The Giant's Chair

By Marc A. Catone

Adam Chance is the quintessential Sixties man. He saw The Beatles at Shea Stadium, went to Woodstock and was active in the Antiwar movement. Then, he wrote about the counterculture in his best-selling book, WALDEN PAVED OVER.

Now, in the 1990s, Adam finds himself middle aged, divorced and suffering from every author's nightmare ... writer's block. An understanding therapist suggests that he keep a journal to do a life review. The effect is liberating. No longer does he have to worry about word limits and cranky editors. He's totally free to express his point of view and explore new writing styles.

Adam recalls sharing a pizza with Jim Morrison in a Greek restaurant. He reminisces about a transcendent conversation with John Lennon in Central Park. He balances satire and parody by imagining a 'Sixties Sell-Out' awards ceremony, composing a list of 60 things he fears might happen and writing the script for the final episode of STAR TREK.

Adam's fondest memories are of his childhood with best friend, Midnight Duke. In the Summer of 1963, Adam and Midnight climb the Giant's Chair, a huge rock formation located in the rolling hills beyond their back yards. The two boys remain friends into adulthood as they pass through different phases of their lives. Then tragedy strikes and each man must cope with the outcome on his own level. Eventually, both friends are led back to the Giant's Chair.

Adam gives himself permission to explore his spiritual side. He immerses himself in books on mind/body healing and practices meditation. He seeks forgiveness from his ex-wife, desires reconciliation with an estranged brother and celebrates the unique qualities of the Sixties generation.

Adam's road to understanding contains a few bumps along the way, but his journal becomes the path to renewal. Ultimately, Adam Chance discovers an answer that has always been inside him ... a basic truth as old as time itself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: May 25, 2004
• ISBN: 9781418476885

Marc A. Catone

  Marc A. Catone lives in upstate New York. He writes frequently about popular culture and politics.   Marc is the author of AS I WRITE THIS LETTER: An American Generation Remembers THE BEATLES. Currently, he is writing a book about his experiences during the 1960s.  You can discuss the social and political events of the Sixties with him and others at:

Book preview

The Giant’s Chair

By

Marc A. Catone

Title_Page_Logo.ai

© 1995, 2005 Marc A. Catone. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 09/28/05

ISBN: 1-4184-7688-9 (e)

ISBN: 1-4208-7906-5 (sc)

Printed in the United States of America

Bloomington, Indiana

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Any comments or questions can be sent to

Marc A. Catone

PO Box 2

Freeville, New York 13068

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

CHAPTER ONE

I can’t remember when the hands became useless. They’re frozen in one position, paralyzed with no control, but even a broken clock shows the correct time twice a day. If only I could claim such accuracy.

The clock sits on the mantle next to a collection of books. My book is among them. Walden Paved Over, Weekend Hippie Press, New Milford, Connecticut, 1978. The critics praised it. They couldn’t get enough of Adam Chance’s book about the Sixties youth movement. ...a pure delight from cover to cover... wrote the Saturday Review. The New York Times wasn’t as charitable, but still they managed a subdued endorsement, Chance’s book is a must for those people who lived in the counterculture and crave its remnants and resurrection.. What else can one expect from a newspaper whose masthead claims supremacy in discerning proper news?

Actually, it was a pretty good book. The title occurred quite by accident. I was enjoying myself at a college reunion when an obnoxious former classmate, Amos Elohassa, approached me and asked,

Addie, have you finished your book yet? What’s it about anyway?

I started to explain about my tribute to the 1960s when Amos rolled his eyes and pointed his finger out the window in the direction of our Alma Mater.

I was in there trying to get an education while you were out here burning things down and making a lot of parents angry at you. You thought you had your Walden...well, look at it now...it’s paved over.

Amos was drunk. He sounded like William F. Buckley and made about as much sense. I looked out the window and noticed the CVS pharmacy across the street. There once was an open field behind that store. I fought with the police there on a hot afternoon in May 1970. Today, that old battleground is a parking lot. So, I stole Amos’ intoxicated words. I’m guilty of plagiarism. So, lock me up...just don’t point any guns at me this time.

I wonder what my therapist would think if she knew I was dwelling on the subject of my late great book. She would most likely respond,

How does that make you feel?

I’ve always suspected that line to be a psychologist’s equivalent of saying you know? at the end of each sentence. At least I can count on the good counselor to be on my side. She thinks I can find the old muse. No more writer’s block. God, I hope she’s right. A writer without hope is like a skydiver without a parachute.

