Marijuana: The First Encounter

I must have been destined to smoke marijuana..after all,I was thought by some to be smoking it years before I actually did.

The year was 1967,and as was considered normal in the Daniels household,Mom,Grandma,my brothers and I gathered in front of the TV to watch CBS Reports. My mom was a firm believer in the Daniels boys keeping up to date on current affairs. This particular episode focused on the cultural events taking place in the Haight-Asbury District of San Francisco and what was known as "The Summer of Love"

The folks flocking to Haight-Asbury seemed to look at life in a different manner than many Americans at the time. They dressed differently. They listened to different music,but most importantly,these "hippies" as they were called, seemed to challenge many accepted notions of American life. My mom, a Civil Rights and Democratic Party activist also was one who challenged certain notions of American life,but what we were seeing on TV was different. My mom attended meetings to change the world. These folks seemed to think that music and love was going to change the world. On the program,it was said that perhaps the reason these people looked at the world differently was because of their rampant use of marijuana.

It was at that moment,I spoke out. "If marijuana helps people become peaceful, I said, "then maybe it's a good thing" The words were barely out of my mouth when I realized I had said the wrong thing in front of my mom.
"If I EVER,find out you smoke marijuana she said "then woe be unto you." When mom said "woe be unto you", it amounted to the most serious offense in her eyes.

In 1968,the Vietnam War was raging and a soft spoken,rather intellectual poet and Senator Eugene McCarthy challenged incumbent President Lyndon Johnson for the Democratic nomination for President. McCarthy ran on an anti Vietnam War platform. Many "hippies" got involved in the McCarthy campaign and got "Clean for Gene". Johnson later withdrew from the race,and his Vice President,Hubert H. Humphrey became a candidate carrying the Johnson banner. In 1964,my mom worked for the Johnson-Humphrey ticket. Hubert Humphrey was her political hero. As a seventh grader,I spent my weekends stuffing envelopes and leafletting for the McCarthy campaign. A rumor was going around at the time that with so many hippies behind the McCarthy effort,his campaign headquarters were a hotspot for marijuana smokers. I never witnessed any marijuana smoking at McCarthy headquarters,but my mom,partially out of parental concern,and partially as a Humphrey supporter looking for ways to discredit the McCarthy effort would interrogate me about marijuana use when I would return home. "Woe unto you if I find out you are smoking marijuana at McCarthy headquarters." she'd say.

In eighth grade,at Mark Twain School,I'd go to school wearing a suit jacket and sometimes a tie and I would carry my books in a briefcase. I'd also wear a "Nixon's the One" button. Because I went to a different school in seventh grade,no one knew I had volunteered for McCarthy previously and that my Nixon button was part of my protest. There was one student however who seemed to see through me. Deborah Caskey. She told me,she knew I was a hippie and she would invite me to her house after school where we could smoke weed. I said no,but Deborah,like my mom seemed to sense I was a pot smoker in the making.

Fast forward to 1972 and my senior year in High School. Marijuana smoking had been widespread since my sophomore year. I had not smoked it myself yet,but one of the things I had done was to read information about it both pro and con. One of the pro marijuana pieces I had picked up was a book titled "A Child's Garden of Grass" It was funny,quirky and much more interesting than any other piece of literature I had read on the subject. After reading the book,I knew it was inevitable that I would try marijuana. At this point,seeing as I had been accused and interrogated enough on the subject I felt as if I had nothing to lose if I tried it.

In 1972,the Senior class at Watkinson School went on a camping expedition at Lake George in the Adirondack Mountains in Upstate New York.Teachers knew that students would drink on this trip and attempted to place limits on the amount of alcohol brought. Of course high school students were going to exceed any limits and our first night in the outdoors was nothing short of a debacle. I drank everything that came my way..beer,wine,tequila,and it didn't take long before I began to feel sick. Most students were by then to drunk to notice I was in trouble. There was one exception however.

Her name was Roberta Markowicz.She had come to Watkinson for her senior year after the school she attended previously,The Austin School, had folded. Watkinson was a private college prep school,and most of us prep school students had a certain "air" about us. Not Roberta. She was rather down to earth.In talking with her,it was clear she didn't really like prep school life The drinking was taking place in a cabin. When I stumbled outside to get some fresh air,Roberta followed me out and stayed with me till I felt better.

