SEVEN NORTHEAST STATES
SEVEN NORTHEAST STATES TRIP WITH LARRY, July 20 - August 8, 1959
MONDAY, JULY 20. My alarm rings at 7 for the start of our trip. Wash and pack car and eat breakfast and we're off, after signing out, at 8:15. Leave APG and drive up to NYC, jabbering cozily away all the way. Through Lincoln Tunnel and to surface to buy tickets to "Music Man," and up to apartment at 12:15, when we "luckily" find a parking spot right in front of 35 E. 61. Laboriously lug all my junk up the stairs, and unpack most of it, finding that Tom left some interesting stuff. Peruse mail and dash out for money orders to pay four bills. Then we subway to Times Square and walk across to Selective Service (Social Security?) Building and I get re-registered. Walk back uptown by way of Takashimaya and the Curio Shop at Madison and 62nd. It starts to rain, as we dash across to apartment and change clothes and take showers and at 4:30 we walk down Madison to the scientific double feature: both of which I'd seen before, "War of the Worlds" and "When Worlds Collide." Out at 8 and over to Hector's for a confectionery and fruit snack and walk over to the Majestic for "Music Man," a jovial, sassy, wonderfully BOOKED play about music and shysters and love (?). At 11:15 we walk back uptown and I have steak and Larry has only coffee on Lexington Avenue and back to apartment at 12:45 to spread bed roll and get to sleep.
TUESDAY, JULY 21. Up at 8 and wash and Larry catches Mrs. McGeogh and I give her mailbox key and talk till 9:45. Out to get a $5 money order at Bloomingdales for the ticket Larry got yesterday for parking there, and get back to find another ticket. Fuss and fuss and curse and complain and send $10 to the NY Police. Take off at 10:30 and go up diverse parkways and bridges in Manhattan and Bronx and get on New England Thruway and Connecticut Turnpike and take off across Connecticut. Breakfast in NYC and have nothing to eat all through the 2-5 pm stop at Mystic, Connecticut, to see the reconstructed seaport with all its ships and shops and models and museums. Larry buys stuff and we look and laugh and wonder and then out east again, going up and down roads and rivers and getting to Conniaut Island, outside Newport, where we eat supper and decide to spend the night. Look over place and travel to north of island to find bag place, but have to go into town and buy awful lotion and get back to first location, blow up air mattress, visit the bushes a bit, and the beach, and rub lotion on and try to get to sleep. The bags are hot and the bugs are busy and I wake up at 3 or 4 different times to spread rather ineffectual and eye-smarting lotion around.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 22. Up at 7 for a leering Larry that practically sends me into convulsions. Breakfast at same place and take ferry to Newport, gaping at huge houses. Drive all around Island on good maps and end up at point, where we roam through an old, deserted, though undeniably luxurious beach mansion. Drive around some more and get to the Breakers and pay $2 for a large tour. House is spectacularly sumptuous, looking all the smaller for being perfectly proportioned. A sight for sure. Wander along Beach walk and get back to car and drive into town for lunch and mosquito netting, and tour Hazard House and roam across town to the Harter House, seeing very much Newport furniture. Leave Newport at 5 and have supper in some little restaurant, Larry having clams and I ham and we drive off to find a place to sleep along Massachusetts shore. Find none and drive through Plymouth and after investigating numerous false leads, find an abandoned road and set up elaborate tenting, which doesn't work at all. Finally open windows of car, drape nets over them and sleep there, easy. Larry is ill most of the night from clams, and the nets prove quite effective.
THURSDAY, JULY 23. Up at sunrise and get into Plymouth at 8:30 to see the Mayflower and the Rock, while I eat breakfast and Larry eats oranges. Tour Plymouth Plantation and start off along interior roadway for Boston, getting there at 1:30. Catch the Adams House and lovely Library in Quincy and get to Boston to start at Museum of Fine Arts. Look at all stuff and meet at 5 after touring completely worthwhile, huge plant. Start driving through town and I continually spout directions to navigate the short, twisted one-way streets in the old town. See MIT and Harvard and then in quick succession the Athenaeum, the State House, many, many buildings, until finally we scream out and dash out of city, leaving coast, see "Old Ironsides" from a distance, and the Bunker Hill Memorial on Breeds Hill. Drive all along New Hampshire coast trying to find a place to stay, to no avail in the Coney Island atmosphere, and finally get into Portsmouth at 9. Try the closed Y and finally end up on the roof of the Rockingham, quite elegant and I get my first shower in three days, which feels GOOD. Come deliciously and get to bed at 11:30.
