“I was fifteen that summer, 1965, and Warren was telling stories on the porch at the summer place. I regarded Warren as a chosen big brother. I was an only child and he the son of my mom’s best friend. At 24 he had lived on his own for a long time, most recently as a manger of a night club in Chicago. He looked around to make sure his mother was out of earshot, and then continued his discussion of a friend’s girlfriend. “And she had a tattoo across her ass, in big bold letters: USDA Prime. And boy, was she prime!”
We all laughed, including my cousin Janie. I wondered: Would I ever be considered “prime”?”
