One of my Uncles most favorite sayings, and he always said it to me whenever I was about to talk back lol

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Thanks to that Douche Canoe Joe Piscopo who did a skit on Saturday Night Live in the early 80s. The you from Joisey I’m From Joisey one where he thinks it was actually funny. Well we are to tell you it isn’t and we have come up with this to let you know a real person from the great garden state says Jersey never Joisey.

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For those like me who grew up around Newark or Kearny. I had an awesome childhood I was raised in three areas Maplewood, Newark and Kearny. This is one of the reasons why I started Jer-Z Wear, I love my state and hometowns.

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I grew up in three towns over the years I went to school in Maplewood and many days after school and weekends were spent in Newark or Kearny and I am very grateful for my Sicilian/Irish upbringing and would not change it one bit. But this post I will be talking about Maplewood and taking you back.

I was born October 1971 at St Barnabas in Livingston to a Sicilian Mother and Irish Teamster Father. My whole family was born in Newark but in 1970 my parents moved from the 4th ave and Roseville northward section of Newark to a nice sized bigger than average apartment in Maplewood with my sister who was born in 1965 so yes I am the youngest.

Maplewood has been compared to a Norman Rockwell kind of town and yes I can attest to that. With the larger than life beautiful colonial-style houses, even the author of the Nancy Drew series Carolyn Keene lived there, and one Holloween she autographed a book for my sister truly a very nice lady who really loved her fans.

Maplewood was really diverse a very large Jewish Community with a few versions from the Hasidic to the Orthodox, Many Irish, German, Italian Sicilian, Greek and I could go on many black and Spanish families were moving in Maplewood was one huge melting pot. We even had a small gay population.

Now no town is perfect you will have your asshats especially in the 70s and 80s did I see racism? yes, Did is experience racism yes?, did I hold it against anyone? no. Now this not a contest on who experienced the most and the worst racism but yes it was there.

But my generation of kids we were the ones that hung out with whoever we wanted to. If we saw someone getting picked on for anything we stuck up for them we did what we felt was right. But we also told them to stand their ground as well because we were not going to be there all the time.

We are jerseyans we don’t take shit from nobody but at times we need to be taught that as well. I was bullied because I was fat and wore braces and if it wasn’t that I was called that fat white boy or you’re Sicilian/Irish and my parents say you are just a Puerto Rican that takes a shower. And that was in the 5th grade lol.

But again out of a huge town that was only a few that actually felt like that like I said every place has those douchebags. But some eventually changed by the end of middle school and High School but still at times there were some tensions in the classroom you just had so many cultures and nationalities in one area each with their own kind of beefs no place is perfect. I surrounded myself with people like me who get along with everyone and it’s all good.

And if you messed with one of us, you messed with all of us you had to have a reason to pick on one of us. If one of us started it well then they finished it, but if you started with one of us because you don’t like them for some reason well then we had a problem and we solved it.

Maplewood had one Burger King and one Baskin Robbins all the other stores were Mom and Pop from Ralphs Luncheonette to many other diners and pizzerias. There was no Hope Depot or Walmart’s. If the local Tru Value didn’t have it then you went to Rickels or some other local family-owned hardware store. If all else failed you would try the Livingston Mall for the last resort.

Maplewood has three awesome parks and very huge, one even has a duck pond and when it freezes over you could ice skate on it. We used to have parades down Valley Street and even summer movies in the park. Maplewood was that kind of friendly town, if you didn’t know someone then either you met them at a mutual friends house or you just started talking to them in passing.

Mapelwood was a place where it takes 3 hours to go down the street to the store. Because either you see 5 people you know and you stop to talk to them or someone is driving by you and asks you if you need a ride and even that turns into a half and hour conversation heh heh.

If my parents were at work the locals would discipline me, I could not get away with anything lol. The older kids looked out for the younger and would even beat our asses if they caught us fucking up. I had the Connors Brothers Jimmy Boy and Timmy looking out for me I looked up to them but also knew not to fuck up too bad.

I went to Our Lady of Sorrows in the 70s from Kindergarten to 4th grade and yes they still would give us the ruler or pull our ears. Then in Middle School and High School we had teachers that said the most outrageous shit at times that if said today they would be fired in a heartbeat I shit you not.

Again was Maplewood the perfect town? No and I am sure there are many others with their own stories on how they grew up in Maplewood the same time I did and that is fine but this story is about me and what I saw and experienced. I love that town but I love the way it was…

Sadly…

Since I moved in 1994 like Bob Dylan sang the times are a changin and boy did they. They have torn down the buildings that gave the town its charm. The mom and pop businesses are getting killed they are adding more and more condos and townhouses. The taxes have been going up year after year, pretty soon they will have to call it the City of Maplewood because they are destroying the things that made it a town.

I am one year shy of 50 years old so my opinion does not matter, but I will say this. I am very glad, lucky and fortunate to have grown up there when I did and they will never take those memories from me.

