by John Fogerty
To get to school, I would leave my home alone and walk two blocks to catch the 67 Colusa Avenue bus across from the Sunset View Cemetery in El Cerrito. Then I’d ride all the way to the top of Solano Ave, in Albany, and get a transfer from the bus driver. From there I would catch the F train, which went into Berkeley and passed behind the School of the Madeleine. The conductor would let us off behind the school. Mind you, I’m in the first grade doing this—six years old! Every morning at eight o’clock the students would assemble in the playground and then march into class to the music of John Philip Sousa. If I missed the 7:05 bus, I was going to be late to school, which happened many times. There was a chain-link fence surrounding the playground, and they locked the gate at 8 a.m., so I would have to climb the fence and run to class.
By this time I’ve been away from my home for maybe an hour. And at around nine thirty or so, something would happen. And it would happen over and over again, okay?
I’d raise my hand and say, “Sister, I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Not now,” she’d say.
After that, she just ignored me. Again, this isn’t, like, one time. It was enough times that it was a normal occurrence.
I’m sitting there in my uniform, blue shirt / salt-and-pepper corduroy trousers, taking my pencil and poking the cracks and crannies in my desk. Oh, I’m squirming. I’m like Alan Shepard in the space capsule. “Houston?” “Yes, Alan.” “I gotta go wee-wee. Is it okay?” “Uh, wait. We’ll get back to you.” You’re holding it, you’re holding it, and then you can’t anymore. Finally, you give up all rules of social convention. It’s too late.
And then you’re hoping nobody will notice. But Kenny Donaldson noticed. “Sister Damien! John Fogerty has a puddle under his desk.” And even then she wouldn’t call on me. So I had to sit there until there was a break, and then I had to clean it up. And sit in my moist clothing for the rest of the day. This happened probably two dozen times over the course of the school year. I’d get detention after detention for wetting my pants—I guess they figured if they punished me enough, I’d stop having to pee.
So one day at lunchtime I found myself looking at the water fountain. It had a white porcelain trough and three faucets. Now, fresh in my mind is getting detention, because I drank water and then had to pee. Under the trough, I see the knob to turn off the water and I’m thinking, Oh, I can help everybody here. I turned off that fountain. Wham! When they found out I was the dude responsible? Another detention and a note home to my parents. At the end of the year, the rest of the class was being rewarded with a trip to the circus. Not Johnny Fogerty. Because I was such an uncontrollable little wild man, I had to stay home. I was a bad boy.
The next year, my mom put me in Harding Grammar, a public school two blocks from my house. I could walk to school! And things were normal. I thrived. I really loved it there.
Okay, so how many of you have had the “flying dream”? For me this was a common occurrence as a kid. In the movie E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial there is a scene where a bunch of kids are following E.T. Suddenly, they are all up in the air (flying!) and then they “fly across the moon.” That scene made me cry and I still don’t know why.
There was a period from about the third grade to about the sixth or seventh grade where I had this flying dream a lot. It was almost always the same. Every night, I would fly around my little town, just above the trees and telephone wires, looking down at the houses and people. I was accompanied by a “friend” who seemed to be acting as a guide. As far as I can remember, we always saw the same stuff. Looking back at this from many years later, I find there is just enough room in my head to believe that perhaps this was an E.T. encounter. O-o-o-o-EEEE-o-o-o.
One day in sixth grade Miss Begovich noticed an odor in our classroom. “What is that smell?” she said. Most of the kids didn’t seem to notice it and couldn’t identify what it was or where it was coming from. Suddenly, this kid Fred blurts out, “John Fogerty smells.” Of course, now everyone is looking at me, and I start to go into confused mode. Like… huh? But Fred is adamant—“Yes, it’s John, he smells!”
So Miss Begovich gently says, “Well, John, maybe you should go to the bathroom and figure this out,” or words to that effect. I stand up and start to head to the washroom, not really understanding what I should do. Suddenly, Kathy, a girl I’d known since preschool days, stands up and says, “It’s me! I’m the one who smells!” Now my emotions are completely topsy-turvy.
