Don Alverzo's Tweezers

By Base Zenfelder

About the Book
Don Alverzo’s Tweezers is about Gregory Basenfelder’s life growing up, and how he kept a secret during that time about something he did, but felt he could never tell anyone, so he lived with guilt and fear since then. It was a “mortal sin,” and he believed he was going to hell so he fought ideas of doing more mortal sins. “Gregory was really smart and had a great sense of humor, and we were so much in love. He promised to take care of me after I had multiple hip surgeries in 2019, but he got so sick, and, of course, I forgave him.” – Charlotte Basenfelder
About the Author
Gregory was born in 1952. He grew up as the second son with three brothers in NE Philadelphia, and his parents raised all four sons as “good Catholics.” We met each other in 1987 and married in 1992. We both loved traveling and drove back and forth to California up and down the West Coast from Mexico to North California. He loved trains and built a train set in our living room. We met each other in a recovery meeting and I hired him to work in my dialysis unit where I was the administrator. I fell in love with him after watching him do CPR on one of our patients; he was my hero. We were both nurses, and he eventually transferred to another unit where he became the unit administrator. Our company had annual meetings for all of the administrators and each year we went to a different state, so we always rented a car and traveled around that state wherever that took us. When we drove to California for our vacations, we decided to camp out on our way there several times. We were both involved in recovery.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company
• Release date: Jun 8, 2023
• ISBN: 9781685375904

