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The mind works in funny ways. Well, mine does, anyway. My mind seems to dwell on peripheral events, not the main ones.

My friend and I went backpacking across Europe after our first year of college. It was 1974; we were 18 years old. The plan was to stay for six weeks, or for however long our money lasted.

London then Paris then Florence then Venice then Rome then Zurich. I think. Oh and Nice. We managed to squeeze Nice in somewhere, too.

What an adventure! Memories to last a lifetime!

Except I don’t even remember how we got around. How did we plan the trip? Find places to stay? To eat? Things to do? Where did we wash our clothes?

The only thing still clear in my mind is what happened when I went to tell my Grandmother about my upcoming adventure.

It did not go over very well.

“I almost died trying to escape from Europe, and now you’re going back there?!” she exclaimed, staring at me from her high-back chair by the bedroom window. “When I was just 14, I left my home and my family in Poland. I was all alone, and spent three days in the back of a horse drawn wagon to get to the ocean. All alone!” she said. “And then weeks in a horrible, stinking boat just to get out of Europe. Why would you go back there? WHY?!?”

I felt horrible, but plans were set and airplane seats were already purchased and I was 18 and knew better, so I went anyway. And I soon discovered, sadly, that she was absolutely right:

In England I asked for a glass of milk, and it had ice cubes in it. In Venice there were piles of garbage floating in the canals. In Rome we passed a communist demonstration in the morning, then a fascist demonstration at noon, then three dozen police in riot gear after lunch. All headed towards one another.

I couldn’t wait to go home; gratefully, our money ran out after only five weeks.

My first day back, I went straight to visit my Grandmother to tell her she was right, and that I wished I had listened to her.

Gram was in her chair in the bedroom, looking out the window as usual. She got up slowly and hugged me tight, very happy to have me back.

But she was having none of it.

“You thought I was lying to you?!?” she said. And that was all she ever said about my trip to Europe.

— — — — — — — — — — — — —

In 1967, the New York City Board of Education began to bus Black kids to my elementary school. This was the city’s way of making believe they cared about Black kids.

And that is how Gregory Harrison arrived in my life.

In his first week as part of my 6th grade class, our teacher, Mr. Farb, changed Gregory’s assigned seat three times. Kids he sat next to claimed he was a troublemaker. The fourth and final kid he sat next to was me.

Gregory was sitting to my right, so I moved my chair as far as I could to the left, practically blocking the aisle. After about five minutes I noticed that Gregory was sitting as far to his right as possible.

Eventually, we both got tired of being scared of one another and pulled our seats closer together. I took my baseball cards out of my pocket. Gregory did the same.

Three minutes later we were friends (it doesn’t take too long when you’re young). It took little more than an hour for me to have an epiphany; we could both be ‘excused’ to go to the bathroom at practically the same time because Mr. Farb would never think that we could be up to something. Not together, anyway.

I raised my hand and got permission to go. Two minutes later, Gregory did the same.

And so, we spent at least three hours each week that year (we didn’t want to push our luck) running through the school’s hallways like the happy little kids we were.

Teachers we encountered on our romps would just stare. These were ‘educators,’ who could not conceive of the possibility that a pair of ten year old boys who looked different from one another could be friends.

Although I still remember having a lot of fun with Gregory, today other thoughts rattle around in my head. Like how scared he must have been when he woke up that first morning, having to board the bus to his new school, then walk into our classroom. With all those strange, horrified faces staring back at him.

I also frequently think about the real reason Gregory’s seat was changed so often; the bigoted mothers of my ignorant, cruel classmates complained to the spineless teacher about having a Black kid sitting next to their precious little idiots…

— — — — — — — — — — — — —

On a lighter note, my store was held up at gunpoint one evening. I had the barrel of a loaded pistol pressed between my eyes (I could count the bullets in their chambers) with the guy’s finger wrapped around the trigger.

Now that’s something I must think about all the time, right? It’s the type of experience that would have a long lasting effect on you. It would put a fellow in therapy.

Well, maybe you. Not me.

What sticks in my mind is what happened 45 minutes later.

I was in the basement office with half a dozen cops, watching surveillance footage. (That’s right. I had surveillance cameras recording all the action. In 1998! Pretty advanced, right?)

The cameras would switch from the scene of the crime to each aisle, in sequential order, spending five seconds on each angle.

We kept the baby formula in aisle six, which is where I saw one of my favorite customers – a woman named Sharon – peering around the endcap, watching the bad guy press his gun to my face.

Sharon was a regular customer and really very nice; she would always ask about my family. How terrified she must have been! I thought I would tell her how badly I felt for what she went through, the next time she came in.

I thought differently when the security camera reached her aisle again. That’s when I saw Sharon filling her shopping bag with baby formula, then stroll to the exit.

She never came back. Lucky for her….