FRIDAY, JULY 24. Up at 8 and finish this up to date and take another shower, arrange clothes, and we leave for Maine at 10:30. Finally get into Bar Harbor after taking Maine turnpike at 70 all the way and ask for directions to Acadia. Look around at a few of the shops and an eager beaver offers me a 10x15 rug for $180. I debate and fume while walking and over a cheeseburger and a frappe, compare prices in stores, and end up buying the thing, to have it shipped later. This shocks my entire day and we drive around quite a bit of the park until fog sets in, and we find a nice campground, register, set up our netting, investigate the men's room nearby, and fall asleep.
SATURDAY, JULY 25. We explore town the next AM, and get lunch for our afternoon jaunt. Larry investigates all the jewelry shops in sight, and finally we get started on the glorious sights of the Maine coast. Start at Anemone Cave and look at waves dashing in and out among weeds and rocks. Then to Thunder Hole and sit for a couple hours simply watching the tide coming in over and through and among the rocks. Also in morning we looked at Soeur de Ments museum and spring and drove to the top of Cadillac Mountain, highest point on the coast. Down to the south tip to interrupt painter and look again at the tide pools and the waves of the out-going tides. Between 4 and 6 pm we hike up the Bubbles and surveyed the Island and the blueberries. Turn about to go down and we get into Bar Harbor for supper, and out again to low tide at Thunder Hole, with flashlights and solitude, busting clams and anemones and sea stars and crabs and myriad colors of the tide pools. Roar around island for last time and get to bed at 11.
SUNDAY, JULY 26. The dawn wakes us for Mass at 8:30, which we barely make. Quite an odd ceremony, with unknown Gospel, and we're out for waffles and the last of Maine. Drive for most of the day, talking about almost anything which comes to mind, including ideas of time before time, being before matter, a time machine, a Chemistry computer, etc. We just start getting on each other's nerves, and conversation and agreements get odd in times. Stop for fancy dinner and pay good price, and on we go, to get to New Hampshire and into the White Mountains in time to ride up the Wildcat, a pleasant little gondola car 2000 feet up the side of a blasted mountain. Look at the view and fly back down, to get to the car and start looking for a place to sleep, after we got supper and gas for what seems to be the umpteenth time. Find a spectacular overlook and spend quite a lot of time tossing and pushing and levering rocks over the cliff, to crash very satisfactorily into the trees below. Get to the next town to phone Larry's kin, one of whom has just died, and then get back to get to sleep.
MONDAY, JULY 27. Up to hear a train whooffing up the hill, and dress and get off the place and go down to Franconia Notch for Old Man of the Mountain, quite a prominent pile of rock. Drive down to the Flume and walk through and along many trails to see the glacial boulders, the natural bridges of felled trees, and huge falls, the green jade pool, the heavy up-hill climbs, and the wooden plank lined gorge of the flume itself. This in early afternoon, the morning being taken up by a 25 minute frolic on a next-to-dirt road to the Cog Railway up Mt. Washington, and we get the first seat in the first car after breakfast and postcards in the Lodge. Up and up and stop for photos and up Jacob's ladder and to the top to wander the highest point in NE US. Clamber about rocks and ride down, with interesting talk with a worker there. Then, in late PM, we get down to Polar Cave and roam the Museum and try all the ins and outs of the sandwich and the lean squeegee, the back breaker and the ankle breaker and the Lost River. Great fun and lovely garden near. Out of New Hampshire and get all across Vermont in evening, ending up in desperation just this side of Lake Champlain in a CEMETERY. Look at the stones and talk only a very little bit about spooks before we doze off at 10.
TUESDAY, JULY 28. Up and into town for the 7:20 ferry to New York, brushing my teeth in undrinkable water. Get into New York at 8:30 and eat breakfast before walking down into Ausable Chasm. Walk along gasping at all the sights and hop into a boat to scrape over rapids. Out to get back into car and journey down to Fort Ticonderoga. Look at the relics to be found at the site and the inferior paintings and the quantities of junk passed off as historic relics. Day very hot and we roam battlements and dungeons and then into the car and to the St. Lawrence and look at two ships going through the Eisenhower Locks, biggest anywhere. Go up to Messina and the Moses Power Dam and see the model of the valley project and the site of the huge dam. Try to drive around, but most of the roads closed. Eat and get flirted at by loose waitress in diner and take off along an abandoned road leading right down to the flooded river bank. Roam about the shore and get ready for the night.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 29. Up at dawn and proceed down Main Street and lather up in quite a good bath. Enjoy looking at roads venturing off under water and the fences going nowhere. Travel toward Alexandria Bay and just manage to hop aboard a tour of the 1000 Islands. Get a personable guide and stare at all the private homes and bays and boats on the placid islands. Stop at Heart Island and look at the two million buck castle in twenty minutes. Dash among tremendous ruins and brambles and leave, sweating, dream of what I may be one day not too far away. Back to dock and set out for Niagara, getting there and, ignoring a perfectly good Y for $1.75, we check into a $10 Red Coach Inn, where we bathe and get down for my sweetbread supper in first suit in ages. Walk partway across bridge, and then cross forbidden bridge to Goat Island to see the falls spray accented by the lights. Wander rapidly through sights and get back to room at 12 and sleep under air-conditioning.
