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CREPE MYRTLE MIRACLE

To this day I don't believe in miracles, much less that money grows on trees; but, when I was 12, the nearest thing to a miracle that ever happened to me--happened to me in the crepe myrtle bush that grew at the end of our driveway.

My best friend "Joey" lived down at the end of our unpaved block of bungalows.  Big oak trees overhung the sandy ruts which snaked down the block of unpaved 58th Street to Elwood Avenue, the only paved street in our neighborhood at the time.  Joey lived on the corner of Elwood and West 58th Street.  I lived on the corner of Vermillion and West 58th Streets.  We were best friends.

When Joey started disappearing on Monday nights, it didn't take me long to find out why--the Scouts!  He was going to a Boy Scout meeting...every Monday night at the Christian Church.  We were 12 years old...and Baptists.  I wasn't so sure that it was right for us to go to a meeting at the Christian Church.  After all, we had to set a good example for the younger members of our church Sunday school department.  We weren't quite sure what we believed, but since the name of that church was different from ours, we felt there must be an important difference somewhere.

Joey wasn't so sure he wanted to join the Scouts--he was just visiting for a while to try it out--but he agreed to take me along to the next meeting.  I couldn't WAIT until Monday night.  When it finally arrived, he came by to get me on his bike--late!

We peddled hard and fast down the sandy ruts of Vermillion Street.  If you didn't steer your bike carefully down the ruts, you could lose your balance and go over...trapped in the rut and off balance.  The low spot in the dirt street where we sometimes waded calf-deep (well, keep in mind that our calves were a lot closer to the ground in those days) after a thunder storm to sail our "boats" made of scrap pieces of 2x4 lumber, was only a dusty memory in the fading light of the Florida summer evening sun. 

Turning right at 60th street, we pumped faster going down, getting up speed to crest the slight hill before Pearl Street, and pure bliss for tired cyclists, reaching its tar-and-gravel paving.  Four more blocks, a right turn on Tallulah Avenue, and we were pulling up to the church...sweaty, breathless, and scared...at least I was.

I rolled my right dungaree pants leg back down after hooking down the bicycle's kick stand with my right toe.  You didn't want to get your pants greasy on the open sprocket, or even worse, caught between the chain and the sprocket.  As I let go of the bike and headed for the church, the point of the kick stand promptly punched into the sandy soil, allowing my bike to fall over onto Joey's.  Both bikes then fell over together with a great clatter, pedal bending spokes, twanging loudly.  Great, no chance of slipping in the back unnoticed.

I tried to take a few extra deep breaths to prepare me for this new experience as Joey pulled open the door of the old wooden Sunday school building.  It didn't help.  I was still breathing hard.  Worse--we were late.  All the other boys were already inside, in uniform, in their seats--and staring at us, as we stumbled in wearing sun bleached "polo shirts" with wide horizontal stripes, faded dungarees, and high topped black tennis shoes, the ones with the rubber patch over the canvass bulge of your ankles. 

In school, when classes were boring, we would pull and tug at the rubber patch, messing with it until it loosened its grip on the canvass, and could be pulled of in bits and pieces.  It was a poor substitute for chewing gum, but that's what we did.  Then, the reason for having a patch over the ankle becomes clear.  Holes quickly wore through...at the ankles.  When new school clothes were being bought in August, it was only expected that a pair of tennis shoes would last one school year--or less.

The Scouts swiveled around on their high backed deacons benches to ogle the noisy new--and late--arrivals.  Only the tops of heads from the nose up showed above the shiny high backs of the benches--beady sets of bright eyes underneath moist brows watching us with intense curiosity--green "fore and aft" garrison caps perched in all directions.  Later, I would learn that the Scouts called them "piss cutters," when no leaders were listening.  To say "piss" when you were twelve was devilishly wicked.

"Why don't you fellows have a seat," suggested a friendly voice with a twangy drawl from the front of the room.  The drawl belonged to a short, wiry little man standing at a shaky podium in front of the rows of benches.  It was Bill Searcy, husband, father of three sons (all Eagle Scouts), deacon, Snap-on-Tools salesman...and Scoutmaster.  That explained why he was dressed in a green Scout uniform like the other 12-year olds--who were all still staring at us.  "Searcy," I was to learn, was the epitome of what a Scoutmaster should be.  I was to learn many, many important and lasting lessons about life from him, lessons which I would use throughout my life and career.  Outside my family, he was the adult male I would look up to the most and respect...and love.  To this day, he was one of the finest men I ever met.

We didn't just sit down, we dove onto the hard bench, sliding down the curved back, corrugated with grooves where the long boards joined side by side, sinking quickly from view, hearing everything, but seeing out only at either end of the bench.
Searcy picked up where he had left off, enthusiastically reviewing a long list of strange sounding equipment...packs, canteens, knives, hatchets, compasses, first aid kits (with snake bite suction cups—shudder-- and halazone tablets to purify water dipped, I supposed, from a handy ditch during a 50-mile hike), sleeping bags, ditty bags, jungle hammocks, and of all things, an empty coffee can--for "coffee can casserole."  Later, I would become a culinary expert on coffee can casserole making.

As he went through the list of items needed for the next camping trip, something they did about once a month, winter or summer, I was captivated by his enthusiasm and excitement for camping and Scouting.  This was something new.  Our Baptist church didn't have this--only the Royal Ambassadors, and the only place they went was to church services--in church.  He was talking about going into the WOODS...and staying out there...OVER NIGHT. 

It sounded interesting, exciting, even a little dangerous...and I was hooked.  Slumped down on that hard deacon's bench, hearing but not seeing Bill Searcy talking about camping...and Scouting...I had no way of knowing what lay ahead...how much that evening would change my life.

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