Wisconsin: Driving in the Dark…by Robert M. Katzman
Robert M. Katzman’s Amazing Story: www.differentslants.com/?p=355
© August 27, 2015
Trapped in my three-hour commute
Wisconsin to Illinois
Illinois to Wisconsin
Over and over and over
Images spill out of my mind
Like coffee sloshing
Over the edge of a cup
Window open, wind racing by
Avoiding the striped road-kill in the North
Muscular trucks belching black smoke
Wreathing me, lulling me
Interstate fossil fuel perfume
I miss my damn exit
Every time
And the yellowed old images
Flicker by…
Wisconsin trips as a child
Wisconsin trips as a young Dad
Wisconsin trips as a Grandfather
“Pick one, please
From the endlessly variable
Memory Buffet
Avoid toxic thoughts, please
Whenever possibleâ€
Right
But how?
Summer camp 1963
Thirteen years old
Very aggressive girls
Eastern European Jewish girls
One grabs me and kisses me
Shocking me
She runs away
Stealing my first kiss
I stare at her back
The cool wind blowing
Her long black hair
Behind her
One night
The girl’s cabin attacks the boy’s cabin
Jesus Christ!
They run into our dark cabin
Rip off our covers and jump into our beds
Everyone squeals
I stare into the dark
Some unknown girl
Taking liberties with my
Frozen body
Parents pay for this?
I didn’t know nothin’ about girls
Even though,
I was cutting up 1963 Playboys
Selling the pictures in 7th grade
But that wasn’t about girls
That was commerce
Where I knew the
Clamoring demand
Exceeded my supply
My Dad said:
Never hit a girl!
A tough World War Two vet
His word was steel
And I never hit a girl
But he never told me
What I could do with girls
Didn’t know how to kiss
Didn’t know how to dance
Didn’t know about clothes
Didn’t know a damn thing about
“Small talkâ€
What the hell was “Small Talk?â€
And sex?
Sex was the
Ultimate Mystery of the Universe
Uncool haircut
My dark brown hair hung over
My clueless dark brown eyes
My expression
One of bewilderment
I was no threat to girl-dom
Turns out
Some girls seek out
The unavailable boy
Who’s too shy to ask
Anyone
Out for a date
Some women, too
Was I standing still
Unknowingly attracting
Only aggressive girls?
Seems that some girls
Like to tell a shy guy what to do
Gradually
Customizing the petting
Being the knowing tutor
Tantalizingly and teasingly unwrapping
Mysteries of the Universe
This was not a bad thing
Suffered cruel sophisticated classmates
In my chic and elegant private school
Never knew how to respond
To the nasty sharp insults
The bored condescension
to the working-class boy
The uncountable cuts
I endured
1964
Freshman: Couldn’t get a date
1965
Sophomore: Couldn’t get a date
1966
Older girl from South Carolina
Taught me something about Southern Ways
Early 1967
Junior: Couldn’t get a date to the Prom
Southern ways didn’t work in the North
Later 1967
Divine intervention
A petite and curvy brown-eyed
Jewish/French woman from Paris
Twenty-eight years old
Slowly, carefully
Decided to teach me
In a “hands-on” sorta way
Every damn thing that
She felt
That a South Side of Chicago boy
Oughta know about sex
And in French!
I’m driving home in the dark
On a quiet country road
Tired of the noise
Maybe just tired
And I pull off the road
Turn off the motor
Turn off the lights
Needing the blackness
And there is no blackness
Like a silent country road
Not wanting the memories
Remembering my pain
Of not knowing what to say
Remembering my frustration
With never being the clever one
The loneliness of shyness
Excluded by the Brahmins of
A very small society
Who would never ever dream
About whom the Universe
Eventually
By some Cosmic Clock
Chooses to notice
To repair and redeem
The scarred soul of a hesitant teen
And eventually
Even everything out
Publishing News!Â
Bob Katzman’s two new true Chicago books are now for sale, from him!
Vol. One: A Savage Heart  and Vol. Two: Fighting Words
Gritty, violent, friendship, classic American entrepreneurship love, death, heartbreak and the real dirt about surviving in a completely corrupt major city under the Chicago Machine. More history and about one man’s life than a person may imagine.
Please visit my new website:Â http://www.dontgoquietlypress.com
If a person doesn’t want to use PayPaI, I also have a PO Box & I ship anywhere in America.
Send me a money order with your return and contact info.
I will get your books to you within ten days.
Here’s complete information on how to buy my books:
Vol 1: A Savage Heart and Vol. 2: Fighting Words
My books weigh almost 2 pounds each, with about 525 pages each and there are a total together of 79 stories and story/poems.
Robert M. Katzman
Don’t Go Quietly Press
PO Box 44287
Racine, Wis. 53404-9998                                                           (262)752-3333, 8AM–7PM
Books cost $24.95 each, plus shipping
For: (1)$3.95; (2)$5.95; (3)$7.95; (4)$8.95 (5)$9.95;(6) $10.95
(7) $11.95; (8) $12.95; (9)$13.95 (10)$15.95 (15)$19.95
I am also for hire if anyone wants me to read my work and answer questions in the Chicago/Milwaukee area. Schools should call me for quantity discounts for 30 or more books. Also: businesses, bookstores, private organizations or churches and so on.
My Fighting Words Publishing Co. four original books, published between 2004 and 2007 are now out-of-print. I still have some left and will periodically offer them for sale on my new website.