Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Six Sentence Story bloghop.
It is hosted by Denise.
It, (the story, not Denise), requires that your story be six and only sentences.
…and involve the prompt word.
(Note: True Six. The Spring semester of my freshman year of college. The names have been changed to protect the supporting characters; the geography is accurate, the better to enhance the drama and provide a contrast between two very different and distinct milieux.)
THUMB
The small group of college freshmen sat on a grassy hillside across from the library and watched their fellow students move between buildings on their way to class; it was not difficult, in this new decade, to distinguish between just-arrived, and finally-graduating, young men and women. The latter were dressed like their parents, hints of self-important frowns on the young men and awkward casualness among the girls; the former were sitting on the lawn and feeling like friends, despite some having only just met.
Text books, lacking in official school vinyl covers, lay around the six young people like a child’s attempt at replicating Stonehenge, and jackets, (fringed and if not fringed, borrowed-looking), put into service as pillows for the more introspective; the temperature for this week before final exams 1970, screamed, “Your calendars are lying, its not May, its July…maybe even August!”
“Lets thumb down to the beach”, said the creative boy; “better yet, lets make it a race!” said the dominant girl; “You three against us three, we’ll leave by the Mt Pleasant access road and you, Kasia, your team leave by Fruit Hill Ave, first ones to Scarborough wins,” said the dominant young man.
“Now, all we have to do is get back,” the group stood in the still-cold sand at the State Beach, the girls had completed the thirty-five mile trip first, beating the boys by twenty minutes; the creative girl walked up, a young man with a beard and a bandana in tow, and announced, “Good news, this is Tony, he has a van and offered to give us all a ride back to school!”
She was smiling a smile that, had anyone present been afforded a glimpse of the future, surely would have moved heaven and earth to preserve it, to afford future generations evidence and proof that times do, in fact, change.
About clarkscottroger
Thank you for taking us back to 1970, when it was okay to get into strange cars with complete strangers.
yvw
This was sooo good! What a great break for those girls :)
Thanks, Susan
dude. just dude.
T, man.. just T
No doubt here that the girls would get there first. LOL
Great SSS with a blast to the past.
yeah, like, sure they wouldn’t totally beat us.
Never had the pleasure (?) of actually thumbing a ride, so i will take the vicarious thrill afforded by your story.
Finally! A price for youth! …wasn’t too much longer after that the idea of recreational hitch-hiking came into disfavor
Oh, no, not a van! There will be wacky tobacky in that van!
Yes, the van. And there almost always was, wasn’t there. (Never quite understood and was totally jealous of the ability to not worry about getting caught, “Hey! I know, lets sit in this van and smoke dope. It has no windows except for the windshield. No, who ever heard of cops sneaking up on a van?”
lol
Very apt description in the first couple of sentences. I remember feeling extra self conscious like I had “Freshman” stamped on my forehead, lol and for sure there was a “feeling like friends, despite some having only just met.”
I could feel the youthful energy. Thanks for the walk down your memory lane!
you’re welcome
for the record, freshmen were supposed to wear placards suspended from the neck to identify us. No one did. Except, there was a group of seniors that were so crestfallen when we ignored them, I wrote my name on my chest for them… they still seemed disappointed.
lol
Was it a white van? Those are the ones with bands and lots of snacks. I miss those days. Your six took me back.
ah, you’ve been there!
glad to have been of service
Thanks for the trip down memory lane Clark. Good times.
Come on, gather ’round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you
Is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’
Or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’
one of my fav Dylan tunes