Sands of Life

The experiences that shape us

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About Vincent

With 47 years of experience as a cabinet maker and contractor, Vincent is passionate about turning his clients’ ideas into reality with precision and care. For him, woodworking is more than craftsmanship; it’s a way to blend beauty and function, where each project becomes an opportunity for personal expression and collaboration. Alongside his craft, Vincent is also a Reiki Master Teacher, helping others tap into their own healing energy. His dual expertise in creating and healing reflects his deep respect for both form and flow…whether shaping wood or guiding others toward balance.

When he’s not in the workshop or channeling Reiki, Vincent enjoys deepening his relationship with his bride Nina. He enjoys taking in the great outdoors. He embraces both adventure and tranquility, whether kayaking, hiking, fishing, meditating, or performing a fire ceremony. His vintage 1975 Bronco or his pickup truck is a regular companion on his journeys, taking him through both rugged terrain and quiet spaces.

Nestled deep in the North Woods of the Adirondacks, Vincent’s off-grid camp offers the ultimate sanctuary. Surrounded by the sounds of a bubbling brook and the warmth of a crackling fire, he finds peace in the stillness. In this quiet place, even the softest sounds…like a bird’s feathers cutting the air or snowflakes settling on the ground…remind him of life’s simple, profound beauty as he continues to navigate the sands of his life.

  • Yoga and the Wreckage

    “A Journey Through Collapse and Awakening”
    By Vincent

    After the divorce, I was a total auto wreck complete with broken glass and colors on the steering wheel. Everything that had once defined my life…my home, my marriage, my sense of belonging just gone.

    Leading up to the big D, I found myself sleeping on the back porch in a sleeping bag, late October winds biting through the night air, a tropical storm threatening to rip through what was left of my dignity. The next night brought near thirty-degree weather, and I remember thinking I could endure anything as long as it meant not sharing the same space as the unmentionable…

    Around midnight, my daughter came to the door.

    “Dad, come inside. Use the couch in the basement. You’re not a dog.”

    “Thanks, honey,” I told her. “Dad’s okay. You know Dad’s a survivor. Besides, that basement’s your brother’s hangout now, just like it was yours. I’m not going to intrude on that. Dad’s okay.”

    Eventually, a close friend and his wife found out what I was going through…that I was sleeping on the back porch. They took me in and offered me a small apartment-like space…just one room, later known as the Situation Room. Apparently, others had used it during their own car crashes.

    There was a small bathroom, a separate entrance, and a north-facing window that somehow felt like heaven. In exchange for free rent, I cooked meals, cleaned, and fixed things around their home. It was a quiet barter of survival and sanity…a fragile refuge while the frigid nuclear fallout of the divorce and legal battles ebbed and flowed beyond those walls.

    9 months became a strange kind of sanctuary. A cocoon where I could breathe again before stepping back into life. Things were finally final, at least as far as lawyers (whether they are on your side or not, they suck) and phone calls and insurmountable bills…

    When I finally did, I landed in a big house in New Fairfield, Connecticut… three bedrooms, two baths, a den with a fireplace, an acre of land, and a garage for my tools and vehicle. All for $1,150 a month!

    It should have felt like victory, like the return to a man’s life rebuilt. But instead, monotony set in. Work, eat, drink beer, sleep, repeat.

    The beers went from two or three to five or six. Then came a joint or two. Then Oxy’s…obtained from lying to my doctor about shoulder pain. He was quick with the scripts.

    The empty hours after work became a storm of fear, doubt, anger, and despair, burring feelings like a squirrel burying nuts, or at least trying hard…each emotion howling its own tune, ripping through my head. I was surviving, but I wasn’t living.

    One night, opened my eyes and saw the floor up close…mostly naked, disoriented, heart pounding out from my chest, head spinning. I really felt like I was going to box. Crawling toward the den, where my phone lay, I reached for it…a 9, then a 1, and then a pause.

    Moonlight spilled through the sliding glass door of the den, glinting off the hardwood floor and catching a picture of my two kids. For reasons I couldn’t explain, that sight told me I was going to be okay. I collapsed…not from panic, but from surrender.

