A Turning Point

One of the worst habits that I picked up and struggled with during my childhood, was the tendency to take things that did not belong to me. A Psychologist might very well refer to this as having poor impulse control.

Let me be blunt, I was a thief. On one occasion, my grandfather told a family whose house we were visiting for the evening that “if you have anything valuable lying around like money or jewelry then you had better put it up because my grandson is a thief and if given an opportunity he will steal from you!”

Was I embarrassed by my Grandfather’s statement? Yes, I was. Nevertheless, what he said was true. I imagine that he felt that by providing a very clear and cautionary message about my dishonest, selfish, and untrustworthy behavior he was fulfilling an important duty and public responsibility.

Looking back, I came to realize that this dishonest behavior all started with something as seemingly innocent as sneaking oatmeal cookies out of my Grandmother’s cookie jar which she kept in the kitchen. Learning this feat took plenty of repeated practice for me to be able to actually carry out the task without detection. It most certainly represented a defiant refusal to accept the rules defined by others or to self-regulate in way that allowed for the deferral of sensory gratification.

In time, I moved on to taking money from the purses and wallets of immediate family that is until everyone finally stopped leaving their valuables lying around within my general line of sight.

These actions culminated with my shoplifting just about anything and everything (i.e., candy, food, clothing, comic books, jewelry, and small electronic items) before becoming a teenager.

Between age 10 to 12 years old, I got caught stealing multiple times, was sternly warned, and then asked not to return to certain places of business by store owners. It had not as yet resulted in any direct or serious consequences involving law enforcement. I imagine that you are probably wondering, how in the world could this have been the case?

Well one afternoon, when I was in the eighth grade and living with my grandparents, I finally got caught in a supermarket by the store detective as I was trying to remove a record album from beneath my coat so that I could place it back on a shelf inside the store. I decided to take this action because I thought that I may have been seen while attempting to steal the item.

Yes in fact, I was “busted” and as a result, I got marched straight to the business office where the store detective contacted the police department and notified them of my unlawful actions.

Then, for the very first time, upon hearing the store detective state that he was going to drive me to the police station, I became very scared over the possible consequences of my actions. I assumed at that point that I would be arrested and ultimately locked up.

Once we arrived at the police station, they contacted my Grandfather informing him that while the supermarket had decided that they were not going to press charges that my Grandpa would still be required to come over to the police station, sign some papers, at which point I would then be released into his custody.

Well guess what? My Grandpa refused to come and get me. That’s right. He said, “you can keep my grandson there with you over night!” “Maybe that will finally do him some good.”

What? I thought to myself. I'm still a kid!

Subsequently, I was driven back to my grandparents house by the police in broad daylight which meant that all the neighbors would plainly see me along with my Grandpa standing there and looking none to pleased while peering out of the front storm door of his house.

Let me now share with you a bit about my grandfather. Grandpa was a professional barber who owned his business in Montclair, New Jersey. He was a very dignified and respected man in the community where he worked as well as the one in which he lived. I think it fair to say, most people found him a man of few words and highly principled.

Grandpa never really had to say much because you could generally tell what he was thinking or whether he approved or disapproved of your actions simply by taking a good look at the expression on his face. Well, on that particular day and in that moment upon arriving back at his house, his face seemed to say it all. “Boy, have you lost your mind?”

Later that same evening, we had dinner together as if nothing had happened. When our meal finished, Grandpa proceeded to say, in a very matter of fact manner that “the police have never been to this house before for any reason until today Jonathan, and today you brought shame upon our home by having them bring you home for shoplifting.” “Stealing is something that you have repeatedly been told by your Mother, Nana, and I not to ever do.”

He followed up his proceeding comments with, “I want you to have your suit case packed by first thing tomorrow morning because you cannot stay here in this house with us any longer.” “You must now go back to living under your Mother’s roof.”

That was the end of what he had to say. I was being kicked out.

That night, I didn’t sleep at all. The seriousness of the situation made it impossible for me to get the slightest bit of rest. The one thing that kept running through my mind was, “what have I done?” An important factor to consider but certainly to late to be taken seriously.

The next morning, while we were in route to the town of Montclair from Caldwell, my Grandpa hadn’t said a single word to me and his prolonged silence felt to me as though I was being slowly tortured. I didn’t know what to think. In fact, I couldn’t even think straight. I was becoming anxious and really scared.

When he finally did speak, it was to say “Jon you are 12 years old now and very soon you’re going to become a teenager. I think that it is about time for you to start thinking seriously about exactly what kind of man you want to grow up to become in life.”

Frankly, I don’t think that I had even started giving this concept very much thought. Grandpa then said, “The choices that you are making are bad ones and if you go on making choices like the one that you made yesterday then they are going to surely lead you right into a reformatory school or even worse straight to jail. I know that you’re not a really dumb kid.” “So, let me ask you this, is that the kind of future life that you really want for yourself?”

“Because you do not have a good relationship with your Mother and your father is not present in your life, both Nana and I had decided to let you stay with us. However, in light of what you’ve done, you are going to have to live with the consequences of your actions and now figure out for yourself how to make the most of a situation that you have actually gone and made even worse.”

