Journal 13 Pictures

Gene is joining the Navy.


Brinker is joining the Coast Guard.

Journal 13

I’ve been watching over Gene, I’m concerned that he is going to take this whole situation harshly since we did not have the best last couple of days together. He seems to be okay. It is June and people are arriving at Devon. Brinker brings up his father to meet Gene. When Mr. Hadley and Gene were talking I learned something new about Gene. He told Mr. Hadley, “I’ve joined the Navy and their sending me to Pensacola.” This was new to me I have been watching over Gene but not enough to know that he has made this decision. At this moment I felt a sense of pride run over me like Gene was my own son. Gene then informed me about something else as well. He said to Mr. Hadley, “And then Brinker, is all set for the Coast Guard, which is good too.” What Mr. Hadley said next made me realize that he wasn’t such a bad guy. For some reason I did not think that Mr. Hadley would be the nice type of guy. He said to Gene and Brinker, “We’re all proud of you, and we’re all-old guys like me-we’re all darn jealous of you too.” At this point Brinker got embarrassed by his dad so after he left he apologized to Gene. Gene did not seem bothered by all of this conversation. After it all he headed to the gym.

The weird thing is that I can sense what Gene is feeling and thinking. Gene feels envy towards me because he feels as though I never could hate anyone he thinks that’s what made me so special. I don’t see the point in hating somebody it uses up to much energy when you can be putting your energy to a greater use. This is also another reason why I am proud of Gene he enlisted in the war because he felt as though he had gotten rid of all his hate. After watching over gene in the war I noticed that he never even killed a man. I respect him for that, maybe he is the same as me after all.

I have never been in such peace. I feel like what happened to me was all part of my destiny. I would do nothing to change it. I blame nobody but myself for what happened to me. Gene should not feel any guilt.

Journal 12 Pictures

This is my suitcase that Gene had brought to me the day after I fell down the stairs.


I had always hoped that there was such place a as Heaven. Now I know there is.


This is Phil Lathem, the wrestling coach. He helped the doctor carry me out on the chair.

Journal 12

At the bottom of the stairs I felt helpless. Everyone was gathered over me, whispering to each other what to do. They finally decided that they’d go get Dr. Stanpole and Phil Lathem. They carried me out on a chair and brought me to the infirmary. I heard the doctor say, “It’s the leg again. Broken again. But a much cleaner break I think, much cleaner. A simple fracture.” You would think at this point I would be relieved that it hadn’t seemed to be as bad as last time, but I was angry that I had to go through the recovery again. When we got to the infirmary the doctors further explained what was going on. When everyone left my room I heard someone say something I couldn’t quite make it out so I said, “Who is it!” I then noticed that it was Gene I asked him, “You want to break something else in me! Is that why you’re here!” I reached out to try to hit him but it wasn’t enough I fell well everything but my legs fell. He pleaded, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” I did not respond I was too busy trying to get myself back up. Finally, he left the infirmary. The next morning the doctor had told me that he left Gene a note to bring me my clothes. The last thing I wanted to see in the morning was Gene. I then confessed to Gene that I wish I had been in the war. He told me that either way with a normal leg or not I would not be good in the war. We then talked about the tree I said, “It was just some kind of blind impulse you had in the tree there, you didn’t know what you were doing. Was that it?” He told me that that was it, and that he would never believe it if I actually believed him. I actually did believe him I believed every word he said. He left and that was the last time Gene and I would ever talk. I went into surgery with Dr. Stanpole, for some reason I felt like this was a bad time like something wasn’t going to go as planned. That is exactly what happened. I saw the light as many people say. Truth is there is a light and halfway through my surgery my heart stopped and it was my turn to see the light and begin my journey to heaven.

Journal 11 Pictures

This looks like the snowball fight that the boys and I had.

I felt like I was being interrogated when Gene and I were brought to the Assembly Room.

This is what the stairs looked like, the ones I fell down. They were marble.

