Father's drained-pool ruin and the family trauma

pivotal · UNDATED — childhood, pre-E.T.A.

• When: UNDATED — Struck's childhood, years before YDAU; narrated retrospectively inside the 11 Nov term-paper endnote
• What: Struck's father was an inveterate red-wine-and-Quaalude drinker given to late-night phone calls he later had to retract at length. One autumn night, drunk, he attempted a one-and-a-half tuck into the family's backyard pool without recalling it had been drained; the broken neck put him in a brace for life, ended his career as a low-80s golfer, and left the family in what the narration calls incredible bitterness and family trauma — after which little J.A.L.S. Jr. was shipped off to the first of his boarding academies (Rolling Hills). The childhood is placed "in Rancho Mirage" here; his hometown is given elsewhere as Orinda CA (see Dating notes). This drunk-shattered household sits under his own later substance use and the three-academy drift.