I had no pulse, no blood pressure no temp. They let me sit up slowly but I was not allowed off the bed till they could a normal reading. It took awhile.
The second day I was there, I was introduced to a nice young man who was the "shrink" or at least a counselor of some kind. He led the group of all patients who needed to learn to stand up for themselves. He mostly had abused women and alcoholics.
He told us all basically the same things. He showed us how to handle situations that bothered us. He told me I ate for the same reason that some alcoholics drank. I was looking for comfort in food. He was really good at his job. I felt much better about everything when I got out.
I don't remember his name but he was the guy who led the group. Why he let me take his photo I don't know.
For one thing the phone was no longer ringing off the wall. I think Mom or Dad told the authorities about what Jim was doing in harassing us all. I never heard from him again but I heard about him.
When Uncle Art died, and remember he was supposed to be Jim's friend, Jim went to the funeral but he didn't go in the church. I think he might have been afraid of bursting into flame if he did. What he did do was have sex with at least one of Arts daughters outside while the funeral was going on. Yep, he was a class act.
I went back to work the following week and threw myself into becoming the best dipper I could be. My college classes were over and it wasn't time to sign up for the new ones. I wasn't sure I was learning anything valuable anyway. I was back singing in the bar.
The girls at work said I didn't need lessons in how to be a bitch that I should have been teaching that group.
A few months went by in which I was getting more and more bored and thinking my life was going nowhere when I met this guy in the bar. He had sandy hair and green eyes. He was a bit pudgy but he was older than me.
We talked for awhile and he made me an offer I couldn't refuse. I signed on the dotted line but it wasn't till a week later. Those kind of deal are not legal if signed in a bar. I was still a virgin and I still didn't drink, but I belonged to the US Army now!
Before I could go I had to be tested, inspected and given a little preparation. Part of it was spent in Schenectady at an Army Reserve place where I went one weekend a month to learn what it would be like when I finally went away.