Pages From The Memory Vault Book III Part IX

Hello, everyone. It just occurred to me that it's been about ten days since my last post, so I suppose I ought to toss out a few more juicy chunks of meaty memory.

I'm going to back up a bit to the actual first summer we lived in Paw Paw. Well, it's not that far of a back up since I really haven't gone much further than that... but you get the idea. I wanted to reverse a bit because I forgot to mention that this would be the first summer where I had an actual job. You see, my uncle decided to start doing a Drama Camp in Portage and the once-existing Waylee Elementary School. I say once because it has long since been un-built in favor of expanding the Central High School grounds that more or less surrounded it. Anyway, my first job was as a counselor at this particular camp. And it was pretty decent money, too. If I remember right, we got paid after the first week, and then again at the conclusion of the three-week session.

So what did I do? Well, the first play we put on was 'Oklahoma!' That's right, the classic play about... the state. Yeah, just that exciting. And I still remember nearly every song, though I've seen the movie and play since then (I wasn't much of a Broadway guy at the time). That first year would go on to spawn such classic standards as 'Grease', 'The Fiddler on the Roof', 'Carousel', and 'The Music Man', among countless others. And yes, each and every one starred children, because that's what the camp was all about: teaching kids who could sort of act and sing to sort of act and sing slightly better, plus the added benefit of crafts! Oh what fun.

I kid. They were great times and great memories. Even though I was older than the kids, I actually made a few great friends, some of which I still maintain contact with. A few of my cousins were in it a time or two, as well, so that was pretty fun, too. I learned how to make miniature set decorations, how to apply gobs of make up effectively so the crowd could really see the emotive faces, and how to break the news that certain lead rolls were not going to those kids whose voices could crack safety glass. Three cheers for responsibility!

Well that was my first job; a job I'd go on to repeat for five years, each and every summer until I'd eventually move on to bigger and better things. Let's see, my second 'real' job was washing dishes for a local restaurant in Paw Paw called 'Warner's', which turned out to be an exercise in futility since I worked with Kevin. I'm pretty sure we broke far more than we washed. After that I graduated to 'Burger King', also with Kevin though he moved on after a bit and I hung around for maybe eight months. Then I got a job at a local factory in Mattawan (just outside of Paw Paw) called EPC and got to sit at plastic-press machines and watched parts fall into boxes. Whoopee. And that was about it until I went away for College. But, as always, I'm getting ahead of myself...

Next up: High School Life or Four Years of Possibly Growing Up.

Pages From The Memory Vault Book III Part VIII

How's about another weird tale? I told you way back when I regaled you with my first 'supernatural' experience that I had a few more under my belt. Well, here's the next one. And this one, as always, is 100% true.

Kevin Ray (I introduced him in the previous chapter) and I had been friends for a year or so at this point (yeah, I'm skipping ahead a bit, but I really wanted to write this story) and we decided to head to South Haven, a nice little lake-shore city that lies roughly thirty minutes west of Paw Paw. It was early summer, likely right about when school got out, so it was still a bit cool during the evenings, and our plan was to hang out all day and just crash for the night in the car. Why pay for a camp ground, right? So we stocked up on a ton of pop (primarily Pepsi) and cigarettes (yeah, I smoked at the time- well I had just started so actually I failed at smoking more than I actually smoke... but you get the idea) and we headed to the shore.

It was a pretty dull day in terms of potential beach babes. It might have been just because it was so cool out and not quite the bikini weather we'd hoped for, but we prowled nonetheless. Soon we got bored and began inventing our own fun, which included chucking full pop cans into the air and trying to make them burst by smacking them into one another. For a destructive game that did little but deplete our soda supply, it was pretty fun. Soon, the sun began to set and we could see off to the west that a pretty decent storm was approaching. I had always wanted to watch a storm come in, and this looked to be a good one: dark wall cloud, lightning flashing, the distant rumble of angry thunder. We headed out to the pier and prepared to watch the maelstrom roll in.

