Little REd Riding Jerk

9/2/11 3:48 AM

A bit of stream of consciousness for your entertainment and my catharsis – thanks for indulging me.

When I was a teenager I used to spend every summer working at a Camp Hoffman in Kingston RI. I am probably one of the few men you’ll ever meet that was an active member of the Girls Scouts of America for more than five years. I worked my way up from kitchen staff to the highly sought after maintenance staff where I learned to bend nails with a hammer -- my boss Eddy Arnold -- was very patient. I actually learned a lot. I’m pretty handy now.

In the summer of 1977 three Girl Scouts were murdered at an Oklahoma resident summer camp. Security at Camp Hoffman became a big deal. As one of only a handful of male staff and one of the even fewer with any muscle tone, I was assigned the additional duty of driving the camp perimeter to ensure nothing was amiss and the campers were safe. I remember – I think – having an axe handle in the cab of my red Ford flatbed stake truck as my protection.

One dark sultry night, the air still sticky from the obligatory early evening thunderstorms, I was doing my rounds with another non-atrophied young man, Jamie Dadona.

“Holy Toledo,” he said. “This road blows.”

The red Ford truck bounced up and down and back and forth mercilessly along the rutted dirt road that was sometimes mud, sometimes dusts, and always a back breaker. The headlights alternated between giving excellent views of nesting habits of local birds or lighting the worm holes in the ground.

We approached one of the campsites containing three or four large tents and about 15 young girl scouts. The lights of the truck bounced down from the treetops to one of the few moments when they leveled out and shined directly on a grey slatted fence that secured a few garbage cans from errant squirrels or the odd feral cat.

Next to the fence was a full grown man wearing red one-piece long john underwear and holding something in his hand. He wore combat boots – it seemed to me – that were only laced halfway.

For a moment Jamie and I were stunned.

We looked at lLittle Red Riding Jerk and he looked at us. Jamie and I grabbed our trusty axe handles; open the truck doors to get out -- prepared to administer some rural vigilante violence. Before our feet touched the ground Little Red Riding Jerk was off like a shot. It looked he was staying close to the road.

“Get back in the truck,” I shouted. “We can head him off.”

“We’re gonna kick this guys ass,” Jamie said. “We’ll be heroes.”

Terrible roads don’t get an better the faster you travel and the total darkness of no a no street path made every twist and jag on these roads we thought we knew, a last second steering decision.

We slogged down the muddy road traveling, we thought, faster than a guy in Red one-piece long johns possibly could.

“We should be running parallel to this asshole,” I said. “Let’s turn off our lights, make a left turn, get out of the truck and wait for him.”

“Great! Let’s set up a trap,” Jamie said.

The Southern New England forest hemmed us in. The vines and creepers made each step a challenge and the moon reflected every now and then off the leaves of the still damp ferns. We knew we only had a little time. If we waited too long, any help we could get from the police would arrive too late to be helpful. If we went back without Little Red Riding Jerk we would look like a couple of paranoid idiots.

As the mosquitoes buzzed in bug made clouds above our heads, we crouched and waited. Nothing moved.

“Hey man,” Jamie said after about a half an hour. “We should probably go see Eddy and tell him what happened. This is kind of crazy and this guy could be getting away using some other road.”

Both things are exactly what happened.

The boss and his family lived on the camp grounds in a little rustic cottage.

When we reported to him what happened, he didn’t think we were crazy or overreacting. Instead he had his son get a shotgun and go with us to the campsite and he stood guard. While this was going on Eddy called the state police and they came. I don’t remember much about what happened after that except a lesson in geography and knowing your surroundings.

Neither Jaime nor I realized the campsite abutted a creek that provided easy access to Camp Hoffman. We didn’t know campers and watercraft instructors often used the access for canoeing daytrips. It turned out that is how Little Red Riding Jerk got into the camp and escaped our trap. Instead of staying parallel to the road, he took a left and ran up a tiny trail to the access and made his way using the creek – at least that’s what the cops said.

What does any of this have to do with chemo? Nothing really. I woke up at 0230 and was going to tell you about a totally different thing –a dream I had. I started typing and this true story is what came out.

I'll post a picture of Jamie, Ed, his son Paul, and I later.

Thanks,

Bill