Kathy insists to the teacher that she is the one who should go to the washroom, and of course this whole scene is being played out in front of the entire class. My head is spinning. Whoa… this girl is taking a bullet for me. I’m filled with emotions that are hard to describe. I realize that she is a very brave person, a very good person, to do something like this. It is such an honor to have somebody do that!
Finally, Miss Begovich decides that we should both go to the washroom, thereby defusing some of the guilt, I suppose. I went to the washroom not really knowing what to do, so I peed, washed my hands, and headed back to class. In the hall, I ran into Kathy and I thanked her. This is one of those times in life where I wish I could go back to that person and really express how amazing that made me feel.
After school a few days later, a couple of us kids were working on an extra school project. This one kid, Yvonne, had been absent for more than a week with an illness, so Miss Begovich asked us to clean out her desk so we could send some books and schoolwork home to her. Among the books and papers, we found a dead bird—in her desk. Y-e-e-o-o-w! We were kinda grossed-out. Miss Begovich said, “That was probably the bad smell from the other day.” The next day she quietly explained it to the whole class…
So much of the flip side—the good side—of those years was rooted in music. I was born with the gift of curiosity, and if I heard music I liked, I just had to find out all about it. I got into the blues at seven. It was really because of doo-wop. There was no rock and roll yet!
My two older brothers were listening to rhythm and blues, and KWBR in Oakland was mostly doo-wop and R & B, meaning black music.* They played records like “Gee” by the Crows and “Ling, Ting, Tong” by the Five Keys—we’d try to decipher the crazy Chinese references. It all seemed so exotic. Later, it was “Death of an Angel” by Donald Woods and the Vel-Aires—he’s talking about his girlfriend dying, but it was so cool! Kids love death! (Much later I found out that the Catholic Church banned “Death of an Angel” because their position was that angels can’t die. Even cooler!) Thirty years later, when Ozzy and all those guys were shouting at the devil? Same kind of deal: it was something forbidden, behind a veil and unspeakable, and therefore music that parents don’t like. A lot of the music I was hearing was pre–rock and roll, but it had so much of the vibe.
Intermingled there on KWBR was some real blues—urban blues, even some country blues. I remember hearing Muddy Waters in the early fifties, and then Howlin’ Wolf came along with that voice. I loved that voice—“Wow, listen to that guy. And the name!” I’d listen mostly by myself. Bouncin’ Bill Doubleday was the deejay from three until six, and then Big Don Barksdale had a show at night. On Sunday they played gospel. That’s where I first heard the Staple Singers, “Uncloudy Day.” The sound of that guitar—God, what a cool thing. That vibrato: bewoowowow. Even as a kid I could identify that sound right away. Pops Staples was doing all that. I loved that sound. The Swan Silvertones might’ve been my favorites. It was spiritual, church stuff, but I was mostly interested in the music.
By the time I was eight years old, I was using my mouth (and my body) to imitate the R & B records I was hearing. Every day I’d walk a couple of blocks from my house down to Harding School. There was that time to be alone, that precious time. I spent a lot of it thinking about music. I’d make the sounds of the band that I was hearing in my head. I’d go along and imitate Ernie Freeman’s “Lost Dreams” or Bo Diddley’s “I’m a Man”—daaaaah daaaaah da dummmm. Sometimes I’d snap and clap and all that,
but mostly I just did it with my mouth. Or my throat. Or hummed it. Grunts and hums and noises. Sort of… guttural sounds. Probably sounded like I was coughing to the outside world, but I loved making the sound of the bass and the kick drum. Nobody I knew of was doing anything like this, but I was quite comfortable with it. That was my way of making music.
It would hypnotize me, walking to school doing that. I even had a little friend who walked with me sometimes who called me Foghorn Fogerty—that’s what he thought I sounded like when I made my noises. I still do that, actually. I hear music in my head and I make those guttural sounds to catch the vibe.
