Though I had graduated Parkville Senior High School, my path was now firmly set to go to the Rhode Island School of Photography in the fall.  It wasn't my first choice or an easy decision as the planning for my rise to, "Manhood," started shortly after the winter break of my senior year at high school.

During Christmas vacation, my father really started to get an attitude with me. That never went away and even got worse as my senior year progressed. This was in reference to planning for my future with either going to college, into the military, or getting a job. His comments were totally irritating.

I told him I was successful with cutting lawns and might start a landscaping company.  He spelled out his thoughts out. "Mike, at least 90% of small businesses fail and with something like landscaping and you, I think that you would rest on your laurels and let things slip."

"No, you need a solid job, working for an established company, or a government one like I got. They may not pay great, but they're stable. Government pays a bit less, but you have excellent benefits like health and retirement. These may not be fun, and you'll have to take a lot of bull shit, and usually you have to bite your tongue, but they'll be there."

I mentioned that with a little support, I might be able to break into photography. This totally flipped Dad out and the conversation turned into a dictator's speech, "Bullshit Mike! That takes years, and I'm not going to afford you that. I tell you what; it's going to be like this ... You got it!"

"If you go to college and stay at home, rent is going to be something that you can afford and still have a bit of money. If you go out of state, you'll be footing all of the bill that you can. If you get a decent job, your rent will cover most of my utilities. If you try to start your own business, you better be successful because I will charge you what a standard apartment costs, plus all of the utilities."

"You want to try to succeed in the real world; I'll give it you right in your face! Personally, I think it is best to go into the military. First, they'll fix that attitude and second, you will always have a job and food, provided you are not a total fuck up."

Really, the military was a serious consideration to me, and I always loved when the various recruiters came to the school, though they started cutting us off for the offered, "Freebees." My main area of interest was with photography and at Pax Naval Air Station; I got to talk to a base photographer.

Another pleasant surprise was, I was able to go with Henry Mortimer, a photojournalist for the Sun Papers. It was amazing that within the first couple minutes in his car, he really nailed down both the truth, versus the perceptions of what a photojournalist is, "Head Shots."

He had me go along side of him, doing assignments that he gave me. For a full day's work, one of his made it into the paper, and one of mine did as well, with full credit. He also talked about the Time/Life and National Geographic photojournalists and what is involved with securing a position with them.

It fostered my belief that I, and my career would best be served with military service, namely joining the Navy and going to the Naval School of Photography. The biggest problem was that it wass a very popular school, and had at least a year in a half wait. I thought it best to talk with a recruiter first.

I called the local Navy recruiter, introduced myself, and expressed my desire to talk with him about entering the Naval School of Photography. His reply was nothing but attitude. "Sure, but first, you're going to come down here and take a test, and I'll tell you where you are going to be going."

"Sir, before I take any test, I would like to talk to you about where I would like to go. I know that there's a waiting list, and I want to see if I have a skill that you need that will expedite my placement."

"No! You're going to get your butt down here and take the test, to prove to me that you're a man."

"I'm sorry, it's talk first."

"Well, I'm sorry. You're going to prove to me that you're a man first."

"Sir, I thank you for your time, I decided not to talk with you or the Navy further."

"So, you don't want to be a man?"

"I hate to tell you, if I am not a man already, it wouldn't take much to make me one. My problem is you. This is a volunteer military, and with the example that you set, I really don't think it would be too enjoyable for me."

I continued, "One thing's for sure, I know myself and if this is the way the Navy is, it will be hell on earth. I think it is best to only serve if I am drafted. I admit, I do have my problems, I have to deal with being picked on, and I am sure the military is no exception."

"I know the drill instructors will not only be attracted to me, they will do their best to break me down, and they will. So when the DI sticks his face in mine and says, 'Oh, look at that, does the baby want to go home?' I'll have him where I want him, and will stick my face back into his and yell, 'No sir! I want to be a Green Beret!"

I decided to hit the recruiter over the head with a hammer of, "Because you don't know me and don't want to talk, you only have a kneejerk conception of the type of person that I am. I have been in Boys Scouts myself, and played with various military manuals on the side. On top of that, I have done nature photography and camped out in New Mexico for a month, so I have a full understanding of wartime reconnaissance."

