Summertime, Amelia Earhart

                         and Livin’ on Love

 Ever since I could remember, I had been told how pretty my mother was and that my dad was handsome.  As I became older, there were moments that my dad, for this reason or that, would have a couple of highballs and spout out something hurtful.  For instance, one evening, he said, “I just need to put all four of you in a gunny sack and throw you off of the Coal River Bridge.”  Of course, he would apologize the next day and it would be forgotten but I never forgave him, even though I pretended I did. 

 The summer before the tenth grade was a good summer.  I was anticipating my rise in popularity as I entered high school.  The boy who I called my best friend lived up the street from me.  We had somehow mended our childhood ways and would sit up at nights, if we didn’t have dates, talking about our lives and loves.  We told one another most everything.       

 My brother had been the Senior Class President and one of the football captains in high school.  He made excellent grades, was good looking and had tons of friends who were usually hanging out at our house.  Everyone talked as if I could just ride on his coat tails when I got to high school.  What did I know?  I was glad he was my brother.  I had a crush on his best friend and thought I had fallen in love with him.  He was three years older than I was, but I could just tell that he had begun the year before to start thinking about me in another way.  I would dream of us getting married and “living on love.”  Who needed money when you could live on love, I often wondered?

  Ever since I was a little girl, I had dreamt of becoming a majorette.  I would watch the majorettes coming down the street in front of the marching band when there was a town parade.  I watched them at the half-time football games, strutting up and down the football field.  I had tried out in junior high school but didn’t make the squad.  My dad said he could have called a favor in and I could have been selected but he wanted me to try to get this on my own merit.  Everyone assured me, from the ninth grade on, though that I was a shoe in for majorette.  They would tell me that I would be everything when I got to high school.  Therefore, I just bided my time.      

 During the summer nights, we would all gather around the front porch and figure out things to play.  The subject of the dead kept popping up and someone mentioned we should try to see if we could conjure up a spirit from the other world.  We became consumed with having a séance.  We wanted to talk to the dead and find out what death was about.  Many names came up to seek first but we all finally decided on Amelia Earhart.  We talked incessantly about her and the plane that had gone down.  How spooky was her story!  Where did she go?  Where was she?  Was she really alive somewhere else and just hiding out?  These were questions that we all wanted answered.  We thought we would be the ones to find her after all the years she was missing.  I was the one who always believed that nothing was impossible.  Our mission was settled and “the troops” rallied but we needed someone to help guide us. 

 It was common knowledge in my family that my great-grandmother had been born with a veil over her face.  Stories circulated around, at least the people I was around, that having “a veil” over your face when you were born was the sign of a special gift, a sixth sense of some sort.  For some reason, we thought my grandmother would also possess some sort of other world power as well.  She just so happened to be visiting our house the night “the troops” were rounded up and ready to find Amelia Earhart.    

We begged her to help us that night and she agreed. 

 She took her place at the head of the captain’s table and proceeded to tell us the story of a woman named Mrs. Blake.  As the story goes, this woman was known everywhere for her special gifts of hearing from the dead.  She would place a specially made horn to her ear that would enable her to hear from dead spirits.  People traveled far and wide to get this woman’s advice about their finances and lives.  We were all sitting there with baited breath enthralled by the story.  Yes, as we looked at each other, we knew we had definitely made the right choice in having such a well-learned person lead us.     

 So, we prepared for the séance.  We placed a candle in the middle of the table, secured more chairs and began.  We turned out all of the lights, grabbed one another’s hand to make a circle and then began to call to spirits by name.  All of a sudden, a bowl fell off the living room mantle.  It visibly shook my grandmother.  She jumped up and she said she would never participate again.  Well, that pretty much burst our bubble.  Being the troopers that we were, we weren’t about to give up so easily but we soon discovered that without our leader, we just didn’t feel anything.  We sat around the table several more times over the course of the summer, but it was never the same without my grandmother.  We needed the veil power, whatever that meant! 

 Ouiji boards were also very enticing to us as were Magic Eight Balls, the latter being a popular Christmas item that seemed to be advertised over and over again on TV.  They could actually give you answers to your life right on the spot.  Right! Of course, I always shook my eight ball until it gave me the correct answer, which was “yes.”  

 That summer I had my first real, older romance with my brother’s best friend.  There was a party at our house one Saturday evening and there must have been close to a hundred people of all ages there.  I had on a one-piece slinky jumpsuit with heels (something just like Cher wore).  I overheard guys ask, “When did she grow up?”

 I knew he was going to be there that evening and “my cap” was set on him.  He had gotten a football scholarship at NC State beginning in August but due to his dad’s job, he was moving to Georgia so I wouldn’t see him much, but I thought I had found the love of my life.  We certainly held hands for the first time and kissed and kissed that night but that is as far as it went.  The next day, he left and my heart broke.  We kept in touch with letters once he moved but it wasn’t the same as he being there.  After just looking at him and dreaming of him for so long, we had finally gotten together.  It was exciting, yet depressing all at the same time.  I was young but had always acted so mature that I could convince anyone of anything.  What an actress I was!  I had convinced him that I loved him and would stay true to him.  I pledged my undying love forever.  I would sit with Mom at the kitchen table and convince her I could graduate early so we could get married.  She said that I had to think about what we would live on for money and my response was, “Mom, we can live on love.”  She replied, “Molly, you have to live on something other than love.”  I dismissed the remark, knowing she was wrong. 

 He, too, had been very popular in high school and had told others to watch out for me and make sure that I was all right.  I just wanted to get married and not go to high school but I knew I had to go.  I was in love and that is all I cared about. 

 I wasn’t so anxious in my heart to let the summer pass.  Overall, it was a great summer.  But, I seemed to sense on a deeper level it would be the last summer “the troops” would congregate together on the front porch thinking up things to do. 

 I had been told over and over that my way was paved for me in the upcoming school year but I started to become anxious about it all.  The closer it came to school starting, the more my stomach seemed to ache again.  Would it ever go away?