When Walden Paved Over debuted I was in my late twenties, young in both mind and body. My publisher booked me on a publicity tour. I went to a few cities in the Northeast and Midwest, but nothing compared to three beautiful days in New York City.

I’ve always had a fascination about the Big Apple. It began during my teenage years when a few buddies and I ventured into the allure of Manhattan. New York was alive, never stopping to catch its breath, yet amid that bustling world was an omnipresent unknown lurking down a street or around the next corner. Women in furs walked down the same avenues as bag ladies who talked to themselves. This double-edged sword planted itself deep into the heart of the city. I stared at the tattered souls sleeping on the waiting room benches in Grand Central Station. I realized how fast the sword could turn on someone, no matter how good their intentions.

Thursday, May 24, 1979 was a spectacular spring day in New York City. The sky was blue and pollution free like country air. I had a couple of hours to myself before making a guest appearance at a Midtown bookstore. I took advantage of the weather by eating my lunch in Central Park. I sat down on a bench near Central Park West and began reading a newly acquired book. A squirrel appeared before me and boldly demanded a piece of my sandwich. Only in New York will a squirrel drop its guard and approach human beings.

I was so absorbed in feeding my squirrel friend that I barely noticed the man who sat down on the bench some five feet away from me. I gave him a quick glance and resumed reading. Then my brain registered the observation. If a camera had been filming my face, it would have captured the greatest double-take in movie history. For there, seated just a few feet away from me, was John Lennon.

I experienced both joy and fear in a fraction of a second. I hoped he didn’t see my reaction and think he was sitting next to an idiot. I took another quick glance. Thankfully, he didn’t notice my awkwardness in recognizing him. Time stood still as he crossed his legs and took a drag off the Gitanes dangling from the corner of his mouth.

It was really him.

I was an extremely big fan who knew every one of his songs, all their lyrics, and the various nuances and interpretations. I was a tremendously big fan. I knew Lennon’s life story, inside and out, from Liverpool to New York. I hadn’t seen many photos of him since his self-imposed hiatus from the recording industry, but I’d recognize him anywhere.

For Christ’s sake, Adam, you’re sitting next to one of the few people in the entire world you truthfully admire...say something to him. To this day I don’t know how I mustered the courage to open my mouth and speak to him. Each word I pronounced seemed to echo throughout the park, bouncing down to the Hayden Planetarium, across to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, cascading off the band shell, and back to where we were sitting. My throat was parched as I said,

I see that an old buddy of yours had quite a celebration last weekend.

Somewhere, in the deep recesses of my mind, I recalled reading that Eric and Patti Clapton had a big party to celebrate their marriage on the previous Saturday. George Harrison, Paul McCartney, and Ringo Starr attended. The three former mates performed an impromptu song in honor of the newlyweds. The press touted the event as the first Beatles reunion since their breakup some nine years earlier. Conspicuous by his absence was the man sitting next to me.

As the echo on my last words continued to reverberate around Central Park, something more unnerving occurred. Total silence. I started to sweat. Had I committed the faux pas of my life? To my astonishment a voice replied,

Ahhh...you must be talking about Mr. Clapton.

It continues to amaze me that an off-the-cuff remark led to a conversation with John Lennon. How could I tell John that he was the major inspiration of my life? How could I make him understand how his words, music, and deeds had influenced me, even beyond my understanding? How could I say if not for him I would not be a writer? I COULDN’T.

I limited our discussion to small talk in order to preserve some semblance of mind. We spoke some more about the Clapton shindig in England. He said he would have gone to the party if he had been in Surrey. He surprised me by stating that he would have joined the others on stage. Most of all I was shocked that he continued to converse with me at all.

I commented that it was an incredibly beautiful day. He concurred. My confidence soaring, I told him my name and why I was in New York. I’m not sure if he was interested, but when I gave him a copy of Walden Paved Over he said that he would take a look at it later. I was sitting closer to him on the bench and felt a twinge of panic thinking he might regard me as just another overzealous fan.

He pulled out a letter from an envelope in his hand and began to read it. So, that’s it, he’s busy and shouldn’t be bothered anymore. I tried to read, but found it impossible to concentrate while thinking about all of the things I wanted to say. My hair was longer than his. Back in 1964, when The Beatles conquered America, could I have envisioned that? I noticed that he did appear a bit older. There were lines around his eyes, but he wasn’t balding as was speculated in the tabloids. His hair had more red highlights than I recalled from earlier years. He was thin and his clothes were baggy. He wore a cap similar to a beret. His glasses were updated from the granny style he helped to popularize some ten years before.

