The Windmill of Time: A Time Travel Memoir

By Jeffrey Goldberg

What if you had the opportunity to return to the past in a universe with time travel?

We all have regrets, what “might” have been, “could” have been, or “should” have been, things we wish we hadn’t said or done and things we wish we had. The Windmill of Time is a time travel memoir based on the relationship of Jeffrey Goldberg and Laureen Shigeko Tanaka during 1970-1974 at Southampton College, LIU. In 2010, Jeffrey learns that his college sweetheart has died when he searched her name in Google. All the memories, emotions, guilt, and regrets for Laureen that he had repressed for the past 35 years suddenly come back to haunt him.

It’s 2043 and the government is sending the elderly back in time to reduce the drain on Social Security and Medicare. Ninety-two-year-old Jeffrey Goldberg embarks on a journey back to 1971 and his twenty-year-old body. Once united with his former self, Jeffrey has but one goal—alter his past and correct the mistakes that caused him to lose his first love, Laureen. But present and future collide as Jeffrey ignores warnings from the scientists in 2043 and attempts to change major historical events. Armed with his knowledge of the future, and his memories of the past, Jeffrey explores the paradoxes of time travel until he begins to question his very existence—and the authorities begin to question where he came by his information. If he tells them the truth, he’ll probably be locked up in a mental institution, but if he doesn’t come up with a reasonable explanation, he could go to jail. Either way, his hopes of reliving his life with Laureen will be dashed. The Windmill of Time begs the age-old question: can love really conquer time?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeffrey Goldberg
• Release date: Apr 14, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370028061

Jeffrey Goldberg

Jeffrey Goldberg has had a fascination with the concept of time ever since he was a child growing up in the Bronx during the 1950's. He considers himself an interloper in the present and always keeps one foot anchored in the past. His attraction to time travel movies and fiction began when he saw The Time Machine in 1960. He prefers the novels and short stories of author Jack Finney who uses the convention of time travel in everyday settings without the use of futuristic devices. Goldberg graduated from Southampton College LIU, in 1974, with a B.A. in English. He moved to Los Angeles in 1977 where he pursued numerous careers from teaching elementary school to teaching golf to working for a national company as a direct mail consultant. In 1991 he purchased his first business and has been self-employed ever since. For the past 10 years he's been selling used books on Amazon. He currently lives in Carlsbad, CA with his wife Inez and is anxiously waiting for the release of his first novel by Black Opal Books, The Windmill of Time: A Time Travel Memoir, and for the invention of a time machine...at least the last time we checked.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

May 20, 2043, 11 p.m.:

Tonight I was either going to die or travel in a time machine back to 1971. Hell if I knew which one. So I prepared myself for both and made my peace.

Sitting in the bedroom my college sweetheart and I had shared. I could feel us here, our souls frozen within these walls. I sobbed. Could I get back what time had stolen from me? Loud knocking snapped me back to reality.

You okay in there, mister? hollered the man from outside.

I opened the front door and was shocked by the darkness. A light fog hovered over the ground. What time it is?

Almost eleven, he said, glancing at his watch.

Jeezus. I’m gonna be late, damn it. Sorry I stayed so long.

I took his hand and thanked the current owner for letting me visit the vacant rental cottage. We had lived here seventy-two years ago. I hurried across the damp lawn to the solar powered car I left sitting in the driveway hours earlier. I switched it into auto-drive mode as a thousand thoughts raced through my mind. I made the thirty-five minute drive back to Brookhaven Lab from Hampton Bays for my two a.m. rendezvous with the past and the possibility of altering it.

When I got back to my room at the lab, it was almost midnight.

You were supposed to be back here two hours ago, scolded Margot, my time-travel adviser. Where have you been all evening, anyway?

I drove to Southampton to see what was left of the old college. Then I stopped by the house where I lived.

I could have lost my job if you didn’t come back. You wouldn’t be the first not to show up at the last minute you know.

Sorry. There’s no way I would have missed this.

Well, I was sure you’d be back. They started prepping for you two hours ago but I didn’t tell them. Did you eat any dinner?

I ate around five o’clock.

Better have something light, she said. I’ll be back in an hour.

Thank you.

I took a container of yogurt from the fridge and a protein bar. It occurred to me that I had never met another potential time traveler during the few days I had been here for orientation. For that matter, Margot was the only person I’d had contact with, although I’d seen other technicians walking around the building in white coveralls. I never asked and she never offered any information about other time travelers she might be advising. I thought it odd, considering there were millions of seniors over age ninety who were eligible to time travel each year, but Brookhaven was just one of five Space/Time Manipulation Centers.

