My hometown south of Boston had ten churches, two temples, and seven traffic lights in 1960.
Milton was a dry town without a single bar within the boundaries of the trolley suburb.
My parents considered Milton a good place to raise kids.
People believed in God and America.
As an atheist and an anti-war radical I fled this town for Boston in 1970 to return only to visit my parents.
Only my older brother lives there now.
I travel north for holidays and keep explanations about my life in New York, Europe, and Asia to fifty words or less.
Some family members think I belong to the CIA, but my cover was blown by a sexually explicit email to a Pattaya friend attached to the address of a family friend.
I had asked my ex-babysitter to delete the email.
Being female Layla opened it instead and responded with vitriol, "What I read made me sick."
She was a true believer in God.
Whatever I wrote had nothing to do with perversity, because I have become a sexual square in my old age, however the passage must have been graphic and I apologized to her, especially since I had carried a decades-old torch for Layla.
"You are not who I thought you are. If you are in Boston for the holidays, it would be best if you didn't come to my sister's house for Christmas."
I was 'persona non grata, which is Latin for 'unwelcome'.
I have to be more careful about those emails in future.
Once more 'mea culpa' to my family friend.
That's Latin for 'sorry', which I learned it as an altar boy.
I looked pure in my cassock and surplice.
It was all a show.
Unlike my crush for Layla.