I hope you don’t think I’m being too forward, but there is one question I’d like to ask you?

"Oh, not THE question then?"

No no no...not that one...I just wanted to know if you have plans to record soon?

I think so, he said without looking up from the letter, but I have to really want it, not because years have gone by and it’s expected of me.

Well, that’s only fair. I hope you do...I miss hearing new songs from you.

Why did I say that? I knew that he didn’t care for people telling him what he should do. So, quickly I added,

As far as I’m concerned you don’t owe the public anything, you’ve certainly given a lot of yourself to them over the past fifteen years.

He smiled, That’s what so many people don’t understand. The whole thing about performing live, making records, getting together with the other three fab ex-Beatles...it’s a personal decision. A decision that only I can make. So, somebody saying we owe it to the boat people to perform for charity doesn’t influence me. I never rule out anything, but the time has got to be right for me. Yoko and I are going to publish an open letter in the newspapers about what we’ve been doing lately. It seems that people are wondering what’s happening with us.

I asked him about his wife and their son, Sean. He said that Sean was quite a handful at times, being three years old and all, but he was one beautiful boy. My question must have triggered something in his mind because suddenly he announced that he was meeting Yoko for an espresso. It sounded like the restaurant was called Cafe Fortuna. I interpreted that as a cue that he was leaving soon and didn’t want to continue our conversation.

He folded up the letter and placed it back in the envelope. He nodded hello to a couple of passersby who had waved to him. The book I was reading fell off the bench and onto the pavement below. As John stood up to leave, he bent down and picked it up. The book was Ladies And Gentlemen, Lenny Bruce. He handed the book to me and said,

Ahhh, Lenny. Too bad the guy who wrote this didn’t like him. It’s a hatchet job...reads like fiction. Lenny Bruce told the truth...though most people wouldn’t listen.

What a life, I said, The guy tries to get himself together after all those years in court, then he dies at age 40.

He stared into my eyes, We can’t control events. Life is what happens while we’re making other plans.

He walked towards 72nd Street and was gone.

CHAPTER TWO

I know that some day it will appear in the field of alfalfa behind my house. I’ll be ready to film it with my camcorder. I’m talking about crop circles, those circular impressions found in English fields of grass and grain during the past 20 years. There was one found near Albany, New York and another near Utica. One is bound to find its way here sooner or later. It will happen. I just know it.

Most people think that all the formations are hoaxes perpetrated by so-called circle-makers. They get their facts from TV programs produced by skeptics. These shows are always skewed in the interests of the hoaxers. Oh, I admit that some crop circles have been faked, but no where near the amount that we’ve been led to believe. Fake crop circles don’t contain plant cell mutations. Laboratory findings show that real crop circles do.

Unlike the sightings of UFOs, there is never a question of do you believe in...? with crop circles. They’re real. You can see and touch one. The questions are Who is making them?, Why are they making them?, and Where do they come from?. It always comes down to origins.

I was born in Fairfield County, Connecticut. I lived in an area that included both urban and rural features. There were parks, restaurants, banks, and buses as well as fields, streams, mountains, and woods. My childhood in the Nutmeg State was basically a happy one. I had my share of the joys and pains of being a kid who received attention for both good and bad reasons. Recently, I discovered a poem I wrote at age 11.

I AM A KING

I am a King in my own right.

Did I hear someone say,

Are you a king of wealth or of an empire?

No, I am a King in one respect.

I have the coolness and freshness of country air,

the song of the bird,

and the fragrance of flower.

What this all means is that whatever you have,

even though you may not have wealth,

be thankful for what you have,

even though it may be small in amount.

My best friend was Midnight Duke, who lived two houses away from mine. His given name was Michael, but no one ever called him that. There were several stories about how he came to be known as Midnight. One tale explained that he was born at that hour. Another stated the color of the hair on his newborn scalp was as dark as the witching hour itself. However, I believe the version he told me himself. Granted, he repeated conflicting tales, but this was the story he told with the greatest of conviction and gesticulation. His sister, Jane, was two years old when he was born. The day he arrived home from the hospital, Jane tried to say Michael, but could not pronounce it. Her parents said it sounded like she was saying Midnight.

Midnight and I were the same age. We both went to North Avenue Elementary School. Usually, we were assigned to the same teacher, except in fifth grade when he was in Mrs. Phillips’ class and I was in Miss Greene’s. We were buddies. We tried to be blood brothers after watching Jeff on the LASSIE show perform the ritual with one of his friends. It looked so easy on TV, but when we actually brought the blade of a sharp knife to our arms we talked ourselves out of it.

