ILLINOIS and CHILDHOOD

HINTS of FATE?

First point of interest: my mother wrote in my baby books when I was just four months old that I seemed to be attracted more to Mickey Mouse and Disney toys than ANYTHING else!

I grew up in a suburb of Chicago called Mt. Prospect. Since the age of about five, though, I've felt incredibly drawn to Southern California. Even though I was only a child, I understood much about the entertainment industry and how the world seemed to work. I wanted, since then, to be a performer. As a baby, I began a pattern of surprising people. My mom's best friends daughter, whom I will call T.,got me more than started walking. Her daughter, T., who I grew up calling cousin, was nine months older, and could already walk. We both wanted to play with this pickle car, from what I was told. After awhile, T. just picked it up, and walked away. I, never having walked before, stood up, and RAN after her to get it! You'll notice this pattern throughout my life! I was adopted. I know nothing so far about my natural parents, but I'd like to find a way to discover all this someday. My parents - the ones who raised me - were former up-and-coming Chicago opera stars. They had given up on their dreams, though - something I REFUSE to do! My mother devoted all her musical talents to the Catholic Church singing, directing the choir, choosing and playing all the music. My father was a butcher for a meat-packing company. At age four and a half, my sister, J., was adopted, born, and brought home. She has been my everything since.

It was also at age five that I began to do things that were early signs of my future path. One day, I got this idea in my head to gather my neighbor friends together, put on nursery rhyme shows in the backyard, and charge parents and neighbors a nickel, dime, or quarter to see it. Even though I directed and produced them, since my first love has always been performing, I always made sure I acted, too. One of our neighbors would never let me forget one of the first show rehearsals. It was "The Three Little Kittens Who Lost Their Mittens". It came time for us kittens to lose our mittens. The other two kittens threw their's up in the air, and shouted, "Oh, our mittens are lost!" I turned into the director again, and said, "You can't do that! No ones going to believe it! You have to really lose them!" During fourth grade, I finally got to be in a SCHOOL play, and, even though I was very shy back then, I got the lead role. The character was VERY strong inside, had a lot of charisma, and ambition and drive even though he was mouse! This all came out of me quite naturally, and it surprised me and everyone else. The standing ovation I received got me forever hooked on performing.

During that same year, I discovered the first clues of other future interests of mine. Every year, the school had a Halloween story-writing contest. I had noticed that each story that had won always had certain elements to it - certain things always happening. The winner always had his/her story read by the principal over the intercom. After reading the story, he would announce who had written it. This particular year, I decided to give it a shot. Later on, there I was, sitting at my desk, listening to the announcements. After a few sentences, I realized that the winning story was mine! I nearly fell over in my chair! I wouldn't write like that again, though, until later in high school.

Later, still in fourth grade, I visited my grandmother, Little Grandma, as I called her. She was Mom's mother. My mom's father had died when I was two years-old. J. was everyone else's favorite, because she was a girl. I was Little Grandma's favorite, though. She always called me "The Apple of [Her] Eye". She was great! She let me drink coffee when we stayed whole weekends by ourselves, with LOTS of cream and sugar. Can't drink coffee ANY other way now, though I hardly ever DO drink it. She also taught me how to waltz to Austrian and German waltzes. It was also at her apartment that I was first introduced to Peter Pan via a Disney music, dialogue, and narration record album. It used to belong to my mother from when the film was originally released. She had a whole bunch of other such Disney albums. But THAT one was my favorite! That was mainly because I flew in my dreams all the time. Still do. And I loved the swashbuckling parts of the album - Peter's duels with Captain Hook, and the battles with the pirates! I would listen to it on that old-fashioned record player over and over again! This began my life-long connection with Peter Pan. Eventually, of course, I saw the movie during its re-releases in the theaters.

On this particular weekend, I was digging through another old trunk in one of her closets, and found a Peanuts book that had also belonged to my mother.

Even though, I was already a Disney fan through and through, something captivated me about this book. I got incredible, unexplainable urges to try to DRAW the characters myself. After awhile, I had gotten them down pat, and started getting on kicks drawing other cartoon characters. My art projects in school began to get better and better, and started to get some attention. This was when I first learned I could draw and had it in me to be an artist.

