The Most Incredible Summer of 1981

Me in my 1970 Pontiac LeMans Sport Car

I've been thinking about summertime lately especially since it's the middle of June and it's starting to get really hot outside.

Gordon, Dicky Dees and Me at the beach

I am 54 years-old now and mind always goes back 35 years ago to the summer of 1981 when I was 19 years-old. I had the most incredible carefree summer that I ever experienced in my lifetime when I look back. I suppose that we have all had one of those summer in our lives I suspect when we reflect on our lives. It was the summer before my senior year of high school at Hernando High School in Hernando, Miss. I am going to give you rundown on what I did that summer by bullet points. At the time, I was living at my father's lake house in Eudora, Miss., 15 miles west of Hernando. My older brother, Gordon, who was an electrical contractor who lived in Memphis. However, we were best friends then and we did a lot of things together in those days. He had money and I didn't have much. He was really good to me. So here it is:

*Drove to Jacksonville Beach, Fla., and Myrtle Beach, S.C., with Gordon and two of our friends. We stayed in the Beachcomber Motel in Jacksonville Beach and the Betty Boop Inn in Myrtle Beach. I'm sure neither motel exist anymore. We swam in the pools, the ocean and hung out at the beach bars for about a week.

Me, Dicky and Gordon at the beach

*Rode to Knoxville, Tenn., with Gordon and two other friends . We stayed at their apartment and went to the Smokey Mountains and climbed the Chimney Tops, swam in spring water holes and walked the mountain trails. It was the first time that Gordon and I had ever been to Smokey Mountains or Knoxville. We were gone for about a week. Then Gordon and I flew back to Memphis via Delta airlines and we had a layover in Atlanta. I was the first time that we had ever flown too.

The Beachcomber Motel

*Gordon and I went to Paris, Tenn., with a friend from Horn Lake, Miss., and stayed at his dad's cabin by the Tennessee River where his dad grew up in the old family home. We stayed there for about a week. We grilled out, fished and drank a lot of beer.

"Leroy," my car at the beach

*Gordon and I went to Greer's Ferry Lake in Arkansas with two other friends from Memphis and stayed at one of the friend's lake house for a weekend. We went water skiing, fishing and grilled out steaks and drank lots of beer.

Me and "Dutchenss" at the lake house

*Gordon and I went to Heber Springs, Ark., with two friends from Memphis, stayed in a cabin, rode mopeds and jumped off the rock cliffs at Greer's Ferry Lake. We also went to Blanchard Springs Caverns on the way home.

*During the second half of the summer, I went to Shreveport, La., to stay with my sister and brother-in-law where I worked at a Burger King for about month or so for some extra money.

The lake house in Eudora, Miss.

*In addition to traveling and going places, I went to concerts, movies, grilled out, smoked BBQ, swam and fished at my dad's lake house and played with my brother's German Shepherd dogs whenever I had a chance.

Graduating Class of 1982 at HHS

So when August of 1981 arrived, I was ready for the new school year. I was fit, tan and I had new school clothes. I was very well relaxed and focused. With the help of a lot of friends at school, I was elected Senior Class-Co President that fall and had one of the greatest school year's of my life before heading off to college at Ole Miss in Oxford, Miss., in the fall.. How could I ever forget all those once in a lifetime experiences thanks to my brother, Gordon, and good friends at Hernando High School? I still thank my brother and all in my high school friends in my heart when I look back on that time in 1981, the most incredible summer of my whole life!

The legend of "The Legend of Boggy Creek" movie

One of the scariest movies that has lingered in my psychic for the last 38 years is the, "The Legend of Boggy Creek," which is supposedly based on a true story. I was 10 years-old in the Summer of 1972 when I saw this movie with some of my best friends at the Malco Theater on Popular and Highland avenues growing up in East Memphis. That movie literally scared the holy, crap out of me and for a couple of years, I was scared to death to walk home at night from my friend's house located at the bottom of the hill where I lived. The worst part of the walk home was when I would get to a long row of mulberry bushes in my yard at the top of the hill and I hated walking past them. I was always afraid that the "Boggy