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Fortunes of Our Fathers

MY DAD, like his father before him, was a natural born musician. He mastered violin in his teens and was known all over the Hawthorne district of Cicero, Illinois, as the best around. He looked like actor Robert Young (the adorably incompetent patriarch in one of my favorite shows, Father Knows Best) and became popular with the local girls with his sidewalk serenades.

In the late ’40s he switched to saxophone and formed a group dubbed the Hi-Hatters. Their repertoire consisted of popular standards of the day as well as the required Czech and Polish polkas. I have fond memories of hearing the sweet strains of “Tea for Two” (the group’s opener) as Dad warmed up in the basement workshop of our Wesley Avenue house, which was part of his routine before he left for a “job,” as such gigs were called in those days. His tone and vibrato put chills right through me even from down in the basement. He had that effect on his audience, too, the ladies flocking around the stage to see and hear this handsome sax man. He blew into his sax from the side of his mouth—a very incorrect embouchure to be sure but his sound was spectacular just the same. He was in the best mood as he tinkered in the workshop, oiling the pads and adjusting the action on his Martin tenor and Conn alto saxes.

Sometimes my mother would threaten the sanctity of his warm-up ritual with sharp criticism or chastisement. “Alice, this is my job; I have to be in a great mood,” he’d say. “I can’t play sweet tonight if you’re nagging me about something and putting me in a bad frame of mind!”

In the basement, he stored the bandstands with the words “Hi-Hatters” carved out in vibrant blue and gold. I posed proudly with the whole band in front of one stand the first day I got my very own saxophone. There was my dad, on tenor and alto sax, Joe Delfino on trumpet, Irv on drums, and a really talented accordion player named Al Tobias. Later on, Al was kind enough to let me use his amazing Magnatone amplifier with a cool vibrato feature.

For a while, my uncle George Peterik played drums with my dad’s band, before he moved to California, and then the band had to change drummers. Though I was too young to remember, they say that that band with the two Peterik boys was a ferocious entity. Irv took his place, but he was no George Peterik, and the musical bond my father and my uncle had developed was gone forever.

By day, Jim Peterik, Sr., was a relay adjustor at Automatic Electric Telephone. I have a picture of him at the desk painstakingly fine-tuning these delicate pieces of gear in his black-rimmed bifocals. Without these relays tuned just right, the telephone of the day would not have functioned properly.

Automatic Electric had a factory parallel to the Eisenhower Expressway, near downtown Chicago. My father soldiered to the bus that took him to the train early each morning, despite the elements. I’d wake up to the familiar farm report blasting from our clock radio, which had become his makeshift alarm.

“The grain is up fifteen points and soybeans are down five,” bellowed a voice from the airwaves in a monotonous tone. The voice was loud enough to wake the dead—and my dad and the entire household.

I’m still an early-morning guy, and that is probably because of my dad’s impenetrable work ethic and that droning call-to-arms. But these rituals bonded us. Each day when he came home, I would greet him as he ambled down Wesley Avenue from the bus drop-off.

As we’d walk he’d tell me stories about his work buddy “Skinny” who was always doing hilariously stupid things. Sometimes he’d talk about an upcoming job with the Hi-Hatters at the VFW or the Moose Lodge in Blue Island.

When I finally got good enough on sax (around sixth grade), I would tag along with my dad to his various gigs—bar mitzvahs, men’s fraternities like the Elks, Lions, or Moose clubs, weddings, anniversary celebrations, and the lot.

For a while they were the featured band at Melody Mill on First Avenue in suburban Riverside. With my alto sax I would hide behind one of the wooden Hi-Hatters bandstands and play harmonies to my dad’s sweet tenor sax.

I had no union card and was underage so I kept pretty scarce. By the way, my dad played “by ear.” He never learned to read music, but it never held him back. He was equally adept at concertina (like his father) and fiddle, and his ear was deadly accurate, his tone was sweet, his vibrato wide, and his soloing was as good as his hero’s, Wayne King, the popular sax player from Wisconsin to whom he was often compared. In some circles he was known as “Young Wayne King.”

Another one of my favorite memories was doing a job at the VFW or the Moose Lodge with my dad and his buddies and then going out for White Castle hamburgers. It was the only place still open at midnight when the gig was through. I felt so grown-up, being in sixth grade and hanging with the guys at these gleaming white burger palaces.

I must have meant a lot to my dad. The day after my birth, my dad boasted to Skinny and Zichek, another friend of his from work, on the bench at Automatic Electric that he now had “a son!” It was somehow the validation my dad needed to make his manhood complete. That phrase, “a son,” echoed through Berwyn for days to come!

My birth did little, however, to still the constant and accelerated bickering between Alice and Jim, my mom and dad.

“Alice, quit belittling me! You’re baiting me again!”

