27 JULY 2013

We all wonder what it will be like when the Father calls us to the other side or, perhaps in my case, drops me over the other side.  You hear stories of white lights and angels with soothing music playing.  Or perhaps soothing nothingness with regard to sound.  I have no idea and really not anxious to find out.  Maybe it will include all those scenes in our minds which we play out in the dark of night when nobody is around to question our sanity or a gentleness within some public macho shell.  A gentleness we all to often don't allow to be seen by the rest of the world.  Or our own loved ones for that matter.

For a kid that grew up with Bay sand and river mud between his toes, a dip net was required equipment along with the sheath knife on his belt.  In the fifties money was not particularly short unless you were a kid with parents who, had the money and thought that fifty cents a week was ample allowance for a 15 year old.  If you wanted more, well there were chores to do at home and in neighbor's yards.  I think I pulled enough weeds in flower gardens to clear another section of I-95.  So, if my friends and I (not local thugs but hustlers) wanted spending money the water was the fastest and most pleasant way to achieve such wealth.

We would hop in my 14 foot wooden runabout with the 15 horse outboard and off we would go exploring or exploiting the bay depending upon your attitude towards young boys in the first place.

East Neck Island, yeah you can google it, has a large flat or shallow section where the bay grasses grew.  The blue crabs loved those grassy sections and all a kid needed to do was walk around in knee deep water and dip them up when they tried to swim away from our approaching net.  We had a bushel basket in an old inner tube on a rope and that was our floating storage unit.

We could get five bucks a bushel (sure it was a rip off) from the fish house for each bushel we caught.  Mostly one!  At that time Maryland allowed retail establishments to have pin ball machines to entertain their customers.  Nickel machines that, when played correctly, ran up additional games when you won.  In addition said retail establishments were allowed to pay a nickel for any games won.  Well, within a week of a new machine showing up in say a restaurant (Hubbards for those in the know) we would have it all figured out and three to four hundred games would provide us with spending money for the week.  It took my parents three or four years to figure out where all the extra spending money was coming from.

Since the good Lord will probably not have a pinball machine waiting for me inside those Pearlie's, I kinda hope my vision when I get there will be a little like the photo attached herein.