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Life's School began again in the summer of ’65…

The trip back to Michigan from Utah State University was quick. I think it took Mike and I only about 24 hours. Mike drove most of the way and I don’t think we stopped for anything but gas and food until we got home.

After a short recovery time at beaches and drive-ins, Mike and I went job hunting. One of our first job leads from the employment office was at a store in downtown Midland . The job was tarring a roof and when we accepted, the foreman told to grab a tar filled mop and get started. We were dressed in white shirts, dress shoes and slacks more suitable for job hunting than day labor and told the guy we’d be back after we changed or clothes.  He said something like “Never mind then” and we left thinking that the guy was some kind of jerk but I guess it was a good lesson for us.

Mike eventually got a job helping to install new lanes in the bowling alley. Mike didn’t like it very much but it paid enough for Mike to buy a car (an MGA sports car, I think) so he stuck it out until he was ready to go back to school in the fall.

Just before I got back from Utah, my mom had taken a job as babysitter for one of our neighbors and traded some of her time and some cash for a 1955 Plymouth convertible that she gave to me. It wasn’t the coolest color or the hottest style but it sure was great transportation for a teenager just out of school.  

Again, not the '55 Plymouth convertible I had but just like it except for color.

Joe Hansen was a neighbor who had an Insecticide/Herbicide business and he offered me summer work for a buck an hour so I took it. Although I’m pretty sure Joe had another crew besides us, Joe’s 16 year-old son Larry and I worked together and I think did most of the work. Joe seemed to spend most of his time going from bar to bar to find customers. That seemed to work OK until the end of the summer when the bugs and weeds went away and Joe slipped me a last handful of cash and told me that he didn’t need me any more.

I think that even before we left Utah, Mike had decided not to go back and, during the summer, made an effort to find another college. I don’t remember why but he chose to go back out west and got accepted at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. After he left for Arizona, I didn’t see Mike again for another 3 years or so.

After Joe let me go, I was able to get a job as a gas pump jockey at the Bay Station near McDonalds on Saginaw road and, shortly after that, had to make a decision about school. After one year of school I began to assume that a college education would probably give me a better (or easier) living than a blue-collar factory job but I felt guilty about my first year’s performance and didn’t want to borrow more money from my former benefactors. It was a full time job but the gas station owner was willing to let me work around a school schedule so I signed up for three classes at Delta Com munity College .

I was only making minimum wage of a buck and a quarter an hour and, with school and my job, working lots of hours, but none of that seemed to hard to do at the time. Living for free at home still left me enough money and no apparent obligations to anybody or anything left me plenty of time to party and roam. Life was good…

For a while…

I knew it was a risk to take only nine credit hours at Delta and, sure enough, within a couple of months of starting school, I got a notice that I had lost my deferment and was eligible for the draft. I was kind of expecting that so, at my dad’s encouragement, I’d already visited the Air Force recruiter to see what it would take to dodge the draft by joining the Air Force. The recruiter arranged for me to take a day trip to Detroit and take some tests to see what kind of training I would qualify for.

While I was waiting to hear from the Air Force (or the Draft Board), I partied on…

Knowing the end of my home life was near, whether I was drafted or got into the Air Force, I dropped out of school so that I would have even more time to party.

One night I met Sue Hand at McDonald’s while she was driving around by herself in her brother’s ’64 Chevy. Sue's brother had gone off to the Army and left his car at home. It had a 327 engine and a 4 speed transmission and Sue was very brave to let me drive it (I hope her brother never found out).

Anyway, once I got behind the wheel, I decided to drive around to try and find a good place to park. Not knowing Midland very well in the dark and in a hurry to get the smooching started I tried to find a good spot by turning up every promising looking alley and side-street. We must have been on the good side of town because every alley and side street turned out to be some rich folk’s driveway. I don't think we ever stopped to park and it was after 4 in the morning before I got home.

I was supposed to be at the Ashman Street Bay Station to open up at 6AM that morning but thought I could get at least an hour’s shuteye so I laid down. I didn’t wake up till almost 7 and, lead footing it down Eastman Road, I passed a car on a small hill just as he was turning left. The force of his impact aimed me at some gas pumps at a grocery store on the left side of the road and, though I smashed into them pretty hard, a tall cement abutment that the pumps were setting on kept me from wiping out the pumps and the potential fireball that may have resulted.

I wasn’t hurt much but that nice Plymouth convertible was totaled. It was about as far from a chick magnet as you could get but I managed to buy an old 52 Pontiac from a neighbor for only 50 bucks and was back at work in no time with almost no consequences. 

'52 Pontiac 4 Door Sedan

Almost…  

The accident was my fault so I got a ticket and had to go see the Justice of the Peace. After a stern scolding and an $85 fine, I found out that the Justice of the Peace was also the head of the Draft Board. I asked him how long it would be before I was drafted and, without hesitation, he said 45 days from the notice that I’d lost my deferment. I told him that I’d been talking to the Air Force and when I asked if I still had a chance to avoid the Army, he said “Well, if you’re sworn into the Air Force by the day you’re supposed to climb on the Army bus, you can tear up your Draft Card.” I should have ignored that suggestion…

The Air Force was doing it’s best to ac com modate draft averse kids like me and I squeaked in just under the wire. I was supposed to report to the Army on January 5^th and was sworn in to the Air Force in Detroit on January 4^th. Fortunately, the Air Force didn’t have room for me even then so I was given a delayed enlistment date and didn’t have to be at the Air Force base in Detroit until February 6^th of ’66. This gave me a little more time to get into trouble before I left Midland .  

Knowing my time was short and having no idea how my life would change when I left for the military, I tried to pack in as much fun (and female companionship) in my last days as I could afford. The Pontiac was an OK car but wouldn’t start when it was hot (I had to either leave it running or wait a half hour for it to cool down) so I bought what I thought was a cool a Renault Dauphine. It was actually a “cold” Renault Dauphine that burned a lot of oil and was the most uncomfortable ‘date’ car I could have had. I think I kind of froze out Letitia Burkhardt on my last date with her. I ended up driving the Pontiac again more often than I wanted and, luckily, was able to talk the Bay Station manager into letting me borrow a nice rental car off and on for much of the last month I was at home. 

I did get in at least on more date with Sue Hand . At her suggestion, I think, we went to someone's wedding reception. There was lots of dancing and music and at least one punch bowl that was well spiked. I probably spent much more time at the punch bowl than I should have and, as a com mon topic at the time, someone started to talk about Vietnam . That was when I decided that it might be fun or funny to burn my draft card.

Being in what may have been an American Legion or VFW hall, several other guys didn't think it was so funny and at least four of them picked me up by the arms and legs and threw me out into the snow. My loud protestations that I had already signed up fell on deaf ears (well, the music was sort of loud) and made no difference.

I was eventually able to convince the doorkeepers of my innocence and was allowed back in but I think we left a short while later. I don't remember what happened with the rest of the evening but my memory loss may have had something to do with my numerous trips to the punch bowl. Fortunately, Sue doesn’t remember either so at least I didn’t do anything more that was so bad that it was memorable to her.

My free time during my last few weeks in Midland were spent dragging the drive-ins with friends and in a frantic search for the that one girl that I’d write home to (and get the Dear John letter from) while I was stranded in some far off distant land (Well, Wyoming is ‘kind of’ far off!)

Luckily and sadly, I did find that one girl and did get that ‘Dear John” letter (actually, a ‘Dear Max’ phone call) but that’s another story…

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