Follow” Goodbye Niagara Falls” (not “Goodbye Columbus”) : My First (and last) ‘Dear John’ Letter From 8-25-68; James Gandolfini remembered. July 19, 2014
James Gandolfini at the Insight Bowl with Rutgers 2005
I’m sitting here listening to Neil Halstead sing “Digging Shelters” (you all need to find it on YouTube and take a trip) The song is from the soundtrack from ‘Enough Said’ with James Gandolfini (his last movie) and Julia Dreyfus. Of course I’ve already seen the movie 11 times because its wonderfully real, magically acted, quintessentially adult and perfectly written and directed. And I love James Gandolfini(an amazing actor and Rutgers graduate) and I miss him. When his name “For Jim” comes up in the credits, I get the chills because he’s not here. I’m into my 44th minute of straight listening to “Digging Shelters” on my computer and just behind the screen, taped to my office wall, desperately in need of a paint job, is a copy of a type-written letter I wrote to this ‘girl’ on August 25, 1968. It’s been hanging there forever. Once a year I take it down, read it and try to understand the emotionality and energy behind its writing. I remember it well as it was my first and last experience with a ‘Dear John’ letter. A bolt of lightning just hit. Maybe Neil Halstead’s music inspired. It never occurred to me to share that letter in a public forum (my blog) but if there’s a statute of limitations, it ran out decades ago and it’s evolved over time into a fascinating few paragraphs especially because I can weave in Phillip Roth (‘Goodbye Columbus’) . Yes there are parallels with my story to Roth’s ‘Goodbye Columbus’.
In Roth’s story, character Neil has a rich girl friend in suburban Essex County. Neil’s a librarian from Newark, N.J. I’m from Newark as well(and so is Phillip Roth. We both went to Weequahic High School) and this girl I wrote the letter to was from suburban Essex county. Indeed haunting parallels. In ‘Goodbye Columbus’ Brenda Patimkin’s (Neil’s girlfriend) mother is a powerful force in ultimately breaking them up. I often wonder about the rumors and stories you hear about Phillip Roth growing up in Newark and having a rich girlfriend in Maplewood (suburban Essex) and what might have happened to fuel ‘Goodbye Columbus.’ I had a rich girlfriend from suburban Essex county. We were pretty serious fast. I was poor and didn’t fit the mold of what her mother wanted. It was a summer 1968 romance that had never been consummated; it was the slower times we lived in. In late August 1968, my girlfriend went up to northern New York State to finish college requirements. We secretly planned our first real ascignation near Niagara Falls; no parents would ever know. I lived in Maplewood (more parallels) and told my parents I was going to Villanova for the weekend but would slip up to Niagara Falls. Moments before I left, her mother called me, violating our secret trust and told me to stop by the house to pick up sweaters for her as it was getting chilly. I still went to Niagara Falls but knew there would be no ascignation and fighting a mother and a daughter team was an impossibility. I was only 23 but learned a powerful lesson, came home embittered (it finally went away) and typed this letter and mailed it and never communicated with her again. A few months ago I found her on Facebook. She’s an older woman now and yes, I loved seeing Niagara Falls and pretending.
me with a friend
