The summer of 1964, I turned ten years old, and our parents surprised my brothers and me by purchasing a practically brand-new Chrysler Newport, four-door, candy apple red station wagon. I remember Mother and Daddy honking and waving as they wheeled it into our driveway as we kids jumped up and down like the wild hooligans we were-- well, at least my brothers were. That was the summer I was busy trying to be a lady, and make Robert Lerioni notice me-- the cutest boy in the fifth grade.
Money was tight; we’d never owned a practically brand-new Anything, and now we were the envy of the neighborhood-- at least in my ten-year old mind. Our practically brand-new Chrysler Newport candy apple red station wagon boasted an automatic transmission, an AM-FM radio, and a gently-used plush interior.
The first order of business after Daddy parked our practically brand-new station wagon was to find our designated seats. As the only female child with four brothers, this was a strategic moment for me; I needed my own window. Getting caught looking out a brother’s window was grounds for an elbow to the ribcage, and possibly a wallop on the head, or in most cases, both. My brothers took no prisoners.
“Oh, please, God,” I wished-prayed, “if you give me my own window-seat, I’ll be good forever.”
The twins, Frankie and Vinnie, since they were eleven and the oldest, chose the seats farthest away from parental authority. They claimed the back seat~ the one facing on-coming traffic, with the window that could disappear into the rear panel with a push of a secret button from Daddy. My eight-year old brother, Joey, whined until the twins finally consented to let him join the No-Girls Allowed Backseat Club, which left me with my six-year old brother, Charlie. Charlie and I were allocated the bench directly behind our parents.
“Thank you, sweet baby Jesus!” I said. I had the sought-after window-seat, even if it was behind my mother and her peering eyes.
After we rode around the block a couple of times to show off our practically brand-new station wagon to the neighbors, Daddy drove us downtown to the Dairy Queen, and treated us to a chocolate dipped vanilla cone: the kind that drips down your elbow before you can finish eating it.
“I have another surprise, kids!” he said.
Mother just smiled.
“Oh man!” said Vinnie through a mouth full of dripping chocolate. “Are we going to have another baby?”
“Another baby!” said Frankie.
“We don’t want another baby!” said Joey. “What if it’s another stinky girl?”
“We’re going to have another stinky sister?” asked Charlie as he licked his chocolate fingers.
“No! No! No!” laughed Daddy. “We’re not going to have another baby! We’re going on vacation to the ocean!”
We had never been on a real vacation before. We’d gone camping a few times, but Mother complained too much about having to do her business in a coffee can; she said it wasn’t lady-like for us girls. My brothers, of course, couldn’t whiz in the can enough. I agreed with Mother.
“Are we going to stay in a hotel, Daddy?” Joey asked. “Can I order room service?”
“We’re staying in a hotel?” asked Charlie, still licking his fingers.
“Can I order room service, too?” asked Frankie.
“No! No! No!” said Daddy. “Mother and I have rented a house at the ocean. We will stay in a house so Mother can relax!”
Mother had a funny look on her face, but she just looked at Daddy and smiled.
The next few weeks were spent getting ready for our first vacation to the ocean. Living in Elsie, Michigan, we had only been exposed to lakes, rivers, and quarries. Daddy bought AAA maps to chart our course, Mother washed and ironed our best T-shirts and shorts with the fewest stains, I sang to the mirror in my bedroom an endless round of Surfer Girl, and my brothers practiced hocking loogies to see who could spit the farthest.
My brothers Frankie and Vinnie were parochial prodigies when it came to spitting. Although Mother frequently threatened to slap their faces off if she caught them spitting one more time, they somehow managed to perfect their hocking talents on a daily basis.
“Wait ‘till you smell the ocean, guys!” Daddy said at dinner one night. “The ocean is salty, and you can smell it in the air!”
Mother had been reading up on how to entertain children on long trips, and had come up with two strategies to keep us busy, both of which she presented that night. The first strategy was to give my brothers and me a little notebook to journal our trip. Because this was our first traveling vacation, Mother wanted it documented. My brothers and I were somewhat less than thrilled; we could smell an educational trick a mile away.
The second strategy had potential. Daddy presented each of us with our own roll of nickels--two whole dollars apiece! Each time Mother or Daddy had to “talk” to us in the car, the offending child would lose a nickel; sassiness (and Mother looked directly at me, why, I don’t know) cost two nickels; fighting in the car (Daddy looked at the boys) cost three nickels. However, if we were lucky enough to have any of our forty nickels left by the time we reached the ocean, the money would be ours to spend as we wished-- two whole dollars.
The big day finally arrived, and we were packed and ready. If everything went according to Daddy’s plan, the 750 mile trip would trek us across three states, and take approximately 13 hours to drive. Daddy decided we should leave at o’dark thirty presumably so we could get a head start on traffic, but Mother confided in me it was so the boys would sleep and behave themselves. Apparently this was another travel-strategy Mother had read about.
Somewhere in Ohio, I felt rather than saw something fly across my shoulder, and whack Mother in the head. She touched her hair, and issued a Boys Warning just as another object flew past my seat, and smacked Daddy On the shoulder. I couldn’t believe it! One of my stupid brothers was going to lose all of his nickels before we got to Pennsylvania! I turned around in my seat to let the offending imbecile know he was missing his target, which was presumably Charlie or me.
A wild-eyed Vinnie was sitting on his knees with his hands cupped over his spewing mouth. In his valiant effort to hold it, Vinnie was now blowing vomit chunks out his nostrils, and all over our practically brand-new car’s gently used plush interior.
“Jesus Christ on the cross!” screamed Daddy. “Why didn’t you tell us you were carsick, Vinnie?”
Vinnie just grinned as he hopped out of the car to finish emptying his stomach of last night’s dinner. Even though he now had to trade seats with Charlie, and ride with a newspaper on his lap, his projectile vomiting had awarded him an enviable status amongst his brothers.
“How many nickels does Vinnie owe for throwing up all over our new car?” I politely inquired. Mother just glared at me, told me to shut up, and charged me a nickel; for what I didn’t know.

