CHAPTER SEVEN

            After a year or so at Boro Hall Academy, one of John’s classmates got him a legitimate job as a messenger for the New York Post newspaper.  He had had other jobs but had his illegal working permit at the age of 12, not 14, as it was supposed to be.  He had spent many summers up at the Board of Elections, working with keypunch computer cards, Xeroxing, and killing time.  He found out then working for the city was boring.  People working there got paid to spend a lot of time making excuses about how they were overworked when they never had much to do in the first place. 

John loved his messenger job.  He got to travel all around the city and he loved to walk, meet the advertising big-wigs and editorial writers and hang out in their brownstone apartments waiting for their nightly copy of the late edition of the Post.  He especially loved picking up copy from the exclusive massage parlors that ran ads in the back pages of the Post.  When he walked by the rooms with the scantily-clad women masseuses, he thought they were prettier and sexier than he had ever imagined women could be.  He didn’t miss a chance to study those flirty women as long as he could get by with sauntering slowly instead of rushing to get his job done as usual. 

When he had to pick up advertising copy, his inquisitive mind sought out how the advertising agencies worked and how they made money, getting people to spend theirs.  The exclusive stores, such as Gimbel’s, Macy’s, Korvettes, and others, all had back room action that John penetrated and absorbed.  Best of all, he was invisible.  After people got used to seeing him around, nobody noticed him anymore.  He could walk into those busy and elegant places, mosey around and soak it all in.  And they actually paid him to do this job, when for the education he was getting he would have done his messenger job for free.

Another great benefit of the job was the fact that he was working outside.  It was New York City in the snow, in the fall, in the spring.  Rockefeller Center with the skating rink in the winter, and the huge Christmas Tree that rose above all reason and was itself a symbol of everything happy.  The city was alive, electric, magical and John got to visit places even the rich didn’t have access to, such as the back stage action of the high fashion shows.  It was a mind-blowing education in itself for a young man like John Petrocelli.
 
The only part of his young life that wasn’t spectacular and phenomenally exciting was the lack of feminine companionship.  He was clueless when it came to the feminine mystique.  He had no idea how to treat a girl, or how to attract one, or how to act if he did get a female’s attention.  When he was still growing to his teenaged height, the girls were all bigger than the boys in grammar school.  Later, he realized the young women around him in school were overweight because one of the favorite pastimes of his neighborhood was eating.  Their plumpness did nothing for John’s libido and there were no such things as pilates or 24-hour gyms in those days.  The good-looking females around in his world were few and far between and usually much too old for his age.  He looked long and hard for the beautiful ladies, too, walking the streets as he did 5 and 8 hours a night. 

Sex remained a closed Pandora’s box for a long time.  People John knew talked about the birds and bees and he never could make the connection, wondering what bird would want to screw a bee.  Like most young boys, he had seen many topless magazines but back then, store owners had different ideas of permissible behavior and were strict about the age restrictions for peering into the “girlie” mags.  John got dragged away from the “dirty” magazines by the collar more times than he could remember.  Even when grown-up men bought a copy of Playboy, they also bought Time, Newsweek, National Geographic and a copy of the NY Times and hid the Playboy in between the sandwich of the acceptable reading matter. 

John was eager to learn about sex but all he heard were non-specific descriptions of what it was “really” like.  His friend, Richie, told him when he was with a woman, he’d have to make a hole.  John was speechless.  “You have to make a hole?  What happens?  Doesn’t someone bleed if you do that?” 

“Yep.”  Richie didn’t explain any further except to say, “The hole is already there.”


“Then why do you have to make one?”

“You ask too many questions.”  Richie said as he walked away.
*  *  *

When John was about 12, he was standing near a group of buildings known as the La Guardia projects and an air vent between the buildings emitted a strong current of hot air.  One day, a young girl probably about 16 with a curvaceous shape was standing near the vent, watching John and his friends across the street, who were sitting on a cement block near a small patch of grass.

“See that cute girl over there?  Well, John, she wants you.”  Mikey, one of John’s friends, smiled like a sly fox and winked in John’s direction.

“Well. . .How do you know?  What do I do?”  John was beginning to break out in a cold sweat.  He knew absolutely nothing about the female body, sexual intercourse, or anything remotely connected to the subject.  Mikey convinced him to walk across the street and start a conversation with the pretty young girl, so he walked over with trembling knees, praying she wouldn’t notice what a greenhorn he was.  They stood in an alcove between the buildings, close to the hot air grate.  The girl looked at him and without saying more than two words, raised her skirt and dropped her underpants.  John’s trembling became severe and he didn’t know what was expected of him, so she pushed him down in front of her and pulled her skirt higher.  The biggest “Afro” bush he had ever seen popped out in front of his eyes and he still had no idea what it was.  She grabbed his hand and put in on her pubic area, so he poked around gingerly, waiting for something to give him an idea about what he was expected to do.  He didn’t feel the hole he’d been told about and she grew impatient, shoving him away and when he toppled over onto the ground, she pulled up her panties and left.  He never saw her again but thought of her often in the years following the first eroding of his innocence.  There were no instructions then like there are today, such as can be obtained in hygiene class in junior high, or earlier.  Kids more or less had to find out things for themselves and then share an exaggerated version with their peers.  How anyone from those self-conscious, guilt-ridden days ever developed a “smooth technique” with such an awkward introduction to a profound experience remains a mystery.

Foreward | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3| Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6| Chapter 7