January of 1994 is mainly taken up with moving in; I immediately start at the YMCA, continuing my gym attendance that I had started at Gold’s Gym in Boston in 1992.  I was only going to stay a few weeks in the East; I stayed for good.  The first year, I lived at my parents’ house; they had made many additions over the years and I wound up with a wing of my own.  Then I began running Jezek Tool, the family business, for four years!  This was totally unplanned, but the proximity to New York made the whole thing seem like a good idea.

I also immediately started attending Trinity Church in Cranford; by the following Christmas Eve, I was a regular and was an usher at that service.  I eventually joined the choir (and sang with Michael Gow, John Beier, John Zebrowski and Doug & Donna Reagan amongst my correspondents) and met their new rector, Craig Wylie+ which led to doing the parish newsletter and later the diocesan newsletter for embattled Bishop of New Jersey, +Joe Morris Doss, along with Glenn Druce+ and Angelin Pozo.

Other present and former congregants include Rowland Bonadie and his wife, Barbara English, Lynn & Ralph Kiamie, Amy Cornell and Lynn Brown, John Beier and more.  And here's a 'shout-out' to the youth of the parish, including Chris Percy, Chuck Kiamie and Natalie Johnson.

For my driving pleasure, my parents bought me a used 1988 (?) Oldsmobile Cutlass in March, one of the advantages of living at home.

Trips include two to Los Angeles/Laguna Beach in the beginning of April and then again during December 13 to 16 while my parents are in Anaheim.  While there, I take the weekend and go up to see Mark Enos in San Francisco.  Mark had continued on to Los Angeles and then San Francisco before eventually winding up in Boulder CO.

During the year, I also take several drives to Boston.

I also got a chance to meet people; people on the address list from that time include David Fine and Dan Fililppo.  And I also did a lot of traveling on my own through the good resources of my travel agent Dick Turner and his assistant Bob McGowan at Turner World Travel.

[The following notes are redacted from a 1995 appointment book.]

Church was still at Trinity, where I was lector and produced the monthly newsletter, Connections.  In January, I was elected to the Trinity vestry for three years.

My gym was still the YMCA, and my therapist was Jamie Chapka.  I attended HIV meetings on Monday at Saint Barnabbas and Al-Anon on Saturday in Morristown.

Television included Larry Sanders, Seinfeld, Melrose Place, Star Trek’s Voyager and Deep Space 9.  September saw the premier of Shaun Cassidy’s American Gothic, one of the great unknown television shows.

January 28, I received my first tattoos from Rob Fritz in Connecticut, a former apprentice to famed inkster Spider Web.

Time was spent getting tan at Sandy Hook (including a summer vacation at the Seabird Inn, a great bed and breakfast in the Atlantic Highlands), Sherwood Island in Connecticut and tanning beds.

Various trips to Boston for the weekend were taken throughout the year.  In addition, I spent May 11 to 15 at the Island House in Key West, as well as November 24 to 29.  From September 15 to 18, I was in Denver visiting Mark Enos.

April 9, did I see Laurie Anderson or Pinchus Zuckerman?

At Halloween, I traded in my old Cutlass for a new 1996 Olds Cutlass Supreme in blue; a two-door “personal luxury” car with all the trimmings.

On November 16, Mario marries his girlfriend Mary Kay in a civil ceremony; it turns out to be a wild ride for a couple of years before the inevitable divorce.

One week after driving to Boston to attend the fabulous annual Jeff Marshall and Alli Wong Christmas party, I attended a performance of “La Boheme” at the Metropolitan Opera with my cousin Lorraine, her husband John Dizzia and their two daughters, Maria and Gina, on December 22, 1995.

We were in the sixth row, on the right hand side (stage left) and just behind us were David McCallum and his family.  I thought the woman might have been Jill Ireland but he was divorced from her in the late Sixties; when I saw him, he was married (and still is) to ex-model Katherine Carpenter.  Dark hair, slightly taller, and perfectly groomed.  Also with them were their two children, a boy and a girl, both blond.  In 1995, they would have been mid-teens.

[I would like to credit Ellen Druda, Media Librarian at Half Hollow Hills Community Library in Dix Hills, NY, in helping re-assemble this memory.  She is the owner of the best fan website for David McCallum, and I recommend it highly.]

And now you have one more year to go before I meet Bryan Johnson and the TVOD Diaries begin in earnest.  Click here and away we go to January 1996.