The Eighties: A Bitchen Time To Be a Teenager!

by Tom Harvey

  I thought the tears would come. They didn’t.

  What came instead was anger.

  My eyes went back and forth across the letters and numbers on the ground.

  This was all wrong.

  Dads weren’t supposed to be gone forever. Dads were supposed to be around when twelve-year-old boys needed them.

  What was wrong with him? Why did he leave?

  A breeze rustled through the trees. Birds chirped but this wasn’t a happy place. My hands clenched into fists so tight my fingernails drew blood. I felt like pounding my fists on the marker. I wanted to scream, Why? Why did you leave us? This is all wrong!

  Dad was so close.

  No, my demons whispered, Dad isn’t here. Dad is gone. Dad left in a fit of rage and confusion and frustration. You’ll never, ever see him again. And guess what, Sport? It’s … all … your … fault.

  I was dizzy.

  Confused.

  Angry.

  Sad.

  Empty.

  Mom’s hand gently found my shoulder.

  “Let’s go, baby,” she whispered.

  We turned and walked back to the RV as tears streamed down my face.

  It took until my mid-twenties to fight the voices in my brain: It wasn’t my fault. His emotion–his temper–got the best of him. No one was to blame but himself.

  Back in Porterville, David burst through the front door holding the album in front of him. His eyes were wide with excitement and sweat dripped off his face.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “It’s the new AC/DC album. It just came out today!”

  “You rode your bike all the way to Midnite Records and back for some lame recording without Bon Scott?” I scoffed. “No Bon Scott, no AC/DC.”

  “There was a line out the door for this,” he countered. “I got the last one!”

  Not one to totally blow off my brother who had gone to the trouble of a four-mile trek in the sweltering heat of that July evening, I followed him to our room where he put needle to record.

  Bong.

  Bong.

  Bong.

  Bong.

  The intro to Hells Bells played and for the next forty-three minutes, time stood still–the only interruption when he flipped the record over after the first five songs.

  We looked at each other in amazement.

  “No Bon Scott, no AC/DC, huh?” David grinned.

  “Play the first song again! The one with the bell!”

  Never has there been a purer moment of appreciation for something initially regarded with such skepticism.

  After playing the album for the second time through, David gushed, “This album kicks ass!”

  Even at twelve, I got it. The album was both a tribute to Bon and a take-no-prisoners introduction of new lead singer, Brian Johnson. There was no way of knowing at the time that Back In Black would become the second highest selling album of all time, second only to Michael Jackson’s not-yet-released Thriller. All we knew was that AC/DC didn’t miss a beat after the sudden death of Bon Scott and we loved the band with and without Bon.

  Nowadays, you’re likely to hear the trademark gonging of Hells Bells at major sporting events. It’s become an institution alongside Ozzy Osbourne’s Crazy Train and Queen’s We Are The Champions. Every time I hear the bells while watching Monday Night Football (usually to start the third quarter), I instinctively jump up, point to the TV, and exclaim to my wife, “Listen! AC/DC in the house! An eighties classic!” She humors me.

  1981 Fun Fact #1:

  “Raiders of the Lost Ark” is the top grossing film of the year, raking in over $384 million at the box office. Oh, and some guy named Tom Cruise makes his big screen debut in “Endless Love” and “Taps.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Unlike the sixth grade, where Mrs. Alexander taught every subject in the same classroom, seventh grade meant a homeroom, multiple teachers, multiple classrooms, and lockers. Most of us turned thirteen in the seventh grade, meaning we were, by definition, teenagers.

  Paul “Skip” Sonksen was my homeroom teacher and my first male teacher (not counting the guitar-toter from the previous year). He was a likable guy, always smiling and interested in his students. His bushy moustache and glasses later reminded me of Richard Dreyfuss’ character in the 1995 drama Mr. Holland’s Opus.

  I tried out for basketball and made the B team. We didn’t practice much, but I remember a few games. Our coach, social science teacher, Bruce Lankford, would throw us our “uniform” after school–a frayed, no-longer-white, yellowing tanktop with a B on the front and a number on the back. I played with the jeans I wore to school that day, complete with Goody-brand plastic comb in the back pocket. (Hey, you gotta look good for the ladies at all times.)

