"Will You Still Love Me..."

It was an early sixties summer on a Lake Erie Ohio beach. At Laylin's Court and neighboring Anderson Acres, little vacation trailers with wooden patios were parked on the edge of Lake Erie. Other trailers and a few cottages were gathered just steps off the beach. They housed vacationers and some Huron, Ohio residents.  We were residents and lived in one of the rented Laylin cottages just steps south of the trailers. 

As in most years, summer girls, mostly with their families, showed up everywhere. I was right in the middle of all that. There were beach parties most nights. Most of them were chaperoned but we would occasionally sneak around with something of an alcohol nature, typically 3.2 beer (legal back then at age 18). Smoking?  Hell ya', smoking was de rigueur. Camels if you were a badass, Luckies if you were just bad. 

Impressing those beautiful girls was often the order of the evening and we would make mighty attempts. Things like placing a 10-12 inch log in the middle of a beach fire and doing handsprings on it. Slow dancing on those patios? Yeah, that was definitely a thing. Sweaty palms were also a thing, an unwelcome surprise to all who experienced them, both givers and receivers.

I was fourteen and my hormones were moving along leisurely at, oh, I would say a hundred million miles an hour. I had maybe three albums in my record collection. One was Duane Eddy and another was the Shirelles. I don't recall the third - maybe the Everly Brothers. And there was this song, one that made my heart ache for a girl I hadn't even met yet. But then, I would meet several over ensuing years as I continued in my somewhat fragile, susceptible state. The song? "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow."

So is this story about raging hormones or music?  Damned if I know.  I do know I sorely miss the rush of both. I am pretty sure though, the two are closely related. 

I can tell you it would be many years later when I bought the Tapestry album and discovered Carol King wrote that song.  Many years later again, I would discover one of the two Shirelles lead singers, Doris Coley, passed away here in Sacramento in 2000. I didn't know she was that close.  I would have loved to tell her how much she and her group meant to me.  

Oh, those voices and these songs; 

Soldier Boy - "I'll be true to you", 

Mama Said - "...there'll be days like this", 

Baby It's You - "I can't help my self...", 

I Met Him On Sunday - "He said bye, bye baby.", 

Dedicated To The One I Love - "Each night before I go to sleep my baby...", 

Stop The Music - "Who does he think he is?", 

Foolish Little Girl -"Fickle little girl". 

Yeah, I loved those ladies... in music, and in life.

The Gud Ritr

This is Miss Mary Windau (RIP), former Dean of Women and English teacher at Huron High School in Huron, Ohio.  In 1962, Miss Windau told me I was a "good writer." It was the only compliment I received in four turbulent high school years.  This is not to suggest I was worthy of any at all, for any reason.  I never forgot that though and often think about her as I am pecking away at this here keyboard. Interesting how brief remarks can stick with a person for a lifetime isn't it?!

Anyway, a much too late thank you so much Miss Windau. Through those few words, you encouraged me to pursue and enjoy a pastime that remained with me for a lifetime. I did a little internet stalking and have found that many others feel the same way about you.  Well done Ma'am.  Well done.  

(I should add that I have produced a book, a memoir that maybe is at times humorous. "Hayseed" includes sections that occurred when I was one of her Huron High School students.  If she were here, she might have given me a C-... for effort... maybe. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FRZG3DVC)