    When I woke the next morning, something in me had changed. The silent friend inside me decided to speak…actually, to scream:

    “Dude, what the fuck man, this ain’t going well at all. You need help. This will not end well if you keep on this collision course. You are a pile of twisted steel rebar.”

    On instinct, I called the marriage counselor (she was the only person I could think of) and left a message. I was sitting in her office AGAIN…this time, not as a husband trying to save a marriage, but as a man trying to save himself.

    After many sessions, I reached a breaking point. I was tired…tired of her, of therapy, of my business (which I somehow still managed to run efficiently), tired of pretending to be fine.

    I finally asked her about what my children’s mother had said in her own one-on-one sessions. (I had stopped calling her my “ex.” That word felt like it still held a connection I was trying to release. My children’s mother gave me distance, peace, and closure.) I just needed to know…couldn’t hear it from the ball and chain…she never had one tiny contribution to why I left…

    My therapist paused, carefully thinking how to respond…then said something that cracked the illusion wide open.

    “I don’t normally do this…client-patient confidentiality and all that. But since you both came to me, and you both had individual sessions with me about the same issue, and now that the marriage is over… I don’t see any harm in giving you a little surface information as I came to know.”

    “After your son was born, your wife had no use for you. The only time she seemed happy was when you were doing things for her. That’s when she would initiate intimacy. When you stopped working for her, she stopped needing you, stopped intimacy.”

    She looked at me and added,

    “You said it yourself, from day one in my office”…”After my son was born, I felt a huge distance between us.”

    That truth hit like a head-on crash. Twenty-five years spent trying to make the wrong person happy. Twenty-five years trying to earn love that was never truly there.

    It was devastating and liberating. For the first time, I saw the full picture.

    Then my therapist said something that would change my trajectory forever.

    “I’d like you to try yoga. Not the kind they do at the gym, but a philosophy-based yoga studio. I think your Krav Maga training isn’t nourishing you anymore. It’s fueling your anger, angst, and anxiety.”

    I laughed and shot back, very sarcastically:

    “Yoga’s for women.”

    She smiled.

    “Yoga was created by men. And you’re a deep person with deep emotions. You need something that reaches those depths, and there is NO competition”

    Then she mimed dropping a stone down a well and waited for the splash.

    “That’s you,” she said softly. “I think yoga might help you hear your own echo again.”

    I went home skeptical, but something about what she said stuck. I searched online and found three studios. I sent a few tentative emails with questions.

    Two replied with class times and prices. The third responded differently…thoughtful answers, no mention of cost or schedule, just conversation. Eventually after two or maybe three email exchanges, came an invitation:

    “If anything I’ve said resonates with you, come by. Come on by, I’d be happy to talk.”

    No mention of money. No mention of times or packages. Just human interaction.

    It pierced my third eye…and my silent friend again, this time whispering,

    “Pay attention to this jackass.”

    So, I went.

    The moment I walked into that philosophy-based yoga studio in Mahopac, New York, greeted by a beautiful being radiating warmth and light, I knew. Somehow, I just knew…I had just laid eyes on my new Sensei.

    That day marked the beginning of a new chapter…not one of quick fixes or miracles, but of quiet healing. Yoga didn’t erase the pain or rewrite the past. It gave me a way to sit with myself without judgment. It helped me find balance between strength and surrender, between control and acceptance.

    Looking back now, I see that collapse wasn’t my end but in fact it was my initiation. Everything that broke me forced me to confront the truth of who I was beneath the roles, the labels, the hats and the noise.

    I had to lose everything that wasn’t real to find what was.

    And in that moonlit moment on the floor and later, on the yoga mat…I began the slow, steady work of becoming whole again.

    To be continued…

  • A Bullet Box

    Bullet’s Box: The Time I Built a Coffin for a Dog

    By Vincent

    After nearly 50 years in the trades as a cabinet maker, contractor, you name it…I’ve seen some strange jobs. Rich folks with wild ideas, crooked floors in million-dollar homes, kitchens that cost more than my first house. But once in a while, something so unusual comes along, it sticks with you forever. This one involved a powerful client, a velvet-lined mahogany box, and a poodle named Bullet.

