BO#31: Sorry —

I cannot imagine that this has not happened to all that write novels.

We write and build and develop an interesting story involving interesting characters and places and times and circumstances and then— as this writer now— after writing this complete addendum…

If after writing this wholly original addition to my two 700 plus page factional, semi-fictional novels : “Becoming” and “For Better or Worse”…

If after writing approximately 76,300 words in the “BOW” (Better or Worse0) series’ — If all this writer can come up with is nothing more exiting than waiting for a Great Dane dog to ‘piddle or ‘poop’ than I must ‘sadly’ leave the Lipensky family stranded on that sidewalk in Des Moines, Iowa on their way to dinner.

However...

For Mitchell and Marsha Lipensky and additional new ‘semi-fictional’ ‘factional’ characters and situations — In a not too future, future time and different place, For Better or Worse, life continues to go on as “PIT”: “Points in Time”.

In thinking about it, it takes at least 50,000 words to write a ‘novella’. So now that I had posted in excess of 76,000 words in the BOW series, I might well consider this series as my third — though unpublished “Becoming” novel, and as we go forward, depending on the total word count (of which at this time I have no idea) “Points In Time” could well be considered as the fourth of the “Becoming” saga.

Before “PIT”, though...

An Overview

An overview from the author (me) in year 2021

As introduced to Mitchell Lipensky in...

Spring, 1939

Chicago, Illinois

The lady and boy stood at the curb.

Watching the stoplight across the wide, busy street, the lady looked forward, waiting for the light to turn to green.

The five-year-old boy at her side looked to his left, watching the light across the smaller street, waiting for it to turn to red.

The lights changed colors: from red to green, from green to red.

Automobiles stopped on either side of the wide street.

From the little boy’s perspective, looking much like a red monster, its steel wheels squealing in steel tracks, a streetcar halted its rattling forward motion and seemed to be straining to begin moving again.

Tightening her grip on the boy’s hand, the woman and child started across the wide street.

On the other side of the street a man carefully stepped off the curb to begin his journey in the opposite direction.

Scraggly gray hair hung over his age-splotched forehead and he propelled

himself slowly with the help of a wooden cane that he held tightly in his

gnarled hand.

Crossing paths, the fog-cast, green eyes of the old man made contact with the clear, green eyes of the little boy and held for the seconds it took to pass.

Passing, the little boy turned his head, watching the old man. Tripping on the curb, he hung by his mother’s hand until she pulled him up onto the sidewalk and his own two feet.

“Mommy, what’s wrong with that man?”

“What man?” Turning, the woman looked at the slowly receding figure. “Oh. Nothing, baby, he’s just an old man.”

Watching another moment. “Will daddy be an old man someday?”.

“Why yes, baby. I hope so.”

“And will you be old someday, too, Mommy?”

“Yes, Mitchie. God willing. Unless something bad happens, I’ll be an old lady someday.”

“And me too, Mommy, I’ll be old, too?”

“Yes, baby, someday.”

His throat tightening, his eyes stinging, the boy began to cry.

“What’s wrong, honey?” Reaching into her purse, removing a handkerchief, she wiped away his tears.

“I don’t want to be old, Mommy!”

Stooping, “Shhh...” hugging her son to her chest “...don’t worry, Mitchie. You’ve a whole lifetime ‘till you’ll be an old man.”

Standing, taking hold of her son’s hand, the two began to walk again.

The boy looked over his shoulder at ‘him’ one last time, but the old man had disappeared from sight.

****

So then began Mitchell’s — I never said that any thing I wrote and will write pertaining to Mitchell Lipensky and the ‘Lipensky Saga’ was or is anything other than ‘semi-fiction’, or ‘faction’… Other than ‘BOW # 29’ which —because of the mention of cigarettes is pretty much the way it actually had happened.

However, through all the years of writing and re-writing, as I, ‘the author’ became older —now in yea 2021, at age eighty-seven, I am no longer sure what, in ‘Becoming’ and ‘For Better Or Worse’ and ‘BOW’ is truth or fiction or, pertaining to my ‘extremely’ vivid sexual episodes — now, at eighty-seven, ‘very’ wishful thinking.

But considering myself as a ‘dirty old man’, sexual situations will still… uh, ‘arise’.

Notation: For unfamiliar readers looking for a sample of my sexual interludes, please search out and read my — in my opinion, ‘classic’ : ‘Longitude & Latitude’.

