Tag Archive for James Preller as child

Old Photo, 1965, the Author as a Young Lad

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I love this old photo of me and my sister Barbara — 1965, I am told — in front of the old station wagon that used to take us all on long summer vacations to Vermont & elsewhere. My father would spend the morning artlessly tying down luggage on the roof, good enough to get the job done, my mother stressed and making sandwiches for the road, anxious about forgotten toothbrushes & wayward children, seven kids climbing in, vying for the good spots. My parents smoking Camels or Chesterfields the whole ride out: 5 hours, 6 hours. It felt like 40 days in Noah’s Ark. But gaze for a moment at four-year-old Jimmy. I look like the future of America right there, standing on the green grass of the suburban dream, 1720 Adelphi Road, Wantagh, New York, bold & innocent in yet another ill-fitting jacket. Whatever happened to that kid?