“Jimmie, all you do is lay around the house doing nothing. Can’t you be useful? And why do you spend so much time in the bathroom? You’ve got some magazines in there with some pretty dandy pictures. I can imagine what you are doing!” My mother’s intimation of my dad’s masturbating in there was not lost on me as I grew older.

“Go jump in the lake!” he would respond, among other unprintable phrases. I got used to the slamming of doors and the feeling that all was not right in the world after all. It shook me to my core. Music became my asylum, my safe house.

As I grew up, I learned how to create a protective shield from the often negative spirit of their marriage. I think it was actually this kind of behavior that made me more determined that I would never be like that. When my sixth-grade teacher, Mrs. Hull, asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I answered, without hesitation, “a good husband.”

For the same reason, I never smoked cigarettes. I had spent one too many Sundays at home tolerating what I called my “Sunday Headache,” which I discovered much later came from inhaling secondhand smoke from my father. He chain-smoked unfiltered Camels all day, lighting the next one with the glowing butt of the last one ’til he died of heart failure at the age of seventy.

My mother and dad always seemed distant from each other. It felt as if some dark secret existed between them—as if there was an elephant in the closet that no one saw or at least acknowledged.

When Daphne, my mother’s pen pal, visited from Australia we all went to the Brookfield Zoo. Although I was only about eight, I noticed something unusual happening—my mom and dad were holding hands. I had never seen that happen before. They were clearly putting on a show for Daphne.

That simple display of affection was so unlike them. I know there must have been a lot of love there, but there was never any demonstration of it. My parents were not huggers. They didn’t hug me, and they didn’t hug each other. In fact, it seemed like nobody hugged back then. Still, I never had any doubt that they loved me—unconditionally.

Every time tempers got really hot and my mother needed ammunition, through her sobs, she would lay out her trump card: “It was seventeen years ago (or eighteen, or however many years it had been at the time), Jimmie, but I remember it like it was yesterday.”

Many years later, my mother finally cornered me and told me what “it” was. “You think your father is so great—well, let me tell you about the affair he had when we had only been married a few years!”

That encounter didn’t change my respect for my father, but it did explain the fights and icy silence between them once and for all. It affected me greatly for years and made me vow not to repeat this pattern of holding onto hurt and using it as a weapon. Inversely, it taught me the vital importance of forgiveness.

My own sexual education was sketchy at best. In sixth grade my buddy Jerry Kmen told me all he knew about the opposite sex. He said something about a girl having “three holes.” And the main one was called a “pussy nose.” This was before I had my first orgasm so the thought of taking off my clothes in front of a girl sounded just plain embarrassing. He described masturbation but I couldn’t quite put all the pieces together.

One day I was at the park with my friends and for some reason I started climbing the poles that supported the swings. When I got near the top I felt a very odd and unfamiliar sensation between my legs. I wasn’t sure if it was pleasurable or not at first—just different. The next day, trying to recreate that feeling at the poles, I clearly decided this feeling was good—very good. I developed strong muscles after that from climbing those poles almost daily! But I still didn’t put that feeling together with what Jerry Kmen had described ’til one day while gazing at a very sexy cartoon in Mad Magazine I figured it all out. Oh, that’s what that pole thing was! Little did I know at that time that I’d be chasing that feeling from that moment on.

My parents were no help in the sex-education department. One day my dad handed me a dark green book called Moving into Manhood. He kind of averted his eyes as he slipped it to me. After glancing through it I still knew nothing about the actual process of sex. The book said things like, “when the sperm meets the egg …” How the hell does that happen, guys? I still was not quite ready for one of those three holers.

It wasn’t ’til I was with The Ides on one of our first road trips (this one to Savanna, Illinois, to play the Road-Runner Den) that I connected all the dots. One of the guys had acquired some grainy black-and-white porn tapes from the ’50s and we watched them in our seedy sleeping quarters above the club owner’s office on the projector we had brought with us. The men in the films were all Brylcreem, white legs, and black socks. The gals were overweight, pasty white, and over the hill, but at least I saw the act in motion. My line, now famous in the pantheon of Ides of March lore, was, “Hey guys, it’s like jagging off—in a girl!” Prior to this I thought you just put it in and waited motionlessly.

For as long as I could remember, my mother had one big dream for me. “Jimmie, you be’s a doctor,” is what my mother always said. For some reason, she spoke this phrase in a kind of “Porgy and Bess” dialect.

My mom actually had a metal box exclusively earmarked for my post–medical school career. “After each patient, you put the money in,” she explained, opening the box and carefully arranging the bills for visual aid. It was never about saving mankind; it was about the money I would make that would go into this strong box.

“You be’s a doctor!”

I heard my mother’s tirade year after year until, at the age of ten, I could stand it no longer. I finally stood up to her and said, “Mother, let me be what I want to be, okay?” The anxious expression on her face eventually broke into a smile. She finally realized that I was my own man, and she never brought it up again.