I packed up my few belongings and tossed them into the disposal. I couldn’t take anything from 2043 back to 1971, so I gave all my assets to my sixty-three year old nephew Daniel. The only other thing I had of value was the matching wedding rings from my forty-nine year marriage, to Inez Terumi Ikkanda. Since we never had children, I decided the best place for them was in a small box along side her urn at Woodlawn Cemetery in Santa Monica. All my photos and letters from Laureen, my college sweetheart, I gave to her son.

At one a.m. Margot knocked on my door. I need your virtual pod.

I removed it from my pocket and handed it to her. It stored all my vitals and communications, in addition to all my thoughts and feelings, since I received the first generation unit in 2031.

It will be destroyed unless you want to give it to a relative.

Send it to my nephew, I guess.

Please follow me.

She escorted me to another room down the hallway and told me to wait then she left the room. I stood in what appeared to be a small medical office. A middle-aged man wearing a red turban and white lab coat soon entered and introduced himself as Dr. Radh Achuthan. He removed a device from his pocket and scanned my upper body.

You’re in excellent health, but I detect a rapid pulse and heartbeat. Now I need to remove the nano computer chip from your neck, he said, stepping behind me. Might sting a little.

This microchip, implanted just above my hairline, allowed my thoughts and feelings to connect with my virtual pod.

Why bother removing it? It’s useless back in 1971 without nanochip technology.

Nothing, absolutely nothing can go back to the past from this time, he said.

He quickly found the gold, inch-long, hair-shaped chip and plucked it out. Then he picked up a jet injection gun off the table and swabbed my left arm with alcohol.

What’s this for? I asked.

I’m injecting you with your personal DNA/Genome nanochip and a GPS nanochip.

Why?

For the morphing process. They will both dissolve within two hours.

Oh. I...uh...I was wondering. How many others are going tonight?

Sorry, Mr. Goldberg. I can’t discuss that.

How come?

It’s just the rules.

There was a slight pinch as the needle penetrated my skin.

All done. Good luck on your journey, sir.

Thanks, Doc.

Margot entered as he left. Time to get over to the Space/Time Manipulation Chamber.

Can I ask you a question?

Sure. But let’s get going. It’s on the lower level.

How come I haven’t seen another senior the entire time I’ve been here?

All departures are confidential.

Why? I don’t get it.

Everyone is entitled to his or her privacy as they prepare to depart. Some want to say farewell to their relatives. I’m sure you can understand that.

I guess so.

It’s time to go, she said in a calm voice. Are you ready?

Yes.

She opened a cabinet marked STERILE and handed me a thin white paper robe and paper booties.

Please remove everything, she said, turning her back.

When I had complied, she escorted me down the long white corridor to an elevator at the far end. There was a flashing red sign on the door that read, DNA Scanning Required. She placed her palm over the scanner.

The scanner responded, Margot Greenwood, cleared to enter.

A small drawer opened, revealing a golden key. She inserted the key and the elevator door slid opened. Panic set in. My body began to shiver. I could barely stand. My knees wobbled, forcing me to lean against her.

The elevator dropped at a rapid pace. Within seconds, it slowed and the door opened into a colossal room filled floor to ceiling with massive machinery that hummed and buzzed. Large mainframe type computers and control panels covered the walls. It seemed as if I’d suddenly been thrust onto the set of a science-fiction movie.

This is the Space/Time Manipulation Control Center, Margot said. This is where the wormhole is created. It’s the vehicle that takes you back to 1971.

Is it...is it safe?

As I explained when you first arrived it’s perfectly safe.

I followed her to an adjoining room just beyond the Control Center where three glass-body chambers stood.

Two technicians in white overalls greeted me. A woman, who was thin but very muscular, grabbed my hand. I’m Esther, she said, flinching slightly from the cold sweat of my palm.

Sorry.

It’s quite all right, nothing to be afraid of.

About fifteen to twenty technicians scurried around. Then the lid to one of the glass chambers slowly opened.

Esther handed me a thin white tablet. This is a sedative. Place it under your tongue. It’ll relax you.

I’m the only one here? I said nervously.

Margot looked at me and said, You’re the only one who has a departure time of May twenty-first, 0200 hours, destination 1971. Please take off your robe.

Esther and the other tech took hold under each arm and helped lift my ninety-two year old body into the chamber. Even though it was all clear glass, once they closed the lid claustrophobia set in. A cold, clammy sweat spread over my entire body.

I wanted to scream, Let me out nooowww, but I resisted.

How’re ya doin’, Mr. Goldberg? asked one of the technicians in a Southern drawl.

Gettin’ very anxious and scared.

That’s normal, said Esther.

Just take some deep breaths and let the sedative relax you. In a few minutes, you’ll be asleep. You’ll awaken in 1971, back in your twenty-year old body, Margot assured me in a comforting voice.

Through the glass windows of the Space/Time Manipulation Chamber, I watched technicians maneuver around in the Control Room. They hovered over digital consoles with scores of dials and gauges emitting a soft glow of orange, yellow, and green.

I tensed as the chamber began to vibrate, slowly at first, then more vigorously. A loud buzzing filled my ears. On the wall of the chamber, a small display counted down 1:57, 56, 55...

Everything outside the chamber whirled into fuzziness. Dizziness overwhelmed me. My sense of time distorted. Deep breaths didn’t help. Every muscle quivered as a wave of fear raced through my veins along with the sedative. Scary thoughts raced through my mind...

Was this time travel technology for real or was it just a ruse to exterminate me along with the burgeoning senior-citizen population? As my departure dated neared, I found myself becoming more paranoid. It wouldn’t be the first time a government committed genocide on its own citizens. No, no don’t think that. I’m gonna make it back to 1971...back with my first love. But can I change anything? Can I save her?

Margot’s voice reverberated in the chamber. Take deep breaths. Have a wonderful life...again, Mr. Goldberg. Don’t forget what I warned you about meddling with the past...it is strictly forbidden.

Eyelids are heavy...feel myself drifting...from this place, this time, this old body.

Darkness swallowed me and plunged me into oblivion.

Oh, God! Oh, God! That it were possible

To undo things done; to call back yesterday;

That Time could turn up his swift sandy glass,

To untell the days, and to redeem these hours!

Or that the sun could, rising from the west,

Draw his coach backward;

Take from the account of time so many minutes,

Till he had all these seasons call’d again,

Those minutes, and those actions done in them,

Even from her first offence; that I might take her

As spotless as an angel in my arms!

But, oh! I talk of things impossible,

And cast beyond the moon...

From A Woman Killed with Kindness ~ Thomas Heywood

CHAPTER 1

Montauk Dorm, Southampton College, Friday, May 21, 1971 2 a.m., The Second Time Around:

I awoke with a jolt, dazed and disoriented, unsure where I was or who inhabited this body, drifting between two times, uncertain if I’d been hurled into the future or the past...

I opened my eyes, blinking to adjust to the darkness. My heart pounded from a rush of panic. Holding back a scream, I jerked to a sitting position, attempting to recover my equilibrium. I was more puzzled than frightened by the feeling of nothingness. I had experienced this same feeling many years ago traveling on Amtrak. The tiny, cramped, coffin-like sleeping compartment vibrated fiercely in the dark. I awoke, startled by the sensation of nothingness, like the infinite timeless, formless, spaceless void before our birth. I’m going to die one day, whispered the voice inside my head. Was this that moment?

Still unsure where I was or when I was, I clutched my stomach as a wave of nausea overcame me. My ears rang to the point of deafness. My head still spun from the G-forces of traveling faster and faster, of being pulled back 26,280 days through the wormhole. My entire body was bombarded with sensory confusion, compelling me to create some kind of order out of the conflicting stimuli. Then I felt the youthful tightness of my skin, the strength of my arms and legs, and the powerful beating of my heart.

The technicians had prepared me for this--for my ninety-two year old body metamorphosing with and into my younger self, yet still retaining all my thoughts, emotions, and memories. The blood raced rapidly through my veins unclogging old, decayed arteries. The sensation of hormones pulsated through my groin. Energy flowed inside my body as it had when I was a teen, and I felt invincible, like I would never die.

I was keenly aware of feeling light. Free of all burdens and the massive weight imposed by age and a lifetime of regrets. Life had yet to beat me down. Lightness permeated my body, reminding me what it was like to have the freedom to not do anything. No worries, no job, no mortgage, no car payments, no one to take care of, no aging parents, and no goddamn responsibilities.

The moist Long Island humidity crawled over my skin. It was still dark outside. Shadows filled the room, but a smidgen of light reflected off the white cinderblock walls. The pungent smell of sea air from Shinnecock Bay infused the room.

My eyes finally adjusted to the semi-dark room. Two metal desks and chairs sat at opposite ends of the room. Stuff was strewn across both desks, but I couldn’t make out what it was. An empty metal bookshelf hung above each desk. Large, wooden, door-less closets filled with clothing stood next to the desks. The first item hanging was a dark-colored jacket with a large white logo that glowed--SOUTHAMPTON COLLEGE. Several white suitcases rested on the floor next to a stack of cardboard boxes. Two frameless mirrors hung on the vacant walls reflecting the blackness of the room. The only sound I heard was that persistent ringing in my ears.

I recognized this place--Montauk Dorm. My sweetheart and I stayed here for a week in May 1971, after the spring semester, waiting to start our summer jobs for the Model Cities Program.

I was here. I really made it. I’m back...I made it back to 1971!

I remembered what Gatsby said to Nick Carroway, Can’t repeat the past...Why of course you can!

Time--that phantom, that great equalizer, numbering our precious days, unstoppable, relentless, indiscriminate, irrevocable time. Finally, I had conquered Time!

I found myself lying on a narrow bed. Another bed was adjacent to mine, the two mattresses held tightly together by the sheets. The ringing in my ears subsided and I startled at the sound of quiet breathing. A body cuddled beside me--my sweetheart, Laureen Shigeko Tanaka. The last time I saw her was sixty-eight years ago. She looks exactly how I remembered her, even better, so different from the pictures I found on Facebook. Those photos haunted me. I found them posted on Facebook after she died. Death was evident on her face. Her beautiful face turned frail and sunken and sallow, as the life ebbed from her body. If only I had known.

For a moment, I sat motionless, studying her, watching her chest rise and fall with each breath. My eyes traced the curve of her soft, full lips and the waves of her long, brown, silky hair. The feelings came roaring back. Feelings of intense love that had been dormant in my heart for sixty-eight years, when I had loved her more than life itself. My body trembled as I sobbed in silence.

Laureen was peaceful in sleep. Eighteen years old with no cancer, no pain, no suffering. I reached over and placed my hand on her chest to feel her heart beat strong. The smooth, dark skin of her face glowed, unblemished by age. Until this moment, I hadn’t realized how extraordinarily beautiful she was, how much I had missed her, how much I’d hungered for her touch.

I kissed her lightly on the lips. She wriggled at my touch, breathing a gentle moan. The last time we shared a kiss was sixty-nine years ago, June 5, 1974, when she boarded the plane to go home to Hana for the summer. Now I stared at her and beamed with inner satisfaction. I finally beat Mark Sanders. He died many years before time travel was invented. Mark stole Laureen from me. They were married for thirty-two years and had two children. Now I had Laureen back again--back in 1971--when she loved me.

I gently eased off the bed testing my young legs. The first few steps seemed shaky but I managed to find the bathroom and flicked on the lights. Oohhh my God, I gasped, startled to see an unfamiliar face. The wall of mirrors reflected the body of my twenty-year-old self. I stared at the image with powerful curiosity. It had been over seventy years since I’d seen that person staring back at me. My head was covered with thick, wavy brown hair and long sideburns. Lips were thick and full. The sag, wrinkles, and deep frown lines were gone, as were those horrible white eyebrows. Even the pimples I always despised had returned to my cheeks. The skin on my hands was smooth and silky, like a child’s. I had been reborn.

I physically looked the same, but something was different.

I stared at my youthface, trying to reconcile this young, vigourous body with the memories of the decrepit old body I’d had only moments ago, the body I would one day have again if I survived that long this time around. I couldn’t escape from one enormous burden--I knew the past and I knew the future!

I crawled back into bed, too afraid to go to sleep. The unrelenting ringing in my ears made it impossible anyway. Anxiety and nausea lingered. Conflicting memories tumbled around in my head. My head was in two places simultaneously--two different pasts, two different lives, two brains in one body.

The Time/Space Manipulator technician warned me in 2043 that I would experience schizophrenic symptoms as my ninety-two-year-old memories merged with my younger self. It could take several hours or even days for the process to be complete. Twenty-year-old Jeffrey was meeting his older self. Not physically, but in my mind, trying to reconcile the seventy-two years of memories that came flooding back.

The reality of 2043 receded.

Entering this old familiar world again, without the technological advances of the twenty-first century I had become accustomed to and taken for granted, was like going backward through the looking glass to a nostalgic, simpler time.

Who in their heart hasn’t longed to be somewhere else in time?

A time before the quickening, when you could go to sleep and wake up the next day knowing the world hadn’t changed overnight. When your choices seemed more clear-cut, when the mundane act of opening up and reading a newspaper was time-consuming and comforting. When you didn’t need a remote because there were only ten channels on the TV. When you knew who your enemies were.

Could I live in this world again? Too late, there was no going back. This place, this time, this 1971, was my real world now.

I watched with awe as Laureen slept. Oh God, to hear her voice again, and that special way she would pronounce words in her Hawaiian accent. I desperately wanted to wake her. I reached out my hand to shake her awake, but then drew it back. It was still the middle of the night, so I let her sleep.

I got up and rummaged through the boxes finding familiar belongings, including several pairs of bell-bottom jeans. It was odd because everything seemed brand new but I also remembered them as old and worn. Now I had my whole life to live again. A single day here in 1971 was worth losing the few companionless years I left back in 2043. My entire life was before me--all the time in the world. You only get one this chance to fix it, so don’t screw it up.

The twenty-year-old Jeffrey from the past had met Laureen nine months earlier in front of the Southampton College windmill. Yet images, feelings, and emotions from the events of a life already lived were slowly being assimilated, like data files transferring from one computer to another. My twenty-year-old mind couldn’t fathom the future, but the ninety-two-year-old me seized that memory from 2010--a moment when something changed my life forever.

Oh God, no--how? God in heaven, no--no, I mumbled.

The horror of what I’d seen, what I’d felt, sitting at the desk in my office staring at the computer screen, caused pain to lash through me, obliterating my euphoria.

CHAPTER 2

My Home Office, Carlsbad, California, December 6, 2010, The First Time Around:

I stared in disbelief at the computer screen.

One word on the screen--OBITUARY--severed my soul in two. A vise of fear and panic squeezed my chest painfully, making it difficult to breathe.

My upper body swayed back and forth, like in synagogue, praying for a favor. Please, God...please, don’t let this be.

Weeping, I chanted, my beautiful, beautiful sweetheart, my beautiful, beautiful sweetheart...

I slumped in the chair behind my desk, writhing in pain. I no longer felt safe within my own skin. Lightheaded and dizzy, I was out of balance, shaky. My heart palpitated wildly, beating with such fierceness that it might explode at any second. I used to think of my body as a friend, but as I recognized my own mortality, it suddenly became my enemy. Whatever vestige of youth was left in my fifty-nine-year-old body was wrested from me forever. At this very moment, something had changed in my psyche. In my mind, I could sense the present moment fading as memories and feelings from the past came sharply into focus.

She died October twenty-first. There was something, something about that date...but I couldn’t remember what.

I had lost Laureen once when I put her on the plane in 1974. Then I lost her in Hana in 1975. Now I lost her to eternity. There was that same awful, horrible feeling in my gut that part of me didn’t exist anymore.

Somewhere deep inside me was always a crazy hope that we might reunite some day. That was why I Googled her name from time to time just to make sure Laureen was still safe and alive, enjoying her life. For some reason this always gave me comfort. And maybe, just maybe, I would find that she was divorced or widowed. Now that crazy fantasy was stolen from me.

The last time I saw Laureen Tanaka was on New Year’s Eve 1975 in Hana. Although we had only communicated one time in the last thirty-five years, I now knew I would never hear from her again. I would never look into those beautiful, soft, brown eyes or see her sweet smile that melted my heart.

I’d been married to my wonderful wife, Inez, for thirty years, who I loved dearly, but I loved Laureen differently. She was my first love, the very first person to let me into her heart, and whom I let into mine. I buried those feelings years ago, letting her go so I could move on with my life. Could you ever stop loving someone who touched your soul?

I stared at the screen for a long time waiting for this nightmare to end, but it never did. I forced my eyes to look away but when they returned the text hadn’t changed. Pushing myself up on shaky legs and clinging to the wall for support, I hobbled into the guest bedroom. Buried in the closet was an old photo album that hadn’t been touched in years. The blue cover was tattered, the pages separated from the binding. Most of the photos were clear and bright inside plastic liners, but the white borders had yellowed slightly.

I ran my finger across her pictures and sobbed. My beautiful sweetheart--my beautiful sweetheart--what happened to us?

How I’d loved to take her picture. She was so beautiful, even though she didn’t think so. She had an inner beauty that touched my very soul. My fingers trembled as I carefully turned the pages. The photos seemed almost new, as if they weren’t forty years old. I remembered exactly when and where each photo was taken. I found myself still living in these photos, images flashing across my mind. Somehow it only seemed natural that the moment in time captured in these pictures should continue, but I no longer knew that Jeffrey.

The camera could only capture a split second in time--a smile, or the look of love between two people. It couldn’t bring them back to life. I thought I was looking at reality, but I was looking at ghosts--our ghosts.

I gently kissed her sweet, frozen face.

I hated time. For some reason I could never grasp the reality of it. Even as a child I knew time was my enemy. All of us are held captive by it. I couldn’t stop it, even for a moment. I couldn’t control it. I couldn’t manipulate it for my own desires. I tried, oh how I tried! My entire life had been spent living in the past. Even the music and films I loved were not of my generation, as if I had been born out of my time, an interloper in the present. Ever since I first saw The Time Machine, I’d been obsessed with the idea of traveling to the past. My favorite poem growing up was Miniver Cheevy. It befuddled me how slow a minute or an hour could take to pass. Yet the last forty years had flown by so quickly. Time had always tormented me.

Forty years--forty years. How could something have happened to me forty years ago? How is that possible?

The moment I always treasured seemed so insignificant, almost silly now, when Laureen first touched my soul...

***

She was out running some errands in Southampton. I was sitting on the couch reading, when she burst into the living room of the house we shared and ran over to me, crying.

What’s the matter? I asked, sitting up abruptly, concerned she might have been in an accident.

I--I was driving on Montauk Highway and a small bird slammed into the windshield, she said, clutching my hand tightly, her thin fingers ice cold.

I sighed from relief and rubbed her fingers to warm them. It wasn’t your fault.

She sniffled. I know, but I think I killed the poor thing.

