Steve Gibbs Autobiography

For Sunday, March 31, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,215 words Abio episode 16: Summer vacation in Wildwood For my freshman summer, my roommate Dan landed me a day-clerk spot at a hotel-motel-restaurant on the boardwalk in Wildwood, New Jersey, the Eisenhower Hotel and Golden Shores Motel, which offered the European plan – no free food – or the American plan – three meals included. Full restaurant. The Savory Seasoned-Salt family owned the business, and their mom ran the place. She opened for nine weeks each summer, then closed, took the proceeds and flew back to Europe with her assistant Sarah. In the summer she hired college students to run the place, plus a freelancing accountant and chef for the money and food. My job was at the front desk welcoming guests with my partner Mike. We’d check them in. Offer to carry their bags. We had no elevators and four floors. We’d record their money in the ledger as received or pending departure. We answered the phone and acc...

for Sunday, March 24, 2024 Drummer Column Gibbs, 1,269 words Abio episode 15 – Meet the adjunct editor-in-chief Because of Mr. Phillips’s D grade back in high school history, I was prevented from becoming a full-fledged Penn State student. I had to enter on adjunct status for one year, a probation. Fine. My moment had arrived. A rural hick with a background in factories was taking his first seat in a University English classroom. My mother bought me a new shirt and trousers, so I looked fine. As other kids wearing similar garb filed in, it became apparent that a lot of our moms shopped at the same few stores. We were freshmen, after all. Looking around I spotted several Wildlife Technology students who were skinning a deer yesterday. I relaxed a little. Mr. Browell entered with his leather briefcase. dark hair, glasses, goatee, banded ponytail and introduced the first novel, Slaughterhouse five by Kurt Vonnegut. He wrote only “Kurt Vonnegut” on the boar...

Abio Episode 14 The big nudge -- My mental breakdown At age 18 I had to visit a psychiatrist. Alice Cooper was right. Something came over me while still working at Pure Carbon, a weight. Little had changed – lunch with my nothing-to-report friends, afternoon showers with 18 other filthy men, hitchhiking 11 miles to and from home every day for 8 months before I could afford a motorcycle. Same old routine that I’d grown to accept. Working with carbon was never fun, but fun and excitement was now seeping out of my evening and weekend life – the real life. Going swimming in the river didn’t interest me. House parties grew dull. Dirt-road bonfire keggers became tiresome. I recall standing in front of a jukebox at the pool hall and not being able to pick a song I wanted to hear. Something was wrong. I developed a tight spot at the top of my head. It was the weirdest sensation, not physical, just a localized pressure, like water torture. I tolerated it for weeks, tried to ...

For Sunday, March 10, 2024 Drummer Column, Gibbs, 1,219 words Abio 13: Period of transition This autobiography was about to take us into my college days, but then, two weeks ago, it did a backflip and dropped us off in 1958 on my neighborhood sidewalk in rural PA just in time for me to get run over by my neighbor and have my skull cracked open and all my memories spill out. Why? I’m in search of nudges that kept me in and out of college. Maybe I’m overlooking a childhood accident. When the pickup truck crashed into my train at my feet with a ball of orange flame, it should have traumatized me further. Instead, it knocked some sense into me. It was real, and I needed real. I was tired cutesy baby talk. By the river I clearly saw pollywogs and blackberries. I had much increased awareness of the world around me. A fog had lifted. I spoke my first words in three months. And so on. Now, today, while writing this, I’m wondering if those early accidents left any remnant ...