THURSDAY, JULY 30. Up to listen to report on "Once Upon a Mattress" and breakfast on waffles. Out to look at the islands and drive across to Canada after I get thoroughly soaked and incidentally disgusted in the Cave of the Winds. Ride a terrifying incline car down to the Maid of the Mist and get a spectacular foam-flecked view of the Horseshoe Falls, magnificent in green and white. Out and buy Larry's gifts and then into boots and raincoat again to go into the caves under the Canadian falls, gasping and cleaning glasses and trying to see through the prevailing foam at the thunderous rush of water. Back to the car at 5:30 after Larry gets caught by the customs inspector. Through much of New York and a bit of Pennsylvania and finally we're into Ohio. Larry stops at 12 for coffee and I pack all things together and I finally get home at 1:30. We talk and I flop into first decent bed I've slept on for more than one night in two weeks.
FRIDAY, JULY 31. Up the next AM at 11 and do absolutely nothing all morning but read funny books until 2, when I have some eggs for breakfast. Mom phones and breaks things up a bit and I also use some very handy mirrors to come interestingly twice, just to prove my boredom. Read through dozens of funny books and look through house curiously. Supper is over and I call Dr. Dunlap and ask Mom and Rita to "Romeo and Juliet" at Stan Hywet. Mom argues and finally doesn't go, but Rita and I sit through long first act and meet Joan and Dave and talk and laugh and compare notes and I congratulate Dr. D. on his great set. The play is rather unintelligible, but cute in places, so it's fairly interesting. Afterwards we walk to coach house for phone, and back to home and get locked out of front door, and have to run after taillights of MG down old dark driveway to wait for cab on Portage Path. Home at midnight and finish watching "Mildred Pierce," with sobby Joan Crawford until 2. To bed quite tired and ready for a week of vacation.
Now in blank spot is a good chance to talk AGAINST vacationing in general. Sure, they're nice, and I certainly enjoyed San Francisco, but after a short span of time, really too short for comfort, I simply get tired of looking into old houses or museums of rows of souvenirs and mementoes, or galleries of pictures and paintings and sculpture, or miles of picturesque countryside. One museum is very like another if they're skimmed through without having TIME to appreciate individual strong points. Anyway, my taste for history is certainly lacking, and I couldn't care too much if the gates were locked about Old Ironsides. Things like "The Breakers," and the Castle on Heart Island certainly stand out, but then the stupidities of sightseeing in general also impress themselves onto the mind very heartily. The perpetual photographers who thinks he has exclusive rights to a sign or a sidewalk or a point of observation, and possibly even worse the one who insists on sticking a relative into the view---certainly to no good effect---make viewing rather disgusting. Why is it that people seem to be too loud and too quarrelsome on vacations, and certainly always dress horridly? They see for the sake of seeing, not for ABSORBING, and if I don't watch out I may be getting that way, too, through sheer surfeit of sightseeing. I feel almost glad of a chance to get back to NYC, where I can sightsee without being a tourist, which is perhaps the best combination of all.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 1. Up late as usual and spend the greater part of the morning, after I eat my bacon sandwich, talking to Mom about NSC, money, Rita, work, her troubles, my trip, the Army, etc. Eat lunch and I get back to writing just a bit of this and reading more comic books and washing clothes, too (on Friday), and catching up on all the funny papers and Peanuts in the basement, and sorting through the books to find some that I want to take back with me, too. Night comes and I call Dave and Larry and we see "The Return of the Fly" and "The Alligator People," the first scary in parts. Then we go to Dave's where I play the organ and we look through his book collection. Then we're off to the "Isle of Lesbos," which I don't want to see and get just a glimpse of male and female, and that's all there is. We end up at Manner's for a Big Boy and a hot fudge and a piece of strawberry pie and home at 1:30.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 2. Up to church and read papers and eat dinner, and eventually I take bus to Larry's, where we listen to records, talk, look at his ceramic collection and talk and listen to more records and he brings me home at 10:30 and I get to bed. Oh, yes, watched end of "Mummy" picture on Saturday night.