Despite periodic rests to stretch our legs and run to the bathroom, we were all getting tired and cranky from the long ride in the car. Amazingly enough, however, after eight hours, my brothers and I still had half of our nickels left, and more surprising was the fact our journals had a few mindless entries. Mid-afternoon, we finally reached the Maryland State line when Daddy said he really needed a break; Mother’s egg salad sandwiches we’d had for lunch were talking to him. This usually meant Daddy had gas, so we were quite willing to stop and get out of the car.
Frankie, Vinnie, Charlie, and Joey were sitting by our car on a picnic table underneath a shade tree when I came out of the bathroom. I wandered over to where they were sitting while we waited for our parents. Frankie was the first one to hock a loogie at a passing car that was entering the parking lot, which was about 30 feet away from us. He missed, but the challenge was on. I was the official scorekeeper because I had my notebook. Vinnie, of projectile fame, managed to hock a big green loogie on a closed window of a car with a Kansas license plate.
“That’s not fair!” whined Joey and Charlie. “That car was going too slow. You don’t get the extra point for hitting the window.” I decided he did get the extra point; as the official scorekeeper, I carefully logged the points next to Vinnie’s name.
Not to be outdone by his infamous twin, Frankie locked, gagged, and retched until he had a mouthful of slime ready to impale on the next unsuspecting vehicle. A black and white car with a Maryland license plate was driving up as Frankie tilted his head back to hock his big one. Bull’s Eye! Frankie’s snot sailed 35 feet into the open window of the passing vehicle, and landed on the driver’s arm.
We didn’t get a chance to laugh. We barely got a snicker out of our mouths before the fat, irate police officer slammed on the brakes to his squad car. Glaring at us through black beady incensed eyes, he screamed “Don’t anybody move!” He flipped on the siren, and grabbed his baton before jumping out of his car toward us.
“Who spit on me?” he demanded as the blue veins in his fat no-neck began to bulge. “What are your names? Do you want to go to jail? Do you want me to handcuff you? Where are your parents?” he screamed at us through his spittle as he waved his baton in the air.
We were all too scared to move, let alone speak. Finally, I said, “We were spitting, Mr. Policeman. We’re just sitting here. Hmmm, maybe a bird pooped on you?”
“Yeah, we’ve seen lots of pooping birds,” agreed Vinnie.
Mother and Daddy, who were looking at the “You Are Here” map on the wall of the rest stop, heard the clamor, and ran over to us and the infuriated Maryland Police Officer with Frankie’s snot still dripping off his fat, hairy arm. Pushing his way through the attracted crowd of onlookers, Daddy said, “These are my children, Officer. Is there a problem?”
Before the enraged Police Officer could sputter a word, a man in the crowd said, “This officer is accusing your children of spitting on him in his car. What little kid could spit that accurate or that far? Mister, your children were just sitting on the picnic table; I saw them.”
On cue, my brothers and I started to blubber.
“I don’t want to go to jail!” sobbed Joey.
“Please don’t let him handcuff us, Daddy. Don’t let him beat us!” screamed Vinnie and Frankie.
Charlie and I bawled tears of righteous innocence. We were making such a hullabaloo, the exasperated officer finally mumbled something to Daddy about juvenile delinquents and reform school before he made his hasty retreat back to the squad car and charged off.
Daddy was herding us back to our station wagon, when Mother spied my notebook. It had fallen off the picnic table in all the commotion. She opened it up, and read my last entry: Vinnie 4, Frankie 3, Joey 1, Charlie 0.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! What is this?” she demanded.
We froze.
Mother pursed her fingers to her lips. “I will take ten nickels from each of you children right now,” she said. “And if you ever spit on a police officer again, I will personally handcuff you, and send you to jail for the rest of your lives. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, Ma’am,” we whimpered as we hopped back in the station wagon. We were just glad she didn’t want to slap our faces off.

We were just crossing the Bay Bridge in Annapolis when Charlie noticed a funny odor. “Is that the ocean I smell, Daddy?” he asked.
Mother gave Daddy a sharp look, but said nothing.
“Hey, I think I smell the ocean, too!” said Joey from the backseat.
This set the boys off on a heated debate over who had the best seat for smelling the ocean. Charlie insisted since he got a whiff of the ocean first, he must have the best seat. By this time Daddy was laughing so hard in the front seat, tears were streaming down his face, and the ocean odor was getting much stronger. Mother was holding a tissue to her nose, and she did not look very happy.
I asked Charlie how did he think we could smell the ocean when we were still so far away from it; the odor smelled like Daddy’s gas to me. Once again, Mother glared at me, told me to shut up, and charged me another gol darn nickel.
The next two hours we could hardly contain ourselves. We craned our necks from one side of the car to the other, each wanting to be the first to declare, “I see the ocean!”

At last Daddy turned our car onto Coastal Highway; we were finally at the ocean. My brothers and I didn’t have two nickels to rub together, but Daddy was right; we could smell the ocean. We could smell the salty air, and this time it smelled good.