That’s how I am with my son, Colin, too. I believe that if you raise a child with good values and you set a good example, that example goes beyond words, beyond lectures. I trust him so much that I don’t lecture, just as my parents didn’t lecture. Nobody ever said, “Jimmie, don’t drink and drive. Don’t smoke pot.” Nobody ever told me that. They knew I wasn’t going to go there—it was just that unspoken trust.

My reaction to the stoners and drinkers was, “Why do that?” It was never a temptation. In fact, I think I felt a tiny bit superior because I had the willpower to resist that course.

I’ve seen too many of my rock ’n’ roll brothers fall to drugs. They’re some of the most evil substances known to man because they totally take you over, change your personality, and ruin your body. I once had a writing session with the lead singer of a very well-known group from the ’70s. He said, “Jim, you know, my problem is that I’ve never had one great song idea when I wasn’t doing coke.” It’s a voice inside many of us that says, “I am not enough—I need a crutch.” To silence that voice is my everyday challenge.

I tried to tell him that those creative juices are “you”; it’s not the work of the drug. You can access those inner chemicals in a natural way by engaging in physical activity, eating right, sharing your talents with others, embracing loved ones, and doing nice things for people. He said, “Yeah, but I still need the coke.” This man ultimately lost his wide vocal range and ability to perform onstage.

I’ve seen way too many examples of this. When I give master classes at a Camp Jam seminar,² I always tell my cautionary tale of the time The Ides of March were invited to the aftershow party hosted by Led Zeppelin after our triumphant gig opening for them in Winnipeg, Ontario.

Here’s what happened. We knocked on the door of the band’s hotel suite. (They stayed at the fancy hotel in the area—not the lowly Holiday Inn where we were staying.)

Robert Plant came to the door in his bikini briefs and welcomed us in. As we walked in, we spotted half-naked groupies cavorting on the bed in a pillow fight. Pot was being smoked, cocaine snorted, John Bonham was in a stupor, and booze was everywhere. Jimmy Page was in the bathtub with a young lady going through some uncomfortable- looking contortions.

I looked at Larry (The Ides’ rhythm guitarist), Larry looked at Mike (Ides’ drummer), and we turned on our heels and said, “Thanks guys, see ya later!” This was not our scene at all. We repaired to a donut shop across the street from the hotel. We were back in our comfort zone.

When I tell that story at a master class, believe it or not, the kids always cheer. I tell them it’s probably why I’m still here talking to you right now. You can’t keep the party going at all costs.

My own Czech heritage also impacted my childhood. About twice a year, usually to commemorate the day someone had died, we would visit my ancestors at Bohemian National Cemetery on Pulaski Avenue and Foster.

Before the age of expressways, this would be a day-long expedition, ending with a feast at one of the authentic Czech restaurants on Cermak Road in Berwyn or Cicero. At the cemetery, we would be spellbound by the elaborate gravestones, which carried hard to pronounce names like Vosacek, Vlcek, Krahulek, and Klitpetko. These names were always dense with consonants.

Nowadays, many American parents take great pains to teach their children their native tongue, but back then, the goal was to assimilate. When my parents didn’t want me to understand what they were saying, they would speak in Czech.

They whispered little Czech phrases under their breath when they wanted to be secretive. Though I didn’t understand a word they were saying, I could pretty much decipher the meanings by their inflection, tone, and decibel level.

My strongest connection and fondest memory of my Czech heritage was the Bohemian cuisine. My mother mainly prepared Czech food. Dinnertime would become another time during which I would get teased and get called “Fatboy.” (My mother had to shop with me in the “husky” section of the department stores where you could find any color of corduroy pants you wanted as long as it was brown or navy blue.)

About once a month, the family would go out for an “eating party” (a phrase I apparently coined at age four). Some of our favorite destinations for Bohemian food were Klas in Cicero (the sidewalk in front shimmered with shards of colored glass), Old Prague, and the Dumpling House in Berwyn.

My family bought “bakery” (always used in place of “baked goods”) at Vesecky’s on Cermak Road (kind of the Rodeo Drive of Berwyn and Cicero). There we’d stock up on hoska—wonderful, eggy bread studded with slivered almonds and laced with dark and light raisins.

We’d also buy plenty of kolaches: doughy rounds made with cream cheese and targeted with apricot, cheese, and prune fillings, or my favorite: poppy seed. Cermak Road was a street lined with the most savings and loans and banks per block of any one city—Bohemians were a frugal lot, that’s for sure.

Little old Czech ladies wearing colorful babushkas (scarves) would wheel their shopping carts from butcher to baker. For meats, there was Vlceks (also on Cermak) for your pork loin and chicken and my favorite sausages called jelitzy and Jaternice or Jitrnice.

