Twister & Family Embarassments

Imagine you are 21 years old and have just arrived home from a night of partying with your friends. You walk in your front door and you see a house full of middle aged people laughing, drinking and standing over a plastic rug full of colorful dots with two of your parents best friends contorted in positions more acceptable at your party than theirs. Traumas such as this remain powerful until you find yourself at that age wondering why you don't have that kind of fun anymore.

Now I cannot take credit for taking this picture. I was probably up in my room by then plugged into my stereo trying to burn holes in my brain to forget this surrealistic embarrassment.

The gentleman in the picture, Mr. Don Bacon, worked with my dad at Flying Tiger Lines at LAX. He was a wonderful family friend who actually hired my dad to FTL in 1950. When the 1971 Sylmar quake struck we had to evacuate our apartment on Haskell Ave. due to the danger posed by the Van Norman Dam. We stayed with the Bacon family in their home near Louise Park at Sherman Way and Louie Avenue. He taught me how to throw a spiral with a football. A skill that has diminished over the years if one could have ever called it a skill to start with.

So here is to a good man who is forgiven for causing me a slight embarrassment in my 21st year.