Also in that same breakthrough year fourth grade the school orchestra began recruiting. I loved all the sounds the instruments made, but was most impressed with the rich sound of the cello. The MAIN deciding factor for me, though, was KNOWING FULL WELL what the reactions would be from everyone once I announced that I wanted to play it. I am still a short guy now, but back THEN, I was outright TINY! I KNEW everyone would go on and on about how there was no way I could play it, because it was three times my size, etc., etc. And it was THIS that REALLY made me want it all the more! Sure enough, that was EXACTLY the reaction I got from them. But I stood my ground. I didnt want to play anything else in the orchestra but the cello, and that was the end of it. I took to it right away. I later got first chair, first prize at all my solo contests, and wound up studying privately under a former Chicago Symphony cellist. This continued until I started high school because they had no orchestra there, and I had to live in the city in the school dorm. More on that later.

CHILD ABUSE

I will first try to describe my parents as best as I can using people / characters that should be familiar to most of you.

My Father:

Looks:

A little like Curly from "The Three Stooges" with a bit more hair, though, and a rather square shaped head. Heavier. Actually, he looked like a combination of Curly and Archie Bunker with dark hair.

Personality:

The views, prejudices, and tendencies to mispronounce things of Archie Bunker throw in a German disciplinary style and bad, German temper.

Voice:

Bass opera singing voice, and bellowed whenever he spoke - even when he was NOT yelling.

Usual Wardrobe:

White T-Shirt that barely covered his huge stomach. Black or dark navy blue polyester pants that he couldn't fully close. White socks with some holes in the toes. Brown criss-crossed sandal shoes.

Charm and Table Manners:

Jabba the Hutt

My Mother:

Looks:

A combination of Walt Disney's Queen of Hearts from "Alice in Wonderland" (Give her glasses and take a LITTLE weight off her.). Disneys Fairy Godmother from "Cinderella" (Give her brown hair and put brown-framed glasses on her.). Leia Thompson's appearance in the original "Back to the Future". Both old, frumpy and young, beautiful versions. When she was younger, she looked and dressed just like Lorraine (the character) in the 1950's.

Personality: The views and crabby attitude and over all demeanor of Bea Arthur's "Maude". The bad temper and need to always be right of Disney's Queen of Hearts. The uncontrollable rage and abusive tendencies of Joan Crawford. The fragility and misery of older Judy Garland.

Voice:

Very beautiful, mesmerizing, talented opera soprano singing voice. But when she shouted, which was alomost all the time, she sounded EXACTLY like Disney's Queen of Hearts. She'd even do the lip - raspberries thing (I have NO idea what else youd call it!) the Queen did during the croquet game. I know I keep using the Queen here to describe Mom, but she was SO much like her in too many ways! In fact, when I began collecting Disney bean bags a few years ago - for when I had my own children in the future - the Queen of Hearts bean bag had a voice box in it that shouted when you hit it. I showed it to my sister when she visited, and said, "Look, Jeannie! A Mom doll!" She agreed completely!

Wardrobe:

Much like Maude's. Othertimes, it was much like the older, frumpy Lorraine McFly we first see in the original "Back to the Future".

Charm:

Can't think of an exact person / character here. But my mother had the charm of a very active PTA Mom.

This is funny, I know, but accurate nonetheless. If you could imagine a German Archie Bunker being married to Maude, you'd have my parents' relationship with each other. My father felt women should wait on men hand and foot. My mother wouldn't have any of that, and wouldn't do anything to rebel and make her point. So, the housework would never get done, and then they'd make ME do it all.

My parents were both extremely strict, and unable to control their anger. Thusly, we went through a lot of child abuse in every way EXCEPT sexually, or any due to alchohol or substance abuse. I got beatings on usually more than a daily basis with belts, wooden boards, shoes, brooms, whatever was handy. They dragged me around the house by my hair, through things at me, made me kneel in corners without support for hours on end and more.

