Leif Playing Soccer as a High School Freshman

I wonder how many new photos of Leif I will find as the years go by. This past week, I opened a trunk filled with old home movies on reels and Leif's high school yearbooks were in it as well. I've looked through the ones from Puerto Rico, and Northwood Junior High, but somehow hadn't really looked at Highland Park High School and Manhattan High School.

Leif wasn't in a lot of activities and didn't have a lot of photos in the yearbooks. He was involved with music (playing and constructing electric guitars) out of school, but he always played soccer, from the time he was just a little tyke until he was a junior in high school, and the only reason he stopped then was because when we moved to Puerto Rico and he went out for the team, initially he couldn't run in the high heat and dense humidity and sprained his ankle. It was a shame. He missed playing, and he was really good.

So, finding this photo of him as a high school freshman in the 1990 Highland Park High School yearbook was a treat. It shows him jumping up to head butt a soccer ball during one of their  games. I wish it were a video, because it's hard to imagine him jumping so high in such a straight posture, but there he is.

I don't know exactly when the picture was taken, only that it was his freshman year in the 1990 yearbook. The ball almost looks like a moon in the sky.

Leif at the Soccer Award Banquet - Highland Park, Illinois - November 1989 - Age 14

Leif played fullback on the freshman soccer team at Highland Park High School in Highland Park, Illinois. He could boot the ball all the way down the field. This photo was taken at the soccer awards banquet and he was being given a certificate and award. You can see how tall he was as he towers over the man giving him the award and those around him.

In those days he loved to wear ties and had a small wardrobe of them. I think the narrow ties looked really good on him.

It's hard to believe that this was 20 years ago this very month. How does 20 years go by so fast?

Leif's Seventh Home - Fort Sheridan, Illinois - August 1986 to July 1990

We wanted to stay in Hawaii, but the army wasn't going for it. Instead, they sent Peter W. to MEPCOM, the U.S. Military Entrance Processing Command at Great Lakes, Illinois, north of Chicago. After checking out all the school systems on the north side of Chicago, we decided the best one for our sons was in Highland Park. We could send them there if we chose to live at Fort Sheridan instead of one of the Great Lakes housing areas, though Peter would have a 20-30 minute commute (which he did not enjoy). That meant that Leif could go do Northwood Junior High School for three years and then his freshman year in high school at Highland Park High School, where Peter Anthony would compete his senior year before heading off to the Air Force Academy. Leif did some of the best academic work of his entire school career there.

We lived at 419-D Nicholson Road on Fort Sheridan. Behind the house was a part of the golf course and just a couple blocks walk brought us to the shore of Lake Michigan. Leif picked out a cute kitten, Scamp, who was our favorite cat. I've written about him before and posted photos of him with Leif.

Leif played soccer all four years. It was there that he got enamored of radio controlled cars and built at least three of them from kits, modifying them to make them even faster, and using them in science fair experiments.

His best friends there were Robert and Chris, and they spent a lot of time at our house. We also had visits from my family, and Leif's cousin Holly spent time with us a couple of summers. We were fortunate to see a lot of my sister Sherie and her family, as they lived in Michigan about two hours drive from us.

During our time in the Chicago area, we also did a lot of things in the city, from seeing a big car show (Leif loved that!), to the time Leif and I went to the top of the Sears tower. We went to the museums and aquarium, and flew NINE times on military aircraft space available, free, back to Hawaii for long weekends. We also flew military space-A to Germany in 1988, the last time we were there, and visited Peter W's relatives, as well as taking a long trip through the eastern half of Canada. Leif was with us on all those trips and enjoyed each one. Of course, we also went to visit Peter Anthony at the Air Force Academy and looked forward to him coming home to see us for a short time each summer and at Christmas.

By the time Leif was in seventh grade, he was also living in his seventh home.

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The photos above are:
1. Leif's school portrait, probably fall 1989.
2. Leif's school portrait, probably fall 1988.
3. 419-D Nicholson Road, Fort Sheridan, Illinois, a townhouse, where we lived for four years.
4. The living room at 419-D Nicholson Road when we lived there.

Leif Playing Soccer - Japan & Hawaii - Ages 6-11

Leif started playing soccer at Camp Zama in Japan when he was only five or six years old. He was really good at it, especially playing goalie or fullback. Even that young it was amazing how far he could boot the ball, and unlike some kids, he wasn't scared when other kids rushed at him in the goalie box.

He played every year through his freshman year of high school. What I can't believe is that with all the photos we have I can't find any from the four years he played in the Chicago area, first with leagues and then on the freshman team at HighLand Park High School. I looked and looked. I even remember having the camera with me at games, and in Highland Park, many of those games were played in cold, damp or soaking wet nasty weather. I remember one game where the field had a couple of inches of icy water on it, with actual ice floating in it, and those kids still played!