One was blood-red, barley sausage in a casing; the other was a light-colored veal sausage. You would squeeze it out of the casing (half the fun of it, really) and mix these garlicky, fatty meats with mashed potatoes and gravy. Talk about a triple bypass plate!

Since that time, of course, the area and the demographic have changed radically. The neighborhood is now largely Hispanic. The homes are still meticulously kept, but many of the restaurants now specialize in amazing flautas and enchiladas. The population has changed, but the smells are still intoxicating.

A little while back, I took my friend and Facebook guru, Paul Braun, on a walking tour of my old stomping grounds of Berwyn. Paul is not only a great friend, but also a music historian whose grasp of rock history is second to none.

We started with a visit to my first home at 2529 Wesley Avenue; the empty lot that is now a police station; the Tastee-Freez (still there!); and my second abode, the big ritzy house with the ornate stained-glass windows at 2647 Oak Park Avenue. We walked up its stairs and peered through the window. All of the walls had been torn out and “modernized.” What a shame.

We walked past Karen Moulik’s family home on Clinton where I used to spy through the front window as I passed, hoping to catch a secret glimpse of my future wife. One night I got more than I bargained for: it was Karen’s enormous father—“the old water buffalo” as I used to call him—in his undershirt and boxer shorts. What a letdown!

I walked Paul past Hiawatha Grade School where I attended kindergarten and first grade and past the school where much of my maturation took place—Piper Elementary. Three things really stood out during my six-year tenure at Piper Elementary: an amazingly caring teacher named Mrs. (Helen) Hull, who was perhaps the first to recognize my potential as a human being; Laura Strama, the object of my affections who kept me up nights and provoked my fantasies; and my nemesis, Piper School Principal, Hugh Biddinger.

Exactly three times in third grade (but who’s counting!), Laura picked me out of all the other boys to help her take off her shiny, white winter boots! (She would ordain one of us every day in the snowy winter months.) This was an honor too great to be believed. I still remember the smell of that rubber and the feeling of being that close to Laura’s calf—that close to any female, for that matter.

Recently, I had lunch with Laura after not seeing her for about forty years. Now I know why I was especially attracted to the American actress Sandra Bullock—Laura could be her sister.

We caught up on old times and she even remembered those white boots! The last recollection was darker; it had to do with the tenuous relationship that had developed with Mr. Hugh Biddinger.

What a foreboding figure! He stood at six feet, four inches tall with long ape-like arms that hung down well below his knees as he swung through the blackboard jungle of Piper Elementary. Mr. Biddinger had a permanent scowl on his face and a diabetes alert bracelet on his wrist.

He really showed his true colors when one morning he joined in our favorite playground game, kickball. He joined the other team’s side to make up for a missing player. As Biddinger rounded the bases to home plate, he was tagged out.

Of course, after I spotted that play, I yelled, “You’re out!”

He screamed, “I’m safe, Jim Pet!!”

I repeated, “No, you’re out!”

Boy of the Year.

He then came over to me and walloped me hard in the back of the head with his clenched fist. I was knocked dizzy, but managed to run to the nurse’s station to report what had happened. You don’t expect your bullies to come in the form of school principals.

From that moment on, our relationship changed. Biddinger knew I had the goods on him. When I came up for the honor of the coveted “Boy of the Year” award in eighth grade, he made sure I was taken off the bench and put into action at the last basketball game of the season.

After that game (where I literally fell flat on my face) I now had all the qualifications necessary to be voted “Boy of the Year.” The day I won the honor was one of the proudest moments of my life. The plaque still hangs above the water fountain in the gym. I only wish Laura Strama had won the “Girl of the Year” honor, instead of the very bookish and straight Sue Sellars—then we could have ruled our little Czech Camelot together.

Finally, I took Paul past the gas station where AZ & R bowling lanes once stood. Every Friday afternoon, Hugh Biddinger would march the whole eighth-grade class over to the lanes to bowl three games.

One particular Friday afternoon will be eternally engraved in my memory, not for the too-salty hot dogs, Green River soda, or the pungent odor that emanated from the shoe rental counter.

On this day, whether you got a strike or a gutter ball hardly mattered because everything grinded to a halt. A voice on the loudspeaker announced that President John F. Kennedy had been shot.

Everyone from that era remembers exactly what they were doing on that Friday. Grim-faced and disheartened, after having our day of playful innocence violently interrupted, we slipped back into our street shoes, grabbed our winter coats, and slunk, dazed and confused, back to the shelter of our homes.

² Camp Jam is the wonderful organization that Jeff Carlisi of 38 Special and Dan Lipson currently run. It’s designed to mentor budding musicians, ages nine to sixteen, coast to coast in weeklong classes. “No canoes—lots of rock” is their slogan!