This is a pin I had made in 1991. It’s still one of my favorite pins today.
The HMP was The Heavy Metal Playhouse — my first home after graduating high school.
My best friend was attending Bryant College (now Bryant University) and no longer wanted to live in the dorms.
I had graduated from high school, and since no one in my life — parent, teacher, or guidance counselor — had ever uttered the word “college” to me, and the expectation was for me to move out and begin living on my own after high school, I desperately needed a place to live.
A little hope for the future would’ve been nice, too, but that would have to wait.
A roof came first.
That’s when Bengi miraculously invited me to move in with him. While sitting in the cab of a bulldozer and eating candy bars on the construction site of a future Stop & Shop in Milford, Massachusetts, Bengi told me about his desire to move off campus and find an apartment, and he asked me to join him.
In many ways, he saved my life in that moment.
So we found a townhouse in Crystal Village, a development in Attleboro, Massachusetts, close enough to Bryant College, the McDonald’s I was managing in Milford, and the place of employment of a third roommate.
That third roommate—someone we met while working at McDonald’s in high school—would eventually move back home, leaving Bengi and me alone in the home that became affectionately known by us and many others as The Heavy Metal Playhouse.
Bengi and I spent three years in that townhouse, which became famous for its loud music, raucous parties, far too many hamsters, and a multitude of video game systems.
It truly was a playhouse.
The walls were plastered with images of metal bands, Bart Simpson, and swimsuit models. Our television—at least to start—was a small TV set atop a baby changing table. All of our furniture was given to us or found on the side of the road.
Bengi and I initially shared a bedroom. He placed his bed in a large walk-in closet, and my bed—Bengi’s childhood bed—was on the opposite side of the room. When our third roommate moved out and his bedroom became available, Bengi and I oddly continued to share a bedroom for quite some time before finally separating into rooms of our own.
We spent months eating elbow macaroni and sitting in the cold because we had no money to buy reasonable groceries or turn on the heat.
But it was also a gathering place — where dozens of our friends would constantly visit, sleep on our couches for days, and celebrate the simplicity of life as only teenagers can.
They were some of the hardest, best years of my life.
Three years I remember with incredible clarity because every day was different, fun, and extraordinary.
Three years that I am so grateful to have lived.
Sadly, The Heavy Metal Playhouse didn’t end well, at least for me. When Bengi graduated from college and moved to Connecticut for a job in the insurance industry, my life quickly descended into homelessness, jail, and eventually a trial for a crime I did not commit.
During that time, I also shared a room with a goat and was the victim of a violent assault and armed robbery.
Three of the best years of my life were immediately followed by two of the hardest, most frightening, and most challenging years of my life.
But like the elbow macaroni and those chilly winter nights spent in The Heavy Metal Playhouse, huddled under blankets, watching Monty Python and The Simpsons, I survived.
Bengi recently gave me the communication log we used at The Heavy Metal Playhouse—a physical form of texting before we carried computers in our pockets. It’s a daily account of our lives at the time, with notes about parties, car trouble, escaped hamsters, and chores.
It’s also a mountain of memories, hilarity, and insight.
A wealth of new stories to tell.
A gift I will treasure with each page I read, dissect, and perhaps share with you.
