When I was a kid living in a stucco house on St. Elmo Drive in Rialto, California, I spent a whole lot of time playing with close buddies who lived two houses away – siblings Mark and Laura Wagner.
I’d walk with them to and from Meyers Elementary School. We’d ride our bikes around the neighborhood. On hot summer days we’d pile into their backyard pool, a four-foot, above-ground pool. Occasionally, they’d ask me to eat lunch with them at their kitchen table, a big picnic table perfect for a Catholic family with lots of kids.
I had to walk through the living room to get to the kitchen and the big picnic table. The Wagner’s had an aquarium in the living room. I always stopped briefly and looked at the fish swimming in the fish bowl. Know what else fascinated me? The sunken ship at the bottom of the aquarium. I could have stared at the fish and the ship for an hour, but the wonderful food aromas would draw me away from the aquarium.
One time Mark and I decided to take a long, unapproved walk to downtown Rialto. The walk required crossing some busy streets, the main reason the walk got me into trouble. He took me into the Catholic church his family attended. I was in big trouble when I got back home, not just for taking the dangerous walk but going into the church as well. You see mom was a Protestant, a member of the Evangelical United Brethren Church (EUB). I guess doing that in those days was a no-no. Thank goodness people are far more ecumenical nowadays.
The Wagner’s oldest daughter, Nola, would sometimes babysit my sister Jody and me. She was my favorite babysitter. Why? She’d tell me about life in high school.
I often wonder how Mark and Laura are doing. Are they even alive? Like me, they’d be in their early 70s now. Back in 1971 when we were living back in Ohio, mom got a graduation card from their mother, Joan, that included a photo of the graduating girl, Laura. She was quite pretty. The photo brought joy to my heart.
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I’m Mike Staton and I’m an author with six published novels. Three are sword and sorcery novels, and the last three have American Civil War settings. The latest, which debuted on May 1, takes place during Reconstruction in North Carolina, and stars a newspaper editor, and his wife, a graphic artist. It’s part of a four-book series that will see my main characters head westward into the American frontier in the final novel, now being written. I’m currently writing that fourth book, which I’ve titled A Wyoming Dawn: A New Beginning.
Writing Wranglers and Warriors 