The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy

AS IT NEVER WOULD BE after classes started, the whole school was open to us when we prowled it in secret. From any point of view other than ours, I suppose, it was closed to us, but because all its parts were equally closed, once we had penetrated one barrier we had penetrated them all. We prowled everywhere, ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Pe...

THAT’S HOW I came to be standing in a locker in the unfinished school building, in the heat of an August night, still and silent and happy and thrilled. The thrill of danger, the possibility of being caught, wasn’t the only thrill. Prowling through the unfinished school building had made me begin to feel a thrilling anticipation of seventh grade that in memory is so thoroughly mixed with the thril...

I BEGAN THE PLANS for the lighthouse with that hopeful vigor we feel at the start of any project, when possibility is the driving force, the likelihood of success is at its highest, the project—in the mind—is perfect, pure, elegant, magnificent, clean, and right, and we seem to see, as if at the end of a tunnel, a shining day in the future when we will finish it and sign it. ... Get full access to...

I HAD LEARNED that the best time to bring such things up was over dinner, preferably late in the meal. I knew, too, that I had to be careful not to give the whole plan away at once, since my father had noticed—and on occasion had pointed out to me—the fact that some of the projects I undertook didn’t turn out quite as I had advertised them before I began. ... Get full access to The Personal Histor...

THE THING AS I FOUND IT was, essentially, this: a motor driven by a spring that the operator wound with a large crank (see Figure 1). ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

THEREFORE, IT IS NOT SURPRISING that when I found myself bored, when I didn’t know what to do with myself, when I was a little on edge and needed to find or devise a way to relax, or even when I was just looking for a way to pass the time, I sought inspiration in junk.     Most of the time, I found it there. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Pet...

SO GUPPA BECAME a sharecropper. He staked out a stretch of land running along one side of our lot, from the back of the garage to the foot of the hill. Every day when the weather was suitable for gardening he came over after work, wearing one of the identical brown suits that he always wore at work, suits that my grandmother, Gumma, called Studebaker suits, carrying a canvas bag in which he had hi...

IT WAS MY FERVENT HOPE that my maternal grandfather, whom I called Guppa, a crackerjack Studebaker salesman and also something of an inventor, would someday appear on Flo and Freddie’s show. I think I must have gotten the idea the very first time I watched the show, but I can’t be sure about that; it’s hard to pin down the onset of an idea. I pestered poor Guppa about it endlessly. ... Get full ac...

     “Fantastic Contraptions” at first lay on the dusky line between the fading giveaway program and the coming competitive program, but over the course of its history it moved with the times toward out-and-out competition. In the first part of the show, amateur inventors would bring their creations onstage and explain and demonstrate them. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures,...

I WAS STANDING IN A LOCKER in the Purlieu Street School on an August night, when a locker was a hot place to be. I was ten. I would be attending the Purlieu Street School in the fall, when I started seventh grade, if the building was finished in time. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

THINGS LEFT UNDONE—how they haunt us. At any rate, they haunt me. I’ve noticed that they don’t haunt everyone else. A great many people seem to be able to walk through their days without hearing at their heels the dogged shuffle of neglected duties, but I am not a member of that lighthearted crew. The things I ought to have done are there behind me always, each with a hook in me, ... Get full acce...

Preface SOMETIMES my memory seems to be mush, with shining moments scattered through it like chips of marble in wet cement or peas stirred into mashed potatoes. I’d like to be able to take a closer look at some of those moments, but whenever I reach for one I disturb the mush, and the moment I seek sometimes sinks out of sight. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences &...

Dedication For Mad Epigraphs Here am I, lying under a hayrick. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

Ike’s      Seated at the bar at Ike’s, we watched, fascinated, while an aging fellow (possibly only our age, come to think of it, but so bent by care and conscience that he seemed much older) tried to pick up a lovely little girl, shrink-wrapped in a tiny skirt. You can guess the type: ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy....

     “I — I’ve seen a lot of your writings.”      Oh, this is wonderful. This is a fine thing. This is great. Get chummy. Maybe he’ll take you on as an apprentice. Invite him up to the apartment. Show him your own work on your own walls. You can drive each other nuts. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subsc...

HE HEARS A VOICE, close to him, then shuffling footsteps and someone sniffling, and he shifts farther back into the shadowy doorway. A man dressed in rags, bent, his hair wild, is making his way along the broken sidewalk across the street, at the edge of the zone of destruction. He’s surrounded by garbage bags. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of...

     Everything’s changed now. I have to go away. I have to get out of this city.     Don’t be ridiculous . You’re just being dramatic. This will never come out. You’re not the sort of person a witness remembers, remember? Those kids won’t remember you. Neither will the cabbie. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack...

IT TAKES A MOMENT for him to realize that he has hit the driver, that the man has stumbled backward, is leaning against the steel upright, is staggering, has dropped to his knees. Matthew steps out from hiding. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

     Fury owns a part of him, an anger forty years old and more. He’s looking for another weapon, though he isn’t conscious of that, won’t allow himself to be conscious of that, is only half-aware that he grabs something, rejects it, grabs something else, a short length of reinforcing bar, bent at one end, hefts it, decides that it will do, and ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventur...

AT FIRST Matthew feels only astonishment, disbelief, something like the shock from a blow. As if he’d had the wind knocked out of him, for a moment he can’t seem to breathe. In another moment he’s sucking air into his lungs fiercely but can’t seem to get any oxygen from it. Then he droops, all his energy gone at once, and feels like a fool, that he’s been played for a fool and deserved it. ... Get...

OFF THEY GO. Matthew rides in a happy fog, mystified by the chatter of his chums, who seem to speak a dialect he doesn’t understand. He has the feeling that, if he made the effort, he could understand them, but he’s content to be out of it, quite happy to sit back and go along for the ride, holding Tracy in his lap, wearing a goofy smile, like a happy child. ... Get full access to The Personal His...

MOST OF THE GROUP gets into two BMWs that are double-parked on Boylston Street, in front of the restaurant. Matthew watches, hanging back, tempted just to drift away, down the street, home, but Tracy’s beside him, and she’s a stronger temptation. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe

“SAY,” says one of the young men to the bartender, tapping him on the arm to take his attention away from the drink he’s mixing, “would you pack all of this up?” He waves his hand over the remains of their snacks — Matthew’s nachos and some ribs and a huge pick-up-stick tangle of fries. . .. Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterlero...

     “But he is kind of interesting on his own, I think,” says Matthew, pushing his true self back into the conversation. “I mean, isn’t everyone? Or, if not everyone, this guy anyway.” You’re making a mess of this, says BW. “There are surprising things as you go through his apartment,” says Matthew, a little desperately. ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Obser...

     “Help yourself,” says Matthew, prompted by BW, indicating his nachos. “God knows there’s enough here for a crowd.” ... Get full access to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy at peterleroy.substack.com/subscribe