My mother strangled me to near unconsciousness three times. The first time was when I took her rings to show and tell. During recess, I playfully lent three girls a ring each for the day saying that I would marry them on the playground. By the time I walked home for lunch, one of the girls' mothers had already called my mother and told her about the ring I had loaned the girl. As soon as I walked through the door, my mother grabbed me by the hair to the center of the room, threw me down, sat on my chest, and began to fiercely strangle me - banging my head on the floor all the while. Just then, to my luck, Michele's mother, Mrs. Poteracki, called to talk - taking Moms concentration on me away until I had a chance to explain. I still got beat again for it later.

The second time occurred when Mom found a faded ink spot on the bottom of a living room couch cushion. I had not done it. It was a complete mystery to me. It turned out later that my sister, Jeannie had done it, but was too afraid to admit it. Who could blame her? In the meantime, we were beaten silly, then sent to corners of the family room to kneel for an hour. At the end of the hour, the oven timer buzzer would go off. If whoever did it had not yet confessed, we would both get more beatings, and sent back to kneel again according to the same pattern. During one of these beatings, my mother lost her patience with me convinced that I had done it. (I almost ALWAYS got blamed for everything even though most often I hadn't done what I was accused of.) She strangled me until I was able to get loose. When she found out later that I hadn't done it, as usual, there was no apology.

The third and final time was due to the fact that I had nerve to be a half an hour late coming home. I had gotten caught up in playing soccer with a neighborhood friend around the block. There we were, kicking the ball back and forth on my friend's front yard when my father drove up. He bellowed at me to get into the car. Embarrassed, I said good-night to my friend, David, and got into the car. The second we pulled away, Dad began to pound on me with his free hand - shouting at me about how stupid I was to lose track of time. He dragged me by the hair into the house and threw me at my mother. They began beating me with the belt that always hung threateningly over

one of the oven handle bars. I broke free for a moment and ran into the dining room. My father came around the other side, and they cornered me as they usually did. (Sometimes, I was able to get down and quickly crawl through the bottom of the dining room table and chair legs and get away. But not this time.) Once I was again in my mother's grasp, she began to strangle me again demanding to know who I thought I was to be home late. I kept thinking, "I'd be glad to answer you if you would JUST LET GO OF MY THROAT!!" I tried to pry her hands free, but was unsuccessful. I felt myself blacking out. It felt like I was down to the last few seconds of my life before she finally let go. I began gasping and heaving. I looked up at her with a look that I suppose made her feel guilty. She began to cry this time, giving me a flurry of apologies. I said nothing to her. I just looked at her again, turned, and headed to my room - wheezing and clutching my throat.

My father, being a butcher, used to have my mother drag us over to him. Then he'd he slam our hands down flat on the kitchen table, and raise a large knife or cleaver in the air with his other hand, and convince us, in full temper, that he was seriously going to chop our fingers off. Obviously, he never actually did it. But he sure had us scared that he would. He WOULD beat us, though, and good. (Well, not really good!) I remember one time he threw everything he could at me from across the room including a set of knives. Luckily, he had terrible aim. Only the bigger things like the broom actually got me.

Back when I was ten years old, after getting beaten to a pulp again, I tried to keep up my optimism as usual, and remember that deep down, I knew that things would turn completely around to the opposite end of the spectrum. But that particular day, it wasn't working. I felt so trapped that, for the first and LAST time in my life, I actually tried to commit suicide. I used my bicycle chain to do it. I didnt have an ordinary padlock. I had a chain that had its own locking mechanism on it. You only had to line up the numbers to a horizontal line off to the side. Even when I locked my bike up, I only moved one, maybe two of the numbers on the end. Not this time. I wrapped the chain around my neck as tightly as I could to the point where I could feel myself start to choke. I then screwed up ALL the numbers.

I changed my mind REAL fast! It was working all too well! I ran to the mirror in the blue bathroom and tried to see the numbers on the lock under my chin. But it was hopeless. I couldn't. I felt myself start to black out. I gave up trying to see what I was doing, and began to randomly, desperately scramble the numbers to get the lock open. Just as I felt my time was seriously up in this world, somehow, someway, the lock opened, and my neck was free! I took in huge breaths of air. I still believe that was a miracle. I vowed then and there, that no matter how difficult things got, no matter how much I should EVER despair, I would NEVER try to kill myself again. NEVER! And I haven't even thought about it again to this day. Death is NOT the answer!