He got an award for his play on the freshman team at Highland Park High School in Illinois. I remember at one game I was awed when he kicked a ball literally down the entire field over the heads of both teams, to one of his forwards way up there by the opposing team's goal. This teammate scored.

These photos span a five year period. The bottom one shows Leif in the black goalie shirt at Camp Zama, Japan in March 1981, when he was six years old. Above that are two taken in the fall of 1982 when he was seven-and-a-half, and the top two are from February 1986 in Honolulu, Hawaii when he was eleven years old.

Leif loved playing soccer and probably would have played on his high school varsity team and perhaps in college if we hadn't moved to Puerto Rico. We got there in August and the Antilles High School team was already practicing for the fall season. Leif went to try out for the team but the shock of coming from a chilly northern climate to weather that was 96 degrees and about 98% humidity. The coach had them running for miles without any chances to cool down or drink anything and Leif was an danger of heat exhaustion. He was coming home about to drop and I was worried about him. The coach refused to make any allowances for his change in climate so that he could adjust, or let the boys stop for a drink. The final blow came when Leif's soccer shoe sole came partially off during a run and he twisted his ankle so that he couldn't run for awhile. He was so discouraged and so upset with the coach that he quit the team. I was so sorry to see that happen, losing a sport he had enjoyed from 1980 to 1990, for ten years. I know he missed it. He went to the games and I could see that he longed to be on the field with his friends, especially Lenny.

Leif - School Photo Circa Fall 1989 - Highland Park, Illinois - Age 14

In this school photo we cross over into a new kind of portrait. Those taken before this were all the standard "head shots," but this time, there's more of a sense of the rest of him, his posture, his slim stance. This was when he first started to let his hair grow out. I liked this style. I liked his long hair, too.

This was the time when he was starting to outgrow his junior high shyness and stride with confidence. He was getting a sense of himself as someone more mature, not just the kid who had outgrown everyone else in height and was teased with comments like, "How's the weather up there?"

I think this was taken the fall of his freshman year at Highland Park High School. He was fourteen.

Leif & His Dad - Highland Park, Illinois - June 1, 1987 - Age 12

Leif and his dad spent a lot of time together throughout Leif's life, much more than many children get to be with their fathers, and we have so many photos of all the times we spent together at home, on outings, hikes, trips, special occasions. His dad was always there. Leif looked up to and respected his dad and Peter W. loved his sons deeply. You can always see that love and protectiveness in the photos, where his arms are around his sons.

Leif also felt he was very different from his dad and that his dad didn't understand his lifestyle and choices, which was true in some respects, particularly his obsessions with weapons, fast vehicles and beer and his irresponsible spending. There were many conversations and letters between us (probably even more often from me) about our concerns over these things, and for a time in his early adulthood, Leif felt he was nothing like his father. However, after he came back from the army and lived near us again, he began to see character traits and mannerisms that were very like his father and at least for those, he embraced that. I wish he had been able to also embrace his father's thriftiness.

Leif and Peter W. lived together in Florida for eleven months during the period when I was still in Kansas finishing up a work contract, figuring out how to move Ravenstone Press, helping my mother move to Florida, and selling the houses. They were both lonely, Peter W. without me being there all the time (though we saw each other ever five weeks) and Leif without a wife or girlfriend (or even friends), so they appreciated each other's companionship.

This photo was taken June 1, 1987, the day that Peter Anthony graduated from Highland Park High School in Highland Park, Illinois. Peter W. was 44 and Leif was 12. Note the "signature" sunglasses. I don't think he had discovered Oakleys yet, but he was always into cool, stylish sunglasses. I you look at the photo I posted yesterday, you can see how astonishingly Leif shot up in height in four years. By the age of 12 he was already his Dad's height and by 13 he was 6' 1" tall! He was always the tallest kid in his class.

Leif in the Snow - December 1986 - Fort Sheridan, Illinois - Age: almost 12

After three years in the warm, balmy climate of Hawaii, the army sent us to Fort Sheridan, Illinois on the north side of Chicago. We lived near to Lake Michigan, and it was COLD. We had quite a bit of snow. Once, we had so much snow that the garage our car was in was snowed under. I remember Leif out there the next day looking like Tarzan in the snow, shoveling great huge shovels full of it and tossing it high up the hill so we could get the car out. I wish we had a photo of that. He got so hot from the exertion that he stripped to the waist and was out there in the cold snow half naked.

That was before these photos, which I think were taken in December 1986. Peter A., his friend Mike Wetzel, visiting from Hawaii, Leif, and his friend Robert made a snow fort behind our house. They had a great time doing it. After it was done, Peter A. put on shorts and a t-shirt and sprayed "Snow Aloha" on the fort with black spray paint and took photos to send to his friends in Hawaii.

I think this was one of the last times that Leif ever got to have a blast doing something with his older brother, as Peter A. graduated from Highland Park High School that spring and went off to the Air Force Academy that summer.