Book preview

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christmas’ll be on a wednesday this year damn that means mass on the twenny-first, the twenny-fifth, the twenny-ninth, an’ again on the first cripes guess that’s the price o’ christmas vacation eleven days off o’ school…ain’t fair…twenny-first is the shortest day of the year…two holy days an’ two sundays in eleven days…geesh nobody does it cuz they like it…i don’ believe anyone likes it…they go cuz they’re scared…mortal sin…a squirrel…hmmm…acorns…lots of ’em…chestnuts too…dad’ll be bringin’ his paper bag to mass sunday an’ we’ll have to pick a bunch up afterwards…i like chestnuts…but i don’ like people seein’ me pick ’em up…we look poor…mebbe we can skip the park an’ pick ’em up in the cemetery…yeah i’ll get ’em before we go to mass that way he’ll think I’m a good son an’ no oneʼll think we’re poor…nuttin’ like gettin’ credit i don’t deserve…i do deserve it…just for other stuff that no one sees…like what? i dunno lotsa stuff…the shorter a sunday is the better I hate sundays…shortest day of the year the twenny-first…really? i don’ think so an’ I still hafta go to mass…but mass days are always shorter by an hour…a wasted hour shit i hate sundays i hate mass…it ain’t really shorter like daylight savings time…it don’ get me any closer to monday i hate mondays too but at least they get me closer to fridays closer than sundays do anyway…i hate monday an’ I hate sundays too…i hate school I hate that ol’ hag sister infanta i hate mass I hate mayonnaise makes me gag i’ll never eat it…i’ll go to mass an’ i’ll go t’ school cuz I hafta but i’ll never eat that disgustin’ shit…i don’ even like anyone who likes it they make me sick too…is it cursin t’ think shit if I don’ say it? whyzzat anyway? how can thinkin’ be a sin? I don’ make my own thoughts they jus’ come to me I can’t help it…i’ll jus’ add a couple hunnert in confession tomorrow jus’ in case…is hatin’ mass a mortal sin? i still go what the heck…what difference does it make? i’m doomed…jus’ in case though mebbe…mebbe…nah…god hates me…ever since i was seven…the sisters say he loves me how would they know? they don’t know him like i do for all their stupid habits an’ those five pound crosses they got danglin’ from their necks an’ all that prayin’ they don’ know him like i do…god hates me…if christmas was on a sunday then I’d only hafta go to mass twice on vacation but then vacation would end on a sunday an’ then a whole week o’ school right after that…that blows…i really hate school…winter starts when the last christmas light goes out an’ not another day off until either washington’s or lincoln’s birthday whoever they think is more important this year…i like those presidents…then not another day off until saint joseph’s day that’s march nineteenth…i guess he’s okay…i wouldn’ wanna be a saint…none of ’em had any fun…mebbe saint augustine did but he stopped…prolly wanted to be a saint prolly had to do a lot o’ prayin…that ain’t fun…bishop o’ hippo…why’d they name a city after a fat animal? i wouldn’ wanna be bishop o’ hippo…momma little baby like shawtnin’ shawtnin’ momma little baby like shawtnin’ bread…wish I could sing that as fast as that hippo in the cartoon…momma little baby like shawtnin’shawtnin’mommalittlebabylikeshawtnin’bread mommalittlebabylikeshawtnin’shawtnin’mommalittlebabylikeshawtnin’bread… carl cronecker can do it really fast momma little baby like shawtnin’shawtnin’momma…what’s the use? bishop o’ hippo…gryglyk says it was a rhinoceros in that cartoon he’s nuts it was a hippopotamus hippo bishop o’ hippo stupid name for a city augustine sounds like a girl’s name…i pray cuz i hafta i go to mass cuz i hafta i go to school cuz i hafta geesh…ah man a halloween decoration already…a cat with a hat an’a monocle…that ain’t scary better’n nuttin’…a couple weeks now…first holiday…glad i’m catholic…man…another mass day why they gotta spoil it for us? better’n nuttin…better’n school…all saints day…they don’ have any fun…guess i’m glad we got the sisters o’ saint joseph…they don’ have fun neither…march nineteenth no mass no school that day ’cept it’s in march an’ i hate march nuttin’ to do no snow i love snow…prolly get some days off for snow…snow at christmastime looks neat but it’s a waste we’re already off…i love fridays an’ snow on fridays is neat but it’s a waste cuz we’re gettin’ off anyway…snow on sundays is the best…i don’ care how much the house smells like burnt roast beef if it’s snowin’ on sunday i hate the smell o’ roast beef reminds me I got school the next day…not if it’s snowin’…last time it snowed on a sunday I got to stay up an’ watch maverick an’ lawman an’ the rebel an’ the late show that was really nice…virginia city was on the late show that night errol flynn an’ randolph scott great movie…three years ago an’ those shows ain’t on anymore ’cept the late show geesh…god forgive me for i am a sinner…that knocks three days off o’ purgatory god forgive me for i am a sinner six god forgive me for i am a sinner nine god forgive me for i am a sinner twelve…what’s the