I have no memory when I began to stutter as a child.  Yet, I have no memory of ever not stuttering as a child.  This imperfection got me into difficulty,  especially in the first grade.  The teacher would assemble a circle of students to read at loud.  Inevitably,  when the reader got two seats away from my turn I would start a fight.  And then I would be kicked out of the reading circle.  By the end of the first grade at Edgemont Public School, they strongly urged my parents to enroll me in a private elementary school, Brookside.

 At Brookside my academic achievement was minimal.  By the fifth grade again the school recommended I apply to another private school,  Montclair Academy.  Again my academic achievement was low.  Montclair Academy recommended to my parents I see a psychiatrist.  The arrangements were duly made by my mother.

On the appointed day to see the doctor my mother dropped me off at his office and said he was expecting me.  I was welcomed by the doctor and told to come into his office,  where he asked me why I was there.  I had no answer other than my mother had brought me and she would be back in an hour.

The psychiatrist looked a little puzzled.  He asked me-

"Do you have any problems?"

I was at a loss for words.  No one had ever asked me that question.

"Well, yes, I guess I do"

"Will you tell me?"

"OK,  .......... I stutter."

"I don't think I can help you much on that.  What else?"

"I still wet my bed and I am in the sixth grade"

"Oh,  I don't think I can do much about that, either."

"I hate my name Sherrill."

"Sherrill?  That is an unusual name."

"I hate it.  Kids call me Shirley Temple, and I have to fight them."

"Well, I may be able to help you on that one.  I'll talk to your mother and maybe we can change it."

My mother agreed to change my name,  but that is the only appointment she ever made with that or any psychiatrist.

After chatting with the doctor a bit more, he asked me."   May I ask you one more question, before you leave?

"OK."

"Which would you rather stop first? Bed wetting or stuttering?"

That was another question no one had ever asked me..   I thought about it.

"Bed wetting."

Within a month my name was changed.  The next year I stopped wetting my bed.  However,   I did not stop stuttering until I was in my 70s.

My Quaker grandmother and Quaker mother were outspoken about the evils of alcohol.  Grandmother lectured me ever summer I visited her in Sandy Spring, Maryland,  the Quaker farming community where my family lived for many generations,

"Thee will live a happier and healthier life   --   if Thee does not drink alcohol."

My mother demonstrated her Quaker belief by living an alcohol free life in the suburban town of Montclair, New Jersey,  where her Episcopalian husband was born and raised.   In my father's family alcohol was a daily part of life.

  My father managed to bridge these conflicting family beliefs.  He did not drink at home.   However, he participated in the pleasures of alcohol outside our home in his daily life and in his business activities.  Business entertainment required him to socialize and host many persons who expected an alcoholic drink at lunch or dinner.

My mother would not serve alcohol at home.  However,  at large family parties or even at neighborhood functions, she would not object if neighbors brought alcohol to these occasions --  or if my father provided a Christmas Punch, wine or champaign to celebrate something special. 

If I detected at a party that someone had difficulty walking a straight line  I often pointed this out to my mother.  She would excuse this behavior and give me some explanation like --

"Roger,  Thee must not be judgmental.   Mr. Williams served in the war.  He "was gassed."

I did not understand what "gassed" meant - except that it seemed to be a military term and must occur in wartime?  I never observed similar balance problems in  Sandy Spring,  so I attributed it to the fact very few Quakers serve in the military.  

  My father encouraged me not to drink alcohol, and he offer me one thousand dollars if I abstained until twenty-one.  He did not drink alcohol for one month every year, to show himself he could stop drinking when he wanted.

My downfall came at the age of eighteen in 1952 when I attended Harvard College.  The entire freshman class was invited to Harvard the week before classes began. It was a week of socializing and some binge drinking that preceded our academic activities.

My Class of 1956 was the last class to be given this traditional freshman party by  Harvard College.  It was called "THE SMOKER".   Our freshman class assembled at Sanders Theater in Memorial Hall.  We  were addressed by the Dean of Students.

"Look to your left.....   Now,   look to your right.   One of the three of you WILL NOT be here to graduate in four years!" 

I  looked to my left and saw my roommate Dick Bertman, a graduate of Brookline High Public School.  I looked to my right and saw my Choate classmate and friend  Roy Shulman.    I assumed Dick was the likely one not to be here and to whom the Dean directed my attention.

