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Gerry Rooney is ready to write about his many adventures as retirement looms Hank SeamanPortraits hseaman@s-t.com 
Line up, book lovers.
If, as the old saying goes, everybody has the makings of a good novel in them, I'm convinced Gerry Rooney has a potential best seller on his hands.
I mean, c'mon, where else can you read about a fella who rode a bicycle through the British Isles, sang with Jackie, Bobby and Teddy Kennedy in Spain, crossed the Swiss Alps on a motor scooter in the middle of a snowstorm, traded stories with heavily armed Bedouin tribesmen in the Jordanian Desert, slept amongst chickens on a peasant family's kitchen floor in the Middle East, had a guitar stolen in Australia and lived with missionaries in Japan?
And, oh yeah -- get this -- he did it all by traveling approximately 27,000 miles in 31 countries ... first, in Great Britain by bicycle, then the rest of the way by motor scooter.
These are but a few of the many highlights of Gerry Rooney's excellent adventures as he traveled 'round the world in the 1960s.
England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, East and West Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium, Holland, France, Switzerland, Austria, Liechtenstein, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Australia, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan.
How can the book miss?
In any event, now that the 65-year-old SouthCoast division director of The Opportunity Center is retiring -- OK, so maybe it's not generally known ... I'm gambling that at this point it'll be all right to let the cat out of the bag -- he says writing this book will be one of his major goals.
Maybe that's because it's a story he's been lugging around in his head for more than 34 years, the Acushnet resident says with a beguiling smile.
With more than 250 meticulously detailed pages of his daily diary as guide, you better believe Gerry will be writing at a nearly full-time clip. He's already started putting some of these notes into his computer, in fact, in anticipation of his final day on the job, Nov. 30.
"My 3 1/2-year odyssey was the great lesson of my life," Gerry Rooney says. The trip helped him go from scientist to humanist, "from test tubes to people," he's convinced.
Graduating from UMass Amherst as a chemical engineer, he explains, could never have prepared him for the job at The Opportunity Center he's loved since his very first workday in 1983. It was traveling the world, learning first-hand about various peoples, various cultures, that provided the great learning tool he's since applied to working with challenged adults.
Gerry Rooney, you see, is a "people" kind of guy.
As if to prove my point Gerry says never once did he feel threatened on his extended journey ... not even when he was stoned by a group of youths in Egypt. "That was just kids," he shrugs. "It was no big deal."
The important thing to remember is, where another might have hung back, Gerry Rooney never failed to interact with the numerous people from various cultures he met along the way.
Outgoing and gregarious, he's the kind of person who makes it a point to fit right in with his surroundings no matter where they might happen to be.
"Everywhere I went, I wanted people to know we were basically the same ... that we all respond to the same stimuli. All people, regardless of geography, education or position in society have the ability to detect sincerity in another person."
That's the basic human denominator, he feels.
"If I can go to a place and convince people of my sincerity, then that's when I'm accepted ... and that's when we can start to learn from one another."
Needless to say, being a people person stood him in good stead throughout his travels.
Of course, it didn't hurt that he brought his guitar with him every step of the way -- even if he did have to buy another after the first one was stolen Down Under -- and engaged many of the people he met with song.
"Music is truly the international language," he enthuses. "Luckily, hootenannies were very big at the time --1965 or so -- and folk songs were popular."
Indeed, Gerry found himself earning a few extra francs, marks or lira more than once working in cafes, restaurants and nightclubs along the way.
"One time I was serenading couples at their sidewalk tables in a Left Bank cafe along the Seine in Paris," he laughs. "I got arrested for playing without a permit and spent the night in the pokey."
Gerry recalls another memorable experience defusing what could have been a potentially tense situation in Amman, Jordan, by initiating an impromptu jam session for 10 people, singing and playing Peter, Paul and Mary's "Lemon Tree."
Obviously, space precludes telling you about each of the fascinating vignettes comprising his travels -- for that you'll just have to read the book.
Suffice it to say, however, that the stimulus for his wanderlust originated with 15 flights over Europe and the Middle East in his time from 1959-63 as a navigator-bombardier on B-52 bombers in the U.S. Air Force Strategic Air Command.
Stationed in Bangor, Maine, Gerry says his crew's job was to fly over all these countries -- refueling in flight -- in the days when the Cold War was at its hottest, without ever once touching down on land.
Gerald Patrick Rooney made a vow to himself that once his service days were over, he'd definitely see, first-hand, each of these countries at ground-level.
Obviously, it was a pledge well kept.
Of all the fascinating places traveled and the wonderful cultures experienced, however, Gerry says that if he had to pick one above all others it would be Japan.
"I fell in love with the Japanese culture, the gentleness of the people ... their commitment to excellence and politeness of manner."
Interestingly, it was only later, in 1969 in New Bedford, that Gerry met and married his wife Ayako, who is Japanese.
The funny thing, he chuckles, was he had seen far more of the Land of the Rising Sun in his travels than the future mother of his two children ever had living there in her youth.
Something tells me Japan will have a special place of honor in Gerry Rooney's book.
But before he can compose the Great American Novel, he has to write his final chapter as the SouthCoast division director of the Opportunity Center.
Of course, there'll be a "surprise" farewell party for him at The Century House in Acushnet on Oct. 19, which comes as no surprise, perhaps, to anyone, except Gerry Rooney. Oops!
Not to worry, though, says his friend Arthur Bennett. He will have been told before this morning's edition hit the news stands.
In the final analysis, however, saying goodbye to the 70 or so disabled adult clients at the Opportunity Center will be the hardest part of retirement, Gerry's the first to admit. By far.
"For me, the Opportunity Center has been a great lesson in life. Whenever I'm having a real down day, I take another walk around the shop. Many of these clients recognize what they've lost due to their disabilities. But I'm always so impressed by their overwhelmingly positive attitudes."
It never fails, he says, to put everything in perspective.
"Their smiles turn me on every day ... I'll miss that more than I can say."
Hank Seaman paints "Portraits" for you every Sunday, Tuesday and Friday. Telephone: 508 979 4504. E-mail: hseaman@s-t.com
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