From Being a Kid to Being a Kid

I lived in Germany in 1968, a couple of years before my best friend was born. Daddy was the family name for our father, Clevin Paul Brossette, Daddy was a SFClass in the US Army. 7th Battalion, I think. We lived in Army housing. We lived on the top floor of a long building that had about four stairwells that separated four floors, with eight single family dwellings per. We had eight bed rooms, a bathroom, a kitchen and living room. Too many bedrooms and enough for all five of us kids and Mom and Dad. It was a very good time. we bowled in the hall. Plastic pins and ball. Fun. There was a truck that came by on Tuesdays and Fridays. I would hear the truck before I saw it. I called it, The Beer Truck. It was a truck full of beer bottles. It was like the dairy trucks that used to pickup empty bottles and leave full bottles. That was the best beer... I had nothing to compare with but it was good. Actually, Colt 45 Malt Liquor was a new beer at that time. Oh I remember it now, beer buzz, cigarette mind clog, and base ball specatalating and particulalating. 'Smoking Camel cigarettes that cost a buck 70 for a carton, 200 fags, 0.85 cents each. A Fag was a smoke and something else, something like a bundle of sticks. I am not too sure right now. Ask Google. I have Sudden Linguistic Deficiency Syndrome.

Lucky me. I have not had a cigarette in over twenty years.

Available beer was easy too. At the local Gasthause, bar, I could drink a liter of local brewed beer and have a meal with the regular patrons at the local Gasthause. No prejudice from the Greybeards for being 13 or 14 years old and partaking. Mucho Respect from me and back. For an adolescent it was like being a grownup that was having a liter at the local bar along side the locals. I did it. It was what it was. I was also welcome at the Discotheque. A Discotheque was a bar with strobe lights, black lights, a dance floor with lights from below and techy music. Discotheques existed but not Disco.

Fun.