Journal 11

Before Gene had told me all about his trip, he came back in the middle of a snowball fight that I was in. I hit him with a snowball and told him, “We need you on our side even if you do have a lousy aim. We need somebody else. Even you.” We all started fighting and laughing, we were having a good time. Then I turned on some of the people on my side to add excitement. It backfired though everyone ended up ganging up on me! I surrendered of course how could I fight off so many men, it seemed impossible. Gene told me that he was concerned for my leg during that fight. But I truly felt like it was getting stronger. When we were up in the room Brinker stopped by to see how Leper was. Gene told him that he just left the war he never explained to him why. Then later that night Brinker came back up to our room and asked Gene and I to go out. They took us into an Assembly Room. There were other people in the room. Brinker then started questioning me about the accident like it was an interrogation. They had asked me what happened I simply told them, “I feel out of a tree.” They kept asking questions, questions to make the whole situation more specific more clear. It was starting to frighten me, I was thinking to myself why am I here anyways. They started asking me who was in the tree with me. They then were suspicious of Gene being in the tree. It all started coming back to me I did ask Gene to go up the tree with me after all we were both up there together. The boys in the room had mentioned that Leper was at the school so two of the boys left the room and shortly came back with Leper. He was explaining how he saw two boys standing on the limb of the tree one in front of the other but he could not distinguish who was who. Someone from room tried helping him revive his memory by saying, “The one who moved first shook the other one’s balance.” I couldn’t listen to them anymore I couldn’t hear them discuss a topic that was primarily about me when I had no consensus. I was outrage I stormed out of the room and started for the stairs and slipped and fell.

Journal 10 Pictures

Gene told me that Lepers mother made them the best turkey lettuce and cheese sandwhich he ever tasted.

This is what I thought about when Gene was telling me how he had kicked Leper's chair over.

Gene had told me how amazing the view was when they went on a walk.

Journal 10

I actually did find out what the telegram was about. The next day Gene went to meet up with Leper at his home. When Gene got back from his trip with Leper he told me everything, well at least he said he did. Gene would not tell me where Leper’s home was and he told me not to tell anyone that Leper had gone home because he could get in trouble for escaping the war. Gene told me that Leper had said, “I escaped!” Leper escaped from the war?! That sounds real serious if you ask me. Supposedly, Gene had then asked him why and Leper responded with, “They were going to give me a discharge, a Section Eight discharge.” Gene had supposed that I knew what a discharge was and had waited for a response. With no response he knew that I did not know what a Section Eight discharge is he told me that it was for insanity. They thought Leper was insane! I asked what they had talked about after he told him about his discharge. Gene said that after talking about the discharge Leper had said something that had ticked Gene off so Gene kicked his chair resulting in Leper falling. Gene never told me what Leper had said that made him mad. Anyways, Gene said when Leper fell, his mother came running in the room, saying, “What on earth happened?” Gene apologized to her and she offered him to stay for lunch, of course, he accepted. After lunch they went for a walk and this is when Gene said things started getting strange. Leper had told Gene that when he was in the war he started to hallucinate. He said that one guys face, “changed into a woman” Gene said that he couldn’t believe it. He did not want to hear this I can understand why this would upset Gene. He was startled and concerned about Leper. He didn’t know what to do other than yell at Leper to stop and ultimately he ran away from Leper. He told me that if he listened to anymore of it then he too may have gone insane.

Journal 9 Pictures

This is what the ski troops looked like. The one that Leper joined after seeing that video.

This is the ski jump that was put together for the Winter Carnival.



This was one of the prizes at the Winter Carnival, a Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.

This was the type of cider that Brinker brought to the Winter Carnival.