use? i’m gone to hell anyway no time off for that…wonder if i’ll get the asian flu again this year almost died last year wanted to die wouldn’ mind dyin’ ’cept i’m gone to hell…no sisters down there…twilight zone tonight i wait all week for the twilight zone best thing about my life then alfred hitchcock…frozen pizza? that’s the best…mebbe fish sticks mebbe macaroni mebbe grilled cheese mebbe fried noodles…mrs. paul’s yuck…i love fried noodles pennsylvania dutch i love fridays I love the smell o’ fish…christmas on wednesday’s prolly the best no school at all that week then only two days o’ school after new year’s then friday night an’ the twilight zone again but still four masses…might not hate new year’s so much this year…never really liked the mummers remin’ me o’ indians why do people like string bands that music sounds stupid…gotta get this chalk off my face before mom sees it…she hates me…always believes the sisters always takes their side…yeah i guess i’d rather go to mass four times then hafta go back to school on a monday…bernie tol’ me that durin’ the civil war guys used to pay other guys to fight in their place…wish I could pay someone to go to mass for me…why don’ they have that? or to go to school for me? what’s the use I don’ have any money…man…god forgive me for I am a sinner fifteen…wonder if i’ll see penelope dime on sunday…it’d be neat if ya could pay someone to go to hell for ya…he’s gotta be stupid enough an’ bad enough an’ poor enough can’t be a catholic he’d know how much hell hurts and how long it lasts…can’t pay protestants they’re already goin’ to hell mebbe they’re too stupid to know it…pagans ‘r goin’ to hell what about pagan babies? we collect money for ’em every week but who gets it? does it get them into heaven? or does it turn ’em catholic? howzat work anyway? gotta get someone never baptized goin’ t’ limbo anyway what’s the difference? guess I gotta get a catholic that goes to public school he won’ know nothin’ anyway won’ know the crap nuns teach us…mebbe it ain’t crap mebbe it is real israel why do they spell it wit’ the a before the e? israel real is are air lair rail ail rails ails airs sail lear is that a word I heard o’ king lear who was he mebbe they’ll teach us someday ear ears real liar liars that’s seventeen words in israel mebbe eighteen if lear’s a word…i hope it ain’t real what they teach us if I only knew I could plan things better…man…catholics that go to public school gotta go to school day after halloween an’ they still gotta go to mass…how do they do that? if a person can sell the devil his soul why can’t a person sell another person his soul? i’d buy one…a clean one…i’d trade with him… mebbe i’ll try t’ be a millionaire someday…yeah that’s right…a millionaire…who wouldn’ wanna sell his soul for a million bucks? they do it all the time…could even tell him that’s where all the girls with impure thoughts go the ones who pull down their pants…hell would be fun if it weren’t for the fire how’s heaven any fun? all the nuns are there all the priests are there…arthur blazik’s prolly goin’ there the sooner the better…i’d buy his soul as long as i din’t have to be him…never lets me look at his test paper…bobby corhan might be goin’ there too he’s such a brownnoser…carl cronecker smokes an’ he can blow it outta his nose i wish i could blow it outta my nose…if wishes were horses then beggars would ride…that’s what the ol’ lady always says he can’t blow bubbles off the tip o’ his tongue…i can…he’s all right though not like all those sissies an’ brownnosers an’ squealers that ‘re goin’ t’ heaven with all the nuns that’s where they wanna be…carl’ll prolly keep me company down there someday…i wish there was some place between heaven an’ hell where i could fit in…be happy…if god is all smart how come he din’t make a place like that? i’m not that bad but i’m pretty bad but i’m not that bad i din’t kill anyone yet an’ i hardly ever steal i jus’ don’ do what people want me t’ do so what? i had t’ commit that sacrilege the way they backed me against the wall i guess i’m sorry i did it at least i’m sorry now and i’ll prolly be a lot sorrier later but sister saint blaise says that a sacrilege is the only unforgivable sin no matter how sorry y’ are…look a train a long one got an engine that looks the same in the front as it does in the back like a studebaker…who wants t’ spend a million an’a half years with all those people? man…if it wasn’t for the fire i’d prolly like it…wonder how fast that train’s goin’…eight cars behin’ the engine no caboose on passenger trains i like cabooses…god forgive me for I am a sinner eighteen…i could live in a caboose jus’ be by myself for the rest of my life with no one t’ bother me and listen to the train movin’ all day an’ all night i could live on a tugboat too ‘specially at night i love hearin’ trains comin’ up the tracks at night mebbe more than i love hearin’ ’em comin’ down the tracks at night what’s the difference mebbe they sound different i dunno i jus’ like it better at night anyway an’ i love hearin’ the tugs blow their