Woke up this morning feelin’ fine.
There’s somethin’ special on my mind.
Last night I met a new girl in the neighbourhood, whoa yeah.
Something tells me I’m into something good.
She’s the kind of girl who’s not too shy.
And I can tell I’m her kind of guy.
It was 1964 in Cleveland, Ohio. I was just 10 years old. And the group ‘Herman’s Hermit’s’ had just released the song, I’m Into Something Good.
We were living in a new housing projects in the middle of a mixed ghetto: whites, blacks and Puerto Ricans. It was full of all the things you’d hear about on the news: drugs, knives, guns, suicides, homeless bums, the smell of poverty, and fighting, everybody fighting. Wives with husbands, neighbours with neighbours, drunks with other drunks, children with children – a by-product of the stress and despondency that thrives in poverty stricken neighbourhoods.
We lived in a three bedroom apartment. The walls were bare concrete block and the floor was a dull grey linoleum tile. But it was new, and when we locked the door it was safe. It was close to the Federal Reserve Bank where my mother had gotten a job processing checks from 11pm to 7am, while her Aunt slept overnight with us four kids. We’d left my alcoholic father back at our own home in the suburbs to deal with his own problems.
I had a 20 minute walk through a bad neighbourhood to get to my new Catholic school, St. Patrick’s. I believe that regardless of where you are at in the world, if you attend a Catholic school, you get the same quality of education, the same level of respect and discipline, regardless of income or life environment. So St. Patrick’s was my oasis in a sea of violence.
At night I’d go to bed with my transistor radio tucked under my pillow. I’d listen to music on the radio by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Chad and Jeromy, and my favourites ‘Herman’s Hermits.’ On my walk to school in the morning I’d meet up with Kenny Wong. He was in my class and his family owned a Chinese Laundry. The laundry was up front, and the family lived in a big open room at the back. I went there once for his birthday. The cake had candles that kept relighting themselves after Kenny blew them out. Hardly any of his family spoke English and they were lighting off firecrackers right there in the house.
Kenny loved pop music and knew all the words to any song I’d name off to him. I told him about the song I’d heard the night before, ‘I’m Into Something Good’ by the Herman’s Hermits. Kenny started to sing it straight away. We sang that song over and over as we walked to school every day for a week.
It made me feel good. It made me feel as if I had a girlfriend. As if I was in love and all was right in the world. Funny how music can do that for you. Transport you off into a whole other realm. Sometimes Kenny and I would feel so good singing, that we’d raise our voices and people could hear us on the other side of the street. We’d get made fun of occasionally. But we were happy and we wanted to sing out that happiness as loud as we could. I was then and still am now, into something good.