  I sucked at basketball–I know it now and I knew it then–and the guys only passed me the ball when they absolutely had to. We had five offensive and five defensive formations. Coach Lankford would yell out a number, “Four! Four! Four!” and, more times than not, I’d stand there confused while my teammates scrambled into position.

  One cold afternoon, we traveled to Pioneer Junior High–a milestone, traveling across town to another school for a sanctioned sporting event. Getting on and off a bus in uniform–parents take note, these are big moments in your kids’ lives.

  As I brought the ball down court, a defender rushed me at the top of the key. I turned my back and head-faked to the left. The kid jumped back. I head-faked to the right. The kid jumped back again. Hell, I’m a player, I thought. Then I realized that it wasn’t my athletic prowess at work, it was my runny nose. With each head-fake, a long string of clear, warm snot flew to the left, then to the right. I turned and fired off an uncontested shot.

  Woosh.

  Nothing but air.

  I did make a basket one time, though it was a different game. I put up the shot. Swish! I was so busy celebrating at our basket that the other team inbounded the ball, ran down the court, and made an easy layup. Coach Lankford threw up his hands and yelled, “It’s called defense! You should try it sometime, Tom!”

  I wasn’t cut out to be a basketball player so I tried something else: Drama.

  Drama is one of those polarizing things–kids either get it or they don’t. I took a lot of flak for being in drama, but my fellow thespians–David Fine, Todd Bailey, Stacy Roberts, Shelley Furr, Gina Pitigliano, Josh Byrd, and Anthony Gibson–were cool in their own right, so it equaled out. We were our own little support group.

  Ms. Jane Smith was our drama teacher.

  Ms.

  Jane.

  Smith.

  Not Mrs.

  Not Miss.

  Ms.

  Pronounced “Miz.”

  Ms. Smith decided that we’d do James Brock’s The Prince Who Wouldn’t Talk and cast me in the title role. Despite the title, the prince had a lot to say, and I struggled trying to memorize the lengthy script.

  As costumes were made (a green tunic, green felt hat, and white pants for me) and props prepared (my horse had a cardboard head, stick body, and yarn tail), I announced I wasn’t ready. The play would have to be postponed.

  “Well, you better get ready! The play’s a week away!” Ms. Smith snapped.

  The big day came and I was terrified.

  Looking out at a couple of hundred faces, my sister one of them, teachers standing up and down the aisles, it could have easily been a crowd of ten thousand.

  I had the first twenty minutes of the play down pretty good, but after that required massive intervention. David Fine, the narrator (lucky freaking guy) sat on a stool, on-stage, with the entire script in front of him. He didn’t have to memorize a damn thing! As the rest of us struggled with our lines–with long, excruciating pauses–David whispered the dialogue to the person closest to him, that person whispered it to the next person, and so on. We must have looked pathetic. No, we were pathetic.

  As we struggled along, Ms. Smith stood off to the side, hands wringed together, white knuckles gle
aming. All she could offer was moral support: the exaggerated head nod, the plastered-on smile. She was a bit quirky–she never wore make-up, she was pale and thin and her shoulder-length brown hair was never curled–in a word, she was plain. Some kids called her Plain Jane. Plain or not, I didn’t want to let her down. I didn’t want to embarrass her. The jury’s still out on that one.

  There’s a point in the play where I ask: “What did it look like?”

  The response: “A tail.”

  Then I say, excitedly, “A tail?”

  The prince is looking to slay a dragon, but there are no dragons around, so the townsfolk make a fake dragon’s tail which makes its appearance in several scenes. (This is the interactive part of the play, at least with the elementary school kids, where 200 squealed in unison, “There it is! There it is!” Naturally, the prince is oblivious–hey, oblivious I had down pat.)

  We were beyond the “tail” scene by ten minutes when I blurted out:

  “What did it look like?”