horns at night…i’d never get off o’ either…never have to see anyone or talk to anyone ‘cep the engineer or the skipper…yeah…skipper gilligan’s island…not sure who i like better ginger or maryann…it’s all right I guess…fire drills are all right stops school for a while an’ ya get to fool around a little…good to laugh…can’t look up girls’ uniforms durin’ fire drills…air raid drills are the best saw agnes lickly’s underpants for five whole minutes on tuesday…agnes…agnes dei lam’ o’ god guess i’ll call ’er lam’ lickly from now on or lammie or lamchop she looked like a lamchop under the desk tuesday…i like lamchops…i likebein’ under the desk no one can see what i’m doin’ an’ no one bothers me an’ i can see up lamchop’s uniform…white underpants i used t’ think she was ugly…i like triangles…triangles an’ lines…we get a day off in three weeks…three weekends an’ halloween’s on a tuesday so we get wednesday off…nobody’ll care about school that week not even the sisters they know we won’t learn nuthin’ they won’ even try…good week…god forgive me for i am a sinner…i forgot to bow my head does it still count? damn gonna ask father in confession tomorrow…i forgot t’ bow my head once when I said jesus durin’ the hail mary sister saint cyril slammed me in the head with a book what kinda name is cyril anyway I never knew anyone named cyril ain’t no cowboys or cops named cyril nuns ‘r weird…i still say twenny-one…i hate confession i ain’t tellin’ him nuttin’ jus’ the usual i was disobedient thirty four times prolly more ‘n that but so what i cursed a couple hunnert times i fought four times even though i din’t fight at all but it sounds good in confession i hate fightin’ an’ i lied once mebbe four or five times gotta cover the lies i’m gonna tell him he might ask me what the lies were an’ i’ll hafta lie some more gotta count ’em all an’ remember t’ give him the right number jus’ in case why do they make it so hard? be prepared i guess i’ll bear false witness whatever that means it means lyin’ but i still don’ get it…rather bear false witness than lie sounds mysterious sounds like sumpin’ a wicked person would do i don’ mind bein’ wicked i like that word i like the word evil too if people think you’re wicked an’ evil they stay away from ya, ’cept the ones ya wanna have around ’cause they’re wicked too…i wanna be a false witness bearer someday but i ain’t tellin’ father that i ain’t tellin’ him anything real he’ll ask too many questions an’ that gives me the creeps one question is too many…that’s why I’m goin’ t’ hell too many questions creepy questions an’ all those mortal sins…can’t let anyone know what I think…what if god don’t know? everyone says he knows everything but how do they know? what if he creates a new universe every five minutes and forgets about the old ones? i don’ know what ants think why should he know what i think? mebbe he forgets about the las’ universe while he’s makin’ a new one an’ what if he sends people to purgatory an’ then forgets about ’em? they’ll prolly be really pissed they spent their whole lives not committin’ any mortal sins an’ endin’ up like me jus’ the same…mebbe i don’ have it so bad after all i’d love to see some of them fairies and goody two-shoes in hell serve ’em right i’d jus’ laugh at ’em all the time hell wouldn’ be so bad then…sister says satan acksbully ‘scaped from hell an’ that’s how he came t’ earth t’ tempt eve…naked eve…hmmm…school would be okay if all the girls wore fig leaves……mebbe if I do somethin’ for the devil he’ll teach me that trick why not? momma little baby like shawtnin’ shawtnin’ momma little baby like shawtnin’ bread…what if god knows what i’m thinkin’ now? shit more trouble…is he gonna sen’ me to a worse hell? how can it be worse, why can’t i jus’ do what i want now what difference is it gonna make? is there any way to get outta this? mebbe they got lawyers after ya die to help ya find a way outta this fat chance i’m screwed…but if there are lawyers for that then i’m sorry god for everything…no chance why should i care? why don’t he like me? god forgive me for I am a sinner how many’s that? i lost count…so what? if god heard ’em he heard ’em an’ if he din’t hear ’em then mebbe he don’t even know who I am why would he? i don’t know who he is…i dunno nuttin’…mebbe god don’t neither…mebbe no one else don’t neither…is it neither or either? if i say the wrong one out loud someone’ll hit me for it i’m glad i can at least think in any words i want…anyway i won’t tell any o’ ’em the truth why should they be tellin’ it t’ me? cripes…mebbe the devil don’t know i’m condemned yet…hmmm…might not be too late t’ make a deal…hmmm…sell ’im my soul for a million an’a half bucks an’ then buy somebody else’s for a million…that might work…three weeks to halloween…more squirrels an’ a crow too whatsa matter with crows? they’re neat-lookin’ no one else likes crows…instead of havin’ scarecrows they oughtta have scarepigeons an’ scaremosquitos…a skeleton on someone’s door they ain’t so scary they’re made outta cardboard…i wonder if petey mc’coochy’s a skeleton yet.