Continuing Overview:

Not wanting to be repetitious; for new and future readers (thank you), an abbreviated introduction of the people, the times, places and descriptions…

Mitchell 1946:

He was the tallest boy in his class, and with the exception of only one other boy in the eighth grade, the tallest in school.

Still a nosher [one that eats between meals] he remained on the heavy side, but due to his bone structure carried the weight well. His face had turned from round to oval, giving him a slightly more masculine appearance. Going on twelve, Mitchell Lipensky was considered the best looking boy at Holland School.

liked the way he looked, and did whatever he could to enhance his appearance even further. Using one of Myra’s nylon stockings, he’d made a cap and slept with it on, hoping to train his straight hair to fall into a wave, which in time it did. In summer he would spend as much time as possible in the sun to ensure a dark tan. Mitchell was always meticulously clean, although, much to the annoyance of his mother, he allowed his bedroom to become messy and the clothing that she so carefully ironed and hung in closet to go awry.

For all his good looks, however, Mitchell Lipensky did have a balance…

Marsha Goldman: Age; not quite thirteen

Union Pier, Michigan

August 5, 1949

“Hi, Norm, Mitch.” Looking from Norman to Mitchell and back to Norman. “I’m Shelly and this is…”

The fifth ball rolled into the pen. The machine went dark a moment, then

lit up again and the number in the game display changed from seven to ten.

Turning from the pinball machine, she looked at Mitchell.

The girl was tall and thin. She had a sharp widow’s peak and short, tightly curled black hair. Darkly tanned, her complexion was perfectly smooth. Her eyes were dark brown and, having a slightly long nose, reminding Mitchell of a picture he’d seen of a ‘Sabra’: a native-born Israeli. Her face Semantically beautiful. With the exception of bobby socks and penny loafers, she wore a matching outfit to Shelly’s.

“…Marsha.” Shelly said. “Marcie, this is Norm and Mitch.”

“Hi!” She glanced at Norman, then quickly back to Mitchell.

The two looked at each other for one, two, three long moments then, “You guys want to play a game?” Marsha asked.

Susan Friedman : Age sixteen

December 8, 1951

Evanston, Illinois

He didn’t want coffee but, “Yeah, a hot fudge sundae sounds pretty good.” Pointing across the street, “Walgreen’s got a good fountain.” Knowing she liked malted milk, Mitchell looked at his mother. “And they make great malts.”

Shrugging his shoulders, “Coffee’s coffee.” Walter said.

“I haven’t had a malt in years. Okay, it’s okay with me.”

They waited for the traffic light to change, crossed Chicago Avenue and, once inside, went to the rear of the large drugstore, waited until three adjacent stools became available, then sat on the long side of the L-shaped counter with Walter between his wife and son.

A skinny, frizzy-haired waitress standing on the opposite side of the counter with a pencil poised over a small, green pad asked, “What can I get you folks?”

“Just coffee, black.”

“You, Ma’am?”

“Vanilla malt, please.”

Removing his jacket, laying it across his lap, “I’ll have a hot fudge sundae with chocolate ice cream, please.”

Within minutes, “Here you go,” their orders came.

The couple sitting kitty-corner vacated their stools and two women sat down.

The movement caused Mitchell to move his rapt attention from the hot fudge sundae to the lady and girl… The long-handled spoon pausing mid-way to his mouth, a blob of fudge dropping onto the cherry- and nut-topped mound of whipped cream, the sundae before him instantly forgotten because then, at that precise moment seventeen year old Mitchell Lipensky fell totally, completely, in love.

Having a clear complexion, her hair impeccably coiffured, wearing an expensive-looking white wool coat with a beige fur collar over a pink, knit dress, the lady was beautiful. But…

Oh, God! The girl!

The girl! Obviously the lady’s daughter, the girl immediately reminded Mitchell of the only movie star he’d ever had a crush on: Elizabeth Taylor.

In Mitchell’s eyes, positively beautiful, the girl was sixteen, possibly seventeen, and as if knowing who she so strongly resembled, the girl’s hair was cut short and styled in ringlets, as was Elizabeth’s in her new movie, ‘A Place in the Sun’. Her eyebrows were thick and arched and, ‘Damn, he thought, she even had a small mole on her left cheek. Okay, so Elizabeth Taylor’s mole is on her right cheek. But so what!

From where he sat could see that she didn’t have Elizabeth’s violet eyes, but the girl’s were a beautiful, light brown.

