Marjorie Williams

It’s a beautiful June 2nd…a Monday. It had been a pretty good weekend, Mike hanging out with Bill and me, and things went quite well. A lot of time just sitting around talking, which reminded me of the old days in the ’80s, just hanging out with friends in the apartment, talking, sometimes drinking, sometimes smoking, but always talking

Mike was planning on coming over and leaving today, but it turned out that last night was when he went back to his crib, which was fine. It had been a good Sunday. I had done over 14 miles, close to 15 miles on my bicycle, scored 135 heart points, which turned out to be good.

The ride was uneventful, a little windy but nothing insurmountable. Once again, the main issue I have with bike riding is people not paying attention to their surroundings and perhaps I have been that way in the past, but on the bicycle, you have to pay attention to what’s in front of you.

Today at lunch, I sit in the shadow of the office building I work in, close to the corner of 16th and 5th, smoking a mini cigar and just watching the parade pass by.

Bill has driven some high school students to Tilted Acres from the movie Hairspray in 1988. He should be coming back tonight.

I posted Marjorie Williams’ name at the top. Marjorie Williams was known to my family at least my siblings, as Mrs. Williams, nee Klatt. I grew up at 13 Riverview, and the Williams family lived at 7 Riverview. I spent a lot of time at 7 Riverview, so much so that I can remember a lot of details about their house.

I thought they were a hip, together family, but it turns out they were probably more messed up than we were. But Marjorie Williams was beautiful.

My brother Frank had a crush on her and wrote a fan letter that there was never sent but was discovered by my mother, much to my brother’s embarrassment. A favorite memory of mine was being at 7 Riverview and watching the movie Camelot on television.

Perhaps I am juxtaposing images, but I swear Mrs Williams was as beautiful as Vanessa Redgrave in Camelot, singing along to some of the songs. I saw her as a strong woman, but in reality, she might have been more vulnerable than I realized. Barbara Williams, the youngest daughter, was at Frank’s wake.

She may have been taken aback by my statement that she was the first friend I had ever had. Years later, when high school happened, I didn’t see her that much and hung out with her younger brother Scott, who was 6 years younger than me.

Barbara later married someone who beat me up during summer recreation in Lodi, New Jersey. I took it as a betrayal, but how did she know? Barbara and I did work together in the HBJ book warehouse, and she was driving before I was, so she generally gave me a ride home at the end of our shift. My brother Frank worked with her in the same building in Hackensack New Jersey and that’s how he reconnected with Barbara Williams.

A bright and sunny Friday afternoon, the last Friday of May 2025. I walk around Union Square at least the perimeter of Union Square. I’m reminded of seeing Peter Gabriel at the Palladium, I guess in 1982, with Kevin Wagner, and we parked, or I parked, in Union Square. A great show by Peter Gabriel, and we ran across Union Square after the show, got in the car, drove back to Hoboken.

It was the first time I ever tried to go to Maxwell’s, REM was playing, and the show is sold out. Steve Fallon was outside, and he looked me right in the eye and would not let me in but he didn’t know who I was, and my brother was inside anyway.

That’s just a memory, then Kevin and I went to the Saddle Brook diner where we saw a classmate that we graduated with 2 years before, and he did not recognize me at all or if he did he was not to say anything to me.

I got some chocolate bread for myself and Mike, and then to get a salad in my attempt to eat well at least once a week. I remarked last week that the salad was good but not nearly as good as the salad I used to get at 11 Park Place, the Elim Deli. The salad was very good, but I found as I was eating it I was getting hungrier and hungrier, which was a weird thing, I suppose.

I am now outside having a mini cigar, just chilling. It’s been a very slow day, not many requests coming in, not much fulfillment going out. I am also trying to select the proper insurance plan from work. I had one already from the state of New Jersey when I was unemployed and had not much income coming in, but now I have income coming in and I have to make a decision.

If only someone could say John, you should do this with John, you should pick that I do so much more satisfied and of course that would shift the level of responsibility to someone else because I could always say well you told me that I should do that and you told me I should do this…

Sigh…now I am tired. About two and a half hours left to go, I can’t say whether or not it will go fast or slow. I find that sparrows are flying around me sometimes, and not afraid of me, and they should not be afraid of me.

I can’t say I have writer’s block, it’s more like dictation block. And I usually have something to say, but right now I am at a loss for words. I am sure I can think of something to say to get the word count up to 500, but until then, maybe maybe not. If I could take a nap right now, I definitely would; it would be so fulfilling and pass the time nicely.

Alas, it is not to be for I am now working full time at a job that I actually like, and I actually am hesitant in saying that as my atheist beliefs preclude superstition, which haunts my days.

I have found a spot to sit, which is a standpipe outside the building where I work, not necessarily comfortable, but not necessarily uncomfortable either, merely functional.
A woman just power walked by with her phone in one hand and an iced coffee in the other, and I saw determination on her face.

A few minutes before that, a woman who could possibly be my age wearing something like a hippie shirt looked by and gave me a smile to which I replied in kind.

Written May 30, posted May 31