Mars!

Thus thought Seeburger….

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Yo, Mars.

Hey, Seeb. Hafta stay after school again?

Yeah. Where ya comin’ from?

Football practice. I’m on the nineties this year. Hey, ya got chalk all over your face again.

Yeah, I know. You still a guard?

Yeah…a guard.

Girls like guards as much as they like quarterbacks?

I dunno, but I tell ’em I’m one jus’ in case it helps. They won’ know the difference.

I tell ’em I’m one an’ I don’ even play.

Does it work?

Nah…nuttin’ works.

Infanta really has it in for you.

They all do ever since kindergarten.

How come?

Cause I’m not Bernie I guess an’ prolly cause I have black hair.

Black hair? Ya sure?

Pretty sure it’s why my mom don’ like me. I’m the only one o’ my brothers with black hair. They all look like Flanagans. I look like my dad.

Hmmm…sure was a lotta commotion this mornin’…she knocked you and Schneider outta your seats wit’ that gigantic math book… never saw her use anything that big an’ that hard before.

I never got to see it.

She was really pissed, huh?

Seeb nodded. I s’pose.

She did it again after lunch…sorta. She pulled ya outta your desk by your sideburn an’ she slammed your head into the blackboard an’ kep’ rubbin’ it up an’ down. How come she din’t slam Schneider’s head into the blackboard?

He turned quiet after she clobbered him.

How come you kep’ laughing?

Couldn’ help it.

"What was so funny?

Remember when Infanta was tellin’ us about what we say in Latin when the priest says dominus vobiscum?

Yeah. Et cum spiritu tuo.

Yeah, well a while after that when we were doin’ arithmetic, Schneider turns to me an’ says, Yo Seeb, what’s the Pope’s phone number?’ an’ I said, I dunno’ an’ he said eckum speery 2-2-0."

Mars laughed and said, That’s pretty funny.

I couldn’ stop laughin’. Then Infanta comes down and whacks Schneider. He falls outta his desk an’ I laughed even more. Next thing I know I’m on the floor starin’ at the ceilin’ an’ everyone else was laughin.

Musta hurt sumpin’ fierce.

Nah, that stuff don’ hurt no more. Ya jus’ get used to it.

It’d hurt me. She wanted t’ know what yas were laughin’ at.

Couldn’ tell ’er that. She woulda called it a sacrilege an’ then drag us both over t’ the rectory.

So, what happened after lunch?

Every time I thought o’ Schneider I laughed…an’ I kep’ thinkin’ about Schneider. Seeb sighed.

Man, she never let go o’ your hair. Ya gotta get that chalk off your face. Your mom’ll kill ya.

Yeah, I know. Blackboards are the enemy…nuns are the enemy…moms are the enemy…nuthin’ but enemies. Sometimes I hate my life.

The one in the afternoon musta really hurt, though.

I’m used t’ that too.

Hughie Burkholder says you’re his hero.

Yeah…he tol’ me that a couple times.

No kiddin’. He says ya never stop no matter how much Infanta hits ya…like ya know it before it happens an’ ya do it anyway…an’ ya always keep it up. No matter how much they gave it to ya in all the other grades, ya never quit. He likes Schneider but says Schneider always stops after he gets clobbered. Not you.

Kinda proud o’ myself. Guess it’s my only talent. Might as well be the best at sumpin’…an’ I’m glad at least someone likes me.

I like ya, but I don’t sit behind ya. Hey, why ya limpin’?

She made me kneel on a broomstick after school while I said fifty act o’ contritions. Ain’t used t that yet. I guess that hurt. Still hurts. Don’ think I’ll ever get used to kneelin’ on broomsticks. Said ’em all as fast as I could then she tol’ me to shut up an’ say ’em to myself.

Didja say ’em all?

Had to. She kep’ lookin’ at the clock. Ya know ya get three years indulgence for one act o’ contrition?

Whatsat?

Time off from purgatory. Got a hunnert an’ fifty years off for stayin’ after school today. Not bad. Ya get days off for sayin’ aspirations too. I don’ think they’re worth it, though.

How come?

Well, ‘God forgive me for I am a sinner’ is worth three days an’ that’s eight words long. An act o’ contrition is sixty-three words long and ya get three years off for it. So if I said the aspiration eight times, that’s sixty-four words an’ I only get about twenny-three days off.

How ya know all that?

It’s in the back of the catechism.

You read that stuff?!

Sometimes…jus’ the useful stuff.

So, if you said act o’ contritions all day long you’re prolly covered, Mars said as he and Seeb were kicking stones to nowhere.

Seeb said, I doubt it. It woudn’ leave any time for fun now. Ya think heaven’s any fun?

I dunno, prolly not. I bet bein’ aroun’ God all day’s kinda like bein’ in school or Mass all day; kinda scary, really borin’. It’s like bein’ inside a convent or a rectory or a school forever. You’d hafta be good all the time, an’ you’d prolly be kneelin’ on broomsticks for the rest of time.

Geez, that can’t be much better ’n hell. Ya think there’s naked girls in heaven?

Don’ think so. All the sisters say it’s a mortal sin t’ be immodest.

Yeah, an’ impure too…an’ havin’ impure thoughts. Ya think there’s any naked girls in hell?

Dunno…mebbe…why not?

I guess it wouldn’ be so bad after all. They sure got it mixed up.

Yeah…I think ya got it figgered out…mebbe.

Ya know Kenny Gryglyk was still takin’ baths with his sisters up until the fifth grade?

No foolin’?

