I was fifteen in 1969; I look back on it now and realize it was my families last year of innocence. My Dad had a one-truck plumbing repair service company and he worked hard. He would be working from sunrise to sunset most days. There were days however, he wasn’t working; they were his drinking days.

My Dad was an alcoholic and 1969 was a bad year. While men were walking on the moon, my Dad was shooting up our house with his .45 pistol. While the hippies were dancing at Woodstock, my mother was rounding up the kids and sneaking us off to stay with Aunt Helen to avoid another drunken rampage. While Joe Namath was sticking his finger in the air saying, “we’re number #!” after winning the Super bowl, I was sticking my finger out to flag down the Police car to come arrest my Dad so we could go to sleep.

It wasn’t all bad however. I played basketball for Garner H.S. and lettered. There was summer baseball to enjoy. I had a Champaign colored drum set and played in a band; at least I had it until Dad pawned it. I took drivers ed. That year and was ready to get my license in 1970.

We lived in a nice brick ranch house in Garner. However, by the end of 1970 we would be living in Halifax Court in Raleigh. Government housing with welfare cheese, runny, oily welfare peanut butter, and spam so hard a knife would not cut it.

I guess I am sounding a little morbid about all this, and I don’t mean to. My family hung together and truly loved each other. We attended church, worked hard, spent a lot of time together on trips and such. My parents stayed together through good times and bad. Today families fall apart over nothing. My siblings and I went on to build successful, happy lives. I will always look back on 1969 with mixed feelings. It’s like the book says, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times”, little did we know it would turn out to be the end of “innocent times”. I’ll be right back.