Next came a short advisory speech from the Dean.  He asked us to open ourselves to new experiences and new ideas.  He suggested we get to know as many people as possible.  His speech was followed by a new experience  --  an artistic and  revealing dance perform by  "ROSE  LA ROSE",   the stripper from the OLD HOWARD,   who had been hired by Harvard for this "SMOKER" event.     Rose demonstrated her unique skills by disrobing to traditional  music.

 Her dance was followed by a beer drinking contest.  All contestants climbed two  flights of stairs behind Sanders Theater stage to a balcony high above that stage.   We were each given  a very large cup filled with beer.  At the signal from the Dean  we were encouraged to drink the beer as rapidly as possible.  I recall spilling most of my beer down  my shirt and not winning a place into the final round of this competition.  However,  free beer kegs were provided in the large adjacent hall and we proceeded to socialize for the rest of that evening.  I became throughly exhausted.  It was the first time I heard the expression --  "I'm wasted !  --  Are you?"   

I recalled my grandmother's admonition.  Was I happier?  Was I healthier?  By the time classes began all hope of receiving my one thousand reward from my father was gone and I considered myself an experienced alcoholic drinker.  

Four years later I witnessed Dick and Roy's graduation.  I remembered the Dean's warning.  I was the one!

Born a Quaker with a committed Quaker mother and grandmother I always was aware of the evils of smoking.  My grandmother lectured me each time I visited her.  She told  me many times-  

"Thee will live a happier and healthier life,  if Thee avoids tobacco."

My mother demonstrated the evil of smoking.  Every year she  brought a bowl of live fish to Quaker Meeting First Day School and rigged a smoke machine to blow into the water.  By the end of class all the fish were floating upside down, dead.  We children got the message.

My father was an Episcopalian.  He smoked cigars, cigarettes and pipes filled with tobacco..  However, he encouraged me not to smoke and offered me a thousand dollars if I abstained from smoking until I was twenty-one.  To demonstrate to himself he was not addicted to tobacco he abstained from smoking one month every year.  My father always picked February -- the shortest month of the year. 

My downfall came at the age of nineteen in 1954.  I served in the United States Army when free cigarettes were given out by the military.  I was soon smoking two packs a day.

After I was discharged I resumed my college education and fell in love with a young woman.  She was a non smoker and let me know of her disapproval of my tobacco habit.  I cut back to less than a pack a day.   However,  she still disapproved.    I asked her if she would enter into a committed relationship with me?  She said no -- not until I stopped smoking.   My sweetheart added that she did not (and never would)  enjoy kissing anyone who smoked.

So, that day was the last day I smoked a cigarette.  I found kissing to be an equally pleasant addiction and within a year we married.  Half a century later I have yet to smoke another cigarette,  although kissing is no longer an addiction and I am no longer married.

  My Quaker mother believed in passing clothing from one child to another until they were sufficiently worn to discard -  or be passed to another family that could utilize them.  Being the youngest of three boys I  was the recipient of much clothing that survived the wear and tear of at least one brother,  if not two.

About the time I took notice of clothes  --  I also took an interest in girls.  Some girls were quite good dressers and dancers.  One special girl with an unusual name, Susan Dear, held my attention.  I asked Susan to the eighth grade dance.  She accepted.   

I knew that now I had to assemble the proper clothes for this very special occasion.  A coat and tie were required as well as dancing shoes.  Sneakers, tee shirt and bluejeans were out of the question.  My older brothers did have the appropriate articles of clothing in their wardrobes,  so it became a negotiation.  What could I borrow -- and from whom?

Shoes were no problem, my feet fit into one brother's best shoes, and my best pants filled that requirement. A dress shirt, tie and coat were the problem. I had to negotiate.  One brother offered me the loan of his coat in exchange for some promises, and my other brother reluctantly agreed to loan his tie and dress shirt for that evening -- exchanged for more promises.

Dance night I put on all the appropriate articles of clothing.  The only problem was my brother's coat sleeves extended beyond the ends of my fingertips.  My mother quickly fixed that problem by pinning up these too long sleeves back under themselves to shorten the sleeves.  A brother drove me to pick up my date and to the dance   --  in exchange for more promises.

At the dance all the pins my mother had placed to shorten my coat sleeves quickly dislodged.  The coat sleeves regained their normal length and covered my hands and fingertips.  It became difficult to hold Susan's hand   --  and impossible to guide her dance steps.  

I was embarrassed.  I did not ask anyone to dance.    No one asked me.