He tol’ me so himself.

They’re really good-lookin’.

Yeah, he has all the luck. All I have are three brothers.

Yeah, an’ one of ’em’s retarded.

Yeah.

Seeb was certain that Petey McCoochy was in heaven, even though Petey had been a pretty cool kid in spite of being good; never a brownnoser, never a squealer and he always let Seeb look at his test papers; and Seeb wondered if he was having any fun there as he and Mars walked down Keystone Street away from school and towards home, late as usual. Maybe Petey is havin’ fun if he had the complete set o’ Matchbox Series wit’ ’im.

Mars said, Wanna take the Indian trail? To which Seeb replied, Indian trails for kids. Let’s go through Dorsey.

There are many routes home from any place in a row house city like Philadelphia whose blocks are regularly bisected by streets that run either north-south or east west. Seeb lived on a north-south street and Mars lived on an east-west street and Seeb always felt the difference, as if it separated them. There were always two kinds of people in his world: those who were like him and those who were not. If Mars had lived on Seeb’s block, Seeb would have noticed other things about Mars that were different. For example, the way he pronounced certain words, or even the way that he sneezed, but it didn’t matter because, for the time being, Mars lived on a different kind of street and that made him different enough.

Perhaps Seeb was the one who was different, but he wouldn’t ask Mars about that. He might not have wanted to learn the whole truth, if there was such a thing, that is, that his loneliness and isolation might be related to all things different between others and himself; although he sensed it often. He would never let them discover the real person behind the curtain that he presented to the world, so he acted like the rest of them, sometimes, just so he could have friends and hang out with them and maybe even be invited to parties, but he would never let them see who he really was. He knew that his friends and acquaintances could only see the mask, the costume, the straw man he created, and he settled for that because, as he would say, "better ’n nuttin’. It wasn’t him that they liked but a character he invented to please them. In the meantime, Seeb thought that east-west people weren’t like him because something had to be a little wrong with them, like left-handers and redheads. Seeb believed to be left-handed and redheaded was almost as bad as being a Protestant.

Thus, he thought as he and his companion walked towards Dorsey playground which, as it occupied an entire city square bordered on all its sides by an equal number of north-south and east-west streets, was neutral territory to Seeb, or so he thought today, and away from the all-seeing eyes of the steeple of Pius the Twelfth Church and the bell tower of its school. Since his thoughts were unending, it is no surprise to us that they continued even while he spoke to Mars. He excelled in mischief, but thinking about unrelated things while listening to others was another of his many eclectic talents. While Mars babbled, Seeb wondered why his school wasn’t named after a dead man. All the others were. Some were named after dead women. He didn’t think it was right to name it after a living Pope considering that the Pope still had time left to exercise his own talent for mischief, if he had any…and then there was that name, Pius!

What kind of a name was that? How come there were no Popes named Bob or Bill or Hughie? Geesh. Of course, he wouldn’t dare share these thoughts with anyone, except Mars, and only for now, for he trusted nobody and he might be overheard and he feared reprisals, the severity of which would manifest itself on his body rather than his soul, which was already worthless, and would most likely result in more chalk on his face along with all the attendant welts. It seemed everything was a sin and his only job was to avoid detection.

He briefly studied the street sign when they approached the corner. Keystone, hmmm, key stone ton tone toke not knot knots eye tons, that counts, keys too, tones eyes tokes stoke nose one ones set yet net teen teens an’ don’ forget noses. Ss are good. How many’s at? Nineteen? Not sure do it again, which he did while counting them on his fingers as the two walked the final few yards along the west side of Keystone Street along a park, the name of which nobody in the neighborhood seemed to know. The park ran for seven blocks north from Levick Street, and its square sections were separated by streets such as Hellerman, Magee, Unruh, Knorr, Longshore, Disston and ending at Tyson. The southern section might have once been an army or national guard encampment as the remnants of what appeared to be barracks were still standing.

Nobody, not even his father who had served in the tank corps at the Battle of the Bulge, knew for sure what it had been. Keystone Street bordered the west side of the park, the school side, but its eastern boundary was the Pennsylvania Railroad where there were always commuter trains, and the fast and long New York- and Washington-bound trains and the freight trains with all their spurs heading to the factories and warehouses on State Road and the piers on the river, all on four sets of tracks that ran over trestles under which all of the neighborhood east-west streets passed on their way to the Delaware River and ending there. The river ran parallel to the railroad and was nearly a mile wide just above the Tacony-Palmyra Bridge.

