The Unforgettable Summer of ‘69
My first step on the stairway down from Heaven
My initial spiral down from heaven started after I attended my only eighth-grade graduation party. The post-graduation summer of 1969 changed my life.
I was twelve… mature enough to know, naïve enough to believe, and stupid enough to trust everything I was told.
During that summer, my religious beliefs, the fire and brimstone of my core Catholic upbringing, were extinguished.
Typically, in the tween years, girls grow and mature faster than guys. For example, the tallest in our graduating class was a girl. However, she was more like the guys in looks, short hair and straight build. If it wasn’t for the dress, she could’ve been mistaken as one of the guys in the yard playing kickball.
But the second tallest, Beth… oh… she was much different.
Beth had long dark-brown hair, deep blue-green eyes and a smile that could melt an iceberg. But, unlike her Amazonian friend, she matured differently… to the point of fiercely straining the top four buttons of her blouse. And the constant adjustments of her skirt helped to ensure the knee to skirt hem length remained within a paper-thin measurement of the catholic school’s…