Journal 9

It was the beginning of January when a recruiter from the U.S. ski troops showed a film to the students. Leper was very interested in this idea. He was ecstatic at the idea of being able to do something he enjoys that will ultimately better the war. I heard him say to Gene after the presentation, “How do you like that!” I wasn’t sure if he would actually take action and sign up for the job until he said, “I’m going to enlist in these ski troops.” Within a blink of an eye time flew by and Leper was gone. The group occasionally met in the Butt Room, this is where we all hung out. We read newspaper about the war and discuss about how we think Leper is doing. Besides hanging out in the Butt Room the weekends were pretty boring. When Gene and I were in our dorm one night I said to him, “You know what we’d better do next Saturday?” I paused, “We’d better organize the Winter Carnival.” He said that there’s never been a winter carnival I told him that there is now. I explained to him that we had to have snow statues, food, and music. He said that he’d take care of the snow statues. Gene took care of convincing Brinker to come as well I don’t know how he did it but he did. Brinker brought cider along with his roommate Brownie.  Chet also came he played the trumpet for the Winter Carnival. A lot of other people came to I think it was the prizes that attracted them. We had several different prizes from dictionaries to hand woven rope ladders. After the ski jump was down getting put together, the games began. Then halfway through the Winter Carnival Gene got a telegram from someone. I thought it was the winter Olympics asking for Gene but he thought otherwise. He took the letter from me faced the other way and read it to himself. His face while reading the telegram was shocked yet concerned. I wish he would have let me read it.

Journal 8 Pictures

This is what Gene's room looked like when I arrived at the dorm. Dirty clothes were everywhere.


These are the other kinds of shirts I found in Gene's room. He said that they were for being a manager.


This is the gym that we went to while skipping class.

Journal 8

After hearing all of Gene’s stories, I went through his closet. I told him, “I can see I never should have left you alone…where did you get those clothes!” He told me that they were his work clothes. I asked him what the others were and he told me, “On the railroad. Shoveling snow.” After busting Gene about his clothes Brinker barged in. He said, “Ready to sign up?” I asked what he was talking about and Gene told me that they were thinking about enlisting. I was shocked, I obviously did not want Gene to enlist and he knew it. He did not want to be alone in that dorm. But Gene ensured me that it was only something that they were thinking about. We went to the Chapel and then on our way back I did not feel like going to class. Both Gene and I had class, but I convinced him to skip it. We went to the gym; I miss working out so much. The gym was like a home to me. Anyways, I asked Gene what sport he tried playing, certain that he had listened to my request, he told me none. I was upset, I wanted him to play sports for me I told him that. Gene feeling guilty asked what he could do for me. I told him that I will train him for the Olympics. To be specific the Olympics in ’44. Gene told me that there will be no Olympics because of the war. I said I had a no-war theory. The next day when we were going back from working out we ran into a master. Gene had just finished running a fast sprint. I told him how we were training for the Olympics. He laughed in my face when I told him this and said that it was all games. It seemed to me that he was thinking the same thing Gene thought about the war and the Olympics. Since I did not feel like explaining to him my no-war theory I just responded with, “No.” Nothing else just a no, the master had a stunned look on his face and ended up ending the conversation early.

Journal 7 Pictures

This is what I imagined the railroad tracks looked like when Gene was describing them to me.



Gene and the boys say soldiers go by after they finished clearing the tracks. Gee, I wish I got the chance to see them.


This is the river that the beaver dam is on. It is at the bottom of the picture.


These are Lepers skis that he used to get around on the snow.

Journal 7

I went to visit Gene yesterday, I surprised him. I showed up at the dorm and he wasn’t there I figured he was out with the boys. I sat and waited when he finally arrived I said, “Hi pal, where’s the brass band?
He had a look of relief on his face. That was the great thing about our friendship we could not talk for months but see each other and feel like were best friends again.

Gene told me about what has been going on. He said he had been hanging out with Brinker, Chet, Leper, and Quackenbush lately. He said that all of them, except Leper volunteered to help clear the railroad for the war. Gene said that when he asked Leper what he was going to do instead, Leper said, “I’m touring.” Gene told me that he asked him how he was touring Leper told him that he’s using his skis. Leper then said, “I’m looking for-a beaver dam.” When I heard this I laughed. Gene said he wanted to laugh as well when Leper had said that. Gene then changed subjects and said that after they had finished clearing the tracks a train went by it with young soldiers on it. He said that this made him feel honored. I wish I was there to experience that, I wish I could have done something that great to help the soldiers fighting in the war. Anyways, Gene said on their way back to the campus they saw Leper. Brinker started bugging him for going on a beaver dam hunt. Gene did not want to witness Brinker bullying Leper, so he asked Leper, “Did you find the dam?” Leper responded by telling them that he had found the dam. They were all shocked but he said that he hadn’t seen the beaver though. He might have scared it away by getting to close to the dam. I asked Gene what happened after they talked to Leper. He seemed hesitant to tell me, like he didn’t want to tell me. I said well? He told me that Brinker was enlisting in the war. That was it that’s all he said.

Journal 6 Pictures

This is the phone I used to call Gene. It was a long distance call so it was costing me money.

This is my television that I watched all day after the accident.

Journal 6

While all the other students were going back to school from vacation I was laying in bed. That’s all I ever did, lay there. I just watched my black and white television all say. It was boring for someone like me. I was not used to just staying in one spot most of the day, but it hurt to move. I started getting angry with people, I yelled at my mother often. I know its not right to do that after all she was the one who was taking care of me the most. I think the reason why I was so mad at people is because I finally knew the truth. Gene did this to me. A human being, a friend, a best friend. Anyways I heard Genes getting pushed around by a kid named, Quackenbush. I don’t know how Genes taking it though, I’ve never seen him get bullied. I decided to give Gene a call to check in with him and maybe chat a little. He told me that his room was empty and that he had not got a new roommate.  Once I heard this I said to him, “You wouldn’t have let them put anyone else in there, would you?” He said, “No, of course not.”

Yes, I was mad at him before this conversation but it seemed like talking to him made me forget those feelings. After all we cannot change anything now. No use being hostile the past is the past.

He told me that he was the assistant crew manager. I was shocked and he knew it. He then said, “Listen, Finny, I don’t care about being a big man on the campus or anything.” I said I never thought he was trying to but why would he want to be some crew’s manager. It just did not seem like the job for him. To end the conversation I said, “Listen, pal, if I can’t play sports, you’re going to play them for me.” It sounded reasonable, I could no longer do what I loved and the reason why was Gene and he knew it too.

Journal 5 Pictures

This is my cast, that I woke up to see in the infimary.


This was my doctor that told me I would never be able to play sports again. I still have bitter feelings towards him even though he was a nice guy.


This is my hometown, Boston, such a beautiful sight.


I was put in an ambulance for my ride back to Boston.

Journal 5

I woke up in the infirmary the next morning, with a cast around my leg. It felt like I was laying there forever until someone came into the room. While I was lying there in the bed so many thoughts were going through my head. I started reflecting what went on the night before. I looked down at my cast and starting wondering how long it will take to get better. I haven’t gotten this injured before, it wasn’t like me to be clumsy and fall from the tree. Yet I did. I had this feeling, which I keep telling myself not to believe. Not to feel, but I couldn’t help but feel this way. In the midst of thinking about everything the doctor walked in. He explained to me that I had ‘shattered’ my leg. He said that it may take me a while to walk again! I couldn’t believe it; I might not be able to walk! I asked him about sports. He said that there is a strong possibility that I will never play a sport again. After our conversation I asked the doctor to get Gene for me. It only took a little while for Gene to show up at the infirmary. I told
Gene that, “I had a kind of feeling.” Gene then said, “Finny, I’ve got something to tell you. Your going to hate me…” Before he could tell me the doctor walk in. Within the next hour I was on my way back to Boston.

A month passed since the last time I had spoken to Gene. On his ride back to school from his month vacation he stopped by to say hello. From the moment I opened the door I knew something was bugging him. I was eager to find out. He told me that he was the cause of my accident. He said, “I jounced the limb. I caused it.” Deep down I knew it this was the feeling I felt the night after the accident. I just couldn’t believe myself that I could think such a thought. I would have never thought my own best friend would purposely do such a thing. But now Gene was confesses to it. Reality hit me and I ended up losing my cool. I yelled at Gene, my mom even said she heard me threaten him. I was in a mix of emotions. I felt betrayed.

 

Journal 4 Pictures

This was what the beach looked like when the sun was rising in the morning.

This is what the infirmary looks like.

 
This is the grade that Gene always needs to get.


This is a bridge that me and Gene crossed on our way back from the beach.

Journal 4

That night on the beach was the best night’s sleep I’ve ever had.  I woke up and went for a swim in the water. It would be so great to do that every day. Living on the beach would be like paradise. As soon as I got out of the water Finny was nagging me about getting back as soon as we can because he has some big test. We got back in time I knew we would. Later in the day we got people together to play blitzball then we went to our Super Suicide Society of the Summer Session meeting. When we got home from the tree Gene was still studying I told him that I knew that he wanted to be valedictorian of the class. He told me , “don’t be stupid, I wouldn’t waste my time on anything like that.” He thought I was being foolish but I still think that that’s his goal. He needs to learn how to have fun.  I try to make him realize that life isn’t all about grades. But one night he got mad at me for asking him if he wanted to see the initiation of Leper in the club. Gene seemed angry when I asked him to come. Then when I asked him what was wrong he replied, “Studying! Studying! You know, books. Work. Examinations.” He decided to come after all he told me that he’s had enough studying. When we got to the tree I told him, “ Let’s go, you and me.” I thought It would be interesting to jump off together. What happened next was the worst moment of my life. If I could take back this night and the decision to jump with Gene by my side I would. I still do not know what happened exactly everything happened so fast. As far as I know I was standing there then turned around to look at Gene and next thing I knew I was falling out of the tree. When I laid there on the ground I felt the most severe pain. Next thing I knew I was in the infirmary.

Journal 3 Pictures

This is the same exact medicine ball that we used to play blitzball.


This is my bible, I use this to pray at night.


This is the swimming pool at Devon.


This is Gene and my bikes at the beach.

Journal 3

I always say “always say some prays at night because it might turn out that there is a God.” Gene makes fun of me for this he says that I always have rules with everything I do. I don’t necessarily agree with him except for the Super Suicide Society of the Summer Session. But, along with a Society comes rules, right? Well I think they do. The first rule was that Gene and I always had to jump off the tree first to start the meeting. Another rule was that we had to meet regularly like any other club. So we met every day. As for my other ‘rules’ of my life that I have another rule that I’ll admit I agree with is that “you always win at sports.”  That’s what makes sports so good and fun to play, the fact that everyone wins. I know Gene argues that if I win then they lose but I don’t mean it like that I mean that by playing a sport and having a fun time while doing something you love that makes you a winner. But you can’t play a sport that you don’t like. That was the problem with the summer sport program. There was only a small selection of sports to choose from that summer, such as tennis, swimming, softball and badminton. So with nothing else to do I decided to make my own game up. It was fairly simple to get. We used a medicine ball; every sport includes a ball to use so I was pleased when I found the medicine ball to use. Now to come up with the name of the game was next. Bobby suggested, “It have something to do with the war, like a blitzkrieg or something.” I thought that was a brilliant idea so I thought of just making the name blitzball. We started playing and it seemed to get real popular over the summer.  One day we went to the pool where I noticed a name that I did not recognize, A. Hopkins Parker if I recall right. It was the 100 yards free style. I thought I’d I challenge him and try to beat his time. I got in the pool and had Gene time me. I ended up beating the record by .7 seconds. Gene was impressed he wanted to go tell someone. But I didn’t think that was necessary I thought everything should be left how it is. The pool was boring me so I decided to go for a bike ride with Gene to the beach, where we ended up sleeping.

Journal 2 Pictures

This shirt is the shirt that I wore to celebrate when we bombed Central Europe.


This tie is our school tie that I wore as my belt with my pink shirt.

This is Mr. Patch-Withers.

