The "That's My Story And I'm Stickin' To It" Story

Rear of the Bay Cottage.  Door on lower level had
the shower behind the left window
and the storage behind the right.

It was an ordinary day.  Summer vacation in August along the sandy shores of the Elk River in Locust Point, Maryland.  In the mid-1980s Carol and I and our three kids as well as our neighbors and good friends Sandy and Gary and their three kids traveled to my Aunt Doris' cottage for a week or sometimes two of relaxation to celebrate the end of summer.  Our children were pretty much the same ages and we had the best times together.  Gary towed his boat along with him and we spent many an hour in the water fishing, swimming and just plain having fun.  My story deals with one of the days that I have never forgotten in all those years.  Day started as usual with Gary pulling the kids on the inner tube behind his boat up and down the river.  Then it turned to water skiing through the slalom course that we made in the river using plastic bottles with bricks attached to them.  Late in the day we heard on the radio of an approaching storm coming from the west.  As supper drew near I had the kids help me husk a bushel of "Sweetie" corn for roasting ears.  Carol, Gary, the kids and I all grabbed showers in the lower level shower room while Sandy went upstairs to start supper.  Burgers, dogs, Gary's baked beans, roasting ears and Sandy's dirt were on the menu that evening.  During the meal we could see the sky begin to darken far off to the west.  After supper Gary stuck a cassette in his VCR and the kids gathered for a movie on the rather small TV screen in the large living room.  Carol was cleaning up after the meal and Sandy decided to go grab her shower.  The sky continued to darken.  I helped clear the table and then I realized I better make sure all the inner tubes, beach chairs and fishing tackle were stored in case the storm would reach us.  It was only around 7:00 pm, but fairly dark because of the storm.  I hustled down the flight of stairs to the ground level and all had been put away except two beach chairs.  I grabbed the two chairs and started for the door on the side of the cottage that faces the water.  As you enter the door you have to go left through a door to the shower room or right through a door to the storage room.  As I entered I could hear the water running as Sandy took her shower.  I opened the door to the storage room and entered.  Room was fairly dark since it had a blind over the window.  I placed the chairs against the far wall and noticed small beams of light on the wall.  I traced them back to the opposite wall that connected the two parts of the basement.  The light was coming from a few holes in the wall where the hot and cold water as well as the shower head came went through to the other side.  The holes were rather large so I looked through one of them.  Immediately I realized someone was directly on the other side.  Pulled away and headed through the door to go out.  All of a sudden it brought back memories from the mid-1960s when I went to Milton J. Brecht Elementary School in Manheim Township.  After gym class the boys would hurry down one flight of stairs while the girls would hurry down another flight to the locker rooms which were connected by a common wall that had a locked wooden door on it and ........ a keyhole.  You had to line up if you wanted to look through the keyhole and sometimes you would see someone looking back at you or you might see something else.  Well, today as I looked through the opening I saw something else and that's all I'll say. I'll leave it up to your imagination as to what I might have seen.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it!  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.