It is not common for ten year old boys to be interested in politics and the news, but I was not a common ten year old. My father was very interested in politics and I often listened (and occasionally contributed) to his discussions with friends and family about the momentous events occurring in the spring of 1968- the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, McCarthy driving Johnson from the race for President, Bobby Kennedy entering the race, the assassination of Dr. King, the riots across America, the near revolution in France. So, it was not strange for me to get up just after my father left for the office and turn on the Today show. It was unusual for my mother to enter the family room to see my crying. My father was a Nixon supporter. I was for Bobby Kennedy and I had come downstairs expecting to hear news of Kennedy’s win in the California primary. Instead, I learned that he was lying near death in a Los Angeles hospital after being shot.
1968 was the first Presidential campaign which I felt a part of. Ten campaigns later, I still remember the excitement I felt at debating the war with adults and adults actually listening to me. I have felt nothing like that since. But, June 5, 1968 was a dark day for me, for not only did I see my political hero struck down, but I found my own innocence about life yanked away from me and trampled by a selfish monster who killed something within me.
I had been enrolled in Red Cross swimming lessons and was to be at the indoor swimming pool at the local college at ten that morning. I had begged my mother to let me skip the lesson that day so I could stay home and watch the news to learn if Senator Kennedy would live. But, my mother insisted I go and, reluctantly, I obeyed. When the lesson was over, rather than shower and change from my trunks to my standard shorts and t-shirt, I simply ran out of the pool building to my bike, which was chained up outside, so that I could speed home quickly and sit back down in front of the television.
An older man approached, large, with graying hair and an old, cheap suit. He demanded to know if I were enrolled in the swimming program, which I thought a silly question as I was still in my swim trunks, with my clothes dropped into the basket of my bicycle. I replied that I was and he told me that I need to come to his office to fill out some paperwork for the insurance. I didn’t know there was insurance involved and I wanted to get home as quickly as possible. But, he was quite insistent and I had been taught to obey adults. I reluctantly followed him upstairs to his office in the building neighboring the pool.
I won’t go into detail about what happened, except to say that he immediately began to compliment me on what a handsome boy I was and how proud my parents must have been. Growing up in a small town in the American Midwest in the sixties, I was pretty naive when it came to sexual matters and didn’t realize that what was happening was wrong until it was too late, by which time I didn’t want it to end. I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t want it to stop.
When he was through with me, he told me to put my swim trunks back on and his entire demeanor changed. He growled menacingly that if I told anyone what had happened, he would kill my parents. He walked me back down to my bike and watched as I rode slowly home.
The shame I felt was incredible, shame that I had allowed him to do it, shame that I had allowed it. How had he known I would like it, I wondered. Was there something wrong with me, some sign that I was a wicked boy who would allow him to do those things? Why had I enjoyed it so much?
I never told my parents. They refused my request to quit swimming lessons. For the rest of the time, I parked my bike near the library and walked around the pool building from the other side to avoid possible contact with the man, though I felt such loathing and disgust with myself for even considering that I might want to see him again.
I consider that morning the moment that it all began, when the long train of events that have brought me to the point It is not common for ten year old boys to be interested in politics and the news, but I was not a common ten year old. My father was very interested in politics and I often listened (and occasionally contributed) to his discussions with friends and family about the momentous events occurring in the spring of 1968- the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, McCarthy driving Johnson from the race for President, Bobby Kennedy entering the race, the assassination of Dr. King, the riots across America, the near revolution in France. So, it was not strange for me to get up just after my father left for the office and turn on the Today show. It was unusual for my mother to enter the family room to see my crying. My father was a Nixon supporter. I was for Bobby Kennedy and I had come downstairs expecting to hear news of Kennedy’s win in the California primary. Instead, I learned that he was lying near death in a Los Angeles hospital after being shot.
1968 was the first Presidential campaign which I felt a part of. Ten campaigns later, I still remember the excitement I felt at debating the war with adults and adults actually listening to me. I have felt nothing like that since. But, June 5, 1968 was a dark day for me, for not only did I see my political hero struck down, but I found my own innocence about life yanked away from me and trampled by a selfish monster who killed something within me.
I had been enrolled in Red Cross swimming lessons and was to be at the indoor swimming pool at the local college at ten that morning. I had begged my mother to let me skip the lesson that day so I could stay home and watch the news to learn if Senator Kennedy would live. But, my mother insisted I go and, reluctantly, I obeyed. When the lesson was over, rather than shower and change from my trunks to my standard shorts and t-shirt, I simply ran out of the pool building to my bike, which was chained up outside, so that I could speed home quickly and sit back down in front of the television.
An older man approached, large, with graying hair and an old, cheap suit. He demanded to know if I were enrolled in the swimming program, which I thought a silly question as I was still in my swim trunks, with my clothes dropped into the basket of my bicycle. I replied that I was and he told me that I need to come to his office to fill out some paperwork for the insurance. I didn’t know there was insurance involved and I wanted to get home as quickly as possible. But, he was quite insistent and I had been taught to obey adults. I reluctantly followed him upstairs to his office in the building neighboring the pool.
I won’t go into detail about what happened, except to say that he immediately began to compliment me on what a handsome boy I was and how proud my parents must have been. Growing up in a small town in the American Midwest in the sixties, I was pretty naive when it came to sexual matters and didn’t realize that what was happening was wrong until it was too late, by which time I didn’t want it to end. I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t want it to stop.
When he was through with me, he told me to put my swim trunks back on and his entire demeanor changed. He growled menacingly that if I told anyone what had happened, he would kill my parents. He walked me back down to my bike and watched as I rode slowly home.
The shame I felt was incredible, shame that I had allowed him to do it, shame that I had allowed it. How had he known I would like it, I wondered. Was there something wrong with me, some sign that I was a wicked boy who would allow him to do those things? Why had I enjoyed it so much?
I never told my parents. They refused my request to quit swimming lessons. For the rest of the time, I parked my bike near the library and walked around the pool building from the other side to avoid possible contact with the man, though I felt such loathing and disgust with myself for even considering that I might want to see him again.
I consider that morning the moment that it all began, when the long train of events that have brought me to the point where I now find myself began. Forty years ago today, June 5, 2008, the morning Bobby Kennedy was shot and the morning I was molested at swimming lessons.where I now find myself began. Forty years ago today, June 5, 2008, the morning Bobby Kennedy was shot and the morning I was molested at swimming lessons.
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