Unable to tuck up and pin these absurdly long sleeves that covered my fingertips --  I suggested we go home.  Susan agreed, and so ended the evening that began with hope.

It was the worst dance I ever attended  --  and I have been to some bad dances.

I first met Shipokazi Koyana visiting my daughter at Smith College in the1980s.  Ruth was living at the International House with students from Pakistan, India and South Africa and Shipo was the recipient of a four year Smith scholarship for black South African women.  Nelson Mandela was imprisoned at Robbins Island.   South Africa was an apartheid society,  and Shipo's generation was at work to secure a better future for South Africa.

That spring Shipokazi received a hate note.  "NIGGER, don't come back next year."

 With the support of her fellow housemates Shipo reported the note to the Dean of Students.  Receiving only expressions of regret she went directly to the president of the college, Mrs Dunn- only to receive similar expressions of regret.  Again with the support of her housemates Shipo wrote two letters - one to the Boston Globe and the other to The New York Times.  Both newspapers investigated and printed front page articles "Smith student receives racial hate note".

Mrs Dunn was contacted by many of her Board of Trustees.  She called a college wide meeting to announce the actions Smith was taking - such as mandatory sensitivity courses and a more racially diverse student body.  Several years later Smith College selected a new president,  an African- American.

Upon graduation from Smith College Shipo did not want to return to an apartheid controlled society.  She asked my help to secure and finance a graduate MA degree in South African literature from Yale University-  that had the best collection of black South African literature.    Shipokazi wished to teach at the university level when she returned.   She hoped for the rumored release of Nelson Mandela and then she expected things would change.  Her request for my help surprised me.  However,  I accepted, and agreed to cover her expenses beyond what was available from Yale University and later at Temple University.  I made an investment in a young woman and South  Africa.

Within two years Shipo had secured her MA from Yale and Mandela was released from prison and elected president of South Africa.  (Several years later  Shipokazi secured a  Phd in Literature from Temple University.)

In 1990 with just her MA from Yale University she returned to Cape Town, as the first black South African woman to teach South African literature at Rhodes University.  Her lecture hall filled - and required TV transmissions to other lecture halls to accommodate the number of students.  Shipokazi not only became among the first black South African women to teach at Rhodes University but later was the first black woman with a Phd in South African literature to teach at  University of Pretoria - and other institutions.

My friendship with Shipokazi has widen and enriched my life, and broadened my perspective to the possibilities for change.

My weekly trip to watercolor class is a long trip.  The class is held in my teacher's studio near Symphony Hall in an old Victorian house.  The entry has a buzzer and it notifies him of the arrival of each student who he quickly guides into what was the front parlor of a nineteenth century home.  My teacher offers tea and refreshments to each of us who have not had time for lunch - and arrive on time for class.

To get to his studio I leave an hour before the noon class, taking the Number One bus from Harvard Square to the other end of Massachusetts Avenue in Boston. The ride is only five miles, but takes almost an hour passing through many neighborhoods such as Central Square,  MIT,  Charles River,  Back Bay, Commonwealth Avenue,  Berkley School of Music and finally Symphony Hall.  At each destination along the route it seems the bus fills - only to empty and refill at the next neighborhood.  There are a few of us long trippers who get aboard at Harvard Square and do not get off until well into Boston. Those of us who do make the long trip offer occasional comments about the more transient passengers.

"I hope that woman takes that child home and feeds her."

"Did you see that sweet little girl look after her baby brother?"

One day I climbed aboard the bus and took a seat.  An aged black lady took the seat next to me and settled in with her many packages.  Inhaling deeply and  lifting her eyes upward, she exhaled -- "Amen"

I turned and smiled at her.  "We don't have to move for half an hour,  if you are going to Boston"

"No matter.  I'm not going to hurry",  she responded.

The bus filled quickly and we began our journey.  Cambridge's Central Square shares a African American neighborhood, and I somewhat expected her to get off.  I turned to her and asked if I could help her with some of her packages.

"I'm going to Boston" she said.  Aren't you?"

I smiled, and nodded...."Yes, I do this every week."

The lady looked at me and noticed my art materials.

"You an artist?"

"When I am not trying to be a grandfather, or not just too tired."  

I smiled at her again. She smiled at me.

We chatted for most of the ride,  commenting on the MIT student engineers and the Berkley musicians as they filled and emptied the bus.  We smiled and laughed at their pursuits of their young lives.