    The Call

    It was the 90’s. Business was real good for me…I got a call from a long-time client…a guy with connections you don’t ask too many questions about. We had a solid relationship: no contracts, just handshakes. I’d build, he’d pay. Invoices, checks, proper forms etc…On time, every time.

    So when he called and said,

    “Hey kid, I need a coffin made,”
    I froze.

    “A what?”
    “A coffin.”

    My first thought? He was serious.
    My second? I was gonna end up in it.

    Did I do something wrong ?

    I asked about size and material, trying to keep my voice steady.

    “Mahogany. Padded good. Red velvet lining.”

    All kinds of possibilities ran through my head.

    “You’re kidding me, right?” I said. “Why are we talking about this on the phone?”

    That’s when he let out a deep belly laugh.

    “It’s for my dog, Bullet, jackass. Who the hell you think it’s for?”

    I’ve never been so relieved and so confused at the same time.

    “Got it,” I said. “When do you need it?”

    “Soon. Any day now.”

    Mahogany, Velvet… and a Trial Run

    I got to work. Built the thing from beautiful, dark mahogany. Smooth panels, thick padding, deep red velvet lining. A little over the top? Sure. But fitting for a dog who lived like royalty.

    Before finishing, I brought the frame to his place to test the fit, that’s right a trial run. Bullet had been around for years, always hanging out with my crew, especially at lunch. Sweet dog. Bullet and I were tight…Treated me like family .

    But when I laid the box down and called him over he got up and tiredly, slowly walked over…clearly not the vibrant full of pep and energy I’d come to know…I had him step in?

    He didn’t fit.

    Too short.

    For the first time working with this guy, I felt real nerves.

    He looked at me.

    “Did you measure him?”

    “No,” I admitted. “Figured I knew how big poodles are.”

    That’s when my assistant…a sharp young woman with a sharper tongue…chimed in:

    “Just break his legs after he dies.”

    Even Bullet looked up like what the hell?!!!!

    The cigar in the guy’s mouth which always stuck straight out slowly drooped, just clinging to his lip.

    He pulled it out with a sharp pull pointed at her and gave me a look that said: you better fix this.

    Then, a curl of the lip. A half-smile.

    “Just measure the fucking dog,” he growled.

    My assistant turned pale. She apologized so fast it came out as one long word.

    He shook his head.

    “Don’t let my wife hear that. Otherwise… we’ll need one for you, and we’ll break your legs to make you fit.”

    Bullet’s Final Ride

    I turned to her.

    “Get back in the truck.”

    Then to the dog:

    “Bullet, stay. Good boy.”

    I pulled out the tape measure and got his dimensions while he wagged his tail and gently licked my hand like we were still on a lunch break.

    I rebuilt the box. This one fit perfectly.

    A few weeks later, Bullet passed.

    Laid to rest in that handmade coffin…mahogany, velvet, the whole deal.

    It was a strange job. But one I’ll never forget.

    That dog treated me like family.

    Funny how building a coffin for a dog felt more like building a thank-you. All free of charge…

  • I Am Not Disposable

    The Seasons of Us by Vincent

    I sat by the open door of my favorite place, my camp deep in the north woods, the soft hum of rain tapping on the roof top…sipping my tea slowly, watching the leaves drift from the trees outside, some green, some golden, some already brown. It struck me how much those leaves reminded me of people.

    For decades, I had believed friendships were forever, like sturdy oaks standing tall through storms. But life, as I was learning more and more, didn’t work that way. People have come and people have gone, seasons changed, and with each shift, I found myself both grieving and growing.

    There were some friends and some teachers, one of my closest, the one I shared secrets and pains and struggles and fears and joys with for years, our bond felt unbreakable. But as time passed, our worlds shifted…new cities, new jobs, new loves. Calls became sporadic, messages unanswered. 

    I felt the soreness of silence more than any fight or argument ever could. On that rainy afternoon, I realized something important: relationships are not disposable, but they must be mutual. Respect for myself meant accepting that sometimes, the kindest thing I could do was let go. Not with bitterness or blame, but with gratitude for the lessons and memories shared.

