DANNY & ME

David W. Corbin

I got a letter today from an old friend I’ll call Danny. During junior high and high school, Danny and I did pretty much everything together. I haven’t seen Danny for a number of years. I think the last time was in 1991 when he came to my father’s funeral. We exchange Christmas cards but haven’t communicated much other than that, so today’s letter was unexpected. One time, he wrote to say that he and his wife Lyn were planning a trip up our way, but when the time came, he didn’t stop by. Danny still lives in San Diego. Anyway, now Danny says he has cancer. Danny and I sure had a lot of good times together.

Memory #1—Danny’s Pop

Danny and I inherited a longstanding and enjoyable argument from our parents. Danny’s pop always bought GM cars; my family always bought Fords. For a while, my dad drove a Henry-J, but that experience only solidified our Ford stance. Danny’s dad didn’t simply buy GM cars; he paid cash. When I was 15, Danny’s pop had saved enough to buy a new Cadillac. When the day came, he walked into the showroom, plunked down a big wad, and drove one home.

During the long years while he saved up, Danny’s family drove an old green Chevy. Once the Cadillac arrived, Danny and I claimed the Chevy. (His mom used it too but only to go to the grocery store and things like that.) Under our care, that Chevy sparkled. We added dual exhausts and heavy-duty rear shocks that raised the back bumper way up. The problem, of course, was that we couldn’t drive.

Although we were both signed up for the school’s driver ed. class in the fall, this was only spring. It was about that time that Danny and I discovered learning to drive doesn’t really require a class. It was actually quite simple. In fact, we took turns driving all over.

This worked well until one afternoon when we passed a police car going the other direction. The police car turned around, which prompted us to make a quick right turn onto the next quiet street. We ripped down half a block and pulled into an open garage door. Then we sank down in the front seat and waited. After a bit, we began to worry about when the people who normally parked there might get home. Finally we backed out, drove cautiously back to Danny’s house, and put the car away for a while.

Memory #2—The Beach

Getting to the beach was a daily occurrence for Danny and me. Neither of us had surfboards, but we got pretty good at body surfing. A great thing about body surfing is that it doesn’t require planning. You don’t have to have a board or wetsuit to surf. If you happen on a beach with a good body surfing break, you can just hop right in. It’s nice to have a towel, but it’s certainly not necessary.

Again, there were family differences when it came to beach use. My family went to the beach occasionally, always lugging a lot of equipment. For many years, we had elaborate beach picnics every Fourth of July and Labor Day. These large family picnics were organized by my mother.

To begin, someone got to the beach by 7:00 a.m. to secure a fire ring and start coals, often in early morning fog. By 8:00 a.m. we were all feasting on melon, steak, eggs, fried potatoes, and donuts. (Donuts were important because one of my sisters worked at a donut shop.) As a rule, everyone was quite full, tired, and sunburned by noon so we’d pack up and leave as the crowds started to arrive.

Danny’s family treated the beach differently. Between June and October, Danny’s parents cooked at the beach almost every Friday night, and I often got to come too. After dinner, everyone gathered around the fire to poke at it and talk.

While poking a fire is always fun, my most vivid memory of these occasions is of Danny’s mom. Danny’s mom was a vivacious and friendly hostess. She always wore a bright flowered one-piece bathing suit that displayed a very nicely shaped body. She was also quite short. At some point, I noticed that her bathing suit was actually bigger than she was, at least the top of it. Standing beside her, I could spy beauty in the cavernous bulge that was the top of her suit. This was even better than donuts.

Memory #3—"Veni, Vedi, Veci"

All during school, Danny and I took a lot of the same classes. Since my parents were teachers and knew which teachers could actually teach, my mom and dad generally set the schedule for both Danny and me. My mom thought that it was important to get a good grounding in language and so signed us up for Latin in the ninth grade.

Neither Danny nor I did very well at Latin that year, partly I think because on this occasion my mom selected the class based on the subject rather than the teacher. When we got to high school and second-year Latin, things came to a head.

This time, the class was taught by a wiry little chalk-covered guy with sparse grey hair who actually knew Latin. Danny dropped out after a few weeks, but I stuck it out and ended the semester without getting an F. What was good about this class was that it was taught in a third-floor classroom. From this classroom, it was possible to tell whether or not the surf was up.