MONDAY, AUGUST 3. Up late again, as usual, and again most of the day seems to evaporate into doing nothing in particular. I have letters to send out, but somehow the letters never seem to get sent out. After getting up late, much of the time is still spent with comic books, and after those give out there's always coming and McCalls and Coronet and Readers Digest. UGH. Then at 3 Marion comes to pick us up and with Henry later we all go to Duncanside to enjoy swimming and sliding and diving and then an almost wienerless picnic supper until they drive us back at 7, when they come in and fiddle with candle. They leave and I slap Rita for some reason good at the time and she glowers at me and I slap her again and we all get riled and I flounce into bedroom and get to bed early, at 10:30.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 4. Up at 10 and iron a bit before breakfast and try rather unsuccessfully to get something done on this. Day slips lazily by until supper and I call Larry to get to a drive-in. Meet him downtown and go out to Northfield to see "The World, the Flesh, and the Devil," and fog sets in for "Green Mansions." We're back at 1:30 and another day in the vacation is through.
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 5. Up with Mom for toast and drive to work to re-see old acquaintances and get told myriad times that I'm looking good. Laugh and gab until 11, and down to listen to much Bruchner at O'Neil's and buy Seaver's gift and get to Akron University to look about and get over to library for Larry and tour the Student Building. Jerry someone asks us up to Cleveland and Larry and I say OK. Back to eat lunch at 3 and start mowing lawn and Danny comes and we talk and I admire. Supper, then I dress to get to town and drive to Cleveland Auditorium to hear the Pops Symphony, and then the Jazz Quartet, and then Dave Brubeck 4 as solo, jazzing through 5/4 and odd time to rather pleasant end. Out at 11 and stop at Left Bank before we hit Chinese place and eat little until 1, getting in at 1:45.
THURSDAY, AUGUST 6. Up at 11 the next AM, no wonder the day goes fast. Dampen clothes and make schedule for my time here. Eat lunch and iron shirts and take off for Grandma's for supper. We four of the three generations have a very pleasant talk and eat session and I tell about trip and everyone exchanges conversation le plus ultra. Then we leave for Larry's and the fun begins. I ask Mom in and she says no! I say that I'll come to car and ask her in and she says don't. We get there and all three Balls gather around car, and on my exit Mom says I didn't ask her in! I fume and we say goodbye and I tell Mom and embarrass her. She doesn't like that at all and ends up stopping car and demanding I get out. I say no, to accompaniment of Hell, and she berates me all the way back, though saying she knows what she said. Into house in a huff and I close door and finish this to present date and huff and debate how I can leave here without having the roof around my ears. Get to sleep at 11:15, after laying down at 10:30. Preflight jitters getting me already, and I don't sleep so well.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 7. Get up at 7 and toss till 9:15, when I come, then eat breakfast, write letter dated August 1 to IBM and go out to get a haircut drooling at noon over lovely creature in front of corner store. Back to finish lawn and eat lunch and wander around getting things accumulated to pack. Look at paperboy longingly and come again in memory of blue-jeaned blond tight shirted doll in front of Canteen. Danny comes and we talk, I expanding ego like crazy. Larry and Dave call to say so long, and after supper I call Joan and talk a while and at 7 I get started packing and actually write a single day of this. At 9 Mom suggests we go on a tour of the Akron bars, and I, eager to leave in good standing, agree and shower and dress and we take off in rain to the Jednota Club, where Beatnik Butke's drumming. We have a drink and go to Krasna's where I have two drinks, and Mom three drinks. Then to the Russian Club, which we get kicked out of, and then to Karam's, where we have drinks and a sandwich. To bed very, very tired at 1:30 am.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 8. Up at 7 and dress and finish packing and Mom walks me to corner and leaves red lipstick all over me as I climb into limousine. Get to airport and check in and fly to Cleveland, where I breakfast and stand in line for plane, which takes off at 10:30. I get aisle seat and crane neck all way to NYC, at 12. Hop a bus and cross to Manhattan, cheering inwardly all the while. Cab from Bus Terminal to apartment and unpack just a bit before I go down to get mail and key from Mrs. McGeogh at 1:30. She talks and talks endlessly, saying I have to leave here Oct. 1, which crushes me, and finally I tear away to read letters, especially Bill's, at 3:30. Unpack more and read Life and get down for groceries, but I'm too busy unpacking to use them. Place is a complete shambles as I attempt to unpack, and I get Tom's nudie magazines and jerk off about three times looking at the lovelies. Completely New York-hypnotized, at 7 I take off in pouring rain and raincoat and walk down Fifth and down to 42nd St. to see if there's any movies playing. Still raining and I'm singing all the way to the Roxy and "The Big Circus" and stage show for $2. Buy paper and back at 11 to jerk off two more times and read theater section and eat strawberries and cream as dessert to frank and orange I had in Times Square. Exhausted to bed at 12:30.