I’m glad you didn’t lose control of the car.

Tears ran down her cheeks. I know.

Was anything on the windshield?

‘Nope.

Well that’s good. Did you stop to see if the bird was okay?

I couldn’t. There were too many cars behind me.

Birds run into things all the time. Maybe it survived, I said, gently wiping the tears from her watery brown eyes with my fingers.

She nodded. Oh I hope so.

Don’t worry. I’m sure it’s okay. Birds are pretty hardy creatures.

I guess so. She cracked a tiny smile, perhaps feeling a little self-conscious for over-reacting.

You have a good heart. That’s why I love you, I said, embracing her and kissing her salty cheek, my soul forever bound to hers...

***

I pulled out an old folder with some envelopes addressed to me. I took out one of the letters, running it through my fingers. The paper hadn’t yet yellowed with age. It was still crisp and fresh, as if it had just been written and sent to me. I lifted the letter up to my nose to see if I could smell her, but there was no scent. I read the letter from July 24, 1972 when she was home for the summer, the handwriting still very familiar to me. I kissed the letter, knowing she had touched it, and when she had wrote it she stilled loved me. She signed the letter, with much love & aloha, your sweetheart Laureen.

I wept. After reading this letter, I realized her days were already numbered. I searched through all the letters and notes but couldn’t find anything written on October twenty-first. What was it about that date?

We had spent about 1,350 days together. All those 1,350 nights we slept together, and I would cuddle up next to her like we were one. How I loved to slip my hand under her nightie and caress her breasts. I had been blessed then, but I hadn’t known it.

I could feel a chasm in my brain between the present and the past--my sense of time exploding in my head, the past erupting like a dormant volcano spewing all the memories, feelings, and regrets I’d repressed for the past thirty-five years. I needed to get back to us--to what I’d lost, but how?

God please, there has to be a way to get back!

I could only get back to her in my mind. The memory of that night we first met forty years ago in front of the windmill and the four years we spent together were forever seared in my brain.

CHAPTER 3

Saturday, September 12, 1970, 8 p.m., Our First Meeting:

It was my sophomore year at Southampton College. I was nineteen years old and had all the time in the world ahead of me. I thought about the first time I saw the campus. It was on a Sunday in August a year earlier, just a few days after the ticker-tape parade for the Apollo 11 astronauts. I was working at Peterson’s Pipe Shop on lower Broadway and had a bird’s-eye view of the parade as it slowly proceeded by the store.

I wanted to see the campus before the fall semester started in early September. I remember the feeling as soon as I stepped out of my father’s car. I felt like I was in heaven. It was a quiet, serene, peaceful setting, lots of grass and trees. Once I graduated high school, I was eager to leave home. I needed to get away from my parents. I needed some peace and quiet, and Eastern Long Island was the type of lifestyle I craved. It was so different from the City College of NY campus in Manhattan where I would have gone if I stayed home in the Bronx. I instantly knew this was where I was meant to be.

I had extraordinary physical energy, raging hormones, youthful dreams, ambition, passion, and so much hope. But also unresolved obsessions. I felt invincible, except I was extremely shy. Even though I had lots of friends, I was a loner, never really feeling like I fit in. I knew I wasn’t handsome, but I wasn’t bad looking either. I always felt too self-conscious about my big nose when I was around girls, and I never knew what to say. I couldn’t seem to relax and just be myself. I had everything except the thing I wanted most--a girlfriend, someone to love me unconditionally.

I dated one girl in high school, Diane Bloom. We went on five dates during our senior year. I was so nervous around her I hardly spoke. What made it worse was that she didn’t talk much either so there were a lot of uncomfortable silences. Then a few days after my grandfather died, she broke up with me. When I asked her why she went out with me she said, So I would have something to do on Saturday nights.

That didn’t do much for my confidence and self-esteem. I’d never known unconditional love. Sometimes I don’t think I even loved myself. How could I when my father left my mother and my eight-year-old brother Norman right after I was born? He moved in with his mistress, Adeline Durso. She worked in the New York Telephone Building near the Washington Market where my father had his wholesale produce business, but how or where they met, no one knew for sure.

My parents never divorced and my father came every Saturday to take us kids out and even my mother. I always loved Saturdays because I hated school, but I dreaded that day, too.

This dysfunctional relationship continued over the next twenty years, but it was much more than dysfunctional. It was toxic. The fighting, bickering, and demeaning never stopped. Most of the time my mother was the instigator. I guess that’s how she got her revenge. She used my brother and me as a wedge between her and my father, especially when they fought over money. Many times, she would say to me, You’re just like your father, or You’re no better than your father.

I grew up feeling worthless, but I swore to myself that I would never do to my girlfriend or wife what my father did to my mother. I finally was able to get away from them, sort of, that day last September, when they dropped me off at Amagansett dorm. There was another freshman on the landing saying good-bye to his parents and he was crying. I couldn’t believe it. What a sissy. That was the happiest day of my life when they drove off and I was finally free.

