Monday, Aug. 23rd, 1976

Had trouble sleeping last night. Pain in my chest. First time I'd had that for awhile.

Jack took out the cans this morning. Mom told me not to take them back (I wasn't going to anyway). Make him do it.

Spent much of my morning in my room reading and drawing and watching TV. Also IT but I promise it'll be the last time before school starts!

No wonder I've got grey hair! I'm already worried about that darned doctor certificate! We'll have to either call them or go to the doctor but Green doesn't know anyway.

Missed my chapter again.

Watched the return of THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY tonight in reruns, once one of my favorite TV series. Seems so long ago now. The music's still good!

Life Squad came to the house for Jack tonight but turned out to be a false alarm...he was just drunk. Ugh!

NOTES: I've always been very sensitive to pains so even the slightest pains feel stronger to me. I still suffer occasional chest pains today. Twice in the nineties, I was rushed to the hospital with them but both times it turned out to just be indigestion.

Dr. Green (not his real name) was my dad's doctor and from about the age of five, when my own doctor was involved in a bit of a scandal I found out about many years later, mine. He was cool, level-headed, friendly...but he ran his office like a factory. He always had dozens of patients and if he could give them penicillin...for anything...he'd send them on their way. As a kid I liked him but as I grew, I realized this wasn't the way most doctors behaved and I found one of my own...eventually. No idea what this certificate that was worrying me here was all about.

Somewhere a year or so before, we had gotten anew TV set and I had insisted that the old black and white one be put in my room. I had it right at the foot of my bed so I could just watch it in comfort. Of course, in those days there were no remote controls so I still had to get up to turn it on and off, change the channel or adjust the sound.

Unlike many kids, especially these days unfortunately, I had never had alcohol in my life. I resented the fact that Jack had been insinuated into my life and onto my radar. Sober, he was nice enough, although a bit bawdy for my tastes, but there were periods where he was rarely sober. He'd come into our apartment with a ladder and tools to work on this or that and he'd smell of alcohol. My father didn't drink. He had a brother who did who died before I was born. My mother didn't drink. She also has a brother who did and who died when I was nine years old. If anyone else on either side of the family had more than the occasional drink, I wasn't ware of it. I was not at all happy that Jack drank.

THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY was, of course, the big ABC comedy hit of 1970 with Shirley Jones, her stepson David Cassidy and cocky little Danny Bonaduce. At this late stage, Shirley's still hot and the music is still catchy but the series has aged badly and is very much of its time.