    My 60s , their 40’s and beyond brought new seasons, unexpected losses, fresh friendships, and a deeper understanding that change is the only constant. Like the trees shedding their leaves, I was learning to release what no longer served my soul…trusting that new blossoms would appear when the time was right.

    I smiled softly. Life’s rhythms were not to be feared. They were to be honored. Impermanence was not an ending but a promise…a chance to rediscover, to create, to live fully in the moment.

    As the rain slowed and the clouds parted, a single leaf floated down and landed gently on the deck before me…a ladybug appeared and I reached out and it landed on my finger (interestingly on the ego finger) and I whispered, “Thank you, for every season, every lesson, every change”

  • Silver Morning Milky Night

    “Death in my hand” By Vincent

    In 1985 I married into a family that never really communicated. When they did, it was usually through the voice of the Crone,,,my mother-in-law. On the surface, she seemed like a nice woman, but in reality, she was a real_______(you fill in the blank). If there were a picture next to the definition of entitled, her miserable face would be right there. She only worked two weeks in her entire life, while my poor father-in-law,,,an incredible man,,,,worked hard for General Motors, then nights as a liquor store cashier, and weekends cutting grass at the local cemetery or doing odd outdoor maintenance jobs. It took three jobs to keep his war machine tuned up and happy.

    But this story isn’t about the unmentionable. It’s about her uncle, Uncle Nat.

    Born on Christmas Day, his middle name was Natalie,,,an Italian tradition for those born on Christmas. Edward Natalie Vetrano was a cool dude. I loved him, even though he was the nicest pain in the ass you’d ever want to meet. The perfect combination for a life in politics and real estate. Uncle Nat was involved in Westchester politics for years. He was mayor of Tarrytown and had the honor of opening the Tappan Zee Bridge when it was completed in 1955. The bridge spanned the widest part of the historic Hudson River.

    Uncle Nat knew early on how to delegate, schmooze, and be diplomatic. He used to say to me, “Diplomacy is the art of letting someone have it your way,” and boy, did he wear that well! He always managed to get everyone else to do his dirty work or handle the things he didn’t want to do. 

    Classic diplomat.

    I often hung out with Uncle Nat at his lake house in Silver Bay, New York, on Lake George. He bought the property right after his discharge….a small cabin just a stone’s throw from the water’s edge. I remember sitting on the back porch in the mornings, having breakfast, looking out at the somber sparkling water at sunrise quiet, serene, maybe a sailboat or two, or even a family of ducks swimming by. Legend has it the name Silver Bay came from that very scene: the wide bay north of his house shimmering silver in the morning light.

    Uncle Nat loved football, baseball, and golf,,,,and he never walked the course. He always had a cart. Lazy? Of course. Status? Even more so. But he was a gentle, giving man.

    Every Columbus Day weekend, Uncle Nat would head to the cabin to take in the Adirondacks’ fall foliage. As he aged and became more of a pain in the ass, fewer people wanted to go with him. But I did. I was the kind of person who’d call you out on your shit from a young age, so I had no problem telling Uncle Nat to go shimmy up a gumball machine when he was being difficult.

    One week before Columbus Day, he called me up. “Hey Humperdink, (everybody had a nickname) you wanna go to the lake this weekend?”

    I asked, “Who else is going?”

    “No one. Just you, if you’ll take me.”

    By this time, Uncle Nat was in his high eighties and fading. No one wanted to deal with his routines and difficulties.

    “Sure, pro. I’ll take you up,” I said.

    Off we went Friday morning. Saturday it rained, so we stayed inside reading, talking and watching TV. Sunday was perfect: clear blue skies and highs in the 70s.

    After breakfast in Ticonderoga, a few towns north, he said, “This was nice. Let’s go back to the cabin.”

    I looked at him with a mix of disgust and “fuck you” and said, “Nope. It’s a beautiful fall day—perfect. I’m not going back to the cabin.”

    He said, “Really?”

    “Correct. If you want to go to the cabin, you can start walking. My vehicle’s going for a ride. You can either come or start walking.”

    “Is that so?” he replied. “You seem so fucking confident about that!”