Journal 2

I woke up to a knock on our door, it was Mr. P. He was bugging us about missing dinner the night before. I decided to be honest with him so maybe he would understand.  I told him how we were swimming in the river, and how we wrestled, then I told him that we saw an amazing sunset that we could not miss out on, how there were friends that we had to see, and how we saw this tree that we had to jump off of. Mr. P did not seem to care that we missed the meal after I finished talking. Mr. P along with other Masters seemed to have loosened up that summer. Gene says it’s partly my fault, because I challenge them but I think it was just the fact that it was summer.  Everyone loosens up in the summertime.  I started getting dressed up for the day and pulled out my favorite pink shirt. Gene made another smart remark he said, “What’s that thing?!” I told him that it’s my emblem and that I was going to wear it for the day. When I put it on he said, “It makes you look like a fairy!”  If you are wondering why I would wear I pink shirt, it’s to celebrate because we bombed Central Europe the other day.  So I wore the shirt for the day and aside from the interested looks I got a couple of people asked me why I was wearing it. Later on Gene and I went to a party where we started talking to Mr.  Patch-Withers. The funny thing is I was wearing the schools tie for my belt! When Mr. Patch-Withers saw it around my waist he seemed angry and asked about it, I told him that it goes with my shirt. Since my shirt represents the celebration of our successful bombing and since our school has to do with the war I felt it was appropriate. Mr. Patch seemed impressed by this and disregarded his earlier anger. We left the party after talking to his wife and him and went on our way to the tree. I asked Gene if he was still afraid to jump. He replied, “There’s something unpleasant about that question, isn’t there?”  As we were climbing I thought of a brilliant idea! We decided to form a society. Gene thought of the name he said that it should be named, “The Suicide Society of the Summer Session.”  We jumped and the Super Suicide Society of the Summer Session had begun.

Journal 1 Pictures

This tree reminds me of the tree that laid over the river that Gene and I discovered on our first summer day
back at Devon.


These five kids walking across the field are Gene, Chet, Leper, Bobby, and I walking back to the school after discovering the tree.


When I saw this picture I instanly thought of Gene and I wrestling with eachother on the field the day we became friends.

This is the radio that we secretly listened to in our dorm.

Journal 1

My names Phineas but most people call me Finny, like Gene. Gene is my best friend who was at Devon School in the summer of 1942. As we were adventuring around the school we came across this river. I noticed an immense tree that’s limb laid across the river. I came up with a fun idea, to make the day more exciting; I decided to try to climb it. I told Gene and the others what I liked best about the tree was such a cinch. Gene being a wise guy remarked, "Is that what you like best?" I ignored his sarcasm and asked the group who wanted to go first. Expecting no volunteers I started climbing the tree. I figured if they say me do it first then they would follow. I got to the top then decided to jump off. I jumped off and landed in the river. To be honest it was fun. I asked them who was ready to go next. That’s when Gene started climbing the tree. I figured he would be the only other volunteer; he was more of a follower than a leader, unlike me. When Gene got to the limb of the tree it seemed to be forever until Gene got the courage to jump. He stood up there examining the tree like it was some mathematical equation that needs careful thinking to solve. If I just stood there letting him observe it more he would have backed down. I told him that if they torpedo the troopship he cannot just stand there! He finally got the courage to jump. When he landed Leper said, “I think that was better than Finny’s.” I told Leper that if everyone wasn’t done jumping yet so he couldn’t jump to saying who did the best. Sure enough he became quiet while Chet and Bobby said that it was against school rules. It didn’t surprise me that they were to chicken to do it. On our way back I told Gene that he was good once I shamed him into it. He told me, “You didn’t shame anybody into anything.” I told him I did and he replied by saying I was goofy. We started wrestling across the field. While the boys were advising us to hurry up before were late so we don’t get in trouble. When we got back to the dorm we listened to our radio that we weren’t allowed to have. Shortly after listening to the news of the world outside of us we went to sleep. Gene found it strange that I slept in my clothes. But I’ve heard that pajamas were unmilitary so I decided they weren’t worth it. I said my prayers and feel asleep to rest for the next day.