Then there was the housework. I was made to single-handedly do all the chores in the house and with the lawns - with the exception of cooking. I even had to clean my sister's room - the filthiest room in the house - when she was more than old enough to clean it herself. They made ME do it because they knew that she wouldn't.

My chores were timed by the oven-timer. If I was not done by the time the buzzer went off, I got a terrible beating, and was sent to do it again. My mother used to take particular pleasure in bursting into my room, taking her arm, and sweeping everything off my dresser and desk tops onto the floor for no apparent reason. A lot of times, she was mainly just in a bad mood. She would then pull and dump out all my drawers. My father did this sometimes, too. Then they'd go start the oven timer

There were also times when my mother would wake me up in the middle of the night. She'd scream at me to get up and find things that SHE had lost or misplaced. If I didn't find it within half an hour, I'd be made to kneel in the corner for the next half hour. It didn't matter whether or not I had school in the morning. Sometimes, if I couldn't find it, she'd lose her temper and I'd get beaten.

The second to last time there was an episode, I was home for the weekend from the dorm, as I was every weekend. Fall was starting to kick in. I had a slight nose cold. Michele came over while my parents went out for something. We sat on front porch and talked. This was our usual place to do everything through the years: talk, joke around, listen to music, etc. My parents soon came home and were furious that I was outside with a cold. Michele knew that was her cue to leave. Once inside, we started to argue. It wasn't that big of a deal to me. It was a simple little cold. I had had bronchitis as a child, but that disappeared when I was around eight years old. History repeated itself as they began to chase me around to try to beat me. I ran out the front door. The outer glass door shattered from the speed, but I didnt even notice. I reached the bottom of the driveway before I noticed that my wrist was bleeding profusely. The flying glass had cut it in a diagonal angle. If the cut had been any straighter! What was strange was that I hadn't even felt it until now. I happened to have a bandana in my pocket. I pulled it out, remembered what I had learned about injuries in school and Boy Scouts, and wrapped it around my wrist. My parents appeared at the door screaming at the top of my lungs. I held up my wrist. "See what you made me do?!! Trying to kill me again??!!" They didn't come out to check. So I went inside. I pulled back the blood-soaked bandana back to look at my wrist. What later turned out to be a blood clot looked a little too much like an exposed artery to me at the time. I was also still heavily bleeding despite the pressure I had been trying to put on it. I almost went into shock, and suggested that I be taken to a hospital. They nearly laughed in my face. So, I went into the green bathroom to continue to treat it myself. I washed it off. Eventually the bleeding stopped. After awhile, I figured out that I didn't have an exposed artery, though it sure had looked like one at the time when the cut was fresh. I still have that scar across my right wrist to this day.

Speaking of my former bronchitis, I'd be coughing like a barking dog sometimes. My parents had no patience for that. It wasn't my fault. Yet I'd get screamed at and beaten senseless for having to cough. I began to be afraid to cough. I'd have to, though, so whenever I could, I'd bury my face into a pillow or the car seat, or whatever was handy that could muffle me when they weren't looking. Thankfully, as mentioned above, that disappeared at around age eight.

The physical abuse finally ended one day - just after the start of my high school sophomore year. I had begun to interfere more and more with my sister's beatings. I refused to let my parents hit her anymore. All she had to do was call me in fear and I'd be right there in a flash. I would stand between Jeannie and them. They usually gave up. One time, though, I had to grab my mothers wrist in mid-swing and hold it, looking her square in the eyes, saying, "Don't!", until she agreed not to hit her. I began to threaten to call the police on them whenever they were about to get violent. Eventually, that last day came.

