The Korean War Veteran at Jerusalem Beach

  I can remember very little in my life sharply before age of five.

    But  on my sixth birthday I vividly remember  my family's trip to

    Jerusalem beach on a sizzling hot day in late July.  I remember the

    old Hudson Hornet caught on fire just before we got there. We abandoned

    the car in Galilee  fishing village at transferred to  my Uncle Tommy's

    car. All a little shaken by the experience.

         Under a beach umbrella when the others were riding the waves, my

    aunt Beth told me to take off my bright red bathing suit.  She wanted

    to protect my young skin with suntan lotion .  I felt her cool hands

    rubbing my little behind. She rubbed me All over. There is a picture

    of me at age six naked in front of the Hudson Hornet with an erection!

     In an old family photo album. Nobody ever considered it obscene . And

    Auntie Beth was never accused of anything  " devious ".

         Walking along the shore- in no hurry to go into the cold water - I

    spotted a strange looking man with a missing leg -a mere stump that was

    disturbingly visible - hopping on his good leg out of the water.

        A  teenage boy - who himself looked like a young Troy  Donahue -

    began to make fun of him . "

      I am a Korean War veteran ! " the man yelled.  "  I lost my leg for the

    likes of you ! ".

          The punk teenager was almost crying. But he went back into the water,

     submerging  himself under a 6 foot wave.

         I observed the strange angry Korean war veteran " point " his unsightly

    stub in the direction of "  Troy ". He was aiming it as if it were a

    machine gun.

        Soon " Troy " was out of sight. I did not see him again that sultry

    July afternoon.

         The next morning my mother was reading  from the front page of the

    newspaper to my father. Someone had drowned  the day before at Jerusalem

    Beach. The victim  was a blond, blue eyed youth age 16!

        I went outside the apartment at the Valley View Housing Project -for

    veterans - and waited for the Johnny the ice cream to come by. I made

    the rounds of the neighborhood with him . Then we stopped for a while

    at Geneva Pond . While I was eating my half-chocolate, half vanilla cup

    of ice cream, Johnny told me all about the deadly leeches in the water.

    Last September a boy who was bunking school fell in and all his blood

    was sucked out by the leeches.

         I always loved Johnny's stories even when I did not believe them .