I even invented a persona, a group called Johnny Corvette and the Corvettes. It must’ve been right around 1953, because the Corvette had just been introduced and every kid loves sleek, sexy lines and a big, fast motor to die for. Everyone in my mind’s band had matching jackets, like the Turbans or the Five Satins or the Penguins. I was Johnny, and we were black. I meant no disrespect—I was just a kid fantasizing about what he loved. So in my mind, the grown-up version of me and my group was black.
The first house we lived in was right across the street from El Cerrito High School, at 7251 Eureka Avenue. That house stayed cool in the summer. I have good memories from there.
But we moved about 1951, and I turned six in the new house, at 226 Ramona Avenue. I remember that time being less happy. My parents split up in that house.
I think working two jobs got to my dad. I remember my mom actually saying a couple of times that he was working way too hard. I think my dad went kind of crazy.
He had a nervous breakdown and was up in Sonoma or Napa, where we went to visit him, and I’d think, after seeing him, that we were all getting back together.
I didn’t see most of the fighting personally, but as I understand it, my parents had a long, messy split. One night we all went to the drive-in to see a Bob Hope movie called The Lemon Drop Kid. When we came home, I went to sleep. My brothers Tom and Jim were awake and our mom and dad were fighting over something. I only heard about it the next day.
Apparently my dad was pointing his finger angrily at my mom and she bit his finger. And there was blood all over the place. Luckily, I didn’t see that particular fight either. I can tell you I never went to see The Lemon Drop Kid again. When it comes on TV, I’m still, like, click! “Sorry, I ain’t watchin’ that.” There was something in that movie that caused bad stuff to happen.
The whole idea that my parents had separated and then divorced was upsetting and very traumatic for me. It really cut like a knife. It was something I couldn’t actually even talk about. The D word. And nobody else was talking then either—there were no divorce jokes on sitcoms. Though I’m sure divorces were everywhere, I didn’t know any other kids whose parents had divorced.
At school, if there was some kind of paper I had to fill out answering “Who do you live with?,” where I had to state that I lived with my mom—only my mom—I was mortified. Because that initiated the inevitable questions: “Where’s your father? Has he joined the… foreign legion?” That’s a phrase I heard more than once. It was a shameful thing, having only one parent. I took it really hard. Almost like it was my fault.
When my mom and dad finally divorced is hazy. When I was near the end of the third or fourth grade—I can’t quite remember—we were all going to move to, I think, Santa Rosa. I was about eight. So I informed all my pals that I’d been with pretty much since kindergarten that we were moving. But I know I didn’t seem to be that upset about it—the way you see kids being torn apart from their roots. I just remember that I kind of explained it to everybody. Then come next fall when school started, there I was, back again! And there were all my friends that I’d already said so long to.
“John, what happened?”
“Well, my dad moved.”
I remember just feeling unworthy and kind of like, “I gotta slink home and never talk about personal things.” I didn’t quite know how to approach the subject, because I don’t think I really understood.
The main issue for both of my parents was the fact that they were both alcoholics. Believe it or not, I had a real aversion to alcohol as a young person. Seeing my parents in a drunken state and hearing them talk in an incoherent way? It was repulsive to me.
I really used to kind of rag on my mom. I was a typical kid, dissatisfied with my parents. There was one meal we hated, liver and onions, because the liver would never be cooked. All us boys would just be repulsed. My mom would kind of be in her cups, acting funny—and we didn’t know why, because we never really saw her drink. I think she hid it in a cupboard or something. That was part of our lifestyle more than I care to admit, and far more than any kid should ever know about. I used to say I got negative examples from my mother. What not to do.
I’m a lot more forgiving now, especially with my mom. And that’s not just because I realize the good she instilled in me from when I was real young. It’s because, man, human beings are fragile. We break easily if things go wrong, especially if you feel hopeless. Oh God, that’s the worst thing for any of us. Frustration is a very powerful and almost insurmountable thing. I’m sure my mom had a lot of heartbreak. She had five boys that were quickly turning into five men that she had to deal with and try to raise right. On her own. I think my mom tried valiantly. God knows she tried.
