Several months ago I was visiting with friends in a New England town, and because of a project that I am developing around a historic property there, I wanted to speak with the Town Manager about my vision. He was fairly new to the Town in that position, and I didn't know him, and when I had looked him up online I saw that he had a background in many of the same areas that are important to me and the work that I've done in the arts and in youth and community and economic development for many years now. I asked someone I know if there was a way to contact him to set up an appointment, and she suggested that I go to the Town Meeting and she could introduce me afterward.
When I arrived with my friends, someone said hello to me and to us, and I didn't recognize him so I asked my friends who it was and they told me his name and that he was the Chairman of the Select Board. I'd known him since high school and was surprised that he remembered me after all these years. Later, after the meeting when my friends brought me up to introduce me to the Town Manager, as I was being introduced the Chairman said that he knew me and that in high school I'd been in love with someone whose name he then mentioned. I smiled from ear to ear because I had indeed had a crush on that young man, and I asked how he had known because I had thought that only my closest friends had. He said I had written about it in his year book and I couldn't remember that at all. Later he sent me photographs of what I had written, but in that moment when he said it, I said that I had a wonderful story to tell about that long ago crush and though I wouldn't want to take the Town Manager's time to tell it then, I'd share it later with anyone who wanted to hear about it.
When we left, I told my friends the story, and it's such a wonderful one that it somehow keeps being told to different people in different places. When I was fifteen, I saw someone walking from the High School across the street to the Town Common who looked like Roger Daltrey. I fell in love at first sight and tried to find out who he was which I finally did. Around that time, The J. Geils Band was coming out with their album, Love Stinks, and I went to a special event at Strawberry Records near Boston where they were appearing to sign autographs. There was a raffle as part of the event, and whoever won would be able to send $100 worth of flowers to anyone they chose. I won, and I had the flowers sent to my crush. He called me to say thank you, and told me that when the delivery arrived and they started to bring the flowers in they filled up his home. He was so nice to me, and told me that he had a girlfriend, but he didn't make me feel in any way embarrassed because he was so grateful and said it made his day.
Though I remembered that story and remembered him all my life, I hadn't remembered that I had written about him in anyone's yearbook, never mind the friend who is now the Chairman of the Select Board, and I couldn't imagine what I was thinking to have done that. When my friend sent me the photographs he took of the pages in his yearbook with my writing about my crush, I laughed and laughed. It brought back so much joy to think of how silly I had been and to remember what a teenager in love could be like.
Recently when I was in a guitar store in the town next to the one where all of this happened, a friend mentioned Peter Wolf of The J. Geils Band and how there had always been a rumor that he was my brother. Someone in the guitar store said he knew him, and I immediately became my fifteen year old self again, telling the story of my crush and the flowers to a group of men who I had just met who were there to talk about guitars. For some reason Peter Wolf had been coming up in conversation on a regular basis with different people, and because whenever he did I found myself telling this story I'd decided to write him an email to tell him about it and about the project I am planning for an art and community center at a historic site in the town where the story began. I had never heard back, and I asked the man in the store to tell Peter Wolf about my email if he had the chance, and about this story that started it all. The guitars we were discussing that day are a part of that story and of the community and art center and what I envision for it. A place where people of all ages and backgrounds can learn about art and music and history and sustainability, a place where we can all join together for projects around community and youth and economic development, health and wellness, healthy food, gardening and living with creativity. The teenager I was is still in the person I am today, and I want to bring flowers and love and beauty and music and art to as many people as I possibly can.
A Photograph From History
A Few Years After This Story Began
Of A Teenager Who Still Believes In Love
Blessings,
Jannie Susan