One October day, I noticed what appeared to be great surf. Danny and I hurriedly discussed options and made a surreptitious exit to the beach. We hadn’t been in the water long when we noticed blue lights flashing around Danny’s Chevy. We trudged back to the car to discover a couple men in blue trying to see what was inside. Of course, they also wanted to see IDs. Further, they wanted to look in our lunch bags sitting on the front seat.

It turned out that a corner grocery in the area had just been robbed by two guys in an old green Chevy. The robbers had left the scene with the cash in a couple brown paper bags. Once the officers had viewed our tuna sandwiches, they told us to get back to school and left. Actually, the surf wasn’t very good any more, so that’s what we did.

Memory #4—
Camping at San Clemente

One June day, Danny and I and a kid named Jimmy Defalco decided to go camping. My dad let us borrow his car. This time, we’d be driving a fiesta-red Ford with the big Thunderbird V-8 engine with overdrive and dual exhausts. We grabbed sleeping bags and took off, planning to buy food when we got where we were going.

We headed up Highway 101 looking for the perfect beach. Since this car had so much more power than Danny’s old Chevy, I decided to see how fast our Ford would go. I got it to 105 before it blew a head gasket. I was pretty worried, but a brief perusal assured us the car was running fine. It just made a lot of noise.

We proceeded on up to San Clemente. When we got there, the sun was bright, there was a good breeze off the ocean, and the surf was up. About 4:00 p.m., the fog came in, so we bought potato chips and hot dogs and brought them back to the beach. This was not a beach at which people normally camped, but we hollowed out an area protected from the wind and assumed no one would mind. The Santa Fe line went right behind us, which was also great. We found some probably unwanted wood next to the tracks and broke it up for a fire to cook our hot dogs.

We had already cooked them before the first contingent of cops arrived to tell us to put out the fire. We were full and warm, so it didn’t matter. Before the evening was over, we had been visited by six kinds of cops, including the Highway Patrol, Santa Fe RR security, and two kinds of military police. (Camp Pendleton is close, so both Navy Shore Patrol as well as some Marine MPs wanted to know what we were doing.)

The last group of cops was apparently from the State Park security. They were very nice and glad to hear that we were enjoying ourselves, but, they informed us, it was illegal for anyone to stay on the beach after midnight, so we might be thinking of moving along soon.

We filled in the hole, burying the remnants of our fire, and drove off. There is a state park in San Clemente at which you can camp, but the gate was closed when we got there, so we just slept in the car and drove home in the morning. It was a great trip.

Memory #5—Slideshow

At some point, Danny discovered that his dad had a secret collection of peepshow keychain holders. Each plastic viewer had a shot of a different woman in a revealing costume. We determined that these photos needed a wider audience. We also discovered that the plastic holders could be taken apart so that the slides inside could be placed in regular slide frames.

Danny’s house was on a steep hill, the road in front running down to a stop sign. Down the hill was a two-story house, one wall of which had no windows. This made it an ideal screen on which to project our slides. Once we had focused a shot, we’d turn off the projector light until a car was coming. Then we’d flash oneof these amazing slides on the side of the house to entertain the passing motorist.

When we had finished each show, we put the plastic key chain holders back together and replaced them carefully under Danny’s dad’s socks. I’m sure he never realized what a wide audience his treasures had.

It’s been a while now since I got Danny’s letter about his cancer. I’m recovering from cancer surgery myself and just returned from my three-month follow-up. As the surgeon was filling out my chart at the end of the visit, he smiled and said that for all the previous visits he had entered "Cancer" in the treatment summary. This time the treatment summary read, "History of cancer."

The activities of our lives regularly change, whether we notice or not. The red line down my belly is a regular reminder that I’m missing more than a prostate. Some experiences I won’t ever have again. I think I missed the demarcations of change while growing up with Danny. Surfing and camping proceeded into other more interesting things, so I didn’t pay much attention to the things I left behind. I could still go surfing or camping if so inclined. It seems a good time to say hello to Danny again too.

—David W. Corbin and his wife live on an island off the Washington coast. There they raise sheep, work at the post office, run a preschool, and sell homemade jams.