My mother was on her way home from the evening Christmas Eve mass, and was headed home before going back to play for the Midnight Mass. We would also attend this one as we did every year. The little girl across the street was over playing with Jeannie. Jeannie, meaning well, invited her to join us if she wanted to. Their family never went to mass, even though they, too, were Catholics. You'd think this was a nice gesture, but for some reason, it sent my father into a rage. He began screaming at Jeannie for it right in front of the girl, who also began to cry in fear. He chased my sister around the house. I was about to go after him to stop him when Mom walked through the door. Being that Mom was so religious, I thought it would make her happy that a girl from a family who never attended church would want to go and shed be pleased with my sister for inviting her. To my utter shock, she sided with my father, and also flew into a rage! She helped him chase her around the house. I quickly went over to the girl and reassured her that I would make everything okay, because she was crying again. I had her stay on the living room couch while I went to intercept my parents. Mom locked the green bathroom so that Jeannie couldn't get back out that way. (We had two bathrooms. We referred to them as the green bathroom and the blue bathroom. The green bathroom had two doors. One led to the family room, and the other to my parents' room. The blue bathroom was in the hallway between my bedroom and my sisters on the other side of the wall not connected to any rooms.) Mom began to go all the way around the whole house to get to the other side of their bedroom. (That led to the hallway. My room was right behind their's.) However, I got there first. Dad had Jeannie in cornered in the back of their room. He began to raise his shoehorn. It was on the end of a long metal rod. Jeannie screamed for me. I ran in and stood between them before he had a chance to swing. I warned him that if he didn't back down and tried to hit her, this time I'd fight back physically. Now even angrier, he shoved me out of the way, and went to swing. But I got back in the way before he could.

All in a second's time, I grabbed his shoehorn out of his hands and threw it across the room with my left hand. With my right, I threw a hard punch right into his mouth that sent him staggering backward. His glasses flew off his face and nearly across the room. He looked at me in shock. His mouth was bleeding and his lips began to swell. My mother arrived at the opposite door just in time to see it happen. She couldn't believe her eyes.

I turned to them both half crying, and half still in rage. I remember basically what I had said."I warned you! The next time, not only will YOU (Looking directly at my father) get it again, but I WILL call the police and have you BOTH arrested for child abuse something I should have done long ago! If there is ANY retaliation tonight, I'll do it right now! I know you'll try to lie your way out of it, but I think they'll believe US! Plus, there's a little girl crying in the other room scared out of her mind who saw the whole thing! Let us get past without trying anything, and DONT talk to us for the rest of the night!" I turned to my father specifically as I pulled Jeannie up. "Now, get out of my way!" Nothing like that ever happened again.

But it wasn't only at home that I was put through abuse. Because I was conditioned (only at the time) to fear everyone and everything, I was very timid at school, and felt that I had to be perfect, or my life would be in danger at home. I was labeled a quiet, timid, goody-two-shoes, a geek, a wimp, got beaten up often, and became nothing short of a joke-on-legs to the entire school from my public grade school, Robert Frost, up to sixth grade to the Catholic school, St. Emilys throughout junior high to the seminary high school, Quigley North up until towards the end of my junior year. At that point, I finally realized that, though it was originally my parents' fault these things happened to me, it had now become my own fault for allowing them to continue. I finally put my foot down, and began to stand up for myself. I also began to BECOME more and more the person I always knew I REALLY was deep down - outgoing, brave, VERY strong on the inside, intelligent, witty, very deep, mature beyond my years, talented, adventurous, athletic, free-spirited, and a lot of fun on all levels. And I FINALLY felt I looked good, too.

GERARD THE PRANKSTER

That's not to say that my childhood was so horrible that I never got to have any fun! You know the old saying, "When the cats away, the mice will play"! And THIS mouse had a blast! Before I get into that, what helped me really get through my early years was Disney. I totally bought into the films messages, the song lyrics, etc., about keeping the faith, knowing that EVERYTHING would turn around to the OTHER extreme someday. Yes, I often "wished upon a star", fully believed that "no matter how [my] heart [was] grieving, if [I kept] on believing, the dreams that [I wished would] come true". And I understood that "A Spoonful of Sugar Helps the Medicine Go Down". I knew all too well that "In every job that must be done, there is an element of funYou find the funand Snap! The jobs a game"! I bought it all, soaked it up like a sponge, and lived my life by it. I still do! Ironic that, for three years, until very recently, I worked for Disney while working on making MY OWN dreams come true on the side! I now got to give that Disney spirit to others from around the world on a daily basis! It's all summed up by the opening lyrics of the song, "American Pie" (Madonna recently did a great remake of this song.) "A long, long time ago

I can still remember

How that music used to make me smile

And I knew that if I had my chance

I could make those people dance

And maybe they'd be happy for awhile"

It's the exact same basic idea.

