Surfing Dude

by Ed Nelson

  In Ohio I could drink 3.2 beer at eighteen and don’t forget registering for the draft, though they weren’t drafting anyone.

  Twenty-one and I could drink, except I had seen what alcohol did to my Uncles. No way was I interested in drinking, at least this young.

  That just left girls to look forward to. Oh, I was looking forward to that. Of course I would have to have a girlfriend. I could have a girlfriend when I met a girl. It’s sort of hard to get close to a girl when you didn’t really know any. Find a girl and you lose her to some high school quarterback named Roman. What sort of name is that?

  I was having these thoughts while doing my morning run. I met the couple who took the girl with the sprained ankle to the hospital. Since they were going the other way we just waved.

  Since I had no plans for the day I dressed in jeans as I thought about riding my horse later. At breakfast Mum and Dad were having a strange conversation about a land deal and should they buy the property. After listening for a while I figured out that the land deal that went bad for the Judge, Sheriff, Prosecutor, and newspaper owner was on the market again and that Dad had been contacted.

  It was apparently four thousand acres out near Ontario, near Cucamonga of Jack Benny fame, and currently was all in grapevines. Mum and Dad were thinking it might be a good long term investment. Eventually it would be developed. Dad thought it would take twenty years before it would pay off, but Mum didn’t see a problem with that. At three hundred dollars an acre it would be a million two. That didn’t seem that much, if they didn’t want it I would take a look.

  When I mentioned that, it seemed to seal the deal, at least for them. They were going to buy it.

  We talked about the garage expansion for my shop. I hadn’t done anything about it. Before Dad and I would have laid it out on a napkin and built it. Now days we didn’t have the time and Mum wanted Jackson House to be just so. We could take a hint. I now had to find a contractor who could have architectural drawings made for her approval.

  They also let me know that they were going up to Boeing in Seattle next so I was to plan to stick close to home to keep an eye on the kids. The boys would be doing their schoolwork in the morning while Mary was in school. We had the afternoon free. Maybe we could go to Disney? I wasn’t certain about that, but was sure I could keep them entertained. I wasn’t asked to help out that often.

  “Am I getting paid for babysitting?”

  Dad smacked me up the back of the head, which reminded me of that Harmon kid.

  “I take that as a no.”

  I finished up breakfast and got out of there, I knew when to quit while I was behind.

  I went out to the stable area where Bob the cowboy was working with Mary and her pony. He was walking the pony with Mary on its back. She had a grin that wouldn’t stop.

  “Bob, has it been decided who rides which horse?”

  “Not really, find one you like and saddle up.”

  That made it easy. There was a bag of apples near the door so I grabbed a handful and went out to the corral where they were loafing in the sun to see if I had a new friend. Turns out with apples I had a bunch of new friends.

  One caught my eye, a gelding about fifteen hands high with a white streak down his face. His color was a dark tan. He had one white sock. His configuration was good and looked like he could carry my weight. In turn he didn’t fight me when I led him back to the stable to saddle him up.

  I had learned how to do this on set and the horse seemed aware of the drill. We had the normal tap in the side so I could get the cinch tight enough. It was more of a formality on both our parts. When I threw a leg over he didn’t raise a fuss.

  I asked Bob if this one had a name. Bob told me there were papers on the horse in the house somewhere, but he just called him George. I asked how he got George.

  “Don’t know, just seemed like his name.”

  “Okay, George and I are going out to ride the trails a bit, be back in no more than two hours.”

  After an hour and a half I came back after a nice ride on the park trails. We saw several runners, but no other riders.

  When I brought George back I took the saddle off and brushed him down, after that I checked his feed and water, which were in good shape.

  Bob asked how he rode.

  “Just fine, like being in a rocking chair; a hard rocking chair that is going to make my backside pay, but all in all a good horse.”

  “Been a while since you rode?”

  “Yep.”

  “That will do it.”

  As I said Bob would talk your leg off if you let him.

  I went upstairs and took a shower to clean the horse smell off me.

  I needed to go to the dry cleaners in Chinatown today. No time had been specified, but I wanted to get it done. Dressing in clean clothes I pinned the Queens Messenger greyhound pin to my sport coats lapel.

  Taking the suit I had worn to New York and the envelope that Mum had given me I went to find her. She was in the library with Anna Romanov; they were discussing some charity event.

  “Mum, I’m taking my suit to the dry cleaners. I should be back before lunch.”

  “Okay Rick.”

  It was a nice day so I drove my T-Bird with the top down. It took almost half an hour to get to Chinatown. Traffic in the LA area had gotten worse since we moved here. They would have to do something or we would be at a dead stop.

  I found the dry cleaner with no problems. I don’t know what I expected but it was exactly what it purported to be, a dry cleaner like any other. In my thoughts on the way down I had it pictured as an opium den from a Charlie Chan movie.

  Well there was an old Chinese lady at the counter. I had never dealt directly with a Chinese person before, so that was different. She didn’t pay much attention to me until I put my suit on the counter. Then she looked up.

