THE WORLD THAT THEN WAS

We decided to take my Four Wheeler instead of her Pontiac.  I asked her to not take any recorders for my stories as that was what ruined it before.  "Blythe, this is not for sale to Hollywood.....why would they or anyone be interested in my story when they have their own?"   "You sound bitter" she said.  "I am realistic"  I said."...We filled the truck up and went South on 99 to Barstow where we picked up I 44.  "This is the route old 66 we took....my Parents and I drove from Glendale to Tulsa almost every Summer from 45 to about 1957.  I made several trips of my own back to see Grandma B and Aunt Mimi....one time in '58 I went on my motorcycle.  ..My   Dad was transferred to L.A. in 44 and that is how I got to California.  I was a little boy by degrees when we took those trips in the Summer....every thing was magic..and even then, I was developing the ability to sense things not seen, but felt.  There was a mysterious foreboding that came from the land from about Flagstaff on East to the New Mexico border.  I think part of it was the little white crosses that were put besides the road to mark fatalities from accidents...sometimes there would be five crosses all together...a family..on vacation...I remember wondering if they had a good breakfast in order to get the day off to a wonderful start....maybe they thought..."What a wonderful trip this is" before they were crowned with death."  "Oh Bob,  that is sick..please don't think that way"   'I'm sorry, sometimes I get angry at something out there...I get cynical....I know one thing, I am angry because God allowed me to dream you died...I have never felt such sorrow in waking life...That dream has put a cloud over my day..today..I hope it goes away."  She said that maybe she help it go away tonight!  I was pushing the speed limit once we got on I 44.  I had my radar detector on.  I like the transition from desert to mountainous beginng around Ashfork.  Blythe did not know that I packed the tent we stayed in when I met her at our first encounter.  In fact, I brought utensils, the works, even the ice chest filled with T-Bone steaks, charcoal, ....wine.  My travel van was a four wheel drive and a high suspension so we could go off road. Huge ass kicking tires..Four Hundred Horses under the hood..... Yes, I brought a camaflauge tarp to throw over the red truck.  I haven't bounced this off of her yet, but I wanted to pull off the road a ways after we were East of Flagstaff.  I asked her if she was horny and she said she never wanted to do it again and then pinched me.  What I really had in mind was getting as close as I could remember to the spot where I, as a fourteen year old traveled with my Dad's friends who were going East.  They were going to drop me off in Tulsa.  That was in 1953 and this was 1984.  Anywhere close would do.  It was getting dusk and the summer clouds were dying along with the thermals.  I saw a sandy wash between two upraised hill like lines going off at right angle to the road.  I pulled over and stopped...I looked for scout planes and there were none..break in the traffic...go for it.  I put it in low low gear and four wheel drive and we plowed into the wash and chewed our way to about a quarter of a mile off the road.  I loved the sound of the throaty four barrel carbs and the geysers of sand flying up behind.    The wash turned left and we passed an over hang of rock and there was a dished out opening that the flash floods had dug out over the centuries.  It was actually an open cave and on a turn where the wash water ploughed into the rock and eroded it out. It  was high enough that I drove the four wheeler into it and it was completely hidden.  Blythe said the ride through the sand was fun but why were we stopping here.  I ASKED her if we could stay here tonight as I had brought every thing we used on our first date camp.  She answered not a word, but got out and walked around inside the cave and kicked her shoes off and walked around in the soft sand.  She came back and said it was lovely....better than our first camp...and called me a Romeo in the Rough.  "Look, driftwood and all...soft sand,,,sheltered...how absolutely amazing...".We quickly gathered drift wood and started a fire.  It was almost dark and the light cast shadows from the wall's out croppings..one looked like an Indian poking his head out of the rock.  I had brought folding chairs which also beat our log we used before...."Absolutely Amazing...." (defintely to be continued...I was still alive and so was my life source)