"I tell you what sir. I have your name and if I am drafted, I will become a Green Beret and I will look you up, to prove to you, just what a man I am." There was a long pause and I could hear a sort of fearful release of his breath before he quietly hung up his phone. Dad was shocked and asked what he said. My father felt that he must have already made his quota for the month and really doesn't care.

There were reasons that I needed to talk. I honestly felt I had all of the various military and photographic skill sets, to expedite my way into the Naval School of Photography. At a camping trip at Cove Point Lighthouse, I met a Cajun Coastguardsman who was taking a rest from search and rescue, and drug interdiction.

He was also Ex Naval Intelligence and convinced me that it was better to be behind enemy lines in a war. Just an idea of his that related to terrorism, shut down the topic discussion in psychology class with, "Mike, I don't know who in the hell your friends are, but ..."

I also figured that being a Naval Photographer could also combine other unique skills I was working on, and also the scientific and technical ones that I gained with honors classes. I love doing photographic analysis, and knew what would be expected of a recon photographer.

I also liked the photojournalistic aspects of the base photographers and figured that as long as I could pull my weight with the military aspect of a photographer, I could freely switch to becoming a base photographer when I needed a respite.

Even if it meant signing up for more time in the Navy, I also wanted to follow in my father's Navy footsteps and do a tour, including wintering over in Antarctica. He not only spent time, establishing the overhead power distribution for the McMurdo Sound base during the International Geophysical Year in 1958, he also was part of the wintering over crew.

This was the one event in my father's life that really had settled in his heart. He also had many unexpected encounters with interesting people, such as Sir Vivian Fuchs and Sir Edmund Hillary. Considering both men attended Thanksgiving and Easter dinners in the way of a slide show, the Navy seemed to be a great choice in life for me. A pity they didn't see things my way.

There was another serious concern that I wanted to address before I took any test or sign papers. Many of Parkville's students signed on, especially in the Navy for a particular field, but ended up in duty that was completely different. While they thought they signed a contract, it wasn't one that would secure them a certain position of duty and a career path.

After my rejection of the Navy, I decided to apply to The Brooks Institute of Photography, but I had my apprehensions. It was a degree course which would have me relocating in Santa Barbara, California. It would be exceedingly expensive, as I estimated that it would cost at least $28,000 dollars per year, with all foreseeable expenses.

Dad didn't really think that I would be accepted at all, but I filled out the application, gathered my transcripts, and portfolio pieces. You also needed two letters of recommendation and Mr. Schwarz had no problem writing one for me.

I wanted Mr. Owens to write one and he replied, "Well Mike, you may have a problem with one coming from me. I consider you one hell of a great person, but in being your physics teacher, I would have to express my opinion that you never really did the course work or applied yourself."

I thought it was best not to use him and instead, I believed that Vern's dad wrote the second one for me, who was scoutmaster of the troop that I was in. I gathered all together, including the application fee and sent the material off.

I was shocked that I received a reply back in a couple of weeks. They said they evaluated my materials, and while I have the necessary photographic skills, my transcripts were found to be seriously lacking. "We are a degree course with a high reputation, and before you decide to reapply, you will have to earn an associate's degree from a community college to better demonstrate your abilities at obtaining a degree."

I was missing the high adventure for the previous year's summer and what bolstered this was a teacher seeing the photographs from New Mexico, and hunted me down. It was instant affection and through her stories of her husband's adventures, I became extremely fond of her. She was one of the business teachers, and though woodsy in appearance, I felt that she was fairly attractive.

Now and then, I popped into her classroom after school and sought more information about her husband's adventure. Yes, he had all of the gear and loved mountain climbing, with his best trip being a mountaineer trek to Mount Everest, Camp Two. She recommended that I take a year off and do something like that, and I could.

It touched me that I had many of the women teacher's affection. In fact, during this hard and lonely period, the woman that was a city school teacher and modeled for me, was driving me to school on her way to work. Many guys noticed that I had a 24 year old woman for a friend.

The girls were a different story; I was walking down the hall when the girls beside me started talking, "Well, my boyfriend is rich. He has a $500.00 car and $2,500 in the bank. Unlike Mike here, I know that he'll take care of me."