While the days on this trip were full of hiking,canoeing and observing nature,the evenings were full of drinking and high school debauchery.The second night of the trip was turning out much like the first. As students were beginning another night of drinking in front of the campfire,Roberta tapped on my shoulder and asked me to come with her.
I remember her words."I have something that's better for you than alcohol" as she along with another student,Lori Redfield took me to their tent. It was inside Roberta and Lori's tent where I saw my first marijuana joint. I immediately enjoyed the aroma the joint had.

We smoked two joints that evening. I felt nothing from it that night,but I knew and understood life was not going to be the same from here on out.

Skip

Sometimes in life,one comes across a person whose impact on ones life isn't fully realized till long after they've gone from it.


Stanley "Skip" Jarocki was one of those people. I knew him from my four years at Watkinson School.
"Skip" was my high school basketball coach. He had been a star athlete at Haverford College in Pennsylvania where as the story goes,until he coached the Varsity Basketball Team at Watkinson,had never been associated with a losing team in his life.

Let me emphasize:UNTIL he coached the Varsity Basketball Team at Watkinson. Watkinson's Basketball team was a collection of wannabe and never-will-be players,and that's being generous. If not for the fact that Watkinson was a small school of 120 students,there were some on the team that would be hard pressed to make a third grade roster at other schools. My stint on the Varsity team was the result of a failed lesson in teaching a predominantly white student body that all blacks cannot play basketball.
Our team never won more than 4 games in a 15-20 game schedule during my entire 4 years on the Varsity team.
Coaching a losing team was not  an easy task for Skip. His coaching style was hard nosed. I would compare him to noted Indiana basketball coach Bobby Knight. He'd harass the refs and was prone to receiving technical fouls. He'd slam his clipboard onto the court. On one memorable occasion,after a 40 point loss,he smashed a can of soda pop against a locker,causing the can to puncture,the end result being soda sprayed all over his suit. Just like Bobby Knight,he did things that in today's world would be unacceptable such as clutching my throat following a series of errors by the team.
One would think given Jarocki's temperament and history that his memory at best would be a negative one. Truth is,the voice of Skip Jarocki sometimes still coaches me today. In playing for Watkinson,there was rarely a game where we didn't face adversity from the moment of the tip off. In many cases,for all practical purposes,the game was over within minutes of the first quarter. At that point,there would be players ready to quit and quitting was precisely what Skip Jarocki would not permit you to do unless you wanted a seat on the bench. It didn't matter if we were losing by 10,20 or 50 points..Lost a game by 73 points once..players played,quitters sat.

Sometimes life has been like the equivalent of losing by large margin with a hostile audience on one's case. Sometimes one "loses" but quitting is not an option and once we beat a previously undefeated team that had never faced adversity.

Skip Jarocki was also my English Teacher at Watkinson School and playing a game in the evening was no excuse for not finishing an assignment the next day in his classroom. He was known to pick on members of the team for answers,figuring that if we cant play basketball we were going to know our assignments. I once thought a snowstorm was going to cancel class and there was no need for me to study for an English exam. The snowstorm never materialized and Skip never hesitated in giving me a 0 for my efforts.
Given the description of Skip Jarocki on the basketball court and in the classroom,one might get the impression of a teacher,especially one teaching in a Connecticut prep school such as Watkinson as one leading a rather traditional and morbitly dull English class. Let me give you a partial list of required reading in Mr.Jarocki's classroom:
                                                       In Watermelon Sugar by Richard Brautigan
                                                       Trout Fishing in America by Richard Brautigan
                                                        Soul on Ice by Eldridge Cleaver
                                                        Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
                                                        The Greening of America by Charles Reich

Sometimes subversives come in the form of a Bobby Knight impersonator..



Watkinson School

 
                                                       

A story about Mom and her Oldest Son

Shortly after November 22,1963,I decided I wanted to be President of the United States. Most third and fourth graders at the time thought I was a little nuts,and especially because no black person was ever thought could ever be elected President. The one person who took my dreams seriously was my mother.
Mom never once told me my dream was impossible, though she did caution that by being black,I might have to work two or three times as hard to get to where I wanted to be. Rather than say my dream was impossible,she would advise me as to what career choices I might want to consider,and what courses I might want to take. She once encouraged me to become a lawyer,and that in high school,in order to understand the law,I should take Latin..

I think it excited my mom for me to take an interest in politics. She after all was active in the Urban League,NAACP and attended many a Board of Education meeting. She was also active in the Democratic Party. She was on a first name basis with Connecticut Senator Abraham Ribicoff. I remember once,Senator Thomas Dodd coming off the Senate floor to greet my mom when we visited the Capitol in Washington DC.