As we approached Symphony Hall I explained this was my stop and I would get off.  I wanted her to know how much I had enjoyed her company on this long ride.

"Thanks for the conversation, and good luck", I ventured.

She turned to face me squarely.  She looked directly into my eyes.

"You know "she said, "your smile is your gift to the world."

"Gaga", my grandmother, was my host each summer.  I visited her, my uncle, aunts, and my cousins on their Quaker farm in Sandy Spring, Maryland. They were loving and always made me feel welcome and special.  Most summers I came alone  -- as their eight to twelve year old guest.  I felt honored.

Gaga supervised my daily schedule. Saturday was bath night.  The tub was on the second floor.  We would fill the tub with cold water pumped from the well by the windmill. Hot water came off the top of grandmother's kitchen stove.  After filling the tub we would heat large pots of water, carry them up the steps to the second floor and pour them into the tub.  This process usually took a good part of an hour.  I would sing songs I had learned from popular Broadway musicals.  "Five foot two, eyes of blue"  was my favorite, and I sang it at the top of my lungs.

Sunday was Quaker Meeting day.  Scrubbed and clean from my weekly bath, I would accompany my family to the nearby 18th century Quaker Meetinghouse and take my seat on a bench between Gaga and my aunts.  Silence was the norm for a Quaker meeting with occasional messages from a participant when the spirit moved them. I don't remember my grandmother being moved and rising to speak, although I do remember my aunt rising to speak of the poor conditions she had witnessed visiting a nearby women's prison.

During the silences between speakers I was bored and looked for an activity that would entertain me. My aunt would slide me her glove.  I would blow into it like a ballon. If I became too bored, they would allow me to go outside and seek my own entertainment. Usually I inspected the graveyard.

Weekdays began at grandmother's dining room table. I requested corn cakes. Gaga would prepare batches of six to eight thin dry corn cakes piled high.  She would place one stack in front of me.  I devoured it. Then Gaga placed a second stack before me served with farm butter.  I devoured them.  The third batch was covered by a farm made bitter-sour brown syrup and it required slow consumption.  With the fourth batch of corn cakes Gaga would take her seat beside me and eat her cakes-  flavored by a wonderful store bought sweet syrup only offered to grownups-   and  me after I had devoured three preliminary stacks.  Then it was time to locate my uncle and join him in his activities.

I would walk to the barn to watch my uncle milk his six cows and befriend the barnyard animals.  Tony, the work horse, came to know me as the boy who sat upon his back when my uncle assembled a team of horses to pull his wagon.

Some days I would sit atop Tony as we led the wagon into the field to collect hay.  Occasionally there were six horses to pull heavy loads.  I sat atop Tony, the "wheel horse", with two pair of horses in front of us straining to move their load.  Behind Tony and me stood my uncle on his wagon, talking to his horses in a language only he and the horses understood.  "He! He!" my uncle commanded.  "Haw!  Haw!"  The horses obediently turned left or right or whatever my uncle commanded.  Occasionally I dismounted from my position atop Tony, and was allowed to climb to the top of the hay filled wagon, to ride back to the barn as the Grand Marshal of this magnificent parade.

Tony grew accustomed to me and would whinny and snort when I visited him in his stall in the barn.  I would slip him an apple from the orchard or an ear of corn from the corn crib.  The barnyard had cows, chickens, and a pig named Jack.  Jack was many times bigger than me and he snorted and grunted a welcome when I visited his barnyard. I always had an apple or ear of corn for Jack.  We loved one another.

Most days I played in front of the farmhouse or in the carriage shed.  One day I heard Jack  scream.  He continued screaming.  I ran to the carriage shed and behind it my uncle and his old black helper, Amos, were tying two ropes to Jack's back feet.  They threw the ropes over a limb and lifted Jack upside down off the ground.  Jack screamed louder. My uncle with his knife cut Jack's throat.  Blood surged from Jack's neck. My uncle cut Jack in half.  More blood gushed.  "Stop!" I yelled.  "Stop!-- Stop it!"   My uncle looked at me and then turned back to Jack.

I could not  --  understand it?  I can not  --  understand it?     

We eat --  our friends?  We eat  --  those we love?