    “Yep. Whatchu gonna do about it?”

    “I guess I’m coming with you.”

    I looked at him and said, “Diplomacy.”

    We laughed like hell.

    Heading north on Route 8 toward Speculator, NY,,,,where I have a remote cabin,,,,sunroof open, windows down, Frank Sinatra on the Bose sound system, I heard Uncle Nat singing, smiling, soaking in the sun on his face. He looked alive and vibrant like I hadn’t seen in years.

    We stopped in the town of Speculator to grab coffee and take a piss, then onward to the woods, ½ hour from center of town to the entrance of Perkins Clearing. Uncle Nat had heard stories about “the camp,” so I figured, why not show him?

    After 10 miles of logging road and we finally pulled in, got out, and he walked over and sat on the garbage can—-No Cane! He looked around and said, “I get it now.” The seclusion, the sanctuary-like vibe: birds, bees, a bubbling brook nearby, and the silence were all the sounds one needed.

    “Not my thing with no electricity,,,,but I respect it,” he said.

    We hung out another 20 minutes or so, then headed back to Silver Bay. Not much was said. “Tony Bennett” played on the tunes, more Sinatra. 

    Finally, we arrived back to the cabin.

    That night he bought me dinner at The Club where he played golf.

    Monday morning we woke, had breakfast, and had to immediately leave. Why? Because that’s what he’d done for 45 or 50 years. Before the Adirondack Northway was built, the only two ways back to Tarrytown were Route 9 or Route 22, both winding roads with thousands of traffic lights—five hours minimum. The Northway cut the trip to three, but I guess he didn’t notice. He was a quintessential creature of habit.

    When we arrived in front of his house in Tarrytown NY, he looked at me before getting out and said, “Well Humperdink, this was an amazing weekend—one of the best—and thank you. Remains to be seen if I’ll see another Columbus Day up at the lake.”

    I said, “Pro, you’re too miserable. The good Lord doesn’t have room for people like you yet.”

    We laughed.

    That was Columbus Day weekend, 2004.

    Uncle Nat became quite sick after that. He never made it back to the lake for Columbus Day again. The following year was very challenging for him. It got so bad for him that senior living was in order, moved his belongings in, but he never spent a night there. Day before he was set to move he went into the hospital. Shortly after into hospice care.

    On the evening of March 2, 2006, we were called to his hospice room. The hospice nurses told us it wouldn’t be long. Family (the Crone) and others sat by, waiting. But it didn’t happen quickly enough for them. Around 10:30 that night, they all decided to leave…they were tired. I stayed.

    My wife asked, “are you coming?”

    I said, “The nurses see this every day. It’s close. I’m staying.”

    Off they went.

    Uncle Nat was out of it, caught between the drugs and the sands of his life washing away. I briefly fell asleep in a lounge chair. Around 1 or 1:30 a.m. on March 3, I was awoken by a gasping sound.

    It was Uncle Nat, he was struggling for air.

    I sat by his bedside, holding his hand, talking to him.

    “Can you hear me, Pro?”

    He squeezed my hand so weakly.

    “Do you know who this is?”

    He squeezed again.

    “Are you scared?”

    Another squeeze.

    “It’s okay. I’m with you all the way. Not to worry. I’ll get the ball into the end zone for you. Everything will be okay on this side. Not to be scared, you’re in good hands.”

    Moments later, his chest rise was substantial, he was taking one bigger gasp, a pause and slowly expelling the capacity of his lungs until his chest no longer came back in the other direction, He had calmly passed over.

    I sat there, his hand still in mine, gazing at him. I’m not sure how long, time stopped…I had never been with someone the moment they passed. I wasn’t sure what I was feeling as I just stared.

    Eventually, I watched the spider veins around his nose disappear. The ruddy color of his face faded. His reddish hand turned milky gray, then his head, chest, and arms followed.

    I sat, observing, then thought, “Where have I seen this color before? I know I have.”

    Then it hit me hard: that was the color of the skin on my two children right out of the womb the moment they entered our world , and just before they took their first breath with oxygen starting to flow through their tiny lil veins.