One of the things my interest did was to allow me to spend time with my mom in ways that my other brothers didn't because she could take me to the various functions she attended knowing I wouldn't be bored and ask my mom to leave within 5 minutes. Once she  took me to a cocktail party attended by Connecticut Governor Thomas Meskill and soon to be Senator Lowell Weicker.

Of course,my most memorable outing with her was attending the 1964 Democratic Platform Committee meeting where I met Dr.Martin Luther King,nearly literally ran into Robert Kennedy,and had lunch with Connecticut Secretary of State Ella Grasso who later became the nation's first woman Governor.
Being the independent sort even at a young age,I didn't completely fall in line with her politics. In 1964,she organized for the campaign of Lyndon Johnson,and his running mate,her political hero Hubert Humphrey. I informed her that for my school's mock Presidential election,I was going to vote for his opponent Republican Barry Goldwater. Furthermore,since I was the only one in the entire school voting for Goldwater which would require me to make a presentation. Mom knew it was important to make a good presentation,and though it pained her greatly,she went to Goldwater Headquarters and obtained for my presentation a Goldwater poster and a Au H20 bumper sticker.

For my tenth birthday in 1965,my mom arranged for my birthday party to be held at a Downtown Hartford Italian Restaurant known to be a hangout spot for Hartford's politicians. Hartford's Mayor,William Glynn briefly appeared to wish me a Happy Birthday. I knew for a fact that my mom and the Mayor had frequent run ins,so I found it amazing he would show up to my party. It gave one an idea of the influence my mom had in the community. No politician wanted to be on the bad side of her!
Having the birthday party at the restaurant was just the beginning. Mom saved her present to me for the end. It was in an envelope. When I opened the envelope,it contained an airline ticket(my first) to Washington DC as well as an invitation to attend the inauguration of President Lyndon Johnson. Apparently,Mom forgave me for supporting Goldwater.

No politician in Hartford wanted to be on the bad side of Mom,but her oldest son found ways to be as four years later,Mom found me volunteering for President Johnson's and later her hero Hubert Humphrey's opponent,Senator Eugene McCarthy.

That however is a different story..

Geno at the Roundtable

I & I was Hungry and you gave I & I Food.

I & I was Thirsty and you gave I & I  Drink

I & I was a Stranger and you took I & I in

Yes JAH was ALIVE at the Roundtable 'cause Geno was there.

Natural Mystic..The Ripple in Still Water with some Bad Brains too

Yes JAH was Alive at the Roundtable 'cause Geno was there

Living Peace Living Wisdom along with the sometimes  not so quiet voice.

No Empty Glasses here 'cause it's the Roundtable.

Blessed are the Meek for they shall inherit the Earth.

Blessed are the Merciful for they shall obtain Mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see JAH

Yes JAH was alive at the Roundtable 'cause Geno was there..

Musings on December 7th

I heard the stories many times from both my mother and my grandfather. Mom was in her living room doing homework as my Grandfather was in the same living room listening to WTOP Radio in Washington DC. There was a football game on the radio. Washington vs the New York Giants. The living room was where my mom did her homework. It was also the location of the radio. My grandmother wasn't much for football and none of the stories I heard involved her,so I imagine she was in the bedroom or kitchen,away from the action.
                                                   This was December 7,1941 and my Grandfather never got to hear the end of the game..
When the bulletins came across the radio about the Pearl Harbor Attacks,both Mom and Granddaddy seemed to know that War was inevitable.

My Grandfather knew a little bit about war. He was drafted out of his South Carolina home to fight in World War I. He didn't object to being drafted  as initially he thought this was going to give him,a South Carolina farm boy a chance to see a world he normally wouldn't see. There was something else going on with my grandfather. Given this was the era of Jim Crow laws,he thought by giving a good account in the war,that the United States Government would reward black soldiers by repealing such laws and affording black people equal rights and protections under the law.

The US Army was segregated in World War I. The white general in charge of the Black Battalions was Gen. John J. "Black Jack" Pershing. If you wanted to make my make my grandfather mad,one thing you could do is mention his name or ever worse,refer to Pershing as a war hero.
World War I was fought in trenches and featured such things as mustard gas and other poison gases.
Black Battalions were on the front lines facing the worst of the German attacks.
As the story goes,my Grandfather rescued a number of wounded soldiers,risking gunfire and gas to do so. My grandfather got a medal,but Pershing became a war hero as did Sgt York,who received the highest Congressional medal and became a screen star for rescuing far fewer soldiers than my Grandfather.
My grandfather was a gentle man and his mannerisms were still very much rural despite living in Washington. I heard the name Marcus Garvey first from my grandfather,and when,on TV news,the images of Stokely Carmichael or H. Rap Brown would appear,my grandfather would often shout "Black Power",and in doing so would sometimes irritate my mom,a mainstream Civil Rights activist working with the NAACP,Urban League and Democratic Party.

