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to visit Joe which went a long way to heal the wound in his heart. Kids at school immediately noticed she was not wearing his ring and a couple of limp dicks asked her out but she declined.
    Joe continued to cruise her house every night after work and the roar from his cutouts sent Clarence a signal Joe was still around. It didn’t take long for Mary to set him straight on making such a racket. She was painting a picture that they were no longer an item and his Chevy’s presence was giving a different signal. Joe promised he would silence the beast.

 
    CHAPTER 7
    A s it turned out, the parental blockade was less of a problem than Joe expected. Mary became an awfully good liar for a pious Catholic girl, and came up with creative ways to get out of the house after school. As Clarence’s fear of Joe began to fade, he gave Mary more frequent use of the family car which she used to meet Joe whenever possible.
    Joyce was aware of the subterfuge Mary was engaged in and was a willing and welcomed accomplice. In time, their friends at school figured things out and gave them plenty of support. She was “Joe’s Mary” and he “Mary’s Joe”. Many of their teachers gave silent approval to the couple’s quest to be with each other and offered reassurance that things would work out.
    No amount of friendly support could prepare Joe for the SATs. He made no attempt to study and threw caution to the wind, knowing he had no chance at all to score high enough to offset his shitty GPA. As luck would have it, a new Community College was soon to open and he expected that to be his next stop academically.
    Phil was focused like a laser on Annapolis and liked his chances. He had the grades and social enhancements to get in. His only problem was that he was a shitty wrestler and the academy required you to letter in at least one varsity sport. Phil was a JV wrestler but his dad knew the coach at the academy and was assured this would not be a problem. If Phil could get the sacred endorsement from a politician he was as good as in.
    Johnny and Larry were not college bound. Both would likely keep working at Food Giant full time until something opened up…for Johnny it would be at Ford, where his uncle and brother in law had good positions and some pull with the personnel department. For Larry…who knew? The Lansdale Class of ’64 would be facing a market where there were good paying jobs with benefits available for any hard working graduate. College was a nice luxury but not the only option. The unions were strong and getting stronger and a UAW job at one of the “Big 3” was the bedrock of the growing middle class in the mid-west.
    —
    Summer break descended on Joe and Mary with some new twists to their normal routine. Mary’s parents took her to the State College campus 80 miles from Lansdale, to see what was ahead for her and she immediately embraced the collegiate vibe and the tremendous freedoms that would come with it. Her application was accepted immediately and she broke the news to Joe with the appropriate, if not genuine, degree of remorse that they would be apart, as Joe’s application was respectfully denied.
    Joe was resigned to attending the Community College and making the long drive to see Mary on the weekends whenever possible. Johnny was developing some fundamental skills on the guitar and Joe was eager to learn as well, building on the year of forgotten lessons he had taken in the 5th grade. That summer Joe and Johnny spent endless hours practicing with hopes of actually forming a band. Joe was able to acquire a cheap Sears Silvertone electric guitar with the small amplifier built in to the case and he practiced until his fingers bled.
    On the work front, Mary was able to get an office job at the Ford Transmission plant in Lansdale, right across the street from Wonderland Mall. Joe would pick her up for lunch several times each week and they would go to a nearby park to eat and make out…usually in total