    Full circle.

    It was then that I broke. 

    I waited about 45 minutes or so and called the unmentionable to deliver the news.

  • Cragar Wheels and Carpentry Dreams

    “And a rolled-up joint along the road of life”
    By Vincent

    I graduated from SUNY Delhi Ag and Tech College in 1979. It turned out to be a great experience…though truth be told, I never wanted to go in the first place.

    Back then, blue-collar jobs were everywhere. I spent summers and weekends working with builders, putting up houses, doing woodwork projects for people…good work, great pay, and physically awesome. Some of those homes are still standing tall today. I drive past them with pride. I’d known I was meant to be a carpenter since I was in the crib, watching my uncle partition off our living room in our apartment on Yale Avenue in Ossining, NY. (But that’s another story for another day.)

    Growing up lower class, I worked…a lot….I always had cash in my pocket thanks to working as a young carpenter. I could wine and dine the girls in style, cruising around in my first car: a powder-blue ’67 Chevy Impala SS, black vinyl top, Cragar SS polished wheels, and a center-shift automatic. Jazz cassettes filled the car, and the backseat was big enough to throw a party. I was different….and I learned early that girls liked “different”.

    Getting caught parked on a back road under moonlight with a bottle of wine or a few beers and your pants down was just part of growing up back then. The cops would shine a flashlight in, let you get dressed, dump your stash out onto their shiny black shoes, without realizing and give you a lecture. You’d nod through it all with a sheepish, “Yes sir, never again sir.”

    My mother, however, was relentless about college. From my first year in high school, she was on my back like a monkey. It felt like living with a hemorrhoid…. painful, persistent, impossible to shake and hard to walk around with,,,, I would’ve taken the hemorrhoid!

    During one battle I finally snapped:
    “If there’s a college for carpentry, I’ll apply to ONE and only ONE! Now leave me alone with this!”…she looked at me and just said “okay” and walked away.

    I thought I’d found the loophole of all loopholes. I strutted off like a Peacock Feathers all spread out…. convinced no such place could exist. College was for those book smart kids, doctors, lawyers, business people, not for guys like me who had their path set out in front of them.

    Then came the crash.

    Senior year, I was sitting in Dennis Deloria’s English class (a saga of its own), when my guidance counselor pulled me aside one day after class. I walked into his office and saw a stranger sitting there. My counselor started:

    “Vincent, your mom called a couple weeks ago. She asked me to find colleges that offer carpentry.”

    I think that’s where I first experienced “that sinking feeling in the back of your neck”, I was gut punched and pissed off. Heck, I can not for the life of me remember either of their names! Probably due to the PTSD of it all.

    “There are two,” he said. “Alfred and Delhi Tech. This gentleman is from Delhi’s admissions office. He was in town, he is a friend of mine and we gave him your transcripts: math, industrial arts, Technical School Carpentry Program, rifle team, wrestling team, baseball…he was impressed.”

    The guy invited me to visit the campus. “Just come up, take a look. You might like it,” he said. I was cornered. I’d made a deal with my mother. So, a couple of weeks later, I skipped school and headed north in a full-blown snit…topped with creamy teenage attitude.

    But Delhi surprised me. It was kind a nice for a school…Nestled in a quiet valley, the West Branch of the Delaware River and Little Delaware snaked through town. All I could think about was hunting and fishing. There were also plenty of attractive members of the opposite sex walking around that campus.

    We toured the campus, the carpentry shop…it had the latest tools, a really beautiful setup…and I felt my breath quicken. The rise in my pants didn’t lie: I liked this place.

    After the tour, he took me to his office. Pure 1970s design disaster: Formica wood-tone desk, tapered black legs, gray cushion chairs…ugly as hell…” modern yuk”.  We talked a bit. He asked me to answer a few course questions. I gave him my best attitude and said, “Sure.”

    The questions were basic multiple choice carpentry concepts with a few process explanations. I finished in five or ten minutes. He laid a plastic overlay on top of the sheets and said, “All correct but one.” I really didn’t care which one. I was too bothered by the whole situation. Funny word, bothered. It summed up my entire mood that year.