Leif's 17th Christmas 1991 - Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico - Almost 17 years old

We lived at Fort Sheridan for four years. In that time, Leif shot up like Jack's beanstalk, becoming six feet tall when he was only thirteen. He was extremely slender. It was a time of his best academic work at Northwood Junior High School and Highland Park High School, his best soccer playing, at HPHS, and his best science achievements. I've already written about some of that, including his science fair projects that took him to the state science fair.

He also had some adjustment problems, developed terrible acne, and got in some fights. Luckily, he got through all of that. It was also where he began developing a much deeper interest in computers and music, including taking electric guitar lessons. The last year in Illinois, he started letting his hair grow long.

The summer of 1990, we moved from Fort Sheridan to Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico, visiting in Charlottesville VA and the DC area on the way, because Peter W. had to take the Staff Judge Advocate Course at the JAG School before becoming the Staff Judge Advocate for the Fort Buchanan command. We also got to visit Disney World on our way south, shipping our car (the trusty Nissan Maxima, which was already seven years old by then) from Port Canaveral, Florida.

Puerto Rican Christmases were another new experience of the holidays. Again, we were in tropical weather and now we not only had the North American snowy carols but local Puerto Rican Christmas carols that were in a Latin beat and accompanied by instruments that were unfamiliar and fascinating as well as other new customs. But we still had Christmas trees and cookies, those German custom that seem to have spread around the world.

Initially, Leif had some disappointments and difficulties in Puerto Rico. He got there just in time to try out for the soccer team, but the coach had the boys running for miles in the extreme heat and humidity (96 degrees, 99 percent humidity), which was oppressive. They weren't allowed to stop to get drinks, and Leif wasn't allowed to work his way up to the long runs. He wasn't used to that climate at all, and he had never run miles like that with his previous teams. (He had gotten an award for his performance on the freshman team at HPHS.) He would come home from practices totally worn out and feeling faint. I was concerned that he would have heat stroke.

Then he injured his ankle when the sole came off his soccer shoe while running, and he couldn't run. The coach was unsympathetic, and Leif ended up quitting. I felt very badly about that, because Leif was an outstanding fullback and could literally boot the ball the full length of the field. He enjoyed soccer and had played since he was only five years old, so to have to quit at the age of 15 was sad and humiliating. He tried to insist it didn't matter, but I know it wasn't true. He went to the games, and you could see he wanted to be on the field.

However, Leif found other ways to use his talents in Puerto Rico, once he got past the "new gringo" initiations. He made good friends at Antilles High School, participated in musicals, took guitar lessons, designed and built his own electric guitar, had parties, became a SCUBA diver, learned to sail, and many other things.

This photo was taken our second, and last, Christmas in Puerto Rico. You can see how tall Leif had become. At 6'1" he towered over his dad. By this time, Leif wasn't interested in surprise gifts for Christmas. He usually had something specific he wanted, and since we tried to get it for him (and if it was expensive, combine it with the money we would spend for his birthday in January), he usually knew ahead of time what his main gift would be. I think this was the Christmas he got his bass guitar. I always tried to get something less expensive so he'd have something to open he didn't already know about.

Peter A. never lived with us in Puerto Rico, since he left home to attend the Air Force Academy in the summer of 1987, but he did get to come to Puerto Rico a couple of times to visit, and Christmas was one of them. It was good to have our family of four together, if only briefly.

Leif as Dracula - May 23, 1987 - Fort Sheridan, Illinois

These photos weren't taken at Halloween, but they seem to belong in a Halloween time frame. Our family enjoyed dressing up and taking pictures every now and then. It seems to run in the family, as my mother did that, too, and so did my brother and sisters and I when we were kids.

If I remember correctly, we were dressed up for some other occasion. Either Peter W. and I were going to some formal event and were dressed in a tux and formal, or Peter A. was going to his high school prom. We have a lot of other photos taken at the same time that show us in such clothing, and the guys posing with fake guns and acting like James Bond. I've already posted some of them. We all had a good time taking pictures like this.

Here, Leif is wearing his dad's white dinner jacket and his red satin lined opera cape, and vampire fangs.

These were taken in our small living room in our quarters on base at Fort Sheridan, Illinois. We moved there from Hawaii in August 1986. Peter W. was assigned as the JAG (legal advisor) to the Military Entrance Processing Command at Great Lakes.

We chose to live on base at Fort Sheridan, though we could have lived in a housing area nearer to Great Lakes or in any of the surrounding civilian communities, because it made it possible for our sons to go to school in Highland Park. We had investigated school systems and private schools around the area and these seemed to be the best possibilities for them. Indeed, Peter A. had a great senior year at Highland Park High School, and Leif did some of the best schoolwork of his entire education at Northwood Junior High.

Leif was 12 years old in these photos.