  You could tell when she saw my greyhound pin because her eyes opened wide and her mouth opened. She snapped her lips together and asked, “You have any letters for me?”

  I did as instructed and handed her the package. She took it and placed it under her counter, then filled out a receipt for my dry cleaning.

  “It will be ready on Friday, no tickee; no laundry.”

  It was my jaw that dropped when she said that. Then she broke into a wide grin.

  “I always wanted to say that.”

  I laughed as she handed me my ticket.

  “I won’t be here on Friday. Can I pick it up next Monday?”

  “That will be fine.”

  While I was near the beaches, at least compared to Hollywood I went over to Katin’s. Red headed Nancy was behind the counter. I asked her if she knew of any properties for sale on or near the beach. I was looking for a place to change and rest while at the beach, and for overnight stays when I had to be here several days in a row.

  She knew of several.

  “How fancy do you want?”

  “I hadn’t given it any thought.”

  She shook her head, “Boys.” She could have at least said, “Men.”

  She pulled out the beach newspaper and circled three classified ads.

  “Think about whether you want a shack to change clothes and overnight in, or a place you could actually live in.”

  Hmm, I would have never thought of it that way.

  I drove past the houses mentioned in the ads. Only one of them looked good to me. I realized I was thinking of something you could live in, if needed. I started to rationalize it as an investment.

  I also figured out that maybe I shouldn’t be the one doing this. Mum would be much better at it to live in, or as an investment Jim Williamson. At that point I turned around and headed home.

  I was barely in the house when there was a call from the front gate. Deputy Sheriff George Burrill was here to see me.

  I asked them to send him to the reception. I wondered what he wanted me for. He was Dads candidate to replace the existing Sheriff who was now in jail.

  Mr. Burrill
seemed embarrassed and he asked if either of my parents were home. Mum was, while Dad was at his office. She joined us.

  “I’m really sorry about this, but I got stuck with this job by the acting Sheriff who is also running for office.”

  “Stuck with what?”

  “Rick, I’m here to serve you, you are being sued.”

  “Sued, what for?”

  Deputy Burrill told me, “Reckless endangerment, for flying that plane without being licensed or training in jets.”

  “Well for crying in a bucket, who is suing me?”

  After looking at the paperwork Deputy Burrill told me, “A Roy Pearson.”

  “He didn’t like my landing him safely?”

  “Apparently not.”

  I took the paperwork. Mum asked me if I wanted her to handle it. Thinking of sterling silver I told her that I would deal with it. Mum did make a point of explaining to the Deputy that this in no way affected the family support.

  In turn he asked her if she or Dad could attend a fund raiser.

  “I thought we had donated enough to see you through the election.”

  “Oh you have, but I have to have fund raisers to generate some excitement and support to get out the vote.”

  “Oh, I never thought of it that way, of course Jack and I will attend.”

  She turned to me and told me that I should show up at one of the more upscale events with Tiger skin in hand and share the Deputies and my story.

  That thought didn’t excite me, but I agreed to do so in two weeks. At least no one knew about me and the chipmunk.

  My taking care of it consisted of calling Dad and after explaining the situation asking him what attorney I should use. He didn’t know either, but would turn the problem over to one of his company attorneys.

  After lunch I dropped off the papers I had been served at Dads office. He told me he would find me the proper lawyer.

  While in the area I ducked in at my office. There was nothing exciting going on. There was a message to call Dennis Lawson the freelancer I had given an interview to earlier.

  Having nothing better to do at the moment I gave Dennis a call. The phone was answered, “Lawson residence,” by a woman. I identified myself to her and asked for Dennis. She told me to wait a moment. She must have put her hand over the phone but I could still hear her. Denny it is that Richard Jackson that you were hoping would call.

  It wasn’t very long until Dennis was on the line. He was slightly out of breath.

  “Sorry I was out mowing the lawn.”

  Heh, my inside contact to the business world news lived at home and mowed the lawn for his mother.

  The reason he called was to try to get a business update from me for the basis of a new article. He was very open with me about how things had been going for him. When I gave the first interview he was able to sell it to the AP, and he had caught a few small assignments but no break throughs. He was hoping to get enough from me to restart things.

  I asked him if he could join me in my office. He could, it would take him an hour to get here, but I told him I would wait and not to get a speeding ticket on the way.

  I spent the time waiting for him reading monthly reports from field operations. They were interesting and I learned a lot, however I had no great ideas to help.

  Dennis had to have sped because he got to my office in forty-five minutes and had managed to change clothes. At least I don’t think he was mowing the grass in a sport coat and tie.

  He had his steno pad out and was ready to go. I slowed him down a bit by asking a few questions about where he lived, school, etc. I had a Coke from the office kitchen area and offered him one. He accepted. On the way through I saw Jim Williamson was free so asked him to join us.

  I explained to Jim what Dennis’s objective was, get a business update. So that was what went down. It turned out that the business world didn’t know how many vessels we had under construction or what governments we had joint partnerships with. It wasn’t a secret, nobody had asked.