    “Vincent,” he said, leaning back and peering over his black rimmed readers, “you’re overqualified for the first-year program. We’d place you in the second year. You’d still need to take first-year liberal arts classes, but we’d love to have you here. For your second year you are here there are other courses you can take like Building Construction, Architectural Drafting, Masonry etc….Oh, and we found out you qualify for grant assistance through the Veterans Association due to your father’s disability.” “You’re accepted into Delhi if you like”. That sound was like nails on a chalk board.

    I thanked him, made a wisecrack about repainting his office as I got up, and left.

    When I got home, I didn’t say a word. Avoided my mother like she had the plague. But on Thursday…yes, Thursday, a day I’ve hated ever since….she was waiting at the door when I got home.

    “You’re going to Delhi,” she announced all happy. “My son is overqualified (Gloating Mother) and with your father’s veteran status, there’s grant money, (way too happy) we only need to pay for housing. I’m proud of you. And mad as hell you didn’t tell me.”

    She grabbed my ear (today child abuse) and pulled me into the house. My Father all smiles as he sat in his wheel chair. I was busted. A deal’s a deal.

    That fall, I rolled into Delhi in my new ride: a fire-red custom Chevy van with flames, drop-down table bed, a moon roof fridge, rosewood interior, fully padded, plush carpet lined and killer tunes. I’d sold the Impala to make room for, let’s say, more comfortable activities. As I pulled onto campus, I flicked my last cigarette out the window and to this day never smoked again. Something about being on my own flipped a switch.

    Later, my classmates nicknamed the van The Lil Red ___Truck. (You fill in the blank).

    College life? Still drank, still smoked weed. CSNY still blared through windows. But I was learning. Two days late to my first construction theory class, the teacher looked me over and laughed: “Welcome! You must be Vincent. Have a seat, my man…and by the way, your eyes look like two piss holes in the snow!”

    The class erupted. I made friends fast.

    Within a month, I was job-site foreman. I didn’t drive a nail the rest of the semester. My job was solving the mistakes made by the Architecture students. We learned theory in the morning and built real homes in the afternoon. One instructor even invited us over for beers and a light-up. No names, of course.

    I stayed on for the second year and took the Building Construction courses where I learned the deeper processes of building. I also took the Architectural Drafting Courses which helped me with design and structure.

    Delhi shaped my future. I learned how to price jobs, read plans, manage crews, and run a business. A couple years after graduation, I cashed in everything and bought a small lot in Ossining. With help from my sister, and by shaking the trees of the Veterans Administration, The Disabled Veterans Administration and Congressman Richard Ottinger’s office, we got some grant money and built a fully accessible house for my parents and started my own business which I still run today.

    No more apartment above my wicked grandmother. (Yet another story for another day.)

    The house had a roll-in shower, wide hallways, no steps. It was everything my disabled father needed…. he had a second burst of life.

    That education from Delhi built that house. It still fuels my business today.

    There’s real power in knowledge….something I didn’t get as a kid full of piss and vinegar. And that relentless, loud, pain-in-the-ass Italian mother of mine?

    She was right.

    Dealing with her was tougher than any job site…..and still is….at 99 years old! But she made me who I am.

    No Shiny Cragar SS wheel on earth shines brighter than a mother’s love.

  • Laughing Gas and Lollipops

    By Vincent

    My experience with childhood dentistry in 1960s suburbia…equal parts trauma, nitrous, and one very wet pair of pants. 

    As a kid, there was nothing more terrifying or oddly exhilarating than a trip to the dentist. Dentistry in the 1960s wasn’t the sleek, spa-like experience you see today. No, back then it was straight-up medical horror. Digging in someone’s pie hole, complete with funk, junk, saliva, stink, goop, and sometimes even blood. Why the hell would anyone choose this profession? Honestly, wouldn’t proctology be more appealing? At least with that gig, it’s predictably full of shit.