  Response: “A tail!”

  We circled back to that scene and performed everything from that point forward not once, but twice. As it unfolded in front of us, in real time onstage, we knew it was wrong. I looked at my classmates with wide eyes. They looked back not knowing how far along the path we should go. The inflection in our voices turned monotone. No one knew how to put us back on course. Do we improvise?

  Sweat poured down my face. I felt like I was on fire. I glanced down at Ms. Smith and she kept nodding that exaggerated nod. She mouthed, “Keep going!”

  If hell exists, my version of it would be stuck in this moment–on stage, completely lost, making a fool of myself and dragging my classmates into the fire with me.

  Despite the rough debut, we were instant celebrities with the elementary school kids. We took a two week break to learn the damn lines for the junior-high presentation.

  Drama is cool, don’t let anyone convince you otherwise. Thanks to The Prince Who Wouldn’t Talk, I found a girlfriend. Better said, she found me.

  After our second performance, an eighth grader named Patty asked me if I had a girlfriend. She did it right in front of a bunch of kids during recess. It was a bold question and, suddenly, everyone within earshot stopped talking. All eyes turned to me.

  “Well, no,” I said.

  “Good,” she smiled, nodded, turned, and walked off.

  All I could think was, Wow, an older woman.

  Our relationship–if you can call it that–only existed within the confines of the school grounds. We hung out during recess. We met up at a school dance and danced to all the slow Air Supply songs. (They were all slow, weren’t they?) She was a pretty brunette, but my interest in her was lukewarm at best–to this day, I’m not sure why.

  Our romance peaked and suffered the deathblow at the same moment. Patty, impatient with my lack of action, took the initiative after school one day. I pushed my bike as we walked together. At the far corner we said our goodbye, so she knew her limited window of opportunity.

  It happened fast.

  She pivoted in front of me and went in with her eyes closed.

  It was very …

  Wet.

  I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand.

  There are a lot of defining moments in a guy’s life and having a girl jam her tongue in your mouth for the first time ranks right up there.

  We continued our walk in awkward silence. I couldn’t wait to jump on my bike and pedal home to report the news to David–the whole thing was weird.

  I don’t remember the actual break-up–not that there really was one–but it was clear that our love was on the rocks. Ain’t no big surprise.

  On December 8, 1980, the Patriots and Dolphins were bashing each other on Monday Night Football.

  Mom was in the kitchen.

  A message, in ticker-tape form, scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

  “Who’s John Lennon?” I yelled.

  She yelled back, “One of the Beatles. You know, (she began singing) ‘she loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah …’”

  “He’s just been shot dead according to Monday Night Football.”

  “… she loves you …”

  Her singing stopped.

  She walked out of the kitchen in disbelief staring at the TV. The dishtowel in her hand dropped to the floor.

  On Monday, March 30, 1981, I stayed home from school after suffering a sunburn from a weekend Walk-A-Thon. As I sat in front of our 19” TV–HBO wouldn’t be on until noon–President Reagan walked out of the DC Hilton. He waved. He smiled. He exuded confidence.

  Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop!

  Chaos erupted on live TV.

  The world soon learned that John Hinkley wasn’t a very good shot. The bullet that hit the president ricocheted off the presidential limo; the bullet that did the most damage hit Press Secretary James Brady in the head. I fretted in silence throughout the day since I was the only one home. By the time school was out and Mom was home from work, it was apparent the president was going to make it. James Brady, on the other hand, was dead–at least according to the initial news reports. Turns out that Mr. Brady wasn’t dead, but he was in dire straits. I went to bed that night praying for Mr. Brady (prior to that I’d only prayed for myself and my family)–no one thought he’d survive the night. He survived but was permanently paralyzed.

  As a result of Hinkley’s brazen attack, handgun control became a major political agenda item and one only need look at our wheelchair-bound Press Secretary to see the ravaging effect a handgun could have in the hands of a lunatic. The Brady Bill, requiring federal background checks for handgun purchasers, eventually became law.

