From Bebe's Homage To My First Cigaret

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September, 1961

The summer is over therefore 
the Oliverios return
to our winter home

in Whitestone.

All those wonderful

summer days and nights

in Rocky Point

will have to wait

another year

to happen again.

The school year began
the next day.

Sandy Rosenblatt and Michael Catera,

my two best friends in Whitestone,
greet us upon arrival.

I did not have to help
the family unload the car
because my friends
were anxious to take me

to Whitestone Park

Where we navigated our way

behind many bushes.

Thirteen, twelve and eleven

are the ages of the three boys.

Sandy is the youngest.

Michael stole a pack

of cigarets from his Father

(or maybe it was from his Mother).

Sandy had a silver lighter

monogrammed with

his Father's initials.

The two of them

had been smoking

all summer long.

I was a twelve year-old
tobacco virgin.

The two of them

were much much smarter

than I would ever be
because I said No
to breath mints
after losing my virginity.

I was too busy coughing. 

When I get home,

the smoke was on my breath

and I could not deny what happened.

It was a Sunday.

***

The next day my punishment

was meted out by my parents.

From Solomon's Candy Store,

school supplies for me

and my sister, Linda,

were purchased.

Mother and Father Oliverio

demanded, as a punitive measure,

that I had to carry

Linda's school supplies

home from two blocks away.

I had to carry ten pencils
instead of five and 
four notebooks
instead of two
... 

Michael and Sandy spent

the week mocking me

for two reasons:

my "punishment" for getting caught

and my inability to inhale a cigaret.  

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Footnote

Every word of the above is pure fact,

including the names of my two friends

whose parents were never informed

about their son's tobacco transgressions.

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