My Life as a Boy Genius: Anecdote One

I bill myself here as Paulie Rockets, Boy Genius. But I’ll let you in on a secret:

I am no genius.

Now that I’ve knocked you right out of your chair, let me explain that I do not know what a genius is. The only definition I have ever heard involved the old Stanford-Binet IQ scale, which has been shown to be inadequate when discussing all the ways that people can be intelligent. So, I do not really know what a genius is, but I am clearer on what  genius isn’t. Thus I say with certainty that I am no genius.

I used to think I was pretty bright. I now think I’m a good strong average.

But I’ve always been a bit goofy.

Let’s go back to my college days. I was quiet and kind of shy, and not one of those guys who had a rollicking college life. Still, I enjoyed my college days. But my idea of a good time was a little different from some people’s. Oh sure, I liked pizza and beer with friends, but I had a different habit when I was in grad school.

Grad School. University of Hawaii at Manoa. Early eighties…

I had a little treat for myself on Thursday nights. I would eat my dorm cafeteria dinner, go to my room, and get ready to go out. And then what I would do then was walk down the campus, down University Avenue, and then down Beretania Street. I would pause at the Fujipan bakery, just inhaling the smell of good baking—pastries and bread—and then when I got to where Kalakaua Avenue and King Street and Beretania Avenue came together, I would hit the two used-book stores on opposing corners. 


Here are a map and pictures

First I would browse in Interlude Books, the neater of the two stores, see what there was, chat a bit if my brother’s friend John McCain was working there (He was the emergency spare Pinkosh Brother) and usually I would buy a book or six. Then I would go across the street to the used-book store diagonally across from Interlude, the legendary Froggie’s. Froggie’s had been around forever, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it still existed in one form or another; it was one of those places that just survived, changing addresses every so many years, but hanging on. Inside it was chaotic and perhaps a bit dusty. Other than being sorted into very general sections, it wasn’t really organized. You could find the Literature section, or the Science Fiction and Fantasy section, but the sections themselves where chaotic. Oh, there was an attempt made to organize books by author, but the shelves were so full it was futile.

In short, it was an excellent place for serendipity. I cannot tell you how many books I found that I thought were unobtainable, or that were just too rare to show up in a cheap used paperback edition. The fun was in never knowing if you would find what you were looking for, and in finding something quite unexpected and exciting. And this happened almost every time I went there.

It really was a cool place.

Then, after spending my pre-planned allowance (I had had to learn to limit my expenditures) I would walk back to campus up King Street. Beretania and King were parallel streets about a block apart, both one-way heading opposite directions.  I might get a cold drink on the way, and then go back to my room where I would either study a bit or read my new purchases.

I did this almost every Thursday night each semester for about three years. What can I say? I was a bookish nerd English major grad student.

Then one night I decided to switch it up a bit just for the sake of variety. I decided to walk down King and up Beretania. And now that I think of it, I was going widdershins.

It was slightly different, but not really in any interesting way. I walked up King, stopped in at Interlude, went to Froggie’s, bought a couple of things, and then went up a block, and started my return trip along Beretania Street.  About halfway along, I got to the edge of the Honolulu neighborhood called “Chinese Hollywood.” Most of Chinese Hollywood had been destroyed in the building of the H-1 Freeway, but some of it remained, mostly wooden bungalow-type houses from the 1930s and 1940s, which is perhaps how it got its name.

And in the yard of one of those little bungalow-type houses I saw a girl hanging from the branch of a mango tree.

I was about 23 or 24 and I noticed female humans regardless of circumstance. And this was interesting. The house, across the street from me, was small but it had an enormous mango tree. Mango trees tend to be large, and this one was above average. There was a young Asian girl hanging onto a branch, swinging back and forth and giggling, just a bit. It was night, she was in the shade of the tree, but I could tell that she was very young and kind of cute.

Young and cute, what’s not to like? I stood and watched her for a moment. She noticed and laughed. I crossed the street.

She had a cardboard box with a few mangos in it. She was leaping into the air, grabbing a branch of the tree, and trying to pick mangos with one hand while hanging from the branch with the other. The branch easily held her up; she was small and rather slender. But her methodology was not all that productive. It’s hard to pick mangos with one hand while swinging from a branch.

“Want some help?” I asked, ever the chivalrous, genteel horn-dog. Well, In those days I thought I could de-emphasize the horn-dog part if I were genteel and chivalrous enough. But this girl  just dropped to the ground with a mango in her hand, plunked it into the box, and laughed again. I realized she didn’t speak much English.

She jumped up and grabbed the branch with both hands, and I started plucking mangos. Held down by her weight, the branch was just low enough that I could pick about eight or nine really fine mangos. She dropped again, jumped and grasped another branch, and I again picked some really fine mangos. The whole time she was swinging back and forth, her legs swinging. In her mid-calf skirt, she looked like a bell.

Then I grabbed a branch and pulled down. I did not want to damage the tree. But it was a sturdy old tree, and the branch came down quite low, and the girl was able to pluck every mango off that branch with no difficulty. We did this with several branches, and even without any words on her part, and very few on mine, we managed to coordinate our hanging and picking, switching roles every so often. It was excellent teamwork.

Finally, when we had the box about half full (it was one of those boxes apples come from the packers in), she decided  that she had picked enough. She tried to hoist the box, but it was a good crop year for mangos, and the box was heavy. So I put my bag of books in the box and lifted it up.

“Do you want me to take it inside for you?” I said, pointing to the door of the house. She shook her head. “Where would you like me to take them?

She answered by beckoning me forward, then leading me out to the sidewalk in front of the house. Then she lead past a couple of houses to the side street.

There, parked on the side street, was an enormous Cadillac. It was black, and simply huge. Standing by it were two other women, not so young and not so cute. The were dressed in slinky evening dresses with slits up to mid-thigh. Even under the streetlights I could see that they were heavily made-up, and a bit hard-looking. The one closest to me was wearing extremely high stiletto heels. She unlocked the trunk and gestured. I put the box of mangos in the trunk, and just had time to snatch my bag of books out of it before the stiletto-heeled woman slammed the trunk. Then all three women quickly got in the car, the youngest one nodding at me once, the driver fired up the engine, and they peeled out.

In Honolulu they have something called Korean Bars. They are not always run by Koreans, but often enough that the name sticks. They sell over-priced drinks and over-priced snacks to men who are encouraged to spend as much as possible by the hostesses, who usually dress in a provocative manner and sit next to customers and sometimes get into a little physical contact—anything to keep the customer buying drinks. The girls will also ask the customer to buy them drinks—usually a champagne cocktail that is beyond pricey. The “Champagne” is usually sparkling cider, as bar employees are prohibited by law from drinking alcohol while working.

I’m sure they have these sorts of places everywhere. “Hostess bars.” “Clip Joints.” Whatever.

And I realized that I had just helped some joint somewhere in town improve their bottom line. Somewhere some chump was paying big money for a dish of mangos and soy made with mangos that I had just helped steal.

So no, I am seriously not a genius.