It was crystal clear that Grandpa was deeply disappointed with me. But, I think that he still believed that I could take this poor conduct and possibly learn from my mistake if I really spent the right amount of time thinking about what I wanted, what I needed to do differently, and began to focus more attention on making better choices going forward. Still, it would be solely up to me to now do.

It didn’t take me very long to see for myself that absent Nana’s and Grandpa’s love and support, and the comfort of their home my life was going to get much harder and that was a pretty terrifying thought for me at the time.

As I grew older and came to recognize how worried Grandpa was for me, I also came to more fully appreciate how hard it must have been for him to respond to my situation in the way that he did. It was one of the most loving things that he could have done for me and it was 'a real turning point' in my preadolescent life.

According to Nana, at no time did Grandpa ever let go of the hope and love that he had for me.

For the first time in my young life, not only did a feel like an idiot but it also felt awful to see how badly that I had both hurt, disrespected, and destroyed my grandfather’s trust. I have always remembered that long car ride back to my Mother’s home the next morning and even as I write this story I can still hear Grandpa’s lingering words as if they were freshly being spoken to me today.

When I walked back into my Mother’s house that morning only to hear her say to me that she always knew that I would fail and that once again I had to accept her extremely harsh disciplinary practices and punishments, well I knew right then and there that I simply could not return to living under her roof anymore. I had been out from under her direction for nearly one year and God bless her but she had lost me to the world outside. I absolutely do not blame my Mother for any of my past behavior, my character flaws or the bad decisions that I made in my life. They were always conscious choices made by me. I gradually learned that what ultimately matters most in life is for each of us to begin to hold ourselves accountable for our actions. No one else.

That day though, I decided to run away again for the thirteenth and last time never to return home to my Mother again. Suddenly, I was less afraid of the outside world probably because I did not have any idea of what I needed to be seriously afraid of.

The rest of that year, I lived in a neighbor’s tree house, a dog house, on local golf course benches, and when possible, I alternated between friends homes for several days and even weeks at a time. All of this took place right within Caldwell, New Jersey.

During that period, I thankfully wore my friends clothes and I was financially supported by their parents. I was very fortunate not to have experienced any harm or to have succumbed to doing further damage to myself or others. All that I can tell you is that more than anything else I wanted to survive and figure out for myself how to gradually become a good person. In many ways, I was largely surrounded by goodness and you can bet that during that rough period I was clinging on to my surroundings for my dear life.

When I finally ran out of goodwill, I ended up becoming a ward of the State of New Jersey under the Division of Youth and Family Services (DYFS) and I was eventually placed in the Essex County Emergency Children’s Shelter located at 520 Belleville Avenue, in Belleville, NJ. It opened sometime in the 50’s and later closed in 1981.

The buildings out back of the Hospital itself where the Shelter officially was have been demolished and condo’s have since been built but two of the large buildings along Carpenter Street are still there.

This hospital was used in “A beautiful Mind” as the mental hospital.

Later in the summer of 1968, under the National Fresh Air Fund Program I was sent to camp in Mountaindale, New York for the better part of that summer.

With extra time on my hands and not enough to do I was fortunate to have found a part-time job working in a Jewish bakery (i.e., Friedman’s) where I learned how to make bagels and Halla Bread as a paid Baker’s Assistant.

In the afternoons and evenings, I played basketball with the two older young men also working at the bakery; Barry who attended Niagara University in New York and his younger brother, who was attending St Bonaventure University in New York. Nearly every day we played together against other talented college basketball players whose families were vacationing in the Sullivan County area of upstate New York.

Truly, I was learning on my feet how to make the most of all my opportunities while also managing to stay out of trouble as much as possible. I was eventually introduced to alcohol, drugs, and sex. None of these diversions came to dominate my life because I returned to the safe haven of Caldwell, New Jersey. That is not to say that these things could not be found there as well. However, the difference was that the friends and families that I was most familiar with were far more protective over what their kids did, where they went, and who they spent their time with. As a result, I benefited from their care, lifestyle, and overarching concern for every local area kids general well-being. For the most part, my friends and I were typically to busy to really get into too much mischief. We weren’t angels by any means but we were definitely afraid of really screwing things up for ourselves or anyone else for that matter.

Years later, back in the good graces of my grandparent’s, during one of the many Sunday afternoon’s that I spent having dinner at their house I took the opportunity to tell my Grandpa how much I loved him and how thankful I was for all that he had done for me throughout my entire childhood. Moreover, I let him know too, that if he had not shown me the sort of tough love that he did when I in fact needed it the most that I might not have been as motivated in late adolescence to get into college or to steadfastly see my studies through to completion with the hope of one day making him feel proud that I had gained the ability to wisely learn from my past mistakes and rightly honor my elders.

My grandparents proudly attended my high school graduation from Clifford J. Scott High School in East Orange, NJ back in 1973 and I continued to have a very close and loving relationship with them throughout my years at college including my travels to England, France, Italy, Germany and Austria during the summer going into my senior year at Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts.

They are gone now, and I miss them both dearly.