Port Herman Beach and Uncle Ernest’s Famous
Redhead
Freighter similar to
the one Uncle Ernest said he leaped from. Schaefer’s Wharf is hidden by the
ship. Photo circa 1936
Port Herman Beach
(circa 1950), viewed from the diving float. Note wharf at far left and cabins
on the shore
Port Herman Beach and Uncle Ernest’s Famous
Redhead
I have to admit that I was
hard-pressed recently because I couldn’t think of a story to post. So, seated outside
in the shade of our giant maple tree, I scribbled down a bunch of words, and
just as I poked my pen to my lips, thinking, “Humm, what next,” a tiny bug
landed on my sheet, a nearly imperceptible speck with apparently no feet. But I
knew he had a set because he glided to the top, paused to taste the ink I
suppose, and then coasted slowly down and carefully scanned the two or three
hundred words I had just forced on the paper. Then he hurried back up the page,
(I hadn’t the heart to brush him off) and when he reached the top he hesitated
a bit before fluttering his wings and lifting off into oblivion. So, I thought,
I hope he liked what he read. Even the most diminutive kind of feedback seemed
good to me.
But no! Wait! When I looked closer
I saw that he’d left a dark deposit, a comment, a sort of grade that made me go
over those sentences again with a clearer head. And, sure, it was a sorry mess, so I crossed it out
and thought of something better, because even a small-minded critic knows bad
scribbling that would surely disappoint the large-minded readers. And so, here’s what I rewrote for this
post. I think the bug would approve
and I hope you will too.
The one time every summer when I
made sure I went to Sunday school was the Sunday before the First Presbyterian
Church’s annual picnic at Port
Herman Beach Elk River . The
church was (and still is) on Biddle
Street of Chesapeake City
Bob Fears owned the beach and as I
recall charged a fifty-cent daily fee. He had a long, screened-in pavilion for
the picnics, a bath house, and a concession stand. And floating out about sixty
feet on the water was a square raft anchored in about four or five feet of
water. That’s where we kids would jump, dive, and have the time of our lives.
Diving in could be a problem, because if you went down too far you’d ooze into
a mass of black, smelly mud. One time by best buddy, Junior Digirolamo, dove
down in and got stuck. His feet were thrashing just above the water and when we
tugged him out of there he looked like some monster from the marshlands with
all that mud covering his head. And do you know that it was well after he was
out of his teenage years and married with kids of his own that Junior ever had
to make do with even a little dab of
Bryll Cream for his hair.
When I got back to the farm Uncle
Ernest had just arrived and, before he took off to catch the ferry to Hattie’s
Inn for a night of liquid entertainment with his Ticktown pals, he told me
about his special redhead. “Oh, she was a beauty all right, Moose-the-Goose.
Her name was Mealia and she was a lady flyer back in the thirties when they flew
those flimsy biplanes. She was the first girl to pilot one across the Atlantic and she was trying to fly above the equator
around the world. When she landed at New
Orleans I walked up to talk to her. She was so pretty,
even in that flying jacket and leather helmet, that I kissed her hand, flashed her
my irresistible smile, and told her that she was a banquet for the eyes and the
best thing since sliced bread.
“Well, Moose, that did it; she
couldn’t help herself, because she pulled me close and whispered that she
wanted me as her boyfriend and that I had to be her co-pilot for the trip
around the world. Yeah, it was hard on me, what with all her passionate cuddling,
but we took off in that rickety plane with that loud engine giving me as much
of a headache as all that frenzied kissing of hers. But the worst part was that
her fascination with me caused her to collide with a flock of geese, which
caused us to lose power and glide down onto a small island that she called
Atlantis.
“Yeah,
we had three years of bliss on that fertile island; I felt like Robinson
Crusoe, but instead of Friday I had Mealia, the prettiest and most talented
girlfriend in the world. But after a while we knew that we’d have to leave the
island because it was gradually sinking into the ocean. And so, using a canoe
I’d made, I paddled out to explore while Mealia picked grapes for dinner. Now,
but—and I hate to have tell you this, Moose—while I was out there a fierce west
wind blew me all the way over to Cuba, where I befriended a homely fellow with
a long, unkempt beard and dressed in full army fatigues. Oh, he was goofy and
bellowed continuously about starting a revolution. But, man . . . he gave me a box of the best-tasting stogies I’d ever
fired a match to. Before I left I urged him to give up his plans to take over
the country. He was a good drinking buddy but if he ever ran the country it
would be a disaster. I’m sure I convinced him to just roll his cigars, distill
his rum, and leave politics alone.
“After a lot of partying I caught a
freighter back to Chesapeake
City Atlantic with
only her tender memories of me to comfort her. You and I are the only people in
the world who know how that famous girl pilot disappeared. I’d tell others but,
you know, people don’t want to believe the truth anymore.”
I was only ten years old but I knew the truth when I heard it. I
remember feeling immensely honored to have an uncle with so much intelligence
and charm. I hoped at the time that I might have inherited some of it so I
could be a little like him. But it never happened. And so, after a mournful
sigh, Uncle Ernest tramped down our lane and made the turn towards town,
leaving me feeling awfully sorry for him for losing such a gorgeous and famous
girlfriend. And I can feel your sense of sorrow too, sensitive reader. But, of
course, you’ll be sure to be uplifted when you read the story I’ll post next
week.
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