It wasn't long after Pearl Harbor when my Dad was drafted into the Army. My Dad was the son of a Texas sharecropper who by strength of will to become a Doctor, made it to Howard University,the cream of the crop of black colleges.

Dad didn't have any problem with being drafted either. His motivation however was far different than my grandfather's. Dad had no illusions about helping to change the racial climate in America.
For Dad,it was all about staying alive,so that when the war was over,he could finish Med School through the GI Bill. Before going overseas,Dad was stationed at Fitzsimmons Army Base in Denver where I heard stories of him cruising the jazz clubs in Denver's predominetly black Five Points neighborhood. He later was sent to Italy towards the end of World War II I did hear a story about a white wounded soldier refusing to be treated by my Dad,but mostly I heard about black soldiers having fun with the Italian women.
The GI Bill  allowed Dad to finish Med School as well as put the down payment on the Connecticut home I grew up in.

When it was " my turn" to serve,this time in Vietnam, I refused. I began my resistance by,when it was time to consider which colleges to attend,I immediately eliminated any college which had an ROTC Program on Campus. This angered my Dad who considered me "soft" for refusing and thus eliminating the possibility of a GI Bill assisting me. Dick Gregory's quote rang true with me
"What we're doing in Vietnam is using the black man to kill the yellow man so the white man can keep the land he took from the red man".

My stance also eliminated any possibility of assistance in college from my Dad. Undaunted,my resistance to all things military continued in college by working for noted anti war Senator Mike Gravel of Alaska and later in one of my more harrowing experiences, assisting a Draft Dodger escape to Canada,a story briefly covered in my first Spoken Word CD Talkin' Roots (Tlingit Story)

My stance didn't end the family involvement with the military when my daughter announced to me that she was joining the Army. Needless to say,not only did we butt heads over the decision,it seemed as if I was going against the family grain by opposing her service.
Now that she's out,I still like to give her a hard time about it,but as she met her husband in the Army,her comeback is "Well,you got two grandchildren out of the deal"

That much is true..

Top photo: My Grandfather
Bottom photo: Howard University ROTC 1942

Halloween Nightmares Roots Style. Parts 1 & 2

This piece is a sequel to Halloween 1964.. If you haven't read it,check out
http://rootswriterdaviddaniels.blogspot.com/2011/10/halloween-1964.html

                                                Part One

In my youth,kids didn't settle disputes with guns,but rather with their fists. Afterschool fights were quite the event at C.A. Barbour School in Hartford Connecticut in my elementary school days.

First there would be the incident. Then there would be the agreement as to where to fight. Cleveland Ave? Garden St? Tower Avenue? Muhammad Ali's influence on the youth was clearly seen as each fighter would say that the other person was in for it no matter what street it was to be fought on. When teachers weren't paying attention, the trash talk banter would go on in the classroom and sometimes in the hallways things would nearly break out,but in most cases,soon as the bell rang releasing the kids from the teacher,the combatants along with half the classroom would run towards the site of the rumble.

My mom was an educational activist who later became a teacher and ended up teaching at C.A. Barbour School,our neighborhood school where the Daniels brothers attended. Even before she returned to the classroom,if she saw the telltale signs of a fight brewing (kids running at breakneck speed,or lots of yelling) she would not be afraid to get into the middle of the dispute to break it up.
If she knew the parents of the kids fighting,she'd often take it upon herself to take the child to the parents house,and failing that,she had lots of phone numbers.

While this may have been good for fight prevention,this never set well within the classroom and the Daniels brothers would often be at the receiving end of that resentment.

One year,on the day of Halloween,rumors were rampant that there would be "tricks" in the neighborhood as well as treats. My brothers and I took this as a warning and tried to convey our concern to Mom. For my mom,education was a passion,and it never once occurred to her that anyone would take offense to her actions to keep the focus on learning.

We encouraged her to not park her car on the street. We had a garage,but it was more often used as a storage area and required some rearranging in order to park the car there. My mom did have to be impressed that my brothers and I were willing to rearrange the garage however,the car remained parked on the street in front of our house.
Halloween night seemed to go as normal for Halloween..younger kids out early and the older ones later..and THEN IT HAPPENED! Simultaneously as our house was being pelted by eggs,one could hear the windshield as well as every window of my mom's car being smashed.
Mom got the car fixed,and I did harp on her about not listening to my brothers and I.

