Summer of ‘80
The summer of 1980 was the first of 6 that we would spend in the enchanted land we called “home”. One thing you learn as the child of a military person is that they are really into playing mind games. What I mean is – when you do something bad, the way to make up is to do something good. Kind of a tit for tat mentality. Well, early in the summer of 1980 we were planning this trip to the “states” just me, my brother, and my sister. The parents were seeing visions of a couple weeks of “alone time”.
We went to Koza early in the summer and, this time was a little different. The girls, remember they were quite a lot older than we were, helped us to celebrate the ending of the school year and the beginning of the wonderful Okinawan summer. This night was the first, not the last, that I would drink a little too much. I drank so much that night my brother and the two of them had to push me up on the bus for the long ride home on the proverbial “last bus”. When we got to the bus stop where we get off, as the story went, my brother rolled me off the bus and somehow got me seated on the bench. He couldn’t carry me the two or so miles down the hill to the house so he was faced with calling the old man.
The old man had to get dressed and come pick us, or more accurately, to pick me up. I was in no condition to walk down that hill. I got grounded pretty quick and long for that episode. So, the games begin (I gotta make up the military way to decrease the terms of the grounding). First, I announce that I would quit smoking and would start training to run the Kinser 10K coming up in July. Now, the old man had always wanted athletic son, so he immediately agreed to my new endeavors. I started running 10 to 15 K every day. It was kinda, sorta like I wasn’t grounded. Running got me out of the house. Really couldn’t and wouldn’t do anything to get in trouble for, but it did provide at least a little solace.
I placed third the day of the run in my age group 16 to 18. I ran against quite a few Marines and still placed third. Dad was beyond proud. Took lots of pictures that day and actually lifted the grounding on the condition ……. (Oh, yeah!).
We, a couple weeks later, boarded a plane for our trip to the States. Layover in Hawaii – what a hoot! On to Dallas/Fort Worth, Drive to Oklahoma with a couple geezers to see some more geezers. Drive to Lousiana to stay with the first geezers for a week, then Back to DFW, board a plane don’t remember the trip back at all except for my baby sister losing her stuffed elephant (elefie). That was a very sad day.
The trip was a trip!