Tonight, a year later, was a beautiful late summer evening. The air was moist and balmy, carrying the scent of the ocean. A very light fog lingered just above the grass. The full moon lit up the campus, making it easy to find my way along the unlit paths. Jacob, the club president, asked me to meet two prospective International House Club members and escort them to his party across the street from the campus. I sat down on the bench that was adjacent to the giant windmill and waited. It was eight o’clock. No one else had arrived yet. My date to the party was Linda Pincus, a girl I liked from last semester.

The windmill looked impressive reflecting the moonlight.

It was originally constructed in the early 1700s and moved from the village of Southampton to its present location in 1890 as part of the former Claflin estate. It had been a Southampton College landmark since 1963, when the campus opened.

I saw Linda walking toward me. I admired her as she approached me and thought she looked pretty. She wore a short, tight black skirt; high heels that showed off her thin, sexy legs; and a red, low-cut blouse that revealed her ample cleavage. She was also from the Bronx like me, and tonight was my chance to get to know her better.

Hi, glad you could make it.

Thanks for inviting me, she said, surprising me with a light kiss on the cheek. I’m not overdressed, am I?

"You look really nice, Linda."

I like your shirt.

I wore my new blue-and white-striped dress shirt that I just purchased at a Madison Ave men’s store for twenty dollars. That was one day’s pay at the pipe shop.

Thank you.

While we were talking, the other two girls arrived and we all introduced ourselves. Linda and I discussed the courses we were taking this semester as the girls followed behind us. It was a short walk to Jacob’s house just across the street from the campus on the other side of Montauk Highway.

When we arrived, there was already a large crowd of people. Jacob greeted me affectionately in his loud booming voice. Jeffrey, my friend, how are you! he said as he hugged me.

Jacob Akindele was president of International House and an exchange student from Lagos, Nigeria. He had three scars across both cheeks and was a kind and gentle soul. He explained to me that the scars were a form of tribal body art to identify a person’s family and regional heritage, but they also had a spiritual significance.

Jacob was always quoting passages from In the Light of Truth, that was like bible to him and the doctrine he lived by. The book was a collection of lectures addressing all spheres of life, ranging from God and the universe to the laws of creation, free will and responsibility, intuition and the intellect, the ethereal world, and the beyond. It answered eternal questions such as what it meant to be human, what was the purpose of life on earth, and what happened after death. It also explained the causes and significance of the unprecedented crises facing humanity today and our responsibilities to the future. As much as I liked and admired Jacob, the book wasn’t something I could relate to, but I considered him my closest friend.

I’d been introduced to Jacob my freshman year by Gary Nault, who lived in my dorm. At one of Jacob’s parties, I had gotten drunk for the first time in my life. I wanted to dance with this attractive girl with large breasts, whom I had been watching all evening. I summoned up the nerve and approached her at the start of a slow dance. When I held her body with her chest pressed close to mine, I got an instant erection. It was very embarrassing. I hoped she didn’t notice. Later, that night Gary had to help me back to the dorm in a freezing snowstorm.

I tried to speak over the loud music. Jacob, you know Linda Pincus. This is, um...I’m sorry I forgot your names.

Collete, shouted the skinny black girl with a huge Afro hairdo.

Laureen, said the petite, dark-complexioned girl with long, brown hair, almond-shaped eyes, and a demure smile.

Nice to meet you, he said, shaking their hands.

Where are you from, Laureen? asked Jacob.

Hawaii.

And Collete?

St. Croix.

Welcome, welcome. There’s lots of food and wine so enjoy. I hope you’ll consider joining International House.

The Beatles’ Get Back, one of the few Beatles’ songs that I liked, blasted out of two wooden speakers as the large vinyl record spun around the turntable.

"Jojo was a man who thought he was a loner,

"but he knew it couldn’t last.

"Jojo left his home in Tucson, Arizona,

"for some California grass.

"Get back, get back,

"Get back to where you once belonged..."

Crackers, cheese, chips and dip, and wine bottles were laid out on a table in the living room. Linda and I carried our paper plates with food in one hand and a glass of wine in the other. We went into the backyard where it was quiet and we could talk. I thought some wine would loosen me up. There weren’t any tables or chairs, but we found a small rowboat tied to the dock. The boat wobbled as we stepped inside. Linda’s wine glass shook as she lunged forward, spilling it all over my new shirt.

Sorry, I’m so clumsy.

It’s okay. Do you think it will stain? I asked, clenching my jaw.

I don’t know, but you should rinse it out when you get back to the dorm.

I’ll get you another glass, I said, grabbing it out of her hand.

