For most of the world ,people have to make a living to eat, to have a roof over their head. Most work at jobs they would quit in a minute if they hit the lottery or inherited a large amount of money.There are a lucky few that earn a living at something they love, that they would do for free. Can anything be better than that? I don't think so. To look forward to go to work, free of depressing Sundays because tomorrow is Monday and back to that crappy job.
That's what I wanted, not money or fame,although that would be a nice fringe benefit, I wanted freedom. So after chasing my tail and going nowhere for the first 30 years of my life, I set out to be a professional actor.While I am not a household name, I am often recognized in a store or somewhere in public and strangers , sure they have met me before, would ask me if I was a chef in some restaurant or a cop that gave them a ticket.
I grew up in a tough working class neighborhood on the lower east side of New York City. This was not the Manhattan of now,overrun by yuppies and wannabes from all over the world. This was the New York of the 50's and 60's, a concrete jungle of overcrowded slums.In those days if you wanted to breath some fresh air or to see a tree or ground that was not covered in asphalt or concrete you had to go uptown to Central Park,where you could get in trouble with uptown tough guys. It was the beginning of the post World War 2 generation later called the baby boomers .Hoards of kids roaming the streets, fighting and playing street games with each other.Street games now all but extinct like stick ball that used a hard rubber ball that would take off like a rocket when hit with an old broom handle.We would play in the street avoiding cars and open cellar doors.There was also touch football.,handball,Johnny on the pony, bottoms up and pitching quarters against a wall .The younger girls practiced all the latest dance steps like the Lindy,Cha Cha, The Slop and the Twist.
In those days,if you wanted to play outside with the other kids,you had to be at least a competent street fighter, otherwise you would get your ass kicked everyday for your lunch money, your belt or whatever the tougher kids wanted from you. If you couldn't or wouldn't fight,you stayed home and helped your mother with housework.The only outlets were sports or crime.Drugs were not widespread then as either you were a hard core junkie or not. There was no distinction between pot and heroin, if you did one, you did the other.If you were able to survive childhood, you were expected to do some kind of military service because being an able body male you had to serve the nation.
In my early tears, I had hoped my ticket out of poverty would be sports.I had speed, power and determination but alas my height stopped at 5 foot and 7 inches which meant that as my competition grew to 6 feet and more, no college would give me a scholarship which was the only way I could go on to higher education as there was no money in my family to send me. So soon after graduating from high school I joined the US Navy.Why I did that, I am not sure.I could have went to college, I was accepted but I would have to work during the day and go to school at night. I guess at the time I needed to get away and military service was hanging over my head anyway in the form of the draft. So I went away to the Navy for 4 years chasing Soviet Union submarines all over the world
I like this!
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