As he stared at her, the girl’s face turned in Mitchell’s direction and she looked at him.

Their eyes locking and holding, the boy and girl looked at each other for an eternity that lasted three seconds, then, hastily, each looked away.

Elizabeth Herzon:

Fat Girl

October 13, 1958

“Here’s yours, Liz.” Handing a stack of queries to the youg woman on the opposite side of the head-to-head placed desks.

Concentrating on what she’d been writing, looking up she smiled at the woman standing above her. “Here we go again, huh?”

Looking across the width of the two desks, their eyes touching, her lingering smile warming, ‘very much so’, ‘too much so’ the young man sitting on the far side of the double desks.

Why’s she got to be so damned beautiful? Mitchell thought for at least the thousandth time since meeting Elizabeth Herzon and, for ‘at least’ twice as many times, Mitchell sensed the… that well known longing sensation in the lower region… in the far lower region of his stomach.

Being Transco Envelope Company’s first female salesman—saleswoman?—Considered an experiment, at age twenty-one, Elizabeth Herzon had long, dark-blonde, honey colored streaked hair, a beautiful, round face with large, green eyes and a crooked smile that warmed every one it came in contact with.

Standing a bit above 5' 5’, weighing approximately one hundred twenty-five pounds, with vital statistics of 36–30–36, Elizabeth had the kind of figure that turned men’s heads…

‘Especially’ the head of the young man that sat at the desk directly before her desk.

“Yes’! Knowing men followed her with their eyes had raised Elizabeth’s ego and ‘yes’, further knowing they looked longingly at her had sent sent her estimation of herself—compared to what her estimation of herself had been before—soaring into the stratosphere because Elizabeth Herzon had always been…

Unknown to all but her family and a few remaining friends, Elizabeth had always been….

“Oy, such a ‘ppunnum’! Such a beautiful face!” Her mother and father and aunts and uncles would say. “Such a shame she’s so…

“Fat!”

Elizabeth’s job as a sales woman was meant as yet another challenge to herself because, after all, if only after fifteen months of pain, unbearable sacrifice and stubborn determination, she could lose a bit more than seventy pounds.

Dressed, Elizabeth—forcing her fat girl syndrome aside—thought she looked good… Great in fact.

But nude, the tissue of her heavy breasts had stretched and though beginning to fade with time and tighten with exercise, Elizabeth’s breasts, stomach, thighs and buttocks were crossed with translucent stretch marks. ‘

*****

Marsha: The descriptions of Marsha Goldman’s early life with her beautiful — in Marsha’s words: ‘vain’, ‘prostitute’ mother are, as I can only rely on Marsha’s memory as ‘exaggerated fact’.

Strange, and this author speaks—in his semi-fictional way this author speaks ‘only’ for himself…

The three people that I— and Mitchell Lipensky have known and loved throughout our lives still, in memory, are as they appeared nearly two-thirds of a century ago.

So age, in memory does not alter the fact that the years have not changed the looks, the features that Mitchell Lipensky, in his semi-fictional way still visualize ‘Marsha Goldman’ and ‘Susan Friedman’ and ‘Elizabeth Herzon’ as they individually appeared at ages thirteen, at fifteen, and at twenty-one

How nice for Susan Friedman and Elizabeth Herzon to know that they had not aged a day… That for better than sixty years they have remained in the memory of this writer to be fifteen and twenty years of age…

And now would not know them, or they, me, if we were standing — one before the other in line in a grocery market to pay for our baskets of food.

As for Marsha Goldman Lipensky.

Keeping her fictional name.

Married in late December of 1955, Marsha Lipensky passed away in year 2005 — The year of Marsha and Mitchell’s fiftieth wedding anniversary due to complication with liver cancer and diabetes.

Going forward…

In the upcoming PIT series, as they no longer fit the PIT narrative, the Lipensky children are to be completely excluded from the PIT series.

In true life, though. Still keeping their fictional names… Now, in year 2021:

Michael, at age sixty-four is a retired business man living in Palm Springs, California.

Ellie, at age sixty-one lives in Valencia, California with her retired “CPA” husband.

Sharon, at age fifty-six lives in Aurora, Colorado with her, still working, school teacher husband.

Sammy, at age fifty-nine …

Sammy, the ‘protector’ passed away in April of year 2019 due to pancreatic cancer.

Look for ….. PIT 1986: ‘The Field 1”