So I want to do right by my mom. I worry about disclosing so much—always have. In the world I grew up in, you didn’t reveal things that you considered nobody’s business. Now that she’s gone, I’m really just trying to tell the story, to get to the truth of her experience and mine.
In many ways my mom was remarkable. She educated me on many subjects, exposed me to a lot of music, and showed up for things in my life. I’m very grateful for all that.
And I see the whole situation a little differently now—not nearly so much from the point of view of what I was missing, what I didn’t get. Because these days I have so much, because of Julie. I see both of my parents almost as tragic figures. It’s a shame that for so much of her life my mom probably felt unloved, that she wasn’t taken care of. My dad certainly never found love after the two of them split. That was all a waste. The real tragedy? Before all the economic struggles and alcohol started ruining everything, I think my parents actually loved each other.
We had a record at home called “When You Were Sweet Sixteen” by the Mills Brothers, an old 78. My dad and mom used to sing that together. God, what a song. Beautiful. It breaks my heart to hear it now. I was just a kid watching his parents divorce and this was their song!
I remember us boys stuck in some courtroom. All five of us, without our parents, being called into a room where an official person, I assume a judge, asked each one of us directly: which parent do you want to stay with?
I think we had all agreed we wanted to stay with our mom. I don’t know if we had gotten our stories synchronized, but I know that in our hearts we all felt like that was the best solution. But it was really scary that this even would happen, being asked this question by a grown-up, a stranger.
It was difficult to have to think about that. Mainly I just wanted to stay with my brothers. We wanted to stay together.
My parents were continually arguing over all the manifestations of divorce. There was one Saturday morning when us boys had been camping overnight in the backyard in our sleeping bags, when suddenly the police arrived. Here we were, just kids in our own backyard, being awakened by the police. Apparently we were supposed to be with my dad that Saturday and Sunday.
My dad was being pushy by sending the cops. And he was supposed to pay alimony, but he wasn’t doing it. I don’t know if he had a job or not. And my mom was basically withholding us. I’m sure my mom was within her rights. She would make comments like, “Well, y’know, I could have him put in jail, but what good does that do anything?” It wasn’t going to change our situation.
All I know is, I was being woken up at eight o’clock on a Saturday morning by the police saying, “
You have to go with your father.” Maybe I didn’t even want to go with my father.
I didn’t see my dad much after that. One period it was one weekend a month. We’d go to a movie. Those kinds of things are just so awkward, at least in our case. It kind of petered out to where I really didn’t see my dad at all. For years.
A few years later, when I was in the eighth grade, my civics class—which was all the kids I knew in junior high and a lot from before that—went on a field trip to Richmond, the county seat. They drove us down in private vehicles—a couple of station wagons, not a big school bus. And we went to the courtroom.
We all file in and sit down, maybe twenty of us. There’s a case going on. A divorce case, ironically enough. I heard one teacher tell another afterwards, “Y’know, I’m not really sure that was something the children should’ve seen.”
Both parties were there, the husband and the wife, and it’s the wife who’s wanting to leave the husband, not the other way around. The wife testifies a little bit, and she’s fairly matter-of-fact. I don’t want to say cold—just straightforward.
Then we watch this poor man talking about his family, his wife. And he’s being grilled by the wife’s attorney. This moron lawyer is pointing an accusatory finger at him. He’s like a bulldog and he is just killin’ this guy. We’re watching, dumbfounded. It’s like television, but it sure ain’t Father Knows Best, y’know? Finally the husband, who is now very emotional, says, “Well, perhaps my wife would consider a reconciliation. Maybe we could get back together.” He’s made himself so vulnerable in front of everybody. Like a little boy. That was unexpected. I’m a twelve-year-old kid who had never imagined such a thing before. I don’t know anything at all outside my parents’ divorce. At that point I didn’t even have a serious girlfriend yet. I’m thinking, That’s real sad. I was shocked and hurt and everything else. It’s hard to revisit this, even now.
