By Kenneth L. Hardin

I don’t go out much anymore and I don’t particularly engage in small talk with people like I used to. I came to this realization as I sat in the Breakfast Time restaurant last Saturday morning enjoying a heavy meal and light conversation with two good friends from high school. As we talked about those no longer with us, ran down the list of the aches and pains that are now so pervasive in our lives, and reminisced on the good times we shared from Knox through Salisbury High, we all had the same feeling about our personal growth and change. We acknowledged finding solace in minimization of the social sides of who we used to be in favor of a more minimalist existence that leans towards less mass socialization. I’ve taken several personality profiles over the years and have been surprised to find that I identify as an introvert who knows how to exist in extrovert situations.

It makes sense as people have defined me as “moody, distant, hard to get to know or close to, not easy to befriend and angry.” People that knew me back in middle and high school are surprised at the person I’ve morphed into today. Back in the day, I was happy-go-lucky, outgoing, gregarious and the life of the party. I never met a stranger and my conversation was ongoing devoid of commas or full stop punctuation. My continual verbal emissions via skilled gaseous oratorical blathering on about any topic may have contributed to our current global warming crisis without my knowledge. As a young man not quite at the age to legally be in dance clubs, when I first entered the military, I talked my way into many dark strobe light filled party hubs. I never got off the dance floor the entire night and gained a reputation and a following as the one-man party machine when I showed up.

Fast forward nearly 40 years later and I no longer recognize or resemble that young man in any way. It’s not that I grew up and matured so much as I’ve just become so disillusioned and disheartened with society that I don’t want to participate in it much anymore. As I recline back in my slightly worn leather office chair, I push down hard but somewhat hesitantly and solemnly on the computer keys. This allows trapped memories of a simpler time to escape out of my head and stream down to my fingertips as I alternate between sadness and fondness of a childhood I wish I could do over. There’s a 1994 hip hop song entitled, “Back in the Day,” that flows in and out of my thought recesses as I think back on the younger years I wish I could re-live, “Back in the days when I was young, I’m not a kid anymore, but some days I sit and wish I was a kid again…”

I miss walking the half mile or so from my front porch down to the Miller Recreation Center back in the ’70s. On Monday nights, I took free karate lessons, played box hockey or learned arts and crafts from wonderful caring adults there like Johnnie Mae Leach. We enjoyed Hall Gym before it became air conditioned and learned where all the dead spots were on the old wooden floor before the current upgrades. We walked the neighborhood searching for discarded glass bottles to exchange them for a few coins at the little store on Horah Street that’s now a barbershop. It was just enough in each visit to then brave the Innes Street traffic to make multiple trips to the Dairy Queen for Mr. Misty’s.

The only allowance we received was the benefit of being allowed to play outside all day, but we never wanted for food. Green apple and pear trees, plum and black berry bushes, and a water hose attached to the side of a house provided all the nourishment we needed. As newly minted teenagers not yet old enough to drive, we walked the entire West End neighborhood, stopping several times at the Mama’s Authentic N.Y. Style Pizzeria restaurant, where Flower Town is now located. We would then trek across the other side of the community through the graveyard on Brenner Avenue to feast on Frankie’s Chicken. For fun, we hopped slow-moving trains over near the VA and rode them up and down the tracks.

There was never a thought of shooting a gun or engaging in any activities that would put us on the wrong side of the law. One of the primary reasons was that Salisbury PD officers, Price Brown and the late Braze Gilmore, lived in our community, coached our little league teams and we knew them personally. I know I’m not a kid anymore, but there are days I wish I was again.

Kenneth L. (Kenny) Hardin is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists.