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Education an Art Based on Science

The education system in the United States is so messed up that we need to go back to basics.

What should the goal of public education be? Historically it was to teach children to read the Bible, write and do basic math.

Today reading is still a goal of public education, but it now draws on all genres of literature to learn life lessons not just the Judeo-ChristianBible.

Basic math today is still a goal of public education. It was needed to participate with business in buying and selling. However, if you look as school curriculums they take all students beyond basic math to higher math. Why? So they can get into college.

I was fortunate to be involved in the opening of a job oriented high school. There was still English and basic math, but the rest of the curriculum was devoted to occupational skills such as: carpentry, electrician, computer programming, culinary, plumbing and nursing.

Then the state started a universal testing program based upon traditional high school curriculum. To get funding our students had to focus on courses that could get them into college. As you can guess, the school essentially became a typical high school focusing on college preparatory courses that were tested state wide and used to allocate school funding. Technical schools essentially stopped focusing on the needs of business, parents and students. How did this change things.

Our culinary program trained students to work in high end restaurants. They learned to be to flamb’e, prepare lobster, prepare fresh vegetables, make all kinds of baked goods. The district cut the budget so that the culinary department only prepared dishes that were on the district’s cafeteria menu. (to be specific, the students were used to open cans and boxes of frozen food, and reheat them. They went from culinary students to cafeteria workers.)

What should be the goals directing our states and local school boards? We are far away from reading, writing and arithmetic. Does every student need to do calculus, read Shakespeare, study physics?

We will look at that question next time.

Please feel free to comment.

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THE DIARY

She thanked her two daughters for accompanying her, albeit reluctantly, to their dad’s funeral. 

Now, she stands at the door, her back to the limo driver and her grown daughters.  Her black kid gloved hand turns the key in the brass lock of the solid cherry inlaid American walnut door.  She waits for the sound of  the limousine tires on fallen gold, brown and red leaves as the limousine rolls down the slave brick driveway.  

When there is nothing but the sound of the patinated copper wind chimes hanging between each of the five granite pillars of the portico, she pushes against the key and the door swings open unsheathing the key into her hand.  Leaving the door ajar she enters, Christian Lou Boutin stiletto heels clicking across the foyer, she drops the keys onto the black lacquered bamboo stand dominated by a half dead Boston fern.  A shower of brown leaves from the fronds float to the grey slate floor.  She feels the cool fall air on the back of her bare neck which is exposed by the tight bun she had pulled her hair into. She pivots. The door still stands wide open.  Remembering that the staff was off for the funeral, her heels clicks across the foyer and she closes the door herself.

Turning, she pulls the bobby pins from the bun, and her jet black hair tumbles to the waist of her solid black matching wool pencil skirt.  She turns and crosses the foyer which is gently lit by the leaded glass windows on both sides of the massive front doors.  She opens the French doors into her husband’s walnut shelved library.  His desk of ebony and Carpathian elm dominates the room.As she approaches the desk she tosses the black patent leather LV  bag so it slides across the desk creating a wide, highly polished stripe as it sends a light plume of dust into the air. 

Finally, it comes to rest against a Moroccan leather diary. 

On the wall opposite his desk hangs a full length oil portrait of her deceased husband.  

“I have cried all my tears over my empty nest, I have mourned the loss of Maureen, our eldest.  Yes, I was not present for you emotionally or physically then.  I am here now.  I want you now.  I am in need of your emotional and intimate physical presence.  Where are you?  Where are you when I need your body pressed against mine?  Where are you when I need to be most intimately possessed by you?  Look at me!”

With that she leans against the desk, removes one and then the other black pump massaging each foot and dropping each shoe as she does.  With both black silk stockinged feet on the floor, she pulls up her skirt and black satin slip exposing the alabaster flesh of her thighs contrasted against her black thong, garter belt and nylons.  She finds and then releases the snaps on the garter belt, and slowly rolls off first one and then the other silk stockings leaving each a little black puff beside each shoe.  

She opens her jacket, reaches behind her back under her white satin blouse and releases  her black lace bra.  With precision practiced to allow him access to her breasts while remaining clothed, she reaches through the buttons on the front of her  blouse and slides the shoulder straps of the bra first from one shoulder and arm and then the other.  With that done she pulls the bra off from under her blouse and lets it drop to the floor.

A small seductive smile crosses her face.  “I hope, dearest husband, you were watching and remember. 

She slowly crosses the inlaid walnut parquet floor to the French doors opening onto a patio.  Through the panes of glass she sees Maureen’s play house next to the barn.  The barn remains padlocked after Maureen’s tragic death.  As the oldest child, Maureen  had become her friend and confidant.  It was a death, a mourning her husband refused to recognize.  After Maureen’s death she lost interest in life in general and in particular any interest in intimacy with her husband.  

He was focused on his career to the point he really hadn’t participated in the raising their other daughters, Jules and Janey.  She had defended his absence, but they still resented and disliked him.  They didn’t know him well enough to hate him for his absence like she did.  She had loved him with great passion once.  They had made love with such intensity that her body had become hot and aroused with merely his touch.  They couldn’t keep their hands off each other.

For the first time tears well up in her eyes.  How could he expect her to continue her daily life after the children had grown up.

He had been indifferent to her needs.   Despite all this, she had been ready to to ignite that fire till their passions burned white hot.

Past her reflection in the leaded glass she notices the shadows of the maple trees had lengthened into a moonless black hole.  She draws closed the drapes over the French doors, as well as the ceiling to floor drapes over the window sentries on both sides.  Returning to the desk she turns on the gold banker’s light, releasing the glow of its green shades. 

She straightens before the desk, feet shoulder’s width apart, tightens her stomach muscles and using her diaphragm draws the air deep into her lungs.  She shrugs her shoulders to release the tension.

The red Moroccan diary sits defiantly in the settled dust from her sliding purse.  Her body automatically shifts her weight forward on the balls of her feet, and then imperceptibly she rocks from side to side as if anticipating his crashing tennis serve. 

She slowly circles the desk lightly and carefully like a ballet dancer.

A  cougar stalking prey, she approaches cautiously, lays a hand on the back of the tufted leather desk chair as if waiting for it to bite.  She brings her other hand to the back of the chair and waits.  Her hands start to perspire.  Hesitantly she steps back, pulling her husband’s chair from under the desk. All the time her eyes never leave the diary.  She lowers herself into the leather chair.   

Her senses, like the hair on the back of her neck and forearms, bristle.  Her heart slows to the tick of the walnut grandfather clock that her husband made for her and the girls.  She reaches across the desk and places her hands on the diary.  Slowly her fingers stroke the glove soft leather, and the feel of his intimacy thrusts into her mind.  Startled, she puts the image from her mind.  Finally, she pulls the diary to her making another stripe and a “V” in the dust.  She picks up the diary, draws her feet under her, pulls her heel tight into her and begins rocking  back and forth against her heals as she cradles the diary against her breasts.  For the second time the tears well up and this time wash the mascara down her cheeks.  She strokes the leather diary,  as the memory of his firm tenderness washes over her.

  Brushing the tears from her eyes, she finds the black silk ribbon book mark and opens the diary to where the newspaper article rests, folded tightly and placed in the diary.  Slowly, carefully she slides a finger down the news article. She reads it again. “LOCAL BUSINESSMAN COMMITS SUICIDE”.

She crumples the article in her fist squeezing it until her long coral nails bite into her flesh and then lets it fall to the floor.  Her shoulders slump forward and her head drops slightly as she uses the marker to open that most recent part of her husbands diary and begins again to read.

DIARY

August 3

Driving to work today when a young woman, long blond hair flying in the wind driving a candy apple red Pontiac Firebird convertible smiled and waved at me.  I was too shocked to wave back.  

Tried to catch up with her, but she turned off.  Noted time 7:15.  Place Herb’s Deli.

DIARY

August  4

Thought about the candy apple red Pontiac TransAm all yesterday.  Actually, it was the girl I recalled.

  At Herb’s Deli 7:15 sharp.  No TransAm.

I put together her appearance in my mind.  Long ashblond hair, sunglasses on an oval face.

Make up understated maybe in late 20’s.   

Smiled.  Well dressed. 

Will leave earlier tomorrow.

.

”That son of a bitch!” 

 The anger of her own voice startles her.

The sun has slowly slipped below the giant Maples.  In the darkened room, she places the satin book mark on the diary and pulls the chain on the second desk light.  casting light on the diary.

“That god damn son of a bitch.” she screams her head thrown back in rage.

….

DIARY

August  6

Still I don’t see her.  Maybe she drives this way only one day a week.  Will drive by the same time for a week.  No, I drove this way every day for 10 years and have never seen her before.  Maybe she has seen me.  I look forward to my commute everyday.  Why this infatuation?  Is it an escape from a marriage that’s mired under the cloud of a child’s death?  Is it empty nest syndrome?  I love my wife, but I’m not sure she loves me or desires me.

I think I may need a hair cut.  Call Linda for haircut appt.  How old is this suit?  Couldn’t be more than …. five years?  Will stop by Joseph’s Clothing tomorrow on way home.

DIARY

August  8

Thought about her all weekend.  I think it’s that she noticed me.  Not just someone, but someone of the opposite sex.  I don’t – didn’t think of myself as a sexual man any more.  After the kids left and then with the death of our child, my wife has had no interest in me.  Grandfather? Father? Co-worker? Husband?  I am all those things, but someone saw something else and smiled and waved.

Maybe she would like to know what I think about when the early morning hours are lonely, and I sit and work on manuscripts that no one ever inquires about.  Maybe I look interesting.  Am I?  Am I still humorous?  Maybe she saw me when I smiled to myself about some little humor that occurred to me and liked my smile or wanted to know what amused me. 

DIARY

August 13

Jack, my boss commented on my new hairstyle and clothes.  My secretary, Marlene even stopped taking dictation to admire my new silk tie.  She’s much older than I remembered.  I brought her a thank you note and a plant for her desk.  She looked at me strangely but seemed pleased.  Been leaving an hour earlier and parking at Herb’s to watch the traffic for the girl in the TransAm.

  So far no sign.  I notice the people in cars now.  So old, so slump shouldered, so pale.  I check the rear view mirror for comparison.  Each day my eyes look brighter but.

Then, as I am making a left turn she honks and speeds by passing me on the right her blond hair blowing in the wind.

DIARY

September 3

Been watching traffic for a whole month and have not spotted her.  But in my mind still I see her as clear as a picture.  I wonder if she thinks about me.  I wonder if she saw me before I waived; I hope not.  I’m embarrassed about what I had become.  All those years.  A  Zombie.  An automaton.  The living dead. And now a stalker?

DIARY

September 10

You know what amazes me?  No one, and I mean no one who is supposed to be close to me, no one who is supposed to love me,  no one who says that they love me has even noticed a change.  Not the hair, not the wardrobe, not the reading, not the change in hours, not the music.  But those others, like my secretary Marlene they have noticed, and I have changed them too. 

She presses the diary against her breasts and leans back in the chair.  “‘You stupid bastard.”  If you had waited, you would have found out how much I cared and wanted; no, needed you.  If you had given me a chance to get over the death of my child, Maureen.  You’re so stupid.”

She places the diary back on the desk and continues reading.

…

DIARY

September 15 

What if I do find her?  The internal debate still rages. Suppose she is happily married?  Suppose she is unhappily married?  Should I try to find her through her license number?

DIARY

September 20

Lunch time.  A note on the seat of my car.  “Want to play instead of stalking me? If you do, put your sun visor down tomorrow.”  My mind is racing. Can’t focus on work. Can I really follow through?

This must be her.  What should I do?

DIARY

                                         September 21

It’s Friday.  I sit in my parking space at work my hand on the sun visor. A couple of co-workers stop to ask if I’m alright. Finally I decide. I slam the visor down and get out of the car.

I  check at lunch and the visor is still down.  End of the day, I return to my car after work and the visor is up.  That’s it?  No note.  Nothing?  I pound the steering wheel in frustration.  It’s Friday!  I will be thinking about this all weekend and wondering.  

I drive slowly home, up the brick driveway and park next to the columns under the portico.  I sit and listen to the music of  the copper wind chimes.  Finally, I take a deep breath, walk to the cherry inlaid walnut doors, stop, release my breath, open them and walk in.  The house is silent as I walk to my office.  Inside I slump in my chair and begin the long weekend wondering about about the TransAm.

DIARY

September 24

I arrive at work exhausted, not only because of the anticipation of what the girl in the TransAm wants, but my wife’s sensing and questioning my anxiety. I park my car.  At lunch my visor is down and a pink envelope scented with Cinnabar perfume lies on the car seat.

“We can meet if you agree to my rules unconditionally. If you agree, put the windshield visor down tomorrow when you get to work and make arrangements that you’ll be out of the office Friday afternoon.”

DIARY

       September 28 

I arrive at work and pull the visor down. At this point I will agree to anything in order to meet her.

At lunch I return to my car. The visor is back up. A pink envelope lies in the bucket seat. I open it and get the scent of “White Linen” perfume. Delicious, I unfold the note inside.

Dear Stalker,

On Friday you will find another note at lunch.

The note will give you the name and address of a luxury hotel and a room number.  

Go to the nearest pharmacy and purchase a sleeping mask.

At the hotel, do not use the valet parking; find and park next to my car.

Go directly to the room; do not stop at the front desk.

Outside the room, knock and put on the sleeping mask. If you remove the mask at anytime, I will leave permanently.

I will bring you into the room and help you to the sofa. Be seated and silent unless you are asked to speak.

When we’re done, you are to leave the room and premises immediately.

Wait for further instruction.

Sincerely,

The object of your desires

I sit stunned. I sniff the perfume and reread the note.

DIARY

     September 28

Purchase clothes appropriate for?  For what? I decide on casual: a pair of Allen Edmond slip ons, new underwear, a light blue YSL polo and a winter white cashmere sweater.                                      DIARY

September 29

Friday morning crawls by.  New clothes and aftershave, “Obsession”, causes unwanted attention and increases my nervousness to a ten.  I cannot focus on work. My mind wonders from fantasy to fantasy. From innocent infatuation to S&M.  Why all the secrecy?

 Why the mask? Why an avoidance of the front desk. Why the particular parking spot?

Finally it’s noon, and I go to my car.  As promised there is a pink envelope on the seat.  I sniff the envelope “Cinnabar”? I wonder if the change of perfume means anything. Inside as promised is the hotel and room number:  Ritz Carleton, room 386.  I return the card to the envelope and head for the nearest pharmacy.  As I head with my sleeping mask to checkout it dawns on me that I don’t have protection. Off I go to the condom section. Oh, my God! Too many choices. Ribbed, lubricated, colored, sensitized? I grab a brand I recognize and head for the checkout.  As I plop my purchases on the counter the teenage clerk grins at me. For the first time in decades I blush as I start to insert my credit card. With a sudden realization I remove the card and pay in cash.  Definitely don’t want to explain these purchases.  The gravity of this undertaking is sinking in.

Up the driveway to the Ritz Carleton and pass the valet parking looking for the candy apple red TransAm.  There along the side of the hotel sits the candy apple red TransAm convertible.  Pretty hard to miss.  I park next to the car as directed.  I grab my bag of purchases and head across the lot and into the hotel, across the lobby and quickly into an elevator where I hit the “3” button.  As the elevator proceeds up, I open the packaging and remove the mask, slip the Trojans into my pocket, tear up the receipt.  Outside the elevator I discard the trash and bag in the nearest receptacle. I see the sign directing me towards the suite of rooms which would include #386.

At the room I stand before the door, take a deep breath, hold it, release, put on the sleep mask and knock on the door. I hear movement inside. The door opens and a soft warm hand takes mine and leads me inside. Across the room she turns me and helps me be seated on a sofa. Using my hands I slide back on the brocaded sofa. I wait in silence as my senses heighten. The scent of Cinnabar becomes stronger.  She must be approaching.  I say nothing as directed and await permission to speak.  I feel the warmth of her body in front of me. She takes first my left and then my right hands by the wrist. She brings them to her naked shoulders and holds them there.  Slowly she slides them to her naked breasts. She uses my hands to massage her breasts as her breathing rate  increases. She slides my fingers back and forth across her nipples till they grow turgid under my hands.  Suddenly she is gone.

Moments later she returns and presses a chilled flute of what tastes like Fluer de Champaign against my lips.  I go to take a another sip, and she grips my wrist and stops me. She pulls my hand and glass toward her while with her other hand she pulls my head towards her.  I feel pressure on the glass and then something wet and cool against my lips.  She slides her champagne drenched nipple across my lips.  When I try to suck it between my lips she pulls it away, dips it in the Champaign and brings her wet nipple to my lips again. When I try to suck her nipple she pulls away again and moves the flute to my lips. I sip, and she releases my hands.  She takes the flute from my hand and disappears.

I sit and listen with apprehension. I move my hands to the mask, and she immediately forcefully pulls them away places them on my knees.

Suddenly there is music in the background.  I focus and recognize it as Ravel’s “Bolero”.  As the beat begins its slow crescendo, I feel her presence no, her heat, before me.  She takes my hands from my knees and places them on her naked hips undulating to the music. She moves her hips erotically to the music circling slowly and ever faster, thrusting to accentuate the beat. She places her hands on mine keeping my left on her hip while she slowly slides my right hand from her hip across and down to cup my hand on the mound of her shaven womanhood. Holding my hand, her fingers intertwined with mine against her labia, she begins slowly to undulate and rub our hands against her pussy.  When I feel her spend, she suddenly thrusts my middle finger into her and rubs ever deeper and rapidly until her thighs lock on my fingers, she shudders and forces my fingers deeper into her.  Immediately she pulls my hand from her pussy and places a warm damp towel in my hands. She and “Bolero” have climaxed together, and silence fills the room.

She takes the towel from my hands and pulls me to my feet, moves to me, throws her arms around me and hugs me. Then taking me to the door, she opens it, and gently urges me through it, and closes it behind me.  I quickly remove the mask. I look down to see that I am still erect and decide I would be smart to take the stairs.

Back in my car, I sit dumbfounded. What just happened? I catch the scent of Cinnabar, but it’s mixed with something else.  It’s not coming from the pink envelope; it’s her scent.  It permeates me. I look around to make sure no one has seen me. What was next?

I drive home, park and go immediately to my study.  I sit behind my desk making this entry in my diary, when I catch the scent of Cinnabar mixed with the scent of her spending.  Shit, it’s coming from me! I need to lock the diary back in my desk drawer and take a shower.

DIARY

September 30 

Spouse noticed that I was home early and had showered.  Need to be more careful.  I hope she’s not suspicious.  I tried to process Friday afternoon. What had I gotten myself into? Had I enjoyed it?  Why.

DIARY

October 1

Friday is a continuous loop in my mind.  And with that loop comes physical excitement and arousal.

DIARY

October 2

Hurry to car at lunch.  Nothing!

DIARY

October 3

Nothing at the car.

DIARY 

October 4 

Noon.  Visor down.  Pink envelope on seat.  “You interested in more fun?  Leave your visor down tomorrow.”

DIARY 

October 5

Pulled into office parking lot.  I sit still, mentally debating whether to continue.  A line has been crossed; I have cheated on my wife. Or have I.  What if she finds out.  What if my boss finds out?  Adult family? Is my wife already suspicious?

I lower the visor, go to work, and let it be known I’d be out of office Friday afternoon.

DIARY 

October 6

More casual today.  Short sleeve light peach shit with button down collar, khaki slacks, Docksider boat shoes sans socks.  Another pink envelope.  Same instructions, different resort, different room number.  I head to pharmacy for another sleep mask.  Fortunately, I get a different clerk.   I head to the resort and find the TransAm. I take the stairs to the room, put on the mask and knock.

Opening the door she takes me by the hand and again takes me to the sofa, but turns me around in front of it.  She places my hands on her naked hips and places hers on my shoulders and pulls our bodies together. She strokes my face and runs her fingers through my hair before unbuttoning and removing my shirt.  With her hands she explores the hair on my chest running her fingers through it and alternately gently pulling on it.  Her hands slide to my hips, and I feel her warm breath on my chest as she begins to lick and then suck first my left and then right nipple.  Next I feel her breasts pressed tight against my chest. Then she releases the pressure and starts lightly stroking my chest with her breasts  sliding her body against mine. Then she’s gone and I stand alone naked to the waist.  

I hear the Champaign cork pop and soon a chilled flute is in my hand.  She takes my hand and lifts the glass to my mouth. I take a sip and she removes the flute from my lips.  She places a full flute in my other hand. If I try to raise either hand to take a sip she stops me. She again runs her hands over my chest only this time she strokes lower, and I feel my belt being unbuckled then my waistband unbuttoned.  She slides her hand slowly across my belly then around my waist lifting the waistband until my trousers drop to my ankles. She caresses my buttocks through my boxers and works her way to the front where she slides her hand through the opening to gently cup my balls in her right hand.  She releases my balls and raises my glass for me to take another sip of champaign.  I hear her leave and momentarily return to refill my glass.  I hear the bottle slide into an ice bucket evidently on the end table. I sense her taking a seat on the sofa in front of me.  She deftly removes my boxers and my cock springs from it’s confines. Holding my cock aside, she snuggles, kisses and pulls on my pubic hairs with her lips.

Suddenly a droplet of Champaign from my quivering glass splashes onto her back, and she stops.  When I have calmed myself she returns her attention to playing with my pubic hair ignoring my now rigid member.  As she plays, her cheeks brush against my ridged cock.  My cock twitches, my hands shake and more champaign spills from both flutes.  She disengages from her play.  I can feel her excited breath on my belly as she waits for the swelling of my cock to recede.  At last all returns to calm.  She grasps me by the buttocks as she begins long slow licks up both inner thighs until my cock stands out of the way enabling her to lick, suck and pull ever so gently on my balls. With my teeth clenched and my lips pursed, I try desperately to not spill any more champaign. After what seems like hours she stops and stands.  She takes one glass from my hand and brings the other to my lips signaling I should take a sip.  I hear her take a sip from the glass she took from my hand.  Quietly she clinks her glass to mine.  A toast?  After my breathing has returned to normal, and my cock lies softly against my thighs she has me lie back on the couch, places the wine glasses back in my hands and refills them from the bottle in the ice bucket.

With agility she mounts me and I feel her hands between my thighs searching for my cock.  She finds it and begins rubbing it against her pussy lips.  My cock immediately hardens and as it does, she places it against my pelvis and wraps her pussy lips about it.  Slowly she slides up and down  the length of my cock again and again. My cock trembles, my hand trembles, the champaign splashes on her back.  She stops rocking on my cock, takes the Champaign, sips and then let’s it trickle down my chest, across my abdomen till it pools in the recess where my cock joins my pelvis. Now she  slides and grinds in earnest. Straddling me  she me licks up the Champaign starting at my neck and ending with my balls.   Repositioning herself so my cock lies between her pussy lips, she begins sliding, riding and grinding in earnest.  I can’t help it, more champaign splashes and soaks both of us.  She hops off my lap and drops on her knees between my thighs and starts licking the shaft of my cock up one side and down the other carefully avoiding the head.  When my cock starts to twitch she gives my balls a quick squeeze.  When it’s  stopped twitching she begins the long licking strokes of her tongue.  Two more times she brings him to the verge and then backs down.  The third time instead of squeezing my balls she grabs the shaft with one hand and with the other she pulls the foreskin down the shaft from the head and holds it tightly there.  With her tongue she lightly licks fully around the ridge. She flicks the back of the head and with the tip of her tongue and alternately licks, sucks and swirls her tongue around the head of my cock until I explode into her mouth.  She swallows and pulls her hand down the shaft tightening the skin as she engulfs the head in her mouth and begins alternately licking and sucking.  All of a sudden she pulls the skin even tighter and rakes the head lightly with her teeth. Again I come as she sucks the head and shaft inch by inch into her mouth and my cock slowly loses its erection. I stand trembling as she licks me clean, pulls up my boxers and slacks and then helps me on with my shirt.  When she has me dressed she leads me to the door and opens it for me to leave. The door closes behind me and I remove the sleeping mask.

I take the stairs and go to the lounge and order a Chevas neat while I figure out what has been happening. Why the secrecy? Why the sleeping mask, why her dominance, and why my submissiveness, and where is this going? 

 As I cross the parking lot to my car, I hear my name called.  I turn; it’s my wife.

“Fancy seeing you here.” she shouts as she quickens her approach.

“Yeah, you too.” as I stop to face her. “I was just leaving from a business meeting.  What about you?”.

”Me too.”  “See you at home.”

“Later.”

In the car I slump back in the seat.  That was close.  I take a deep breath, and my cell phone chimes. It’s my secretary.

“Yes, what is it?

“The boss has been looking for you.”

“And?”

“He saw your car in the parking lot of the hotel.”

“He thought you said you had a doctors appointment.”

“Tell him I was there for lunch before the appointment and will see him Monday.”

“And your wife called earlier, and I told her you were out for the day on business.”

“Thanks, see you Monday.”

DIARY

October 7

Just finishing dinner when wife asks about my lunch.  I hesitate for a second before I remember I supposedly had lunch out Friday.  I then offer an elaborate description of the lunch and the business associates I had eaten with. She asked what credit card I had put it on.  Again I hesitated  and then told her the clients had covered it.  She looked at me with a raised eyebrow, but said nothing.

DIARY

October 8 

Again the subject of lunch comes up as she wants to know how the food was and whether I would recommend it for she and her friends or business associates.  I gave it glowing reviews.  Again the raised eyebrow as she left the table.

DIARY

October 9

At work, and I walk in the door to my secretary announces that the boss wanted to see me.

“What did he want?”

“Something about Friday.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s all he said.”

“Tell him I’m on my way up.”

I step out of the elevator door into his office.  He looks up from his desk. 

“You OK?”

“ Sorry?”

“You said you went to the doctor Friday.”

“Oh, yes, just a checkup.”

“Funny, I could swear I saw your car in the resort parking lot.”

“Oh, yeah, I stopped to pick up a brochure about a weekend couples special.”

“Well, I’m glad the visit to the doctor went well.”

“Thanks.  I’ll see you later then.”

At lunch my window visor is down, and there is another pink envelop on the seat.  I open the door and the scent of Cinnabar wafts out.  I get in the car and open the envelope.  Another resort, another room number, same instructions, same warnings.  For the first time I hesitate and consider the dangers to my marriage, and my career.  People are beginning to notice: my wife, my secretary, my boss.  As I think, I tap the envelope absentmindedly against my chin and the scent of Cinnabar makes the decision.  I place the note in the envelope and raise the window visor to indicate I accept the invitation.  On the way back to the office I stop and place the envelope and note in a wastebasket.

DIARY 

October 13

Once again outside a different door at a different resort, I slip on the sleeping mask and knock.  The door opens and she takes me by the hand and leads me in.    Once inside the room she kisses me lightly on the cheek and begins undressing me.  Tie and shirt removed, she throws her arms around me and I can feel her naked breasts against my chest.  When I try to respond, she quickly pushes my hands down to my sides.

Releasing me from her hug, she unbuckles my belt, loosens and unzipped my slacks and lets them fall to my ankles.  Once again she hugs me this time pressing not only her naked breasts against me but her pussy which she grinds into my groin.  As my cock starts to stir, she releases the hug and slides her body down mine until I can feel her hair against my cock as she pulls off my shorts, shoes and socks.  She raises her head and licks my member placing a kiss on its head as she gets back up.  She guides me, now naked to a bed instead of the usual sofa.

She sits me down and turns me moving me to the top of the bed.  I feel her kneeling over me.  She positions herself so her pussy is so close that I can catch her scent. She takes my hands One at a time and ties them to the bedpost with what feel like silk stockings.  Quickly she reverses her position, spreads my legs and ties them to the foot of the bed.  She disappears.  

There I lay, blindfolded, tied spreadeagled on the bed.  I can hear her moving about.  I hear the ice maker. I hear wine being poured. She returns and mounts me once again so that now my cock is resting under her wet pussy.  She squirms around and my cock responds. She places my cock at the entrance to her pussy. My cock twitches, and she pulls away and rubs an ice cube against my cock which shrivels. Again she brings my cock against her wet pussy until my cock is just inside her pussy lips.  My cock responds and she slowly pushes the head in and out.  My cock twitches; she applies the ice. Next time she takes the whole head into her pussy and uses its ridge to massage her clit. My cock twitches and more ice.  By now I am bucking to get into her.  After several more times she has managed to fully engulf my cock till it twitches.  Again the ice. Again she brings him to erection. I’m deeply inside her, waiting for the next tease.  I lay their soaking in her juices.  Then I hear it.  She has a vibrator.  She places it above my cock and against her clit.  She starts with the vibrations very slowly as she begins to fuck on my cock.  She takes her fingers and separates her lips fully exposing her clit to my cock and her vibrator.  As she increases the speed of the vibrator, she increase the rapidity of her thrusts taking each thrust to the hilt.  I come, but she thrusts him back to life again. Finally when she can orgasm no more, she collapses on top of me, and even then her cunt continues to clip my cock.  Next she unties my hands and leaves the room.  Since she doesn’t return, I finish dressing myself and leave removing my sleep mask as I go through the door.

Diary

October 16

When I get to my car to leave work, the sun visor is down and there’s a package on the seat.  In it there is a homemade DVD with my name on it.  I instantly recognize the handwriting as being the same as that on the notes on the pink stationary of the girl in the red TransAm, License #DLK00.  Once home I go into my office, pull out my portable DVD player,  Insert the disk and there I see all our sexual encounters in living color, in order by date.  I look inside the envelope for a note or explanation.  Nothing!  I walk over to the wet bar and pour myself three fingers of Chevas.  I’M BEING BLACKMAILED!  No sleep!

DIARY

October 17

I watch the DVD from my wife’s point of view.  This pretty much guarantees a divorce not only by what I did, but the lies.  Watching from my bosses point of view, my job or my career are over.

I watch the DVD again; there’s no way to spin this!  I can’t take my eyes off it. The camera angle is such that I am the only one that can be recognized.  The camera, including zoom, must have been operated by remote.  That would explain the blindfold and her departures to get wine must have been to change camera angles.  I don’t know for sure it’s blackmail.  Maybe it’s just more sex play.  I can only wait to see what happens.

DIARY

October 20

After work, again the visor is down, and there’s another pink envelope.  The scent of White Linen fills the car. I open the envelope, and pull the neatly folded note free.  As I open the note, a second sheet floats to the floor.  It is definitely her handwriting.  I pick it up . It lists my income, my assets and my wife’s assets.  I unfold the note “How much is it worth to get the complete unedited tapes?”  I must provide an answer by Wednesday and be prepared to make the purchase Friday.  I sat stunned in my car the envelope and note on my lap.

My boss sees me sitting in the parking lot and asked if I’m OK.  I told him I was fine and would see him tomorrow.

At home, in my library I cannot see a way foreword. I unlock the top right desk drawer and remove my Smith and Wesson 357 magnum loaded with copper jacketed, hollow points.  There will be no suicide note; what could I say?  This diary will be on top of the desk.  I drive to a nearby lake where they will find the body one bullet in the brain.

She gently closes the diary, puts it in the desk drawer and locks it.  Tears stream down her face as she sobs

 “Why?”  

“Why did he do it?”  

“Why did I do it?” 

Leaning foreword she uses the arms of the chair to stand. A shudder goes through her body, and she shakes her skirt into place and straightens her blouse.  She stoops and picks up her silk stockings and bra and drops them on the desk chair.  Standing on one foot and then the other she slips the pumps back onto her feet.

Turning, she walks to the French doors, parts the drapes and opens the doors.  There, in the light of the moon, she sees the shadow of the barn.  She folds her bare arms across her chest, starts to take a step and stops.  Mustering her will power, she steps, haltingly towards the barn door.  From the pocket of her skirt she removes the key, walks the brick path to the barn, unlocks the padlock and removes it from the wrought iron hasp. She pulls the door open and flicks on the spot light.  

Brightly illuminated in the center of the barn, under a silver coated ripstop nylon cover sits the shape of a car..  She walks slowly to the car and pulls a corner of the cover.  With a slight swish the cover slips to the floor revealing a candy apple red Pontiac TransAm convertible bearing the license plate DLK100.

 In the passenger side bucket seat is her blond wig, pink stationary with matching envelopes and bottles of White Linen and Cinnabar perfume.

She opens the car door, turns her back to bucket seat, hikes her skirt up mid- thigh, lowers herself  into the bucket seat and swings her legs in.  She starts the car

The engine purrs through the tuned mufflers.  Maureen is gone, her children are grown and have families of their own.  Now, because of her actions, and her “DKL00 game73” her husband is gone.  

What is left reminds her of all that she has lost.  There can be no future.  

She attaches two hoses to the exhaust, runs them through the drivers window, climbs into the passenger side and closes the car door.  

The Pontiac TransAm bearing license plate DKL00 hums along till the engine, deprived of gas follows her example, chokes, shudders and dies.

BRADNER POND

Prologue

The hazy red sphere, reflected in the rear window of the rusting hulk of the1929 model A Ford, lifted above the brown cattails, pin oaks, and dead sycamores on the eastern edge of Bradner Pond in Northern Ohio.   The passenger door, the rear fenders and the cloth roof had abandoned the rusted out, black four door sedan years ago.  The rubber tires had rotted off the wheels.  The front end rested on what remained of the rims.  The rear axle rested somewhat precariously on rocks rolled from a nearby field to keep the rear wheel rims off the ground.

“Tequila” by the Champs ripped the cool stillness of the morning, as the three teens worked feverishly wrapping the frayed rope, clothes line and binder twine around the right rear rim of the old Model A Ford.   To be truthful the the rope was rope in name only.  They had modified the rim so that it would hold two hundred yards of the rope which now stretched across the dark blue waters of the pond and disappeared into the tall grasses, brush and cattails. Chris, Mike, Eddie and I stepped back and admired their work.

Chapter 1. CALL OF THE WILD

Miss Hatie, wire rimmed half glasses, white hair in a tight bun, black polka dot mid calf length dress and matronly black shoes, was our English teacher.

With ram rod posture she stood in front of the class peering out at us looking for any glimmer of literary knowledge and any potential deviant behavior.  Satisfied, she looked down at her teacher’s edition.

“This week we are reading….”

The classroom door blasted open flying back on its hinges smashing the door handle into the wall.

“I’m sorry I’m late, Miss Hatie.”  Mike yelled as he crashed into and upended Alice and her desk in the front row.

History, geometry and English books flew everywhere.    Alice’s Rockabilly handbag with lucite handle skittered across the floor leaving a trail of its contents.  Pens, pencil, rulers, one each – pearl ink, coral, and white lipsticks and a small cellophane blue package labeled “KOTE_”.…  Before the rest of the letters could be read, Miss Hatie and Alice dove for it at the same time.  Their Heads collided. Balance was lost and Both ended sitting on the floor each clutching one end of the package of KOTEX.

“Excuse me.” Mike gingerly stepped over the two and nonchalantly made his way to his seat.

Miss Hatie struggled to her feet, straightened her dress and her glasses which were hanging from one ear.

Alice scooped her belongings into her purse, uprighted her desk and took her seat.

The class which hadn’t exhaled since the door flew open, exploded into riotous laughter.

One stare over Miss Hatie’s  wire rimmed glasses, and the room went silent.

“As I was saying, this week we are reading from the works of Jack London.”

As the class read, discussed and droned on through the novel paragraph by paragraph and sentence by sentence, I began reading ahead.  Ever so slowly the classroom disappeared around me, and I sank deeper and deeper into the adventure. 

Every American high school student is exposed to “The Call of The Wild”.  Not every American boy is as captured by the sense of adventure as I was.  In a matter of weeks I had read all of London’s short stories and novels.  Particularly, I was drawn to his novels about the South Sea.   My favorite was “The Cruise Of The Snark” which I read over and over again.  

Jack London also introduced me to surfing.  He called it the “royal sport for the natural kings of earth”.  I started to look for anything I could find on surfing including Alexander Hume Ford and George Freeth, the father of Modern Surfing, who became the catalyst for West Coast Surfing.

It was in January 1960 that, while browsing comics  at the Rexal Drug store, our combination drug store/ice cream parlor, that I saw and bought  the first issue of “The Surfer” January 1, 1960 Volume 1.  It subsequently was to become just “SURFER”.  I bought. I studied. I memorized that and every subsequent issue.  I knew the day that it was delivered to the store and waited excitedly for each issue.  For 75 cents I was transported from my small Midwestern town to the exotic surfing worlds of California and Hawaii.

In the subsequent issues you could order 8mm surfer films.  It was in these that I first saw “the tube” and surfers riding these huge waves.  The best of these was John Severson’s original “Big Wednesday” in 1961. 

I bought Duke Boyd’s color block “Hang Ten” surfer shorts with the two foot print logo.

I bought the jacket.

I found and  bought an original Dewey Weber long board.

I talked my two best friends, Mike and Eddie into going in with me on a dilapidated “Woodie”.  I sold them on the idea that we needed a cool vehicle to scoop girls at the “Atom”, and the “A&W Root Beer”.

Every penny I earned from my part time job at a flower shop/green house went into either the woodie or my surfing obsession.  Finally, I had all my surfing gear, and the woodie should be able to make it to the nearest large body of water. 

CHAPTER 2. THINGS GET ERIE

The problem was this: the largest body of water capable of producing surfing waves was Lake Erie, the shallowest of the Great Lakes. It can go from calm to nine foot waves in less than fifteen minutes.  Unfortunately, It was a good ninety miles away.

Mike, Eddie and I tied the Dewey Weber board to the top of the 1950 canary yellow Ford woodie.  Next we hoisted the rusty red steel CocaCola cooler loaded with our bologna sandwiches, Charlie Chips and Dad’s root beer into the back.  On top of that we chucked our towels, sweatshirts and swimming  trunks.

We clambered into the front seat.  I was behind the wheel, Eddie had shotgun and Mike was sandwiched between.  We looked at each other and began the ritual.

I stomped the clutch to the floor, gripped the wheel with my left hand, threw the stick into first with my right and then inserted the key into the ignition and put my foot on the floor mounted starter button.  Mike and Eddie solemnly placed their hands on the dash.  We looked at each other then looked to heaven.  I depressed the gas pedal and hit the starter.  The starter motor ground – nothing.  Again I hit the starter – nothing.  I straightened into the seat, looked at Mike and Eddie who tightened their grip on the dash.  We all looked to heaven, I turned the key, the starter ground, caught, the engine coughed once, twice, three times, belched fire and started.  A cloud of blue smoke enveloped us.  We coughed, wiped the tears and the stringent exhaust from our eyes.  I eased out the clutch, the car lurched and shuddered, and we were on our way.

Two hours and three stops later we are once again waiting for the radiator to stop spewing steam.  Finally, we arrived at the shores of Lake Erie’s East Harbor State Park.  The place was packed with families and other teens on summer break.  Mike and Eddie grabbed the cooler and food.  I untied my Dewey Weber from the roof, tucked it proudly under my arm, and we headed over the dunes and across the hot dark beige course sands of Lake Erie.  I couldn’t help noticing the families and girls staring at my surf board and smiling.  Although my chest swelled with pride, I couldn’t help but notice the lack of other surfers.  All the better for me I thought; no competition for the best waves.

So there I was in my shortie and baggies sitting on my original Dewey Weber board a couple of hundred yards off shore bobbing like a cork in a washtub.  I waited and waited and waited as the sun slowly moved across the grey northern sky.  No waves!

It was a long slow ride home even in our beloved woodie.

A week later we had another long drive with the same results.  Another week and the same results; no waves.  The troops were beginning to grumble.  Quickly I hatched a plan. We would bring the girls from our English class with us. The grumbling subsided.

Chapter 3. Beaches and Bikinis

on the next surfing expedition we brought the girls, our classmates and lifelong friends.  We soon discovered that our treks to the beach would be dramatically different with the girls in tow.

First of all, along with our equipment the girls now added: picnic baskets, changes of outfits, hats, various CopperTone suntan lotions, lemon juice (for high lighting hair — who’d have thought it), beach chairs, a beach umbrella, cameras, and a radio.  The girls wore the same one piece suits they had worn swimming with us all summer at the White Star Quarry, which had been abandoned and allowed to fill with water when the mining operation shut down.  The girls had slipped madras plaid shorts and white blouses over the swim suits for some reason.

We, the guys, hadn’t really thought about the seating arrangement.  It seemed simple enough.  We would keep the same arrangement we had always had.  I would drive, Eddie would ride shotgun and Mike would sit between us, and the girls would share the back seat.  We loaded the woodie, took our usual seats, and looked through the windshield to see all three girls standing in front of the car staring at us with hands on hips and furrowed brows.

“What?” I shouted.

Eddie, Mike and I waited.  We looked at each other in bewilderment.  We looked at the girls.  There they stood arms folded across their chests, staring icily, tapping their feet.  I turned to Eddie and shrugged my shoulders.  Eddie turned to Mike who shrugged back.  As we turned to look back at the girls, the car doors flew open.  Ruthie yanked Eddie from his shotgun position, Alice pulled Mike from the car, and no sooner had Mike’s feet hit the ground than Juanita slid in next to me on the front seat.

So, this was to be the seating arrangement.  I was behind the wheel with Juanita right beside me, Ruthie and Mike, Eddie and Alice were in the back seat.  I sat bewildered.  I looked in the rear view mirror at Mike and Eddie.  They shrugged; the girls glared. 

I turned facing front, took a deep breath, stomped the clutch to the floor, gripped the wheel with my left hand, threw the stick into first with my right, turned the key in the ignition, depressed the gas pedal, and stomped the starter button on the floor.  The starter ground – nothing.

I looked at Mike and Eddie.  They shrugged.  Again I turned the key – nothing.  I straightened in the seat.  Mike and Eddie leaned forward and grasped the back of the front seat. The girls looked puzzled.   I hit the starter – nothing. 

I asked Ruthie and Alice to join Mike and Eddie and put their hands on the back of the front seat and Juanita to put her hands on the dash.  The girls rolled their eyes and reluctantly complied.  Mike and Eddie tightened their grip.  I depressed the starter again, nothing.  I took a deep breath.  

The boys looked to heaven.  The girls looked at each other puzzled.  I jammed my foot down on the starter; it groaned, caught, the engine coughed once, twice, three times, belched fire and started.  A cloud of blue smoke enveloped us.  We choked and wiped the tears from our eyes. I eased out the clutch, the car lurched, and shuddered.  The six of us were on our way.

The trip to East Harbor park was, aside from the engine’s usual overheating, uneventful.  

The girls chattered endlessly, the guys stared ahead awkwardly.  Once we got to East Harbor State Park, I grabbed my board from the roof and headed for the beach and firmly planted my board in the sand.  I turned to discover I was by myself.  I started back to the car and discovered Mike and Eddie struggling towards me loaded like a couple of pack mules with the girls things.  

“Where are the girls”, I asked.

“They’re in the cabana.” Mike replied.

“Doing what?” I asked.

“They’re changing, you dolt.”

“They already had their suits on in the car.” I replied.

Mike and Eddie just shrugged.

At that moment the girls appeared in their brand new bikinis.

Mike, Edie and I stood dumbfounded with our mouths open.

“Mike, Edie, are you coming?” Alice and Ruthie giggled in unison.  

Ahead of the heavily ladened burros, the chattering girls walked on.  

I turned back in time to see Juanita staring at me.  She wore a bright yellow polka dot bikini.  I just stood there staring at the bikini with the stupidest grin on my face. 

Juanita walked over, smiled, and punched me in the shoulder.

“Owww!”  “What was that for?” I asked’

“You know, Chris.” she laughed.

“What?” I whined.

“RRRR!” She growled as she gave me another punch in the arm, spun and stomped off kicking sand back at me with each step as I followed her, the girls, and my friends, the burros.

The surfboard never made it into the lake the rest of that summer.  Instead every weekend the six of us piled into the woodie and headed to the beach.  It became a summer of sun, sand, sweet smelling CopperTone, lemon juice and peroxide. And, the girls sporting their latest bikinis.

When we weren’t at the beach we were at Len’s, the burger place that served as teen central in our small town.  There was a long counter with stools along one side.   The worn splitting, red leather seats satatop a chrome frame spun so that you could see and talk to anyone in the restaurant.  Along the other side were booths, and in the corner was our booth.  There was always at least one or two of the six of us holding our place.  If not at Len’s, we were cruising between the A&W and the Atom in the next town fifteen miles away.  The A&W, on the east side, was known for its root beer floats. The Atom, on the west side was knows for its onion rings.  So, by circling from one end of State Street to the other you had a complete meal, and you could see who was cruising with whom.  Round and round we would ride, laughing, teasing, talking and enjoying the feeling of the warm summer breeze in our hair and on our skin.

Every two weeks there would be a new flick at the Starlight Drive-In, and we would go there for the evening.  The StarLight was an older drive-in.  The girls would bring snacks; the guys would bring beverages, usually soft drinks.  Initially we went to watch the movies.  Then it soon became obvious that some, if not all of us, were becoming more than best friends.  Although the seating arrangement in the woodie was well set, at the drive in the couples took turns rotating from front to back seat. Everyone made out with their boy or girl friend. Two couples cramped into the front seat so that the third couple could enjoy the comfort of the unencumbered back seat.  The nonstop teasing and comments from the front seat kept the activities in the back seat from getting too out of hand.  We named ourselves “the six pack” since we went everywhere together.

Chapter 4. Passion Rekindled

Summer ended. 

School started. 

I sat in my room, listening to the Beach Boys “California Girls” on the hi-fi.  I stared at the geometry text in front me.  My eyes returned to my longboard gathering dust in the corner.  As I looked at the board, the desire to surf started to glow like an ember in one of our beach fires until it ignited into a raging inferno.  

I had to surf. There had to be a way.  I would never get reliable surf on Lake Erie.  I needed another option.  I slammed the geometry book closed, grabbed the keys to the woodie, opened the garage door, grabbed axes, shovels, and tool box. I closed the garage door and left to pick up Mike and Eddie.

Within minutes I was in the driveway of Mike’s house.

“Nice flat top, Mike” I called out as Mike ambled to the car.

“Where are the girls, Chris?”

“Don’t need them. We’re headed to Eddie’s.”

“What’s happening?”

“Wait till we get to Eddie’s.”

A short ways out of town I turned into Eddies lane and the woodie left a cloud of dust the length of the long lane to Eddie’s farm house.  By the time we reached the two story, chalked grey, clapboard farm house, Eddie was waiting.  He slid in and slammed the door just as the cloud of dust was about to envelope him.“That was close,” he laughed.  “What’s goin on?”

I took my foot off the brake, released the clutch and we started back down the dust choked lane.

“Remember how we were going to spend the summer surfing?” I asked.

Grinning at each other and in unison, “We sure do.”

“Did we ever get to surf?”

“Depends on what you mean by “surf”?, smirked Mike.

“I’m serious”, I said.  “I really want to surf.”

“Looked to us like you “surfed” pretty good.” Mike replied.

“You finished?” I asked.

“OK. OK.” laughed Eddie.  “Talk to us about surfing.  But, first where we goin?”

“Bradner,” I announced.

“Bradner?” Mike and Eddie in unison.  “Seriously.”

“What’s in Bradner?” They asked.

“You’ll see.”, I said.

I peeled from the dirt lane leaving a cloud of dust as I pulled out onto the county road.

“Ok, Chris, where we going?” Mike asked.

Listen, guys, do you remember where we took the girls skinny dipping? I asked.

In unison, “Do we ever!” they enthused.

“That was Bradner Pond.” I shared.

“You want to go skinny dipping without the girls?” Edie asked in disbelief.

“No! numb nuts!” I shouted.  “Just wait, all will be made apparent.”  Just shut up and turn on the radio.

“I feel fine”, “Come See About Me”, and “Like a Rolling stone” by Bob Dylan began the musical journey.

Within fifteen minutes we turned down an overgrown lane making our way to Bradner Pond.

We bounced along two overgrown parallel tire tracks as the path became less and less discernible. Wild raspberry bushes, milk weed, young sassafras trees scraped under and along the woodie. All manner of bugs and mosquitoes clouded around the car as we picked our way down the overgrown path.  Suddenly around a curve was Bradner Pond.  To the right next to the edge of the pond was an overgrown pile of brush obscuring an old Model A Ford.  The rest of the day was spent clearing the overgrowing vegetation and decades of debris from the car.

We stepped back and leaned agains the woodie.  

“Gentlemen, behold ‘Dream Maker’!”

Mike punched me in the shoulder. “Looks looks more like “nightmare maker” to me.”

“Nightmare or dream maker,” I said, “it’s time to divide and conquer.”

“Mike, you find and remove the oil filter and drain the oil.”

“Eddie, you pull the spark plugs, wires and distributer then drain the radiator and open the petcock in the sediment bulb.”

“I’ll clean out the inside then pull the valve cover and oil pan and see how bad the mechanics look.  Whoever gets done first will start inspecting the transmission.

“Hey, Chris, this oil is the consistency of peanut butter.”

“Mike, Eddie,” hold everything!  “Guess what I found under the front seat?”

Eddie yelled, “a rat’s nest.”

Mike chimes, “a pair of panties.”

“Idiots, I found the original owner’s manual from Ford.  This will help us get this baby running.”

We gathered around to study the manual. We had our guide book, and we had our work cut out for us.  Fortunately all we had to do was get the engine running enough to turn the rear wheels. Each of of us tore out the section of the manual dealing with the job he had been assigned. At the end of each day we would compile a list of tools, parts and materials we would need for the next work session.  The journey began.  After school all week long  we worked on “DreamMaker”.

The weekend came, and the girls made their feelings known about our absence; and truthfully, we were missing their company too.

Also, our parents were raising concerns about us showing up only at meal time and the affect on our grades.  

A solution finally was worked out: Friday nights and Saturdays we focused on the girls. Sundays were reserved for families.

As summer approached,  it appeared “Dream Maker” would be ready to go by Memorial Day.

Chapter 5. Memorial Day

Standing there Mike, Eddie, and I were ready.   Dream Maker was ready.  The rope across  Radner Pond was ready. The surf board attached was ready.  “Tequila” was blaring.  The surf board was appropriately waxed.

“Well, whose the first surfer?” I asked.

“Your project, you should be the first to surf,” said Mike as he turned down the 8 track player.

“You agree, Eddie”

“Yup.”

“Ok, you guys fire up Dream Maker, and I will swim over to the surf board.  When I raise my arm, you throw the clutch and stand back.” 

I swam easily following the rope across the pond where the surfboard waited in the cattails. I heard Dream Maker cough and rumble to life. I mounted the board, placed my feet to lower my center of gravity. Mike and Eddie   revved the engine building rpms.  I raised my arm.  They engaged the clutch.  The board started moving slowly as the rope caught on the spinning wheel.  I struggled and kept my balance on the board which is hurdling across the pond.  My friends are jumping up and down waving excitedly.  I’m surfing! I’m surfing!  And then I’m not as the board hits the shore propelling me into the air as it aims for Dream Maker.  Looking up from the muck, I see Mike and Eddie running from Dream Maker as my surfboard plows into it knocking it off the rocks holding the rear end off the ground.  Dream Maker shakes as the drive wheels dig into the ground propelling her towards me and the pond.  I roll to my right in the muck as she screams by me headed toward the pond.  She hits the water sending a tsunami across the pond and promptly bubbles her way to the bottom of the pond.

We trudged back to the car in silence never to speak of Dream Maker again.

Chapter 6. Of Boys and Girls

Shortly after the start of school, Mike and Eddie each got their own cars.  We no longer triple dated.  The six pack existed only at Len’s  where we still had our table.

Juanita and I became a couple.  Ruthie and Mike paired together.  Eddie and Alice became the third couple.  Throughout the school year the couples began to break up.  

By Thanksgiving Ruth and Mike and Eddie and Alice were no longer going steady.  By Christmas Juanita and I were seeing other people.  Dating others in our school was awkward and depressing. The question was always present with each new date. “Why did you break up?”  I really didn’t have an answer.  No one cheated. There were no big fights. No hurt feelings.  We just couldn’t or didn’t want to go beyond the really great, fun and close friendships we enjoyed that summer.

Spring brought SATs, College Boards and college applications, senior proms and graduations.  

Summer brought summer jobs and prep for going away to college.

Chapter 7. In the Blink of an Eye

Sex, Love, Marriage, Children, and Grand children.

EPILOGUE 

 “Grandpa, What kind of old car did you say this was?  It says Ford on it.”

“ It’s called a Woodie, but Ford made them first.”

“Grandpa, where are we going?”

“I told grandma we were going fishing, Delaney.”

“But you put that old surfboard along with mine in the back of the Woodie along with the fishing gear.”

“You never heard of surf fishing”?  “ You know, you catch a wave and troll for fish on the way to shore.”

“Grandpa, I may be a girl, but I’m not stupid.”  “Did you forget that we used to go fishing by that old junker resting half in the water at Bradner pond?”

“No, I remember that spot well he grinned.  It has many memories for me, including having to bait the hook for a little red haired girl with dimples.”

“Why am I driving all the way to Sebastian Inlet?”

“Best fishing and surfing on Florida’s Atlantic Coast!”

The old man, feigning sleep, slouched on the bench seat and against the door.  At one time the woody was cherry red; now it was faded pink and bleaching white from the Florida sun. 

The sun had taken its toll on the old man too.  It had bleached his shoulder length hair white and burned splotches of pigment out of his deeply tanned and wrinkled skin.  He had worn his old faded Duke Boyd color block “Hang Ten” surfer shorts with the two foot print logo.  The old Dewey Weber longboard he had repaired bounced along beside Delaneys short board in the back of the woody.  

As they drove along  he succumbed to the drum of the old woody on fresh pavement, and images filled his mind.  His wife of 60 years, his son, his four grand children, places they had lived, places they had visited (42 of the fifty states), the dive trips (Barbados, St. Croix, the Caymans, the Bahamas, Bonaire), the ice cold waters of White Star quarry), their dogs (Star – the Irish Setter, Fletcher, Alfie and Alfie2.0 – the standard poodles.  

“Grandpa, Grandpa, wake up.”

“What?”

“We’re here.”

“Where?” He asked trying to shake the sleep from his head.

“Sebastion Inlet. Don’t you remember?” 

“Of course, I remember.  Grab our boards from the back of the woodie.”

“What about the poles and fishing gear?”

“Fishing gear?  Oh, right, I forgot.  We’ll get that later.”

“Should I roll up the windows and lock the woodie.”

“Nah, nobody would want to steal it.”

“Where you want to go, gramps?”

“Over where the rest of the boards are standing upright in the sand.”

He stood, curled his toes in the hot sand.  The Atlantic air filled his nostrils with the smells of salt and sea.  This was definitely not Lake Erie, nor was it in any way Bradner Pond.  After all these years he was going finally to surf.  He felt the excitement building in his body. His heart rate increased. It pounded in his chest like a runaway locomotive.  His vision blurred as he felt his knees buckle.  In the far distance he could faintly hear Delaney.

“Grandpa!”

“Grandpa!”

He felt her hands cradling his head in her lap and brushing the sand and his hair from his face.  He turned his head to the sound of the waves crashing on the shore and chuckled to himself at the irony.

“Someone help my Grandpa!”

A couple of surfers ran up the beach to her aid, but it was too late.  The crashing waves rolled up on the sandy beach and slid with his dream back into the ocean. 

LAST PERIOD (old school)

Buckeye trees bordered the street on the way to my high school in northern Ohio. On this brisk fall morning, I picked up the first buckeye of the season and with practiced ease split the thorny, mottled green covering revealing an inside as smooth as silk.  The  buckeye itself was dark, shiny brown with a tan eye.  I picked up more as I walked to school putting the nicer ones in my jeans pocket.

The bell rang.  All the students, like B-Bs swirling around the rim of a puzzle, rolled into their desks in last period study hall.  This was not any last period study hall; it was Mr. P’s last period study hall.  And, as such it was avoided if at all possible.

I remember the first day I was in his study hall.

Mr. P. snarled, “There will be assigned seats, no talking, no chewing gum, no sleeping, no yawning, no looking up.  If you look up and don’t see my shoes under my desk you are dead meat because I am on my way to nail you.”

Mr. P. didn’t so much as sit at the teacher’s desk as hulk behind, over, and around it.  One huge ham of a hand grabbed each end of the six foot desk.  He looked out at us, eyes wide open like a boxer watching for an opening or a batter watching for that fast ball breaking on the inside.  His eyes never moved.  He took in the whole study hall and its students in one gulp.

Mr. P. taught shop when he is not terrifying the last period study hall.  It’s rumored that the principal is afraid to let him loose with other than shop students.  No one else would take last period so Mr. P. was assigned our study hall.

Howard Klein, squint eyed, stared defiantly at his book.  He is two rows over and to my right.  He picks a scab from the self-inflicted cigarette burns on the back of his hand.  Then he starts tattooing himself with a straightened safety pin and ink from his ballpoint pen.  I don’t look at Howard much.  Howard doesn’t like to be looked at.  When Howard doesn’t like something he pummels the nearest victim.  No one wants to sit near him.  Even two rows over it’s like sitting next to a keg of dynamite.

Rudy Smith, turning his head away from Mr. P. rests his head on his right hand.  His right hand is supported by his right elbow which in entrenched in his open history book, which by the way is upside down.  Slowly he brings his left hand to his face, ceremoniously makes a fist then nonchalantly extends his index finger and begins probing his right nostril.  His eyes glaze over and roll back in ecstasy.

The bell rings!  Last period study hall has officially begun.  

Mary Jameson, has waist length blond hair shrouding her face. One shoeless heal is tucked into her warmth under her red, green and black tartan skirt.  She rocks rhythmically against her heel. She could actually be studying were it not for the blissful smile on her face.  She looks at me, blushes, and goes back to her rocking.

Pete Roberts is counting the tiles on the floor.  He has already counted the number of desks, ceiling tiles, spit wads on the ceiling tiles, girls, boys, panes of glass, erasers and chalk.  A scientist of sorts, Pete has already discovered the only true constants are the floor and ceiling  tile.

I check and Mr. P. is still behind his desk.

Alice Areola is the most beautiful girl in school.  She’s a cheerleader, of course.  There is a pep rally today.  She wears her cheerleader outfit: a short pleated skirt a tight sweater which forces the varsity “S” to protrude breathtakingly.  She goes through cheering routines with her fingers on her desk.  Her feet swing and her thighs open and close in to perfect synchronization to the cheers her fingers perform.  Each cheer causes her skirt ride up.

Bill Sams watches Alice.  The effect is predictable. He squirms in his seat.  He sits sideways.  He sits bold upright but to no avail.  Slowly he slides forward and down into his seat hoping the desk hides his bulging thoughts.

Once again I check and sigh relief to find Mr.P’s shoes under his desk.

I lower my head and look under my right arm pit to check out Steve Smith.  Steve is my idle.  Sure enough there he sits, text book open, head resting in both hands, eyes wide open and, yes, fast asleep.  I stretch my legs, flex my shoulders, and mimic his posture.  I  close my eyes to remind myself of the feeling of sleep.  I open them.  I wait.  I cross my eyes slightly to blur my vision.  I wait for sleep.

Suddenly,  I catch movement to my right.  It’s Howard Klein.  I focus in time to see his arm swing like a pendulum backwards.  His hand is full of buckeyes.  Oh, my God!  I rivet my eyes to the book open in front of me.  The buckeyes hit the floor skittering and rolling loudly towards Mr. P.’s desk.

AND. I have a pocket full of buckeyes. My mind becomes a thesaurus : Armageddon, doomsday, second coming, death, crucifixion.  I don’t dare lookup.  “No, dummy, if you don’t lookup you’ll look guilty.”

I look up.  No shoes.  Desks are flying and crashing right and left. “Dear Jesus,” I pray.  “Let Mr. P. have seen who threw the buckeyes.  Also, dear Jesus, have mercy on Howard if Mr. P. did see.”

Suddenly, Howard disappears from my peripheral vision. I hear Howard’s body, like a bag of potatoes, hit the study hall wall.  We listen and cringe as he ricochets off the hall lockers into the distance. Finally, aided by Mr. P. he smashes into the principals office.

As the sound dissolves, everyone returns to their “work”.  Not a word is said, but all eyes are glued to where Mr. P.’s shoes had been under the desk.  We wait in silence for Mr. P’s return and for the last bell.

Surfs-Up on Bradner Pond

Prologue

The hazy red sphere, reflected in the rear window of the rusting hulk of the1929 model A Ford, lifted above the brown cattails, pin oaks, and dead sycamores on the eastern edge of Bradner Pond in Northern Ohio.   The passenger door, the rear fenders and the cloth roof had abandoned the rusted out, black four door sedan years ago.  The rubber tires had rotted off the wheels.  The front end rested on what remained of the rims.  The rear axle rested somewhat precariously on rocks rolled from a nearby field to keep the rear wheel rims off the ground.

“Tequila” by the Champs ripped the cool stillness of the morning, as the three teens worked feverishly wrapping the frayed rope, clothes line and binder twine around the right rear rim of the old Model A Ford.   To be truthful the the rope was rope in name only.  They had modified the rim so that it would hold two hundred yards of the rope which now stretched across the dark blue waters of the pond and disappeared into the tall grasses, brush and cattails. Chris, Mike, Eddie and I stepped back and admired their work.

Earlier

Chapter 1

CALL OF THE WILD

MISS Hatie, wire rimmed half glasses, white hair in a tight bun, black polka dot mid calf length dress and matronly black shoes, was our English teacher.

With ram rod posture she stood in front of the class peering out at us looking for any glimmer of literary knowledge and any potential deviant behavior.  Satisfied, she looked down at her teacher’s edition.

“This week we are reading….”

The classroom door blasted open flying back on its hinges smashing the door handle into the wall.

“I’m sorry I’m late, Miss Hatie.”  Mike yelled as he crashed into and upended Alice and her desk.

History, geometry and English books flew everywhere.    Alice’s Rockabilly handbag with lucite handle skittered across the floor leaving a trail of its contents.  Pens, pencil, rulers, one each – pearl ink, coral, and white lipsticks and a small cellophane blue package labeled “KOTE_”.…  Before the rest of the letters could be read, Miss Hatie and Alice dove for it at the same time.  Their Heads collided. Balance was lost and Both ended sitting on the floor each clutching one end of the package of KOTEX.

“Excuse me.” Mike gingerly stepped over the two and nonchalantly made his way to his seat.

Miss Hatie struggled to her feet, straightened her dress and her glasses which were hanging from one ear.

Alice scooped her belongings into her purse, uprighted her desk and took her seat.

The class which hadn’t exhaled since the door flew open, exploded into riotous laughter.

One stare over Miss Hatie’s   wire rimmed glasses, and the room went silent.

“As I was saying, this week we are reading from the works of Jack London.”

As the class read, discussed and droned on through the novel paragraph by paragraph and sentence by sentence, I began reading ahead.  Ever so slowly the classroom disappeared around me, and I sank deeper and deeper into the adventure. 

Every American high school student is exposed to “The Call of The Wild”.  Not every American boy is as captured by the sense of adventure as I was.  In a matter of weeks I had read all of London’s short stories and novels.  Particularly, I was drawn to his novels about the South Sea.   My favorite was “The Cruise Of The Snark” which I read over and over again.  

Jack London also introduced me to surfing.  He called it the “royal sport for the natural kings of earth”.  I started to look for anything I could find on surfing including Alexander Hume Ford and George Freeth, the father of Modern Surfing, who became the catalyst for West Coast Surfing.

It was in January 1960 that, while browsing comics  at the Rexal Drug store, our combination drug store/ice cream parlor, that I saw and bought  the first issue of “The Surfer” January 1, 1960 Volume 1.  It subsequently was to become just “SURFER”.  I bought. I studied. I memorized that and every subsequent issue.  I knew the day that it was delivered to the store and waited excitedly for each issue.  For 75 cents I was transported from my small Midwestern town to the exotic surfing world of California and Hawaii.

In the subsequent issues you could order 8mm surfer films.  It was in these that I first saw “the tube” and surfers riding these huge waves.  The best of these was John Severson’s original “Big Wednesday” in 1961. 

I bought Duke Boyd’s color block “Hang Ten” surfer shorts with the two foot print logo.

I bought the jacket.

I found and  bought an original Dewey Weber long board.

I talked my two best friends, Mike and Eddie into going in with me on a dilapidated “Woodie”.  I sold them on the idea that we needed a cool vehicle to scoop girls at the “Atom”, and the “A&W Root Beer”.

Every penny I earned from my part time job at a flower shop/green house went into either the woodie or my surfing obsession.  Finally, I had all my surfing gear, and the woodie should be able to make it to the nearest large body of water. 

CHAPTER 2

THINGS GET ERIE

The problem was this: the largest body of water capable of producing surfing waves was Lake Erie, the shallowest of the Great Lakes. It can go from calm to nine foot waves in less than fifteen minutes.  Unfortunately, It was a good ninety miles away.

Mike, Eddie and I tied the Dewey Weber board to the top of the 1950 canary yellow Ford woodie.  Next we hoisted the rusty red steel CocaCola cooler loaded with our bologna sandwiches, Charlie Chips and Dad’s root beer into the back.  On top of that we chucked our towels, sweatshirts and swimming  trunks.

We clambered into the front seat.  I was behind the wheel, Eddie had shotgun and Mike was sandwiched between.  We looked at each other and began the ritual.

I stomped the clutch to the floor, gripped the wheel with my left hand, threw the stick into first with my right and then inserted the key into the ignition and put my foot on the floor mounted starter button.  Mike and Eddie solemnly placed their hands on the dash.  We looked at each other then looked to heaven.  I depressed the gas pedal and hit the starter.  The starter motor ground – nothing.  Again I hit the starter – nothing.  I straightened into the seat, looked at Mike and Eddie who tightened their grip on the dash.  We all looked to heaven, I turned the key, the starter ground, caught, the engine coughed once, twice, three times, belched fire and started.  A cloud of blue smoke enveloped us.  We coughed, wiped the tears and the stringent exhaust from our eyes.  I eased out the clutch, the car lurched and shuddered, and we were on our way.

Two hours and three stops later we are once again waiting for the radiator to stop spewing steam.  Finally, we arrived at the shores of Lake Erie’s East Harbor State Park.  The place was packed with families and other teens on summer break.  Mike and Eddie grabbed the cooler and food.  I untied my Dewey Weber from the roof, tucked it proudly under my arm, and we headed over the dunes and across the hot dark beige course sands of Lake Erie.  I couldn’t help noticing the families and girls staring at my surf board and smiling.  Although my chest swelled with pride, I couldn’t help but notice the lack of other surfers.  All the better for me I thought; no competition for the best waves.

So there I was in my shortie and baggies sitting on my original Dewey Weber board a couple of hundred yards off shore bobbing like a cork in a washtub.  I waited and waited and waited as the sun slowly moved across the grey northern sky.  No waves!

It was a long slow ride home even in our beloved woodie.

A week later we had another long drive with the same results.  Another week and the same results; no waves.  The troops were beginning to grumble.  Quickly I suggested that we bring the girls with us, and the grumbling subsided.

Chapter 3

Beaches and Bikinis

This next surfing expedition we brought the girls, our classmates and lifelong friends.  We soon discovered that our treks to the beach would be dramatically different with the girls in tow.

First of all, besides our equipment the girls now added: picnic baskets, changes of outfits, hats, various CopperTone suntan lotions, lemon juice (for high lighting hair — who’d have thought it), beach chairs, a beach umbrella, cameras, and a radio.  The girls wore the same one piece suits they had worn swimming with us all summer at the White Star, an abandoned limestone quarry that had filled with water when the mining operation shut down.  The girls had slipped madras plaid shorts and white blouses over the swim suits for some reason.

We, the guys, hadn’t really thought about the seating arrangement.  It seemed simple enough.  We would keep the same arrangement we had always had.  I would drive, Eddie would ride shotgun and Mike would sit between us and the girls would share the back seat.  We loaded the woodie, took our usual seats, and looked through the windshield to see all three girls standing in front of the car staring at with us hands on hips and furrowed brows.

“What?” I shouted.

Eddie, Mike and I waited.  We looked at each other in bewilderment.  We looked at the girls.  There they stood arms folded across their chests, staring icily, tapping their feet.  I turned to Eddie and shrugged my shoulders.  Eddie turned to Mike who shrugged back.  As we turned to look back at the girls, the car doors flew open.  Ruthie yanked Eddie from his shotgun position, Alice pulled Mike from the car, and no sooner had Mike’s feet hit the ground than Juanita slid in next to me on the front seat.

So, this was to be the seating arrangement.  I was behind the wheel with Juanita right beside me, Ruthie and Mike, Eddie and Alice were in the back seat.  I sat bewildered.  I looked in the rear view mirror at Mike and Eddie.  They shrugged; the girls glared. 

I turned facing front, took a deep breath, stomped the clutch to the floor, gripped the wheel with my left hand, threw the stick into first with my right, turned the key in the ignition, depressed the gas pedal, and stomped the starter button on the floor.  The starter ground – nothing.

I looked at Mike and Eddie.  They shrugged.  Again I turned the key – nothing.  I straightened in the seat.  Mike and Eddie leaned forward and grasped the back of the front seat. The girls looked puzzled.   I hit the starter – nothing. 

I asked Ruthie and Alice to join Mike and Eddie and put their hands on the back of the front seat and Juanita to put her hands on the dash.  The girls rolled their eyes and reluctantly complied.  Mike and Eddie tightened their grip.  I depressed the starter again, nothing.  I took a deep breath.  

The boys looked to heaven.  The girls looked at each other puzzled.  I jammed my foot down on the starter; it groaned, caught, the engine coughed once, twice, three times, belched fire and started.  A cloud of blue smoke enveloped us.  We choked and wiped the tears from our eyes. I eased out the clutch, the car lurched, and shuddered.  The six of us were on our way.

The trip to East Harbor park was, aside from the engine’s usual overheating, uneventful.  

The girls chattered endlessly, the guys stared ahead awkwardly.  Once we got to East Harbor State Park, I grabbed my board from the roof and headed for the beach and firmly planted my board in the sand.  I turned to discover I was by myself.  I started back to the car and discovered Mike and Eddie struggling towards me loaded like a couple of pack mules with the girls things.  

“Where are the girls”, I asked.

“They’re in the cabana.” Mike replied.

“Doing what?” I asked.

“They’re changing, you dolt.”

“They already had their suits on in the car.” I replied.

Mike and Eddie just shrugged.

At that moment the girls appeared in their brand new bikinis.

Mike, Edie and I stood dumbfounded with our mouths open.

“Mike, Edie, are you coming?” Alice and Ruthie giggled in unison.  

Ahead of the heavily ladened burros, the chattering girls walked on.  

I turned back in time to see Juanita staring at me.  She wore a bright yellow bikini.  I just stood there staring at the bikini with the stupidest grin on my face. 

Juanita walked over, smiled, and punched me in the shoulder.

“Owww!”  “What was that for?” I asked’

“You know, Chris.” she laughed.

“What?” I whined.

“RRRR!” She growled as she gave me another punch in the arm, spun and stomped off kicking sand back at me with each step as I followed her, the girls, and my friends, the burros.

The surfboard never made it into the lake the rest of that summer.  Instead every weekend the six of us piled into the woodie and headed to the beach.  It became a summer of sun, sand, sweet smelling CopperTone, lemon juice and peroxide. And, the girls sporting the latest bikinis.

When we weren’t at the beach we were at Len’s, the burger place that served as teen central in our small town.  There was a long counter with stools along one side.   Worn splitting, red leather seats atop a chrome frame spun so that you could see and talk to anyone in the restaurant.  Along the other side were booths, and in the corner was our booth.  There was always at least one or two of the six of us holding our place.  If not at Len’s, we were cruising between the A&W and the Atom in the next town fifteen miles away.  The A&W, on the east side, was known for its root beer floats. The Atom, on the west side was knows for its onion rings.  So, by circling from one end of State Street to the other you had a complete meal, and you could see who was cruising with whom.  Round and round we would ride, laughing, teasing, talking and enjoying the feeling of the warm summer breeze in our hair and on our skin.

Every two weeks there would be a new flick at the Starlight Drive-In, and we would go there for the evening.  The StarLight was an older drive-in.  The girls would bring snacks; the guys would bring beverages, usually soft drinks.  Initially we went to watch the movies.  Then it soon became obvious that some, if not all of us, were becoming more than best friends.  Although the seating arrangement in the woodie was well set, at the drive in the couples took turns rotating from front to back seat. Everyone made out with their boy or girl friend. Two couples cramped into the front seat so that the third couple could enjoy the comfort of the unencumbered back seat.  The nonstop teasing and comments from the front seat kept the activities in the back seat from getting too out of hand.  We named ourselves “the six pack” since we went everywhere together.

Chapter 4

Passion Rekindled

Summer ended. 

School started. 

I sat in my room, listening to the Beach Boys “California Girls” on the hi-fi.  I stared at the geometry text in front me.  My eyes returned to my longboard gathering dust in the corner.  As I looked at the board, the desire to surf started to glow like an ember in one of our beach fires until it ignited into a raging inferno.  

I had to surf. There had to be a way.  I would never get reliable surf on Lake Erie.  I needed another option.  I slammed the geometry book closed, grabbed the keys to the woodie, opened the garage door, grabbed axes, shovels, and tool box. I closed the garage door and left to pick up Mike and Eddie.

Within minutes I was in the driveway of Mike’s house.

“Nice flat top, Mike” I called out as Mike ambled to the car.

“Where are the girls, Chris?”

“Don’t need them. We’re headed to Eddie’s.”

“What’s happening?”

“Wait till we get to Eddie’s.”

A short ways out of town I turned into Eddies lane and the woodie left a cloud of dust the length of the long lane to Eddie’s farm house.  By the time we reached the two story, chalked grey, clapboard farm house, Eddie was waiting.  He slid in and slammed the door just as the cloud of dust was about to envelope him.“That was close,” he laughed.  “What’s goin on?”

I took my foot off the brake, released the clutch and we started back down the dust choked lane.

“Remember how we were going to spend the summer surfing?” I asked.

Grinning at each other and in unison, “We sure do.”

“Did we ever get to surf?”

“Depends on what you mean by “surf”?, smirked Mike.

“I’m serious”, I said.  “I really want to surf.”

“Looked to us like you “surfed” pretty good.” Mike replied.

“You finished?” I asked.

“OK. OK.” laughed Eddie.  “Talk to us about surfing.  But, first where we goin?”

“Bradner,” I announced.

“Bradner?” Mike and Eddie in unison.  “Seriously.”

“What’s in Bradner?” They asked.

“You’ll see.”, I said.

I peeled from the dirt lane leaving a cloud of dust as I pulled out onto the county road.

“Ok, Chris, where we going?” Mike asked.

Listen, guys, do you remember where we took the girls skinny dipping? I asked.

In unison, “Do we ever!” they enthused.

“That was Bradner Pond.” I shared.

“You want to go skinny dipping without the girls?” Edie asked in disbelief.

“No! numb nuts!” I shouted.  “Just wait, all will be made apparent.”  Just shut up and turn on the radio.

“I feel fine”, “Come See About Me”, and “Like a Rolling stone” by Bob Dylan began the musical journey.

Within fifteen minutes we turned down an overgrown lane making our way to Bradner Pond.

We bounced along two overgrown parallel tire tracks as the path became less and less discernible. Wild raspberry bushes, milk weed, young sassafras trees scraped under and along the woodie. All manner of bugs and mosquitoes clouded around the car as we picked our way down the overgrown path.  Suddenly around a curve was Bradner Pond.  To the right next to the edge of the pond was an overgrown pile of brush obscuring an old Model A Ford.  The rest of the day was spent clearing the overgrowing vegetation and decades of debris from the car.

We stepped back and leaned agains the woodie.  

“Gentlemen, behold ‘Dream Maker’!”

Mike punched me in the shoulder. “Looks looks more like “nightmare maker” to me.”

“Nightmare or dream maker,” I said, “it’s time to divide and conquer.”

“Mike, you find and remove the oil filter and drain the oil.”

“Eddie, you pull the spark plugs, wires and distributer then drain the radiator and open the petcock in the sediment bulb.”

“I’ll clean out the inside then pull the valve cover and oil pan and see how bad the mechanics look.  Whoever gets done first will start inspecting the transmission.

“Hey, Chris, this oil is the consistency of peanut butter.”

“Mike, Eddie,” hold everything!  “Guess what I found under the front seat?”

Eddie yelled, “a rat’s nest.”

Mike chimes, “a pair of panties.”

“Idiots, I found the original owner’s manual from Ford.  This will help us get this baby running.”

We gathered around to study the manual. We had our guide book, and we had our work cut out for us.  Fortunately all we had to do was get the engine running enough to turn the rear wheels. Each of of us tore out the section of the manual dealing with the job he had been assigned. At the end of each day we would compile a list of tools, parts and materials we would need for the next work session.  The journey began.  After school all week long  we worked on “DreamMaker”.

The weekend came, and the girls made their feelings known about our absence; and truthfully, we were missing their company too.

Also, our parents were raising concerns about us showing up only at meal time and the affect on our grades.  

A solution finally was worked out: Friday nights and Saturdays we focused on the girls. Sundays were reserved for families.

As summer approached,  it appeared “Dream Maker” would be ready to go by Memorial Day.

Chapter 5

Memorial Day

Standing there Mike, Eddie, and I were ready.   Dream Maker was ready.  The rope across  Radner Pond was ready. The surf board attached was ready.  “Tequila” was blaring.  The surf board was appropriately waxed.

“Well, whose the first surfer?” I asked.

“Your project, you should be the first to surf,” said Mike as he turned down the 8 track player.

“You agree, Eddie”

“Yup.”

“Ok, you guys fire up Dream Maker, and I will swim over to the surf board.  When I raise my arm, you throw the clutch and stand back.” 

I swam easily following the rope across the pond where the surfboard waited in the cattails. I heard Dream Maker cough and rumble to life. I mounted the board, placed my feet to lower my center of gravity. Mike and Eddie   revved the engine building rpms.  I raised my arm.  They engaged the clutch.  The board started moving slowly as the rope caught on the spinning wheel.  I am balanced on the board which is hurdling across the pond.  My friends are jumping up and down waving excitedly.  I’m surfing! I’m surfing!  And then I’m not as the board hits the shore propelling me into the air as it aims for Dream Maker.  Looking up from the muck I face planted in I see Mike and Eddie running from Dream Maker as my surfboard plows into it knocking it off the rocks holding the rear end off the ground.  Dream Maker shakes as the drive wheels dig into the ground propelling her towards me and the pond.  I roll to my right in the muck as she screams by me headed toward the pond.  She hits the water sending a tsunami across the pond and promptly bubbles her way to the bottom of the pond.

We trudged back to the car in silence never to speak of Dream Maker again.

Chapter 6

Of Boys and Girls

Shortly after the start of school, Mike and Eddie each got their own cars.  We no longer triple dated.  The six pack existed only at Len’s  where we still had our table.

Juanita and I became a couple.  Ruthie and Mike paired together.  Eddie and Alice became the third couple.  Throughout the school year the couples began to break up.  

By Thanksgiving Ruth and Mike and Eddie and Alice were no longer going steady.  By Christmas Juanita and I were seeing other people.  Dating others in our school was awkward and depressing. The question was always present with each new date. “Why did you break up?”  I really didn’t have an answer.  No one cheated. There were no big fights. No hurt feelings.  We just couldn’t or didn’t want to go beyond the really great, fun and close friendships.

Spring brought SATs, College Boards and college applications, senior proms and graduation.  

Summer brought summer jobs and prep for going away to college.

Chapter 7

College

Sex

 Love

Marriage

 Children

 Grand children

EPILOGUE 

 “Grandpa, What kind of old car did you say this was?  It says Ford on it.”

“ It’s called a Woodie, but Ford made them first.”

“Grandpa, where are we going?”

“I told grandma we were going fishing, Delaney.”

“But you put that old surfboard along with mine in the back of the ah Woodie along with the fishing gear.”

“You never heard of surf fishing”?  “ You know, you catch a wave and troll for fish on the way to shore.”

“Grandpa, I may be a girl, but I’m not stupid.”  “Did you forget that we used to go fishing by that old junker resting half in the water at Bradner pond?”

“No, I remember that spot well he grinned.  It has many memories for me, including having to bait the hook for a little red haired girl with dimples.”

“Why am I driving all the way to Sebastian Inlet?”

“Best fishing and surfing on Florida’s Atlantic Coast!”

The old man, feigning sleep, slouched on the bench seat and against the door.  At one time the woody was cherry red; now it was faded pink and bleaching white from the Florida sun.  The sun had taken its toll on the old man too.  It had bleached his shoulder length hair white and burned splotches of pigment out of his deeply tanned and wrinkled skin.  He had worn his old faded Duke Boyd color block “Hang Ten” surfer shorts with the two foot print logo.  The old Dewey Weber longboard he had repaired bounced along beside Delaneys short board in the back of the woody.  

As they drove along  he succumbed to the drum of the old woody on fresh pavement, and images filled his mind.  His wife of 60 years, his son, his four grand children, places they had lived, places they had visited (42 of the fifty states), the dive trips (Barbados, St. Croix, the Caymans, the Bahamas), the ice cold waters of White Star quarry), their dogs (Star – the Irish Setter, Fletcher, Alfie and Alfie2.0 – the standard poodles.  

“Grandpa, Grandpa, wake up.”

“What?”

“We’re here.”

“Where?” He asked trying to shake the sleep from his head.

“Sebastion Inlet. Don’t you remember?” 

“Of course, I remember.  Grab our boards from the back of the woodie.”

“What about the poles and fishing gear?”

“Fishing gear?  Oh, right, I forgot.  We’ll get that later.”

“Should I roll up the windows and lock the woodie.”

“Nah, nobody would want to steal it.”

“Where you want to go, gramps?”

“Over where the rest of the boards are standing upright in the sand.”

He stood, curled his toes in the hot sand.  The Atlantic air filled his nostrils with the smells of salt and sea.  This was definitely not Lake Erie, nor was it in any way Bradner Pond.  After all these years he was going finally to surf.  He felt the excitement building in his body. His heart rate increased. It pounded in his chest like a runaway locomotive.  His vision blurred as he felt his knees buckle.  In the far distance he could faintly hear Delaney.