Seeb had a good sense of this and it was one of the only subjects he actually enjoyed. The Delaware River ran parallel to the Atlantic Ocean and as long as Seeb could place the river, he would always know where east was, and Canada and Florida and California for that matter, plus England and Japan. He only needed to know where the river was and when he traveled by foot or car, he always marked every turn. It was his own North Star. And, of course, he was satisfied in knowing that his block ran parallel to it. Traffic on the river was always heavy back then as there were many piers and factories lining the western shore from South Philadelphia to as far as Bristol, maybe even Fairless Hills, in Bucks County. The drawbridge, for it was a drawbridge, opened at least a dozen times a day to allow ships’ passage.

This amused Seeb whenever he was bored in class, which was most of the time, and the room had windows that faced east. How did they expect him to learn anything when they couldn’t hope to compete with a pretty park, a busy railroad, and a dreamy river that had ships and tugboats and a bridge that not only connected Pennsylvania to New Jersey but opened often? Why would they ever build a school there in the first place? The fairies of the world could have their schools and high schools and colleges. Seeb wouldn’t. He was going to be a train engineer or a tugboat captain or a toll collector. They were the good jobs.

They turned right on Magee Avenue and, as always, Seeb wondered why it was called an avenue. It looked no different from a street, had no rows of stores lining either side of the block, and neither buses nor trolley cars ran on it. It shoulda been called a street. He was distracted as they passed the Magee Bar and smelled the stale beer and cigarette and cigar smoke as they walked by its exhaust fan. He loved the aroma and sometimes amid the odors he could hear the fan-corrupted voices of the loud afternoon drunks, usually arguing about nothing. Anyway, it’s the bar where Emil Dusterman’s mom and dad always drank too much, and in the afternoon. He often saw Emil leave the exit line after school to go in there and get them, and Emil always looked sad and humiliated when he emerged from the bar with the two of them, in front of all his classmates. Seeb felt sorry for Emil then, but not so much anymore since Emil had been left back after the third grade and they rarely saw each other. Magee gee age game seems I heard of sage whatsat? mag? Eight. Gam? I heard that in a movie once. Nine.

He was part Magee himself as his paternal grandmother, whom he never knew, nor did his father, was named Ann Magee. She’d been the only immigrant among his four grandparents. He often wondered whether he’d like her or not. He loved Grandmom Flanagan who once said to him, Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, if ya didn’t have an arsehole your belly would bust. He wished his mother could have been more like her mother. Just the same, he always felt good seeing the name Magee on a street sign or a bar as he felt he owned a piece of it, and it’s most likely the reason he preferred walking this way rather than taking the Indian trail, which was for kids. As they headed toward Dorsey playground Seeb asked Mars, Ya know anyone named Pius?

Nup.

Ya know anyone who took that name for confirmation?

Nup.

What’s your middle name again?

Mars said, Pius.

Get outta here.

It’s Mark.

Hmmm. Gerald Mark Marski, Too many m-a-rs, don’t sound right, but I guess it’s okay.

How come ya never made your confirmation with us?

Seeb said, Tonsils, and he remembered how nice it had been to get a week off from school for it. He hoped he could get appendicitis this year or maybe even be hit by a car. There would be no school for a while and everyone would feel sorry for him and leave him alone; maybe they’d even let him eat what he wanted and bring him comic books and model airplanes and stuff.

Mars said, Yeah, right. So, ya gonna make it this year?

Yeah, wit’ all the fourth graders. I’m gonna feel like a creep.

When?

Next month.

What’s your middle name gonna be?

Ahh…I’m thinkin’ maybe Xavier.

Mars exclaimed, Xavier! Nobody’s named Xavier. That’s like Pius.

It ain’t. Lotsa people have it for a middle name. It might soun’ silly, but at least I get an X.

Yeah, but every time ya sign your name people’ll know you’re a Catlick. Only Catlicks got Xavier for a middle name. It’ll be jus’ like wearin’ ashes on your forehead every day o’ the rest o’ your life. You really wan’ strangers t’ know sumpin’ about ya when ya don’ know anythin’ ’bout them?

"Yeah, you’re right about that, but it’s such a