Okay, now for the REAL fun part! I would round up my sister, and my next-door-neighbor, Vanessa. She was a year and - a - half younger than me. The three of us did the wildest, most dangerous, but most exhilarating things together! That's why my parents didn't want us to play with each other. I would put the patio furniture cushions out in certain spots in the backyard. Then, I'd put on adventure-film soundtracks like "Raiders of the Lost Ark", and turn the volume up high enough to hear from outside. That was our cue. The three of us would then climb up onto the rooftop via the front porch railing. We'd take running starts off the roof landing on the cushions! Man, was that fun!

Other than that, we'd ride our bikes to the nearby forest preserves to go exploring. We climbed trees (I spent MUCH of my childhood in trees! Both there and at home!), ride our bikes along the trails, cross the river and creeks over fallen logs, and more. But our FAVORITE thing to do was to play on the rope someone had tied high up in the trees just over the river. We would spend HOURS swinging back and forth over the water doing all kinds of acrobatic tricks! After "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom"came out in theaters, we were so taken by it, that we all pitched in and bought a little, yellow, rubber raft. We took it into the Des Plaines River. We lost all track of time. It got very dark all of a sudden, and we had gotten very far downstream. Paddling back, we discovered that a hole had somehow appeared in the middle of the boat! We had to take turns putting our fingers over it the whole way back so that we didn't sink! Eventually, we found our bikes, deflated the boat, and got home. Later, we heard that river was FILLED with leeches! Boy, what could have happened!

We had just as much fun INSIDE the house when my parents were gone. Somehow, I came up with the idea of taking the couch cushions (Cushions AGAIN!) and sledding down the basement stairs with them! That became my favorite indoor thing to do. I also loved turning over all the furniture and making little caves and forts out of them. Then there was our own version of tag. The person who was "it" had this certain pillow. The rest of us would run rampant all throughout the house trying to avoid having the pillow being whipped at us, and becoming "it". I also used to, being the prankster that I was, have a lot of fun with my dads deer head. Of course, loving animals as much as I always have, I felt very sorry for the deer, and wished my father hadn't gotten him. But, alas, it was too late, and now too much of a multi-method prank NOT to use! One example: our other neighbor friends would come over when my parents were gone. When they rang the doorbell, I would grab it, run to the door, stand behind it, open it slightly, and stick just the deer head out. It always made the boys jump, and the girls scream!

But, our fun wasn't necessarily limited to when my parents were gone! We would have Vanessa sneak in through our bedroom windows - especially Jeannie's because it faced the side of Vanessa's house. We'd close and lock the door, and do things like use a tape recorder to tape ourselves spoofing Dr. Ruth's sex-talk radio show. My sister did the best voice impersonation of Dr. Ruth, and Vanessa and I would be the callers with the most RIDICULOUS sex problems! (And the most ridiculous voices!) Jeannie/Dr. Ruth would always cop out of solving every problem by saying, "Alvays uss contlacepshen (contraception)!" We had our own version of hide-and-go-seek, too. Whoever was "it" put the pillow over his/her head. We'd shut the lights off, and the other two would hide somewhere in the room. Keeping the pillow on, "it" would have to find the others in the dark. Our TRADEMARK "Jeannie's Room Thing To Do", was get packs of those Easter marshmallow bunnies, three buckets of water, and a LOT of old newspapers. We'd spread the newspapers all over Jeannie's room, choose our spots complete with some piece of furniture we could use as a fort, place our buckets next to us, dunk pieces of the marshmallow bunnies into the water, and have an all-out "Wet Marshmallow Bunny War"! When the pieces hit you in the face, they'd just ooze down! It was great! And it was hilarious watching the girls cringe, and go, "EEEEW!" each time they got hit!