The storm was coming in far more quickly than we'd anticipated. As we hit about the half-way point of the pier, we could physically feel the wind really picking up: whitecaps began to foam and water started to spray a bit over the stone breakwater. Besides us, there was one other guy on the pier that night, and as we walked by him he was reeling in his fishing line a rapidly packing up his gear. We said hi and he informed us -rather obviously- that the storm was going to be big and we'd be smart to head back to the beach. We thanked him and told him that we were only going a bit further and we'd turn around. The storm hadn't quite gotten there yet, but it was knocking on the door for sure.

With little warning (other than the storm, of course) the wind suddenly doubled into whipping, lashing gusts and it became apparent right then that we might have gotten a bit to far out onto the pier for our own safety. We said nothing, but turned toward the beach with our intentions perfectly clear: get off the pier. And as we looked back toward the welcoming solid ground we both saw the exact same thing. What could only be described as an Angelic figure stood right where the sand met the outcropped pier. Her translucence haloed yellowish white and her 'robes' billowed in the wind, only more like the breeze was gusting in slow motion. She was stunning and welcoming and most of all, beckoning. Her arms moved back and forth in a 'come forth' gesture and a feeling of warmth and safety washed over us. We looked at each other wordlessly (Kevin and I, I mean), and sprinted toward the figure. About half way back, we both stopped and turned at the same time to witness a huge wave wash over the very spot on which we were just standing. That spurned our fear even more, and we continued our run back to the beach doing our best to fight against the howling wind.

We hit the sand breathlessly, and both turned in unison once again toward the north end of the beach. And there was the female figure yet again, maybe thirty yards away. Her stance was unchanged and her beckoning arms called us forth for a second time. Without words, we looked at each other just as before, and took off in the direction of the glowing lady. As we huffed and puffed, catching our breath, to the spot where we were sure the woman stood, we were at a loss. She was gone. We looked around and both found ourselves staring back at the edge of the beach where it connected to the pier and watched as another gout of water erupted over where we had been merely moments before. At that point we could do nothing but head back to the car in wide-eyed wonder as we were absolutely pelted with wind and rain.

We sat there, Kevin and I, in the car, drying ourselves off and just wordlessly nodding our heads. It took an hour or so before we could even talk about what we'd seen, and neither of us could be absolutely positive how or why we'd seen it at all. We certainly chalked it up to Heavenly intervention, and that's how I've always looked at it. It just wasn't our time.

And that, friends, is the truth.

Pages From The Memory Vault Book III Part VII

This is the story of how I met my two best friends from High School. One of which I still regularly chat with on FaceBook, and the other who's wife I talk to on occasion because he might have fallen into a gorge or something... I don't know.

I'll start with Rolland Weekley, otherwise known as Rusty. Which is how I met him. If I remember correctly (and he might end up helping me fix this error), we met in an Algebra class. I think. Regardless of where it was, I do remember the circumstances. He sat on one end of the class and me on the other, and I had no idea who he was previous to our meeting, so it's not like we were glad we shared a class or anything; it was just a happy circumstance. A few of the class members began talking about movies; recently seen, new on video, ones we wanted to catch, and the like, and 'Total Recall' was brought up. Now, keep in mind this is the original starring Arnold, not the newer version that apparently sucks. How people can mess up a Philip K. Dick story so badly is beyond me. But I digress. Rusty mentioned that he wanted to go see it and it seemed that everyone else (people I assumed he already knew) were either busy or just didn't want to. So I said I'd go. And so it was. Literally. Just that simply we became friends. Isn't it sweet? We went to the movie, maybe held hands, shared a bucket of popcorn with a hole in it... okay, probably neither of those things happened, but we did in fact see the movie. What happened was we began seeing movies a lot. In fact, for a while, that seemed to be the lynch pin that held us in such good friendship. Soon, of course, we found we had more and more in common and just began hanging out and doing stuff friends do. It was nice because even at that point I didn't really hang out with anyone in my grade. Rusty was a grade ahead of me, which made no difference especially in High School. It was just nice to have someone to hang out with. And, in all actuality, we've been friends ever since. There is a ton more to our stories, but I'll save those incidences for other times.