We grew up fighting World War Two all over again. We were always fighting the Japs and the Gerrys. Our dying scenes came straight from central casting at the Shakespeare festival as we rode our bikes and fell off of them once a mortal shot pierced our hearts. Once, when we were fighting some Nazis, we executed another friend as a German master spy. War was adventuresome, worldly, and noble as we imagined ourselves to be our fathers when they served in the military.

The summer of 1962 stands out in my childhood memories as the season I ceased being little. I was 12 years old. My parents allowed me to be more independent. Things which once required begging and pleading became simple questions of permission with a usual response of yes.

To be a kid is to be immortal. You’re Wiley Coyote. No matter how many times you fall off that precipice, with a small plume of dust rising from the impact your body makes on the ground below, you get up and shake it off. When I was a child it never occurred to me that death could happen to anyone young. In the summer of 1962 Marilyn Monroe died. How could anyone so beautiful, vibrant, and alive be dead, I wondered?

One of the older kids in my neighborhood was a James Dean type named Richard Stuart. He and some of his friends rode around all summer on homemade motorbikes. Richard dressed in a blue denim jacket and black pointed-toe boots. He had a girlfriend who was the prettiest girl in town. Her name was Sally. She was fourteen years old with blond hair, blue eyes, and freckles on the ridge of her nose. Midnight and I thought she was the most beautiful girl we had ever seen. Pining over her did us no good. We were only two twelve year olds, and anyway...she was Richard’s girl.

One late August afternoon, Midnight and I were sitting on the curb in front of my house when in roared Richard Stuart on his motorbike. He talked to us for a few minutes and complained about the police cracking down on his pals for riding around on their illegal bikes. He vowed to continue riding his bike for as long as he could. He let me start up the engine and said that someday he would let me ride it. The next morning I walked outside to find Midnight Duke, head in hands, sitting on his front lawn. He told me that during the night a car hit Richard Stuart as he rode down Route 202. His head met the pavement. He never regained consciousness.

He can’t be dead, I screamed, I just talked to him yesterday.

Now that I’m in my forties, childhood memories, especially little things, erupt in my brain. Is this a normal sign of aging? Am I starting to lose it? Is it an early indication of Alzheimer’s Disease? I’ll be reading about the budget deficit and...POP!...the image of someone I haven’t seen or heard from in over twenty years will appear in my mind. Most of the time I remember happy days, as in 1967 when I got my driver’s license or that really hot day in July 1966 when Joanie Miller let me get to first base. Occasionally, something genuinely sad will rear its ugly head. I find it difficult to shake those images. Try as I may the negativity latches onto me like a barnacle to a tugboat.

There was a guy named Lenny Napoli, who went out with my sister, Susan. We were friendly despite the fact that he was two years my junior. I always liked him. He was quite good at mimicking people on TV commercials. During the late 1960s, the makers of Aunt Jemima’s pancakes used the following rhyme in their ads:

Aunt Jemima’s pancakes without her syrup,

Is like the Spring without the Fall.

There’s only one thing worse,

In this universe,

That’s no Aunt Jemima’s at all.

For some reason, which escapes me now, we thought the commercial and its jingle were hysterically funny. One day in study hall, Lenny suggested that we sing the song slowly in a whisper to see if the teacher would notice. After each line we stopped and pretended to be reading while the teacher scratched his head as if being bothered by a pesky fly. When we sang it for a second time other kids started to join in the chorus. Finally, the teacher threw down his pencil in disgust and shouted, O.K., who is responsible for this outburst?. He figured it out. Lenny and I had to do time in Detention, but it was worth it.

Fast-forward to 1981. Lenny Napoli is a TV cameraman for a large Midwestern station. He’s covering the PATCO strike when he finds out that the president is about to fire all the air traffic controllers participating in the action against the Federal government. He captures the reactions of the strikers and rushes out of Washington DC., film in hand, aboard a private chartered plane. Just outside of Pittsburgh the small plane crashes, killing everyone on board. I hated Reaganomics.

A few years later, while passing through Connecticut, I visited Lenny’s grave. There was a simple marker neatly inscribed, Leonard Napoli 1952 - 1981. I wonder what the caretaker thought when he found the pancake mix and maple syrup next to the headstone.

