Cruising the boulevard

Kenmore is the part of Akron where I grew up.
The people who lived there were working class, blue-collar types who toiled at Goodyear, Firestone, General Tire or Goodrich, or they worked for a tire-related business. No one was wealthy in Kenmore; those people lived in west Akron and, most likely, supervised our parents. Most of our parents both worked, and as we got older, more and more of them divorced.
While our parents bowled (what was the name of the bowling alley on Waterloo Road near Main Street?) or played euchre on the weekends, we roller skated at the Arena Roller Rink where we smoked cigarettes, "made out" under the coat racks and, of course, roller skated.
Kenmore guys loved muscle cars. The louder they rumbled, the better. Guys would drive down my street, pass by my house (and Lisa Spak's, who lived across the street) and rev their motors as they passed (sending Lisa and me both to our bedroom windows). I got to know the sounds of different guys' cars that I didn't really have to run to the windows - Troy Silver's Cutlass had a high-pitched waaaaaa sound under the hood, especially when he was pissed off at me and would fly at full speed down my street. John Shipley's car, which I think was a Chevelle (correct me if I'm wrong, John), had a killer sound system for back then; he was way ahead of his time as he would blast Jimi Hendrix's "National Anthem" from his woofers and tweeters. Tom Cox would drive by in his piece of sh*t El Camino that lacked an exhaust system (which required passengers to ride with the windows open year-round) or his friend Brian Fields' Corvair with the WMMS buzzard painted on the trunk. Mike Perenkovich's multi-colored whatever-the-hell-that-was ...
Cruising was a big deal when I was in high school. Sue Zurzolo would pick my friend Jodi Gump and me up in her huge boat and we'd cruise around, driving by people's houses, honking and then driving away really fast so they wouldn't see us. We'd drive by guys' houses we liked. We'd drive by girls' houses we didn't like. We'd smoke cigarettes and cruise, trying to find other people who were out doing the same thing. We had places we'd go to hang out - that old strip mall at Arlington and Waterloo roads, where the cops would come and chase everyone away. Does anyone remember The Ledges behind Rolling Acres mall?
Lori Orlando would pick us up in her dad's Ford Falcon (I think it was a Falcon?) that had push-button gears, and we'd cruise the boulevard and end up at KB's, where she and he would end up yelling at each other.
A cool car for guys meant more "friends" and girls. One guy showed up at school driving a shiny bright orange restored late '60s Camaro or Firebird. No one knew who this kid was until he rumbled into the parking lot. Suddenly, he was wearing a black leather jacket and hanging out with our guys (who all wore black-leather jackets). Behind his back, they all said his car was full of bondo (a filler for rusted-out cars) and that's why he had to paint it orange - you had to use bright colors to hide the bondo. That bondo didn't keep him from getting invited to parties, though.
When I see the new Camaro, it takes me back to my neighborhood. I got my driver's license with my ex's '68 Camaro, which had no power steering, no air conditioning and had a custom-size steering wheel that was about the size of a dinner plate. It was full of bondo.
The new Camaro brings out the Kenmore girl in me, and makes me want to shop for a black leather jacket, pop in some Nazareth and cruise the boulevard. No smoking, though.

You CAN'T talk about THAT

My friend Mary called me from Colorado and said, "I just read your blog. I can't believe you wrote about poop. You  can't TALK about  that!"
But it's funny, I told her.
"Who reads your blog!?" she said, worried about my future, my career, my reputation.
"I don't know. My Facebook friends, I guess," I said.
"You can't write about that! We don't talk about poop!" she said.
There isn't much Mary won't talk about. When we were in sixth grade, she was such a chatterbox that our homeroom teacher, Mr. Lomax, threw a piece of chalk at her after getting so frustrated with her because she wouldn't shut up. Really. I had no idea she was so uptight about excrement.
I told her that's why I wrote about it - because no one likes to talk about it. Yet everyone does it. Daily. I hope.
"I can't believe you wrote about that," she said. She WAS laughing, by the way.

The only time bowel movements become accepted and expected topics of discussion are when new parents watch their babies' outputs to gauge how well their inputs are working.
"Just changed his diaper."
"Did he poop?"
"Yep."
"How was it?"
"Mustardy."
"Perfect."
Believe me, I have issues with the subject.  As I said in my last blog, I once went 36 hours without doing it, all in the name of romance. And it wasn't by choice. Each time we'd enter a restaurant, my first stop would be the ladies' room, just to give my poor bowels an opportunity to relieve themselves. They never took me up on the offer.
I even went for a run that Sunday morning, planning my route by a Safeway, thinking things would loosen up on my jog. Nope.
It wasn't until he dropped me at my door, carried my bags inside that my body knew it was home. I quickly hugged him, patted him on the back as I ushered him to the door. "Thanksforthelovelyweekendcallmelaterbuh-bye ..."
When my son was a toddler, we bought the book "Everyone Poops," because, as responsible parents, we wanted him to know that there is NOTHING wrong with it - every animal does it.
Maybe the title of the book would be more appropriately, "Everyone Poops, Just Keep It To Yourself."