When I returned she was sitting on the wooden seat. The short skirt slid up, revealing her pale, white thighs. As I sat down next to her, I glimpsed down her blouse to peek at those large breasts. Like most Jewish girls from the Bronx, Linda had a hard edge to her personality. She wasn’t easy to get close to. Other than a few dates, I never had a relationship with a Jewish girl. I never even kissed Diane Bloom. I only made out with one girl, Lishma Bugayeff. That was one night last semester. She was Mongolian, and no doubt the most unattractive girl on campus. I don’t know what attracted me to her except that maybe I was desperate. The next day she acted like she didn’t know me, which really hurt. Who knows, maybe she didn’t like the way I kissed or that I was Jewish?

It’s nice to be back here after spending the summer in the Bronx, Linda said.

I know what you mean. What’d you do?

I worked at Alexander’s on Fordam Road. In the women’s department, she said, sipping her wine. "How ’bout you?

Second summer I worked at Peterson’s Pipe Shop on 42nd Street across from Grand Central.

Do you smoke a pipe?

I started smoking in high school.

I smoke a joint every now and then, she said, reaching into her purse. Want to share one with me?

Sure.

I was a little stunned. I’d never smoked pot before, but tried not to show it. She lit it up, inhaled deeply twice, then exhaled, and handed it to me. Following her example, I inhaled deeply. Just as I took a puff, she leaned over and said, Kiss me and blow the smoke in my mouth. The acrid smoke burned my mouth and throat as I held it for her. Our lips met, my tongue reached into her mouth. Then she pulled her head back with disdain. I don’t tongue kiss, she exclaimed.

I didn’t respond to her rejection, handing her back the remainder of the joint. I wanted to get intimate with her, but lip kissing wasn’t very romantic or affectionate. She made me feel as if there was there something wrong with me. I tried to fondle her breasts, but she wouldn’t let me, giggling as she slapped my hands away. We drank several more glasses of wine on the boat then went inside and danced. Later, we walked back to her dorm holding hands and we lip kissed some more at her door, but that was all. She didn’t ask me to come in.

When I got back to my dorm, I still felt high from all the wine and was horny as hell. There was something about the pot, the wine, the kissing, and teasing that left me dissatisfied. The entire evening seemed impersonal and forced. I never felt comfortable or at ease, somehow. Just being myself wasn’t enough for her. I was unable to penetrate that wall she put up. Do I even like Linda? I wondered. Does she like me? What I really wanted was someone to like me for who I was.

CHAPTER 4

Our Second Meeting, Wood Hall Dining Room, Sunday, September 20, 1970:

I entered the Wood Hall dining room around five-thirty and found it nearly empty. That was typical of Sunday since students wouldn’t return from the weekend until later that evening. Most students were from Long Island or the City and the campus was dead on the weekends, so there was no reason to stick around.

The huge dining room occupied the upper level of the building and the Ratskeller the lower. There were five long rows of blue Formica-topped tables lined with uncomfortable plastic chairs. On a typical weekday, the dining room would be very loud with the cacophonous sounds of talking, laughter, shouting, trays slamming down on the tables, and chairs scraping the floor. There’d be good-natured pushing and shoving as students waited in a long line to get their food but today it resembled a ghost town.

Close To You was playing over the loud speakers, echoing through the empty cafeteria. I walked over to the far left side of the room and picked up a blue plastic food tray and soda from the dispenser.

There was no line today, so I walked right up and looked at the dinner choices: fish sticks, chicken a la king, or hotdogs. I didn’t like fish, and didn’t feel like eating a pale-looking, boiled hot dog. No way. Not after growing up eating grilled hot dogs from the Jewish deli’s on Lydig Avenue. I took the chicken a la king and some cake with chocolate icing.

"Why do stars fall down from the sky,

Everytime you walk by?

Just like me, they long to be,

Close to you."

Scanning the large dining room for a place to sit, I noticed the shy, petite girl I had met at Jacob’s party last week sitting alone at the very end of a long table. I thought she was very Asian looking, but then most of the girls I knew were Jewish. I never liked to sit by myself in the dining room. Sometimes, if I didn’t know anyone around, I would leave and come back later to eat.

I walked over to the table. Hi, I remember meeting you at Jacob’s party, but I forgot your name.

She looked up at me with big, almond-shaped, brown eyes. Laureen.

Can I join you?

Uh, huh. She nodded. Jeffrey, right?

That made me feel good so I sat down across the table from her. You remembered.

Noise of clattering dishes, trays, and silverware echoed from the kitchen along with the loud music. The chicken a la king tasted all right. I noticed she had the fish sticks.

Where’re you from, Laureen?

Hana Maui, that’s in Hawaii. How about you?

I tried not to stare at her too much, but I liked the complexion of her dark, flawless skin. It wasn’t olive color but had more of a golden tint. She looked like she never had a pimple