Chapter 20 Chick's choice

I'm going to tell you about two days in my college days.Because, these two days let me experience the highest and lowest state of mind.The climax occurred during my first semester of sophomore year.The baseball thing hasn't started yet, so I have free time to hang out on campus.After the midterm exam, one Thursday night, a club in the school held a grand party.The venue was dimly lit and packed with people.The music was deafening.Dark lights shone on wall posters to everyone in the set making everything seem to glow with a will-o'-the-wisp phosphorescence.We laughed loudly, raised plastic beer glasses, and toasted each other.

All of a sudden, a guy with long hair jumps up on a chair and starts lip-syncing and strumming his guitar along with the song It's a Jefferson Airplane song that's quickly formed a contest.We rummaged through the wooden crates of milk bottles in which the records were kept, looking for a song to perform. I don't know whose records these are, but I saw a very different one.I yelled to my companion: Hey, wait a minute!look at this!That was the Bobby .Darling's record.On the cover, he was dressed in a white dinner suit, his hair was extremely short, and he was very neatly dressed.

I know this one!I said: I know all the lyrics in this. take it out.One said. Let's listen.Another said: Look at that bumpkin. We hogged the turntable and put the needle on the groove of the song "This Could Be the Beginning of Something Big."The music started and everyone froze because the song was clearly not rock and roll.Suddenly, I found myself standing with two of my good friends next to me.They looked at each other awkwardly, then pointed at me and twisted their hips.But I felt a burst of relief, and I thought, who cares?So, when the trumpet and clarinet sounded from the loudspeaker, I lip-synced and sang the words from the bottom of my heart:

∮ You walk in the street, or attend a banquet, Otherwise you feel alone, and then suddenly you find, You're looking into someone's eyes and you suddenly realize, This could be the start of something big. I snapped my fingers and made a snap, like a singer on a TV song show.Suddenly, everyone burst into laughter and shouted: OK!Sing on, jazz singer!I'm getting crazy.No one would believe, I thought, that I knew the words to all the songs on such a contrived record. In any case, the performance ended and I received warm applause.My friends grabbed my waist and everyone pushed and laughed.

I met Catherine that night.This is the moment of climax.She and a few friends were there to see me perform.I saw her and I was shaking all over while I was singing to my lips and my arms were moving.She was wearing a sleeveless pink cotton shirt and skinny jeans, and she had strawberry gloss lipstick on her lips.I sing Bobby.She was playful and flicked her fingers to Darling's song.I still don’t know to this day if she would have given me a second look if I hadn’t stepped up on stage and performed like this. Where did you learn this song?She came up to me as I was getting beer from the barrel.

Well from my mom.I answered. I feel like an idiot.Who uses my mom as a conversation starter?But she seems to like it.So we started from here. The next day, I got my report card.Good grades, two A's and two B's.I called the beauty salon to find my mother.She comes to answer the phone.I told her the grades, and I told her about Catherine and Bobby.Darling's song.She seemed very happy, happy that I called her at noon.She shouted over the sound of the rumbling hair dryer: Charlie, I'm so proud of you! This is orgasm. After a year, I dropped out of school. That's low tide.

On my father's advice, I dropped out of school and joined the little league.In this regard, my mother was very disappointed.The Pittsburgh Pirates offered me a spot to play winter ball.If I did well, I could play for Pittsburgh on the minor league team.Father felt the time had come.If you compete against college students, you will not improve.He said. The first time I mentioned this idea to my mother, she screamed: Never!No matter what baseball offered me, no matter how much potential the scouts thought I had, maybe I had the potential to make it to the big leagues; she just said: Don't do it!

But I ignored her words. I told the school registration team that I was leaving.I put my stuff in a duffel bag and left.Many boys my age were sent to fight in Vietnam.I don't know if it was luck or fate, but I didn't win the draft lottery.My dad is a veteran and seemed relieved to hear that.You don't need to go to the battlefield and get into that trouble.He said. Instead of going to the battlefield, I followed his rhythm.I followed his orders: to join a minor league team in San Juan, Puerto Rico.So my school days came to an end.What can I say now about this?Is it baseball or the affirmation from my father that tempts me?I think it's both.But I don't feel forced to do this at all, it's the same as my childhood when I followed the breadcrumbs to find my way out. However, things didn't fall apart when I was a child, and I wasn't my mother's son then.

I still remember calling her from my motel in San Juan.I flew straight from school and it was my first time flying.I didn't want to go home before getting on the plane because I knew my mother was going to throw a tantrum. Your son's call is charged.The operator spoke in English with a Spanish accent. My mother was speechless with astonishment when she heard that I was in San Juan and that the matter had been decided.Her voice is flat.She asked what clothes I had brought and what food I had eaten.She seems to be holding a list of questions that must be asked, and she is reading according to the things listed on it.

Is it safe where you live?she says. is it safe?I think it's safe. Who else do you know over there? I don't know anyone.But I have teammates.I still have roommates.He's from Indiana or Iowa or something. Um. There was a silence. Mom, I can go back to school anytime. This time, the silence was longer.Until we hung up the phone, she only said one more sentence: Going back and doing something again is not as easy as you think. I figured that if I had done anything to break my mother's heart, it wouldn't break her heart like this one.