Somedays I would look for Calvin, Amos' black grandson, and adventure.   I would walk barefoot through the barnyard stepping on cow plops.  I squeeze those plops between my toes.   "Calvin", I call.  My uncle milks his cows.   I watch him.   Tony, the workhorse, kicks the side of his stall.  I walk to Tony and scratch his forehead, stroke his neck. Chickens are running about. I try to catch one.  Then I am excited and happy to find Calvin.  We climb up into the top of the barn, the hay loft, our space, that we only share with the pigeons. The hay loft is hot and dusty.  The pigeons fly out the window at the peak of the barn.  Now there is only Calvin and me in our world, two ten year old boys, friends for the summer.  Calvin is the only boy I know these summers when I visit.  We arrange our hay spaces high in the barn's hay loft.  No adult will venture here until winter to throw down hay.  Calvin and I laugh, love, and wrestle in the hay.  We talk.  No one can hear us.  We masturbate,  call it hitting home runs.  No one knows our secret. We are happy and content sharing our special private world.

Calvin and I are allowed to play on the lawn in front of the farmhouse, and we run, climb trees and wrestle and tumble over each other.  Today, we are hot and tired from our climb to the hay loft.  I tell Calvin I want a drink, and he does too.  We walk to the front door of grandmother's half of the farmhouse.  I open the screen door and go in.  Calvin follows.  My grandmother quickly comes out of the kitchen and tells Calvin to go right back out her front door.  She tells me if I want to give Calvin a drink I must bring him around to the back door.

I do not understand...   I only realize that there are some pleasures I can not share with Calvin-  like to bring Calvin into my grandmother's house ( my house for these summers ).

I sought the company of my three girl cousins, when they were available.  My cousins were usually in their half of the farmhouse and spent a great deal of their time helping their mother cook, prepare and store food for winter, churn butter from the six cows, make clothes and many other chores.  However, they were available at the end of the day after supper,  and the dishes had been put away.  My grandmother, aunts and uncle would gather in rocking chairs on the front porch of their farmhouse and talk.

My cousins and I would endlessly re-enact the marriage of a Quaker man and woman.  We would begin on the far side of the front lawn with Molly, my age and my oldest cousin, dressed in everything white.  My two younger cousins were Molly's  maids of honor and attended to Molly's ever need and wish. We slowly and majestically paraded across the front lawn to the steps leading to the front porch.  Then the adults would stop their conversation and turn towards us.   Up the steps we would slowly climb.  At the top we faced the adults.   I would turn, to face my cousins and say " Molly,  I take thee to be my wife."  She would say "I take thee, Roger,  to be my husband."  In Quaker tradition no minister was needed.  Then after kissing, we turned and slowly descended the stairs to recross the lawn.   I was married about one hundred times each summer.  Marriage was highly valued in rural Maryland in the 1940s.

I was shocked when two decades later, in the 1960s, I learned Molly had committed suicide, leaving her husband and two young children.

Years after I spent my childhood summers on my family's  farm I went back to Sandy Spring to visit this 200 year old Quaker community.  It is located half way between Washington and Baltimore. What had been a rural farm community had become a Washington suburb of house lots.  I was bewildered by the new churches and suburban landscape.  I located the 1750 Quaker Meetinghouse, set apart by a little dirt road leading to the Quaker cemetery, with modest gravestones set low into the ground in Quaker tradition.  I found the gravestones of my grandmother, uncle and aunts.  I walked into the 18th century Quaker Meetinghouse and sat on a bench, as I had many times as a boy.  In silence I remembered.

Finally,  I rose, and walked back to my car, intending to drive to the old family farm.  I heard the farm had been sold to the City of Washington, with the intention of using it as the depository of sludge, produced by the City's sewage processing facility.

Locating the farm was hard, as the farmhouse and barn had long since been torn down and the driveway filled over.  By carefully locating a curve in the road I approximated where the farmhouse had stood.  Only flat sludge landscape lay where the farmhouse, carriage shed, corn crib and ice house had been.  No evidence of any kind remained.  I walked the distance from the roadway to where I remembered the farmhouse, across what had been the front lawn and the scene of hundreds of weddings.  Then I walked the short distance to the back door, where Calvin was required to wait for a drink.  Ten steps further I found the only evidence of my family's farm, a pipe from the windmill that brought water to the farmhouse and my weekly bath.

Walking in this barren landscape, I could find no indication of where the barn, barnyard, cow pasture or orchard had been.  The sludge had leveled and buried every evidence of this farm -- that I loved.  I walked to my car.  Tears came to my eyes.  I drove away, forever.