“Grandpa!”

“Grandpa!”

“Grandpa?”

He felt her hands cradling his head in her lap and brushing the sand and his hair from his face.  He turned his head to the sound of the waves crashing on the shore and chuckled to himself at the irony.

“Someone help my Grandpa!”

A couple of surfers ran up the beach to her aid, but it was too late.  The crashing waves rolled up on the sandy beach and slid back into the ocean. 

Apocalypse

“DAMN IT!”

“DAMN THEM!”

“DAMN THE PROGRAMMERS!”

“DAMN THEM ALL TO HELL!”

Shatters the usually quiet serenity of the room-full of the best programmers in the universe.

A lowly programer turns to the control room and says quietly, “Mike, take a look at this”.

Mike, the A.A. and number two in command appears in the control room.  He has been assisting Him from almost the beginning so he has seen His wrath.

“Yes,” Mike answers. “What is it?”

“Sir, look at the monitor.”

“Yes, terrible.”

Ion the screen, beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming until multiple mushroom shaped clouds fill the screens.  Gone is the beautiful blue spheroid haloed with delicate white clouds. Then the screens go blank.

“I want new programmers.” Mike announces.

Old programmers disappear as new programmers appear.  In unison, “Sir!”

“The monitors, look at the monitors!” He shouts as he replays the beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming into multiple mushroom shaped clouds fading to a blank screen.

The programers In unison, “We see, sir, very pretty.”

“No, it is not supposed to end like that.”  I want the program fixed, debugged, whatever it takes.  If you don’t fix it, you will end up like, like the “pretty” infernal you just observed.  I assure you He won’t hesitate, and you won’t find it “very pretty”.

“This is directly from the Boss.  If you don’t get the

program to work this time, you will join all of your predecessors.  The failure of Project Genesis is not an option.  You are the best, your processors are the best, your operating systems are the best.  The goal is a program that runs continuously throughout eternity.  Begin!”

The clicking of keyboards immediately fills the room.  Once Mike, the A.C. leaves, the programmers begin talking in a whisper among themselves:

“Such a fuss over an explosion.”

“It’s that it is self-destruction.”

“It’s the suffering of the people.”

“No, No, you’re all wrong.  Look!”  

The programer hits a function key, and line upon line of

code scrolls on their screen until the word ‘END’ appears.

“Well, anyone see anything?”

Dead silence.  The programmers look from one to another.  Finally, a programmer raises his hand.

“For Christ’s sake,” Mike roars, “Just speak!  “We don’t have time to stand on formalities.”

In a whisper the young programer responds.  “It’s not the program.”

An audible gasp fills the room.  “It has to be the program,” they respond in unison.

The young programer timidly responds. “No, it’s the prime directive.  Given that directive, the program will always run the same and have the same results.”

Mike responds. “I’d be careful what you say.  Remember your predecessors.  Do you want to join them?  You could.  Just like that!” He tries and fails to snap his fingers.

Again the young programer, “If we don’t change the prime directive, the program will 

run with the same consequences; and we will be gone anyway.”

The others nod in agreement.

Mike orders, “Bring up the prime directive, and we’ll take a look at it.”

Immediately the prime directive appears on all their screens. 

Genesis 1:26 …Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness….”

“Who’s going to tell Him, Mike?’

The programmer’s heads hang in despair as silence guillotines their hopes.

Apocalypse

“DAMN IT!”

“DAMN THEM!”

“DAMN THE PROGRAMMERS!”

“DAMN THEM ALL TO HELL!”

Shatters the usually quiet serenity of the room-full of the best programmers in the universe.

A lowly programer turns to the control room and says quietly, “Mike, take a look at this”.

Mike, the A.A. and number two in command appears in the control room.  He has been assisting Him from almost the beginning so he has seen His wrath.

“Yes,” Mike answers. “What is it?”

“Sir, look at the monitor.”

“Yes, terrible.”

Ion the screen, beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming until multiple mushroom shaped clouds fill the screens.  Gone is the beautiful blue spheroid haloed with delicate white clouds. Then the screens go blank.

“I want new programmers.” Mike announces.

Old programmers disappear as new programmers appear.  In unison, “Sir!”

“The monitors, look at the monitors!” He shouts as he replays the beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming into multiple mushroom shaped clouds fading to a blank screen.

The programers In unison, “We see, sir, very pretty.”

“No, it is not supposed to end like that.”  I want the program fixed, debugged, whatever it takes.  If you don’t fix it, you will end up like, like the “pretty” infernal you just observed.  I assure you He won’t hesitate, and you won’t find it “very pretty”.

“This is directly from the Boss.  If you don’t get the

program to work this time, you will join all of your predecessors.  The failure of Project Genesis is not an option.  You are the best, your processors are the best, your operating systems are the best.  The goal is a program that runs continuously throughout eternity.  Begin!”

The clicking of keyboards immediately fills the room.  Once Mike, the A.C. leaves, the programmers begin talking in a whisper among themselves:

“Such a fuss over an explosion.”

“It’s that it is self-destruction.”

“It’s the suffering of the people.”

“No, No, you’re all wrong.  Look!”  

The programer hits a function key, and line upon line of

code scrolls on their screen until the word ‘END’ appears.

“Well, anyone see anything?”

Dead silence.  The programmers look from one to another.  Finally, a programmer raises his hand.

“For Christ’s sake,” Mike roars, “Just speak!  “We don’t have time to stand on formalities.”

In a whisper the young programer responds.  “It’s not the program.”

An audible gasp fills the room.  “It has to be the program,” they respond in unison.

The young programer timidly responds. “No, it’s the prime directive.  Given that directive, the program will always run the same and have the same results.”

Mike responds. “I’d be careful what you say.  Remember your predecessors.  Do you want to join them?  You could.  Just like that!” He tries and fails to snap his fingers.

Again the young programer, “If we don’t change the prime directive, the program will 

run with the same consequences; and we will be gone anyway.”

The others nod in agreement.

Mike orders, “Bring up the prime directive, and we’ll take a look at it.”

Immediately the prime directive appears on all their screens. 

Genesis 1:26 …Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness….”

“Who’s going to tell Him, Mike?’

The programmer’s heads hang in despair as silence guillotines their hopes.

APOCALYPSE

“DAMN IT!”

“DAMN THEM!”

“DAMN THE PROGRAMMERS!”

“DAMN THEM ALL TO HELL!”

Shatters the usually quiet serenity of the room-full of the best programmers in the universe.

A lowly programer turns to the control room and says quietly, “Mike, take a look at this”.

Mike, the A.A. and number two in command appears in the control room.  He has been assisting Him from almost the beginning so he has seen His wrath.

“Yes,” Mike answers. “What is it?”

“Sir, look at the monitor.”

“Yes, terrible.”

Ion the screen, beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming until multiple mushroom shaped clouds fill the screens.  Gone is the beautiful blue spheroid haloed with delicate white clouds. Then the screens go blank.

“I want new programmers.” Mike announces.

Old programmers disappear as new programmers appear.  In unison, “Sir!”

“The monitors, look at the monitors!” He shouts as he replays the beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming into multiple mushroom shaped clouds fading to a blank screen.

The programers In unison, “We see, sir, very pretty.”

“No, it is not supposed to end like that.”  I want the program fixed, debugged, whatever it takes.  If you don’t fix it, you will end up like, like the “pretty” infernal you just observed.  I assure you He won’t hesitate, and you won’t find it “very pretty”.

“This is directly from the Boss.  If you don’t get the

program to work this time, you will join all of your predecessors.  The failure of Project Genesis is not an option.  You are the best, your processors are the best, your operating systems are the best.  The goal is a program that runs continuously throughout eternity.  Begin!”

The clicking of keyboards immediately fills the room.  Once Mike, the A.C. leaves, the programmers begin talking in a whisper among themselves:

“Such a fuss over an explosion.”

“It’s that it is self-destruction.”

“It’s the suffering of the people.”

“No, No, you’re all wrong.  Look!”  

The programer hits a function key, and line upon line of

code scrolls on their screen until the word ‘END’ appears.

“Well, anyone see anything?”

Dead silence.  The programmers look from one to another.  Finally, a programmer raises his hand.

“For Christ’s sake,” Mike roars, “Just speak!  “We don’t have time to stand on formalities.”

In a whisper the young programer responds.  “It’s not the program.”

An audible gasp fills the room.  “It has to be the program,” they respond in unison.

The young programer timidly responds. “No, it’s the prime directive.  Given that directive, the program will always run the same and have the same results.”

Mike responds. “I’d be careful what you say.  Remember your predecessors.  Do you want to join them?  You could.  Just like that!” He tries and fails to snap his fingers.

Again the young programer, “If we don’t change the prime directive, the program will 

run with the same consequences; and we will be gone anyway.”

The others nod in agreement.

Mike orders, “Bring up the prime directive, and we’ll take a look at it.”

Immediately the prime directive appears on all their screens. 

Genesis 1:26 …Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness….”

“Who’s going to tell Him, Mike?’

The programmer’s heads hang in despair as silence guillotines their hopes.

APOCALYPSE

“DAMN IT!”

“DAMN THEM!”

“DAMN THE PROGRAMMERS!”

“DAMN THEM ALL TO HELL!”

Mikes voice shatters the usually quiet serenity of the room-full of the best programmers in the universe.

A lowly programer turns to the control room and says quietly, “Mike, take a look at this”.

Mike, the A.A. and number two in command appears in the control room. He has been assisting Him from almost the beginning. Mike has seen His wrath.

“Yes,” Mike answers. “What is it?”

“Sir, look at the monitor.”

“Yes, terrible.”

Beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming until multiple mushroom shaped clouds fill the screens. Gone is the beautiful blue spheroid

haloed with delicate white clouds.

Then the screens go blank.

“I want new programmers.” Mike announces.

Old programmers disappear as new programmers appear.

In unison, “Sir!”

“The monitors, look at the monitors!” He shouts as he replays the beautifully brilliant reds, oranges and yellows swirling, moving, melting and reforming into multiple mushroom shaped clouds fading to a blank screen.

The programers In unison, “We see, Sir, very pretty.”

“No, it is not supposed to end like that.” I want the program fixed, debugged, whatever it takes. If you don’t fix it, you will end up like, in the “pretty” infernal you just observed. I assure you He won’t hesitate, and you won’t find it “very pretty”.

Mike from the control room, “This is directly from the Boss. If you don’t get the program to work this time, you will join all of your predecessors. The failure of PROJECT GENESIS is not an option. You are the best, your processors are the best, your operating systems are the best. The goal is a program that runs continuously through eternity. Begin!”

The clicking of their keyboards immediately fills the room.

Once Mike, the A.C. leaves, the programmers begin talking in a whisper among themselves:

“Such a fuss over an explosion.”

“It’s that it is self-destruction.”

“It’s the suffering of the people.”

“No, No, you’re all wrong. Look!” A programer hits a function key, and line upon line of code scrolls on their screen until the word ‘END’ appears.

“Well, anyone see anything?”

Dead silence. The programmers look from one to another. Finally, a programmer raises his hand.

“For Christ’s sake,” Mike roars. “Just speak! “We don’t have time to stand on formalities.”

In a whisper the young programer responds. “It’s not the program.”

An audible gasp fills the room. “It has to be the program,” they respond in unison.

The young programer timidly responds. “No, it’s the prime directive. Given that directive, the program will always run the same and have the same results.”

Mike responds. “I’d be careful what you say. Remember your predecessors. Do you want to join them? You could. Just like that!” He tries and fails to snap his fingers.

Again the young programer, “If we don’t change the prime directive, the program will run with the same consequences; and we will all be gone anyway.”

The others nod in agreement.

Mike orders, “Bring up the notes on the prime directive, and we’ll take a look at it.”

Immediately the prime directive appears on all their screens.

Genesis 1:1:26 …Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness….”

“Who’s going to tell Him, Mike?’

The programmer’s heads hang in despair as silence guillotines their hopes.