  It’s shocking that the leader of the free world damn near died according to Del Quentin Wilber’s brilliant account of that day (Rawhide Down: The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan). How little we knew at the time.

  President Reagan gained a cool nickname–the “Teflon President”–and enjoyed an unprecedented level of popularity from adoring Democrats and Republicans, alike.

  A coworker of Mom’s at Montgomery Ward (she worked there part-time while going to nursing school at Porterville Junior College), a thin guy with a huge red beard named Don, offered to take us to our first BMX National. David and I loaded up his van and we drove two and a half hours south to Northridge, home to a sprawling track called Devonshire Downs. It was on Devonshire Boulevard, hence the name.

  We camped at the track, along with hundreds of other kids, anticipating the crack of dawn and two full days of racing. That night I said to Don, “Hey, you should buy us some beer!”

  Don, a likable guy in his twenties with the hots for our thirty seven-year-old mother, looked at me skeptically. “You sure you want to do that since you’re racing tomorrow?” He would have done it, for sure.

  David answered, “Not a good idea.”

  That was that.

  Forty-eight thirteen-year-old novices made up my class. The task at hand was to whittle that down to eight for the Main. This was accomplished via motos, semis, and heats with six gates worth of competitors–and that was just the thirteen-year-old novices. To my surprise, I advanced through each round easily.

  David, on the other hand, raced the fifteen-year-old experts and had his hands full with kids that were factory-sponsored. That is, kids who were members of organized racing teams from major manufacturers such as SE Racing, GT, Redline, Schwinn, and Diamond Back. These kids traveled all over the country nearly every weekend, racing at all the big events. In David’s age group, Diamond Back-sponsored “Pistol Pete” Loncarevich, was virtually unbeatable along with Robinson-sponsored Gary Ellis. David needed a moto win to advance and finished second all three times. While disappointed, we agreed his showing was impressive (beating future hall-of-famer Gary Ellis two out of three races).

  We were too excited to sleep on Saturday. Sunday rolled around and the thirteen-novice main approached. I was exhausted, mentally and physically, before the day began.


  Picking poker chips out of a coffee can to determine gate position, my heart sank when I pulled the number one. The track swept around to the right meaning all seven guys would be to my left. It would take a monster holeshot to have a chance at leading the pack through the banked first turn.

  My body trembled as the demons awoke. You’re the only racer not wearing an expensive full face helmet. Your Redline outfit doesn’t match your PK Ripper bike. You don’t belong here, dummy.

  I looked over my left shoulder and studied Diamond-Back-sponsored twelve expert Doug Davis. He was relaxed and smiling. A picture of total confidence. His silver and black uniform matched his gleaming chrome bike. What a stud. He knows he’s going to win. There isn’t a doubt in his mind. (He actually took third that day.)

  My heart pounded.

  Relax, you can do this. We’ve come this far.

  The starting cadence began: Riders ready!

  Balanced on my pedals, the seconds ticked off in super-slow-motion.

  Boom, boom, boom. The sound of my heartbeat, deafening in my head.

  I shifted my weight back then forward. Bam! My front wheel hit the gate. The gate dropped a split-second later and seven guys lurched forward as I stood with my feet on the ground.

  A second passed.

  My mind screamed, You are blowing it! Get on your pedals you idiot! I gave chase down the thirty yard sloped straightaway.

  And then the funniest thing happened.

  Like falling dominoes, five riders vying for the inside line came together and crashed in front of me. I swerved to the inside narrowly avoiding the bodies and bikes on the ground. Time slowed to a standstill in my mind.

  The two racers out of gates seven and eight flew by on the outside and I shot straight up into the banked turn behind them. They had the momentum and stretched out into the lead, a two-man race for the win. I pedaled with all my might, the adrenalin surging through my body, my mind yelling, You’re in third place! Your name’s going to be in Bicycle Motocross magazine! Don’t crash now! Don’t get passed!

  I pedaled around the winding track with no one within forty yards of me. Crossing the finish-line, I skidded to a stop earning the third place trophy–at three feet tall, the tallest one I’d ever received.