Located 15 miles from Lenny’s grave site was a place of childhood joy...the Great Danbury State Fair. Now, I’ve been to the New York State Fair in Syracuse and the Big E in Massachusetts, but both of those events pale in comparison to the Fair in Danbury. There was the Midway where the Ferris Wheel, Tilt-a-Whirl, Roundup, Caterpillar, and Dive Bomber beckoned my cohorts and me to take a ride. Next door, the ever popular freak show with the Mule-faced boy, Fat Lady, and Human Pin Cushion barked their way into our believing eyes. We would walk through the Dutch Village, Gold Town, the gigantic Big Top, every conceivable huckster wheel-of-fortune game, all the agricultural exhibits, and eventually, as teenagers, we watched the Hootchie-Cootchie girls. The food at the Danbury Fair was wonderful. My stomach knew no limit in its consumption of french fries, sausage and pepper grinders, Bavarian waffles, and snow cones.

My parents drove my sister, brother, and me to the Fair every year. In 1963, the final Sunday of the Fair was so crowded that we spent two hours in my Dad’s Plymouth listening to the Dodgers beat up on the Yankees in the World Series before we got out of the parking lot for the ride home. Always a die hard Yankee-hater, my father blasted the horn when Koufax got the final out. As we grew into our teens, our parents had the unenviable task of driving us to the Fair and coming back at a designated hour to pick us up. Finally, we could drive there ourselves. In those years it was never a question of going to the Fair, but who you were going with. Having a date for the Fair was more crucial than having a girl lined up for the Junior Prom. Cotton candy won over dancing.

Several years ago I drove through Danbury on I-84. I wanted to catch a glimpse of the fairgrounds which had closed its gates for the last time in 1981. My jaw scraped the steering wheel as I stared at a giant mall situated where the Great Danbury State Fair once stood. My beloved haunt was gone. How could this happen? Why does everything have to end?

I’ve been told that I’m a pessimist, but I’m not. I’m a realist with an attitude. There are moments when I miss my childhood. I appreciated my early years as I experienced them. Beginning at a young age I was aware that childhood was special, something to treasure and hold onto for as long as possible.

You’re only a kid once, my grandmother used to say, but you’re an adult for the rest of your life. Don’t confuse acting childish with being childlike. Always keep the little boy inside you.

My generation was the last one to walk freely into the night. By the Fall of 1962, Midnight and I spent all our time talking and thinking about monsters. We loved to scare ourselves. We listened to the Monster Mash, watched Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein when it was shown as the Million Dollar Movie on WOR-TV, and built replicas of our gruesome idols from model kits supplied by Aurora Toys. Midnight built the Mummy, Dracula, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon, while I glued and painted Wolfman and Frankenstein. Each model sat on our bedroom window sills. We figured it would scare away the real monsters.

Kids in the 1990s don’t wonder if monsters are real. Imagine a child of the 90s trick-or-treating alone on Halloween. We did. Halloween, in the 1960s, wasn’t a one day event. It was celebrated for an entire week culminating in the traditional door-to-door masquerade of October 31st. Halloween was a safety valve for my mind, allowing me to rid myself of the inhibitions and conformity of everyday life. It was a way to purge myself by acting silly and scared in a child’s version of Mardi Gras.

During the week leading up to the holiday my friends and I, armed with flashlights, met outside at night. We had major decisions to make. Would we ring doorbells throughout the neighborhood and run away before someone answered? Should we wrap trees with toilet paper? Perhaps soaping up car windows would be our height of mischief that evening. Some nights we walked around in the dark trying to find a house where the family wasn’t wise to us yet and left their porch lights off. Other nights we just talked and told each other spooky stories about a witch who lived in the woods bordering our back yards.

October 31st must have occurred on a weekend at least once or twice when I was a kid, but my memories consist of spending every Halloween day in school dreaming about going home and getting into my costume. When I arrived home my mother let me fill the small individual bags of candy that she would hand out to the various trick-or-treaters coming to our door. I filled those bags with unwrapped candy corn and other confections. Nary a thought was given to the wisdom of receiving unwrapped candy. Getting a piece of poisoned candy or an apple with a razor blade inside was inconceivable.

Each year as I was getting ready to change into my costume, Mom said,

Sit down at the table and eat this soup I made. You’re going to have something nourishing before all that candy gets in your stomach.

I was ready to go as soon as the sun set. When I was very young my mother accompanied me to the neighbors’ homes while Dad stayed home and gave out candy. By age nine I went out on my own or with friends. One year I dressed up like a cowboy, the next year as a Martian, and the following year I was a pirate. I roamed the streets with a large paper shopping bag with reinforced handles to gather my goodies. The people who answered the doors would try to guess who I was before handing out the bag of candy. There was