The worst part of it all however was witnessing my mom's illusions shattered.
 

                                                         Part Two

Now Mom's car was parked in our garage but she began delegating more of the job of distributing Halloween candy to me.

Halloween 1964 shaped my view on Halloween and the attack on our house later did little to change that view. Beginning in the fall of 1967,and through the spring of 1968,I had spent many a weekend as a volunteer in Sen. Eugene McCarthy's bid for the Presidency. As a seventh grader too young to vote,I was left primarily to stuff envelopes and leaflet. Because the center of McCarthy's campaign was opposition to the War in Vietnam,everyone involved in that campaign was well schooled as to the evils of  that war. McCarthy didn't win the nomination,and in the fall of 1968,the choices for President were Democrat Hubert Humphrey,Republican Richard Nixon and Independent George Wallace,all in favor to some degree or another of the war.

I felt somehow like I had to do something to make folks aware of this travesty. I persuaded a sixth grade classmate of mine,William Naylor to agree to become a write in candidate for President. I became his Vice Presidential running mate. The next important job was to get the word out. I used Mom's typewriter to type out Naylor-Daniels leaflets complete with our platform. For added emphasis,I would staple to our leaflets old flyers from the McCarthy campaign along with new anti war flyers I had obtained from the Hartford office of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)

I volunteered to distribute all the candy on Halloween of 1968. My mom obliged. Little did she know I had a plan. Younger kids were to get candy and a flyer,older kids were to receive only a Naylor-Daniels flyer. This served two purposes.One to get the word out about our write in candidacy,and Two,Mom had bought some good candy that I felt was better served in my own stomach as opposed to some other kids'

I got lots of strange looks from parents escorting their kids as well as kids themselves,but I felt this was the best way to engage.
All was well as the evening was winding down,and I had just shut the door when..SMASH SMASH SMASH It was the sound of our house windows being smashed.
My mom was dumbfounded as to why this would happen again. I did take some heat for distributing flyers instead of candy.

All I knew was that I was finished with Halloween.

Dad and Golf

9/28/2016 St.Paul Minnesota

With the Ryder Cup here in Minnesota this week,my thoughts automatically turned to my Dad.

Golf was one of the few leisurely activities I saw my Dad enjoy.

I remember him taking me to one of the courses once and also a trip to a miniature golf course in an effort to garner my interest in the sport. Dad's efforts failed with me as I found golf as a whole to be quite boring,and I preferred wacking the ball as hard as I could as opposed to the puts required to be successful in the sport. I guess I was more suited for baseball.

With Dad being the prominent doctor that he was,he eventually gained membership at the Wethersfield Country Club. Most folks would view his entrance as some sort of sign of prestige. For Dad however,it was all about getting to play golf at one of the best courses in Connecticut. One of the things he would do to spoof the country club would be instead of driving his Mercedes or BMW to the club,he often arrive at the valet in one of my half brother's beater vehicles. It would only be after they'd start hassling him when he would pull out his membership card.

A major golf tournament would be held yearly at the Wethersfield Country Club-The Greater Hartford Open,and Dad was  there in 1967 when Charlie Sifford became the first black to win a major PGA Tournament. Later the Greater Hartford Open became the Sammy Davis Jr. Greater Hartford Open, The Sammy Davis Jr GHO was a Pro-Am event in which my Dad entered and got to play with the likes of Lee Trevino and Billy Casper.

One of Dad's golfing buddies was State Senator,later US Senator Joe Lieberman. For the both of them,golfing would also be a profitable venture. Dad would contribute money to Lieberman's campaign,and when Lieberman won,there would be money alloted to my Dad's medical clinic. Joe Lieberman orginally was a Democrat but later became a Republican. I remember as a kid asking my Dad what his political leanings were,and I remember him telling me he was a Socialist,yet the last poliical contribution I heard he made was to George W.Bush. Under the Bush Administration  with Joe Lieberman's assistance buried amonst defense expenditures were funds allocated to Dad's clinic.

In the fall of 2004,Dad was diagnosed with a terminal form of lung cancer. Dad and I had a rather rocky relationship over the years,and on the first day upon my return to Connecticut,we had one of those clear the air sessions that anyone with issues with their parents should try to have with them before they pass..

One of Dad's biggest gripes with me was letting my idealism get in the way of  "playing the game" to get ahead like he did.

Maybe that's another reason I never played golf..