Yes, I was perceived as poor and felt that it was best not to mention, while I had shoes for wheels, I had a bank account of over $13,000. Mainly built from my labors since age 12, gifted Baltimore Gas and Electric Stock, and helped from the high interest rates which occurred under President Carter's term.

An Everest Expedition cost $10,000, plus the airfare to take you to the Expedition's gathering point in the states. Mainly like the teacher's husband to Camp Two, but it held the allure of Camp Three if the weather holds out. The risk was in the weather, which had the chance of pinning you down to Camp One.

When dad discovered I was seriously planning this, he went through the roof and told me, if I do a fool thing like that, I will be disowned and out of the house. He even took control of my bank book, so I wouldn't pull anything off on the sly.

I wanted a personal accomplishment with nature, and wondered about solo hiking the Appalachian Trail. A 2,175 mile trail that follows the Appalachian mountain chain on the East Coast that extends from Maine to Georgia. It was easy enough to procure the trail guides and maps.

I planned it out and figured it would take about six to eight months to complete, and cost around $3,000.00 to do. My itinerary would be the opposite of their recommended course; I would start from Georgia in summer and complete the Maine portion in winter. I wanted to maximize the adventure and see what I was truly made of.

The food turned out to be the major expense, as I would be figuring on eating two freeze dried meals a day, plus a snack like crackers and meat spread for lunch. I found out that there were many state parks that I could ship the food to for pick up, as well as the trail's volunteers to get supplies to me.

I figured that the good Lord had it figured out right and I would hike like hell, six days a week and reserve one for resting, which would be left free so that if I found an area that I really enjoyed, I could layover there.

But boy was hell flaming when my father caught me planning things out, "What the hell are you planning on doing!"

"I would like to take some time off and hike the Appalachian Trail from one end to the other."

"Bull shit Mike! You're going to do no such thing; the only thing you are going to be worrying about is either going to school or getting a job. You're not going to be doing such a fool thing."

"But Dad, this is one of the few times in my life, time is available for me to undertake something like this."

"Bull shit Mike! Your only adventure is going to be how to become a man, not a bum or fool. June, come here, what do you think of his bull shit plans?"

"Well, I think that if he did something like this, I'll worry so much that my life would be miserable. I would horribly miss him."

"See, Mike! See what this would do to your mother. I'm telling you right now, you're not going to be doing this, or you'll be leaving this house for good! While you think that your bank account is yours, it's still in your mother's name, and I'll make her sign it over to me if you don't use the money for school."

Well, that killed my plans. If it wasn't for my thoughts of my mother, I would have said, "Good riddance;" and strike out on my own, with my earned money or not. Becoming a trail guide or expedition leader also wasn't in my father's conception of what a job is. It was late in the year and I really didn't think that I would get accepted, but applied to attend the Rhode Island School of Photography.

It was mid May and surprisingly, I received a letter from the school that said I have been accepted and there were still positions available. They requested down payment to secure my placement, and a meeting over the summer to place my residence. Dad called them up and made the plans.

At the same time in scouts, things went on a downhill slide. Vern's dad was giving up being scoutmaster, and the adult taking over was the father of a new boy. He approached Norm and I and requested, "Both of you really keep the troop together and are great scout leaders. I will need all the help in the world from you two so I can get up to snuff and keep the troop going like it is."

Norm and I agreed. It wasn't even two weeks before the plans changed. This year, summer camp was going to be at Lake Halliburton, a Canadian Boy Scout Camp. The ex-scoutmaster from when I first joined the troop used his ties to arrange the trip.

The ex-scoutmaster had a different idea, "Don't take any advice from either Mike or Norman. Yes they are assistant scoutmasters, but at their age, they are neither adults, or boys."

Vern Sr. and another old-timer also shared that opinion. Norm and I seemed to have our balls busted at every step. We applied to the troop to be counselors for the following merit badges: Hiking, camping, canoeing, swimming, lifesaving, pioneering, backpacking, safety, and wilderness survival. The troop refused to do it, so Norm signed us up with the Baltimore Area Council.