As for Kevin Ray, he was a little different, as were our meeting circumstances. There was something about Kevin that appealed greatly to my awkward and goofy side. That side was always there, it was just never brought to the surface like Kevin could make it. When we were together all seriousness flew out the window, especially in school. As I said in the previous entry, I think we met in a Biology class, but it's possible it was an Art class... these things just get buried under far less important things, ya know so I can never be too sure. Either way, we met and it really was (in the most masculine sense of the word) love at first site. We were an unstoppable force of ridiculousness that when combined became its own living entity. It was different with us than it was with Rusty and I, because with Rusty and I things were just standard. Sure, we had our share of silly times and funny things here and there, and they were great, but with Kevin they just escalated into mass hysteria. Eventually they rubbed off onto people around us, including Rusty, but again: tales for another time. Kevin and I would get into copious amounts of trouble in school. Nothing too serious, mostly do to just plain stupidity and hijinx. I would break into a hallway display case across from the art room and Kevin would climb in and pose as I admired the 'Art Work' just as the teacher would arrive freaking her out to no end. We would purposely mess up experiments in Chemistry class just to see what kind of room-clearing mess we could make. We'd draw crude pictures, make rude noises in the library, and just be annoying. But we did it together and it was fun. Like I said: never anything too serious and we were never expelled. Maybe given detention once or twice, but so what. And that was who Kevin was. We were inseparable through High School, and far beyond it. I have to say: I sometimes long for those days with Kevin and Rusty. I really do.

Other than those guys, I had many other friends eventually. Most of whom I talk to regularly on FB (you all know who you are) and life in Paw Paw became a fair bit more comfortable. Ah, but it was just getting started. Stay tuned, there's much more to come...

Pages From The Memory Vault Book III Part VI

So, we moved to Paw Paw.

The real funny part was we had only just moved our stuff in and set up our rooms right before my mom and Bill's wedding, so our actual first week and weekend in our new, exceptionally creepy house was with a 'baby sitter' we'd only just met. In fact, I can't even remember her name, but apparently we met her (and by 'met' I mean 'saw and understood existed') at the wedding reception. So, yeah: weird lady, weird house, weird week. I don't remember much else since we didn't know anyone in Paw Paw and therefor didn't have any friends over. It was rough, but that's about all I can recall.

Fast forward a bit to a week or so later. We were settled in to our new house, though I know that the three of us kids weren't especially happy about it. And then came the big blow. Even though I was 15, I was deemed not ready to stay at home and watch my brother and sister while my mom and Bill worked. So, instead of just letting me stay at home, all three of us were forced to stay at a Day Care. Oh man was that about the most emasculating and horrific thing ever at the time. It was literally like a day camp for little kids who were all younger than even my brother, who was 13 at the time. The two of us would sit there and grouse for hours on end, dreading the day and hating the fact that we were made to stay there like some kind of trapped, elderly dogs in a kennel full of puppies. We rarely participated in anything they offered, which included things like crafts and eating with a spoon. And a few weeks went buy like this until we finally won the war and my mom let the two of us stay home. My sister liked it, as she was only 9, and content to hang out with kids her age and have fun. Eventually we became far happier during that summer and were even allowed to have friends from Kalamazoo over to hang out with.

And then High School started.

I'm sure many of you have had to switch schools before somewhere in your childhood (heck, my wife and I have had to do it with our own kids once), so you know what it's like. New town, kids you've never met, a weird building you've only seen driving past, teachers who haven't heard of you from your life at the previous school... just an agonizing event all in all. Oddly, there were two people at the school in my grade who I did know from Portage who had moved a year or so before, so they helped a bit in meeting people, but it was definitely a trying time doing all I could to find a friend I could latch on to. And looking the way I did (an afro-headed goof with poor taste in clothing) mad it all the more difficult. But, there were a few kids who did find me interesting. One of which I met in a math class, and the other in a biology class.

Stick around, because next time you'll meet my two best friends from High School: Kevin Ray and Rusty Weekley.