the greatest gift I've ever received 

Christmas, and visiting home in 1970 something.

I’d been away for a while finding myself, or retreating

from myself, or searching for the balance between the two.

I came bearing gifts;

for my father, a gas card for fifty bucks at any Esso station

in the lower 48, and for my mother, a fifty dollar

gift certificate to “Cherry & Webb” department store on North Main.

my mother gave me a shirt and tie combo which I would never wear.

but my father, knowing I liked teeshirts with a message such as:

“Write-in Eldridge Cleaver For President”

or: “Unite Ireland” or: “Impeach The Cox Sacker”

or:“Champaign Don’t Drive Me Crazy / Cocaine Don’t Make Me Lazy”

one of the great ones, silkscreened by my buddy John Copley at

“Crow Quill Graphics in Ann Arbor, Michigan,––

gifted me with a teeshirt which read: “Kiss Me I’m Italian”

printed below a set of voluptuous, red female-looking lips.

yessiree bob, it's the greatest gift I’ve ever received, which

like the shirt and tie combo from my mother, I would never wear.