I got a compact disc in the mail this week with a collection of songs done by a small band in Oregon.

It is a band led by Pat George, a gifted jazz pianist who can also play Dixieland or pop standards, backed by his daughter, Patty, on vocals and some other musicians.

The most important musician to me is the drummer in the group, Rick Ledoux, grandson of Bernie Ledoux. Bernie was a neighbor kid when I was 13 in Portland, Oregon. He and his brother Joe and cousin Poose played a lot of touch football in front of our house with me and my brother Russell. That was back in 1933, the epicenter of the Great Depression, but we didn't care about that .

So what if our beat-up football had a bladder problem. We just stuffed it with rags and played on. It worked okay, but was hard to throw a pass.

Son Mike, who grew up listening to me tell stories of my youth,never believed me when I said I actually knew a kid named Poose Ledoux. But this summer, traveling the Oregon coast highway, he happened to stop at a roadside inn in the tiny town of Yachats. [That is pronounced Ya hots.] Even before he walked in, he could hear a hot jazz group wailing on the bandstand and the crowd clapping happily after every tune. Then, on a flyer at his table, he spotted the name Ledoux, and out of curiosity started asking questions. The vocalist, who sounds like a cross between Jo Stafford and Rosemary Clooney, told him that Rick Ledoux did grow up in Portland, and might be related to my old football pals. So Mike bought the disc for me. The music is easy listening stuff like Teach Me Tonight and ten or so other ballads of the forties and fifties.I love it. My kind of music. But it also brought back those years in the street in front of 550 North Simpson in Portland.

Poose wasn't the only kid on our street with a memorable name. There was also Alfred Bomber, whose father had a job, so he wore sneakers that always looked clean, if not new. And Carl Clogston, whose mother was Christian Scientist and would not take Carl to a doctor even after he tripped on the Macadam street and broke his wrist.

And there was Sodie Lonergan, who always had a nickel or two and sometimes came by eating a popsicle and wanting to get in the game. He would lay his goody on the curb and it always melted. What a terrible waste. And I can't forget Ronnie Slotboom. His Dad was a contractor. so they must have had lots of food because (sorry, Ronnie) he was fat as a hog and not very fast, but a great lineman because he was too big to block out of the way.

Bernie Ledoux's Dad was an electrician for a company called Poppleton. I always liked that name. One day I came home from Sunday school and we got a game up and Carl Clogston knocked me over and ripped my Sunday corduroy pants. Brother Russell got hot and smacked Carl and got a bloody nose in return . Then Russ put Carl in his dreaded Indian Head Lock and Carl went limp so Russ sat on him and let his nose drip blood on his face.

If I had just changed my pants like Mom told me to, it would never have happened, but I didn't and have been feeling guilty about it ever since. Sorry, Carl.