"That's all well and good, but this troop isn't going to use you. Yes, you probably have more knowledge and experience, but you two don't have the maturity I think you would need. No sir, you're not going to be merit badge councilors for us."

Both Norm and I went on the trip and it basically sucked, not only for us, but for the boys as well. The best part was going to Toronto and visiting their Science Center, it was so huge; we only toured half of the center. Norm and I lobbied to come back, but the other adults wanted to visit the huge mall.

We were headed off to Lake Halliburton, but it was obvious that we had problems as neither Norm nor I, were allowed to interact with the boys, or the adults to any great extent. It was like the ex-scoutmaster not only came back to reign as king, but forgot what made the troop great. I detected a lot of selfishness with the three adults who were treating the scoutmaster more like a puppet.

Norm and I did what we did best and totally had the adults irritated with us, we played practical jokes on the other adults. We injected the eggs, onions and oranges with green food dye, I heard that Vern Sr. was preparing to have a sit down at a kybo (Canadian lateen,) so I taped Snap and Pops to the underside of the toilet seat. Unfortunately another adult, a huge truck driver beat Vern to it. The loud pop was still funny, but when he walked out, he demonstrated he wasn't amused.

Not to mention our troop urinary dye debacle. A Scouter from another troop gave us urinary dye to use in the drink the troop uses. One adult caught us and had the others gathered around the bug juice container to figure out what we had done.

We got reamed out for that, especially because the person that gave us the dye also played a little joke on us as far, as the amount that we needed to add which dyed the container red. The other adults were peeing red for days.

At Lake Halliburton, we got to our camp by placing our gear in a queen boat ( wooden life raft) and we paddled out. Then got taken back to get our canoes. No one was permitted to do anything and the senior patrol wasn't doing their jobs, kids were getting homesick and fights were breaking out all of the time. When Norm and I attempted to get the senior patrol functioning, the effort was broken up.

Near the end of the week, I traded for a Canadian Scout Uniform with a log of Copenhagen tins and my Order of the Arrow sash. When it came time to go to the main camp on trading post day, I was wearing it and the ex-scoutmaster demanded an explanation on why I am wearing a Canadian Scouting uniform.

"I defected! They seem to appreciate Norm and me more." Christ did he hit the roof. After that trip, Norm said that until the scoutmaster is out and the troop changes for the better, he is out. With Rhode Island approaching, I was pretty much out as well.

During the summer, Mom, Dad, my sister and I made plans to visit The Rhode Island School of Photography. We met with the admission person, a Mr. Julianne. He was the salesman type, but things looked to be decent.

In the morning, we visited the school, which appeared to be an old elementary school that was converted for use as a photography school. The basement areas were the darkrooms and film processing labs. The main floor was the offices, president's office and two large rooms. One was divided for use with portraiture, and the other one could be used for portraiture or as a large classroom.

The upstairs had a main hall that included a cantina, a negative retouching facility, classroom, and the commercial studios. For the first year, it was 35mm SLRs and 4x5 inch view cameras. Mr. Julianne took us out to lunch and treated us to the best Clam Chowder that there was to be had. I didn't mention that I liked the Manhattan clam chowder better.

I agreed to attend and Dad handed the man the check for the first quarter. With the school tour and lunch out of the way, the next step was to find housing as the dorms were already full. We were introduced to a dashing Italian man in a suit, Ron Romano.

His family owned a couple of funeral parlors, and also had other houses they rented out to RISP students. He showed me the no longer used funeral parlor on Pocasset Avenue. They were renting the top floor to four people. You had your own bedroom, but the bathroom, kitchen and living room was communal.

Dad signed a $2,500 check for the rent and $400 security deposit. That night it was Japanese fare at a restaurant dad had found and wanted to try. Boy was that Japanese and like the bizarre food show, it was real Japanese.

Once home, dad had me sign the stocks and accounts over to him and he took the money, saying, "Mike, I'm giving you $500.00 out of this. That should be plenty for food until Christmas."

Though out the summer, there wasn't a day that went by without Jean crossing my mind, but at this place in time, the grief was more like a headache in my head and a dull pain in my heart. At least I was getting by.

To possibly help with my transportation up to Rhode Island, Mr. Julianne gave me the name and phone number of a girl from Maryland who also would be attending the school.