resigned his commission and applied to Sacramento State University, citing an "antipathy to sea travel." He was even less enthusiastic about staying with us when he finally came back for good that summer.

Before long he was back at his old cashier's job in North Highlands earning money for the Fall Semester. I remember him re-uniting with some of his old high school buddies, some of them already in their sophomore year at Sac State. Eventually, my brother and two of his buddies pooled their resources to get an apartment near the campus.

I have a clear memory of my mother and I in the car driving back home from somewhere, and my mother looking out over the steering wheel with a sad expression and commenting on this feeling in the pit of her stomach of Bob pulling away from her as he struck out on his own.

There was another big change ahead. The following year, 1962, a co-worker of hers offered to rent us a 3 bedroom house in North Highlands. The rent was higher

than she was accustomed to paying, but Bob's roommate experiment didn't work out as planned, and he offered to help with the expense and move into the 3rd bedroom, which was a long and narrow converted garage. For the very first time ever, I was about to get my own bedroom, and I was really excited about it.

I would be 12 in October, and I was already beginning to experience those bodily changes that signal the beginning of adolescence. One time, after getting out of the shower, as I was drying myself off, I noticed some hair beginning to grow around my privates. I had seen my brother naked before, so I knew this was to be expected, but I didn't expect it this soon.

Aside from that new development, I didn't feel any different, except I tended to touch myself down there more often and experience a strange "on the verge" kind of sensation I'd never felt before. I began having erections in broad daylight, not the usual wake up kind I'd had for as long as I could remember. This wasn't alarming to me, and I knew something about the birds and the bees from playmates and from television. Still, it was yet another change, the dawning of another day.

***