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First and foremost when I say Jersey Guido’s I do not I REPEAT I DO NOT mean those buffoons on that half-brained Mtv Show The Jersey Shore. Where only one or two of the jackasses were actually from Jersey. They were all mostly from the other side of the Bridge.

Now I am not saying we don’t have douchebags in Jersey, but they are our douchebags a little different from you Brooklyn or Staten Island Douchebag.

And by the way Mtv Fuck You you suck for releasing that STD-filled dumpster fire of a show.

 Sadly that is how it is today you have to be a total ass clown to be famous nowadays the public just eats you up and makes you more famous than GOD himself.

Anyhoo…

The 80s Jersey Guido was basically a carryover from your 50s 60s and 70s Guido. Except for now we rolled our sweat pants up, wore Reebok or any other high top sneaker that was not a pair of Chuck Taylors. Yea we didn’t wear Chucks anymore. We still had the Gold Chains and our hair was either slicked back or spiked some of us grew the back of our hair long and dyed it blonde (Yep that was me)

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You see Guido’s died out from 81 to 83 but by the end of 84 and the start of ’85 oh it was on and coming on hard.

If you worked out at the Gym a sweatshirt with the collar cut out and sleeves from the elbow down cut out and you wore a tank top underneath (Yep that was me too) it was always optional to take the sweatshirt and gold chains off before getting into a fight. Hence the Phrase “Hold My Gold I’m Gonna Kick His Ass” Believe it or not that phrase is used just as much as ” I need some Cologne before I go in there, you got any Cologne before I go back to the car?”

If you were to get dressed up you wore a nice pair of pants maybe jeans, Z. Cavaricci really didn’t get popular until 1989 into the 90s. I was a gear head Nickey Newarker so it was guinea Ts (Before they were called wife-beaters thanks to the rednecks on COPS for messing up our shit) Sweatshirts or Hoodies and Sweatpants rolled up a little past my calves. And my black hightop Reeboks.

I was a working Guido many of us were I pumped gas at the local gas station. Actually, I’m Sicilian/Irish my mom being the Sicilian, and my dad the Irishman. My parents worked I worked there was no Gym-Tan Laundry like the rich spoiled douchebags on The Jersey Shore. Real Jersey Guido’s had jobs when to the gym when we could and worked on our cars and raced them on the street.

That was not all Guido’s many were jocks played football or soccer even baseball or lacrosse. Their parents did well for themselves either had good jobs or had their own contracting, landscaping, or pizza business. My dad was a Teamster and my mom worked at the local cleaners we were middle class for sure. Not many ultra-rich Guidos in my area for the record I lived in Maplewood/Newark and Kearny. You would find the rich guidos in Livingston, East Rutherford, and a few other towns.

Now for the record we didn’t fist pump……………………..Everrrrrrrrrrrrrrr……

Now you didn’t necessarily have to be Italian or Part Italian to be a Guido, the Spanish kids were into the same things we were. Some just liked the music and the style we had and vice versa. And we didn’t care when we were hanging on the ave, diner parking lot or wherever

. It didn’t matter where you were from, what you nationality or color you were. If you were cool and liked hanging out till the wee hours of the night cruising Bloomfield or Kearny ave or long parkway trips to Sensations or The Bamboo in Seaside Heights or D,Jais in Bellmawr it was all good.

And well Freestyle music was king Stevie B, TKA, Company B, and many other awesome freestyle artists. Now I had a diverse upbringing and I was a metalhead before I was a Guido many of us here. Some Guido’s listened to freestyle only no ifs ands or Buts. Now if you liked a chick you had to listen to what she wanted to or else be the Bud Bundy of the night.

Now muscle cars were in and very cheap back then, but when the new IROCS, Trans Ams, and Mustang GTs came out well it didn’t hurt to have a car like that and a hot poufy-haired Guidette in your passenger seat neither My very first car was a 67 Camaro SS 4 speed, when when I eventually worked and saved I eventually got my ’86 Z28 not an IROC but the same thing.

The 80s was a weird decade for sure, but it was awesome the diners. The Music. The Memories and looking back the start of many things, many good things actually. Were there fights? yep.. Was there Heartbreak? For sure.. But there was a lot of togetherness and good times.

You can just stand on the avenue meet someone for the first time driving by and be friends for life.

Guido Terminology….

Fuck Outta Here…. Could mean either stop bullshitting me or go some where’s else with that shit.

Your Sister’s Ass … The short version of Up your sisters ass or shove it up your sisters ass..

Yo What The Fuck… This could either be a question or a statement depends on the situation

Keep Talking Mother Fucker… Means stop what you are saying right now or you get a smack.

Well that is it for now if you didn’t know now you know…

Now through the introduction of social media a huge Godzilla vs Mothra debate broke our back in 2008 and has been going on ever since. And I mean some individuals are dead serious about it too a little too serious if you ask me but that’s the thing with Social Media you interact with many many many individuals that you normally would never see in your life.

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