After Atlanta, I returned to Pennsylvania. Mom married Bill.
Bill was an old high school beau and retired Navy cook. He had four kids from a previous marriage; eldest Cathy, son Jimmy, Helen, and Peggy Lee.
We became a family of his hers and ours when Billijane came into the world.
One of my favorite memories from that time is when Helen and I were with a group of friends walking up a stream bed and Helen noticed that a snake was eating a fish. Helen grabbed that snake by the tail and twirled it around her head until the fish flew back out of the snake‘s mouth. Miraculously, the fish survived. I don’t know what happened to that snake because she flung it up into the woods never ro be seen again. But I knew right then and there that Helen was a force to reckon with.
Suffice to say that Bill was the catalyst for my eventual Navy enlistment and that is where the story will continue for now.
Oh, there are a lot more stories from that teen era of my life. I could probably build a whole novel just around that timeframe.
I will add them to this recollection as time and memory allow. Even the bad boy memories.