    My dentist…let’s call him Dr. Wasser to protect the innocent (or guilty)…was a lanky guy with overgrown eyebrows, salt-and-pepper hair, thick black-rimmed glasses, and breath that could clear a room. A genuinely nice man, but scary as hell. He had the social presence of a wet sponge and the appearance of a horror movie villain moonlighting as a chemistry teacher complete with a black rubber smock. His wife, the office manager sat meekly behind a black desk with dark brown Formica top. A thin woman with reddish Peppermint Patty hair, sat just behind a small 1/2 wall answering phones, stuffing envelopes, typewriter blazing and seemingly forcing a smile with a sheepish “hello Vincent “ as I walked in with my Mother.  Anyone could see they were meant for one another. The wet sponge thing must run through the family!

    The waiting room was a monument to mid-century discomfort: faux oak paneling with those deep brown grooves, yellow stained 12×12 ceiling tiles, and sickly-colored modern lighting that buzzed like an angry bee. Plastic flowers that never ever changed for YEARS! Every time he needed assistance, a bell would ring, and a young dental assistant would sprint down the short hallway like a prisoner making a break for it. Today that’s a civil rights violation or very minimum labor law violation! The high-pitched whine of the dental drill echoed through the place, drilling straight into my young, anxiety filled heart. It felt like a cardiac episode in slow motion…but hey, I was young. I could take it.

    Then came the voice:
    “Just breathe deeply…”

    Ah yes, the gas. The sweet escape. The only thing I actually looked forward to.

    Nitrous oxide: my Dentist, my first dealer.

    A rubber balloon on my stomach, a tan hose strapped to my face like some post-apocalyptic scuba diver complete with a cold shiny metal nose cone and the world began to melt away. I’d get so high I wouldn’t have cared if he pulled one of my eyes out. As a kid, I didn’t understand it….but looking back, maybe it was Dr. Wasser who kick started my brief career in recreational drug abuse. “Just breathe deeply”. Who needed peer pressure when your dental office handed out the good stuff?

    Then the real horror would begin. The drilling. The filling. The tools that sounded like they were designed for auto body work. My head would rattle, my jaw would lock, and still he’d shout:

    “Open wide, wider”!

    As if I hadn’t already dislocated my god damn jaw trying. Numb to the world, spinning in my nitrous fog, he’d jam that drill into my mouth like he was mining for silver. Which, ironically, is exactly what he put in there: mercury-laced silver fillings that are still riding shotgun in my molars to this day.

    And yet, somehow, the worst part was after the high wore off,,,when the gas was cut, the lights came back on, and I realized I was soaking wet. Shirt collar damp down into my undershirt below, pants clinging to my knees. Not from fear, but from the great flood.

    Years later, my new dentist Dr. Post, I think of cereal every time I say his name, a young fit, great sense of humor guy who purchased the practice, casually explained after a much more pleasant torture session in my mouth when I asked: “Doc, do you have different equipment or something?”,  “ I’m usually soaked after all of this !”

    “Oh yeah—Wasser? The mad scientist! ” “He didn’t know how to adjust the cavitron. Sprayed water all over goddamn Ossining.”

    And it all made sense.

    The black rubber smock. The full face shield. He wasn’t protecting himself from my funk and junk….he was shielding himself from his own incompetence. Every cleaning felt like dental waterboarding.

    But then….the prize. The Treasure Chest.

    Every kid who survived got to open that glorious wooden box filled with plastic toys from the local Tops store and pic a toy. Dr. Wasser’s Treasure Chest. A bribe? Absolutely. Brilliant marketing? Without question. And to top it off? A lollipop. Because nothing says “Thanks for sitting through dental trauma” like giving a kid pure sugar right after a filling. That’s like a cardiologist handing out bacon-wrapped cigarettes.

    And yet, there I was. Cleaned. Filled. Baked. Soaked. Rewarded.

    All in under an hour.

    Looking back, it was insane. But it was also perfectly of its time,,,equal parts absurd,,,traumatic,,,and strangely formative. That office on the top of Church Street in Ossining NY with its view of the Hudson River and the Palisades, its smells, sounds, and horror-movie haze…it’s burned into my hard drive forever.

    So thanks, Dr. Wasser, for the laughs, the toy, the lollipops, and the lingering dental PTSD. Today would be considered child abuse and endangerment!

    And for my first real high.