  And we hadn’t thought to tell! That got me thinking. We weren’t a public company so didn’t have to sell our image to make people buy our stock. That didn’t mean that we shouldn’t care about our image.

  In my movie career I had a publicist, why didn’t the business have one? I excused myself for a minute and used the phone in Jim’s office to call my Dad. As I expected he was in his office so I got through to him right away. I asked him if we had or thought of having a publicist on the company staff. In short the answer was no, neither his company nor mine had one.

  I told him I had someone I was going to try to hire. He thought for a moment and told me to go ahead and that he would go to school on how it worked out for me, and if it went well he would do the same.

  I returned to my office where Jim and Dennis apparently hadn’t missed me at all. They were into the minutiae of the shipping business.

  I interrupted them and told them I had a change of subject. When I had their attention I told them of my bright idea. They both thought it was a good one. Dennis asked if I had anyone in mind.

  “Yes, I’m offering you the job.”

  You could have knocked him over with a feather.

  “I don’t know anything about being a publicist.”

  “Think of yourself as a reporter with a lot of inside information; oh yeah, and a salesman, selling the company.”

  “I don’t know, I have never thought of anything like that.”

  “I would get you together with Susan Wallace, my movie publicist so she could give ideas on what you have to do.”

  “What would it pay?”

  I hadn’t given it any thought, so I offered what I was paying Susan. How was I to know that Hollywood pay scales didn’t translate to the real world?

  “I’ll take it.”

  From the look on Jim’s face I had better have a private conversation with him later.

  “I’m going to have you work with Susan Wallace, she is my acting/talent publicist; as a matter of fact I may have you work directly for her. I have to bounce it off her for the best way to handle this. That way you will have someone with experience to get you started.”

  I tried to call Susan directly, but my luck of having people at their desk ran out. I left word for her to call me at home after dinner.

  After an excited Dennis left to tell his mother he wouldn’t have time to mow the lawn anymore, Jim and I cleared the air.

  I asked him how bad I had stuck my foot in it.

  “Not too bad, you already pay us a high rate. To keep it even you only have to give everyone a twenty percent raise.”

  “Ouch, what will that do to the business model?”

  “Let’s go over it.”

  We did and in the total budget we had it didn’t shift things at all. This was only for the headquarters office staff. At the Division level starting with the Presidents who not only had a salary but profit sharing built in there was no need for changes, they and everyone below them down to the janitors were making more than their counterparts in industry.

  This was one reason every time the word Union was mentioned it died a quick death.

  “Actually Rick this was good timing. There has been some minor rumbling in the break area about how many dollars are flowing through here compared to what they make. No problems, but now you are ahead of the game.”

  “How should we break the news?”

  “Why don’t you tell them now? They are probably wondering why you are here today.”

  Who would think people would pay attention to my comings and goings, but then I am the boss.

  Jim called everyone into the conference room. I didn’t make a big speech about it. I just told them since the business was going so well that it was time for a general increase of twenty percent across the board. Wow, that got their attention!

  From the smiles and excited conversation I knew I had ruined the rest of the work day, so I told Jim to send everyone home except a person to take messages,
and to reward them with double comp time.

  Well that certainly upset the apple cart for the day. I wondered what the effects of my impulsive decisions would be. Figuring I had done enough damage for the day I returned home. I spent the rest of the time before dinner doing school work. After it’s said and done I’m still in the tenth grade. I had thought about trying to test out of grade levels, maybe I should give it some more thought.

  Dinner that night brought to light some very interesting information. A reporter that Dad had assigned to find out what happened to each individual on the yacht that night had a report.

  We were interested in any that might still be alive or who had descendants that might know about the sub-basement.

  One that jumped out was a musician named Arley Lewis who had committed murder during a robbery, but he wasn’t alive. He had been hung in 1941 at Walla Walla prison in Washington State for the murder of a Jack Avent. Since he was twenty-nine at the time of his hanging it is doubtful he had anyone to tell about the sub-basement.

  There was only one person left alive from that trip, a minor actress Eunice Carpenter nee Lewis from the 1930’s. She was now in a rest home in Ontario; CA. Dad planned on visiting there tomorrow.

  I spent the evening on my schoolwork. I would be so glad to be done with this. I was beginning to see the wisdom of taking a full year to get through the material. You would have time to have a life. It seemed like all I did was schoolwork. Nothing exciting ever happened to me.

  I started laughing at myself; most people would be happy going a lifetime without the events which I had been involved in. Oh well, homework still sucks.

  Chapter 39

  I gave up early and read about Nurse Nelly, Emile De Becque and the Marine who fell in love with a Tonkinese girl.

  In the morning I did my run and exercises, I didn’t see any ferocious beasts or anyone else on my run. I spent some time with George and a curry comb. Today there were carrots in the horse snack basket.

  Mary was there plaiting Misty’s mane with ribbons. Misty didn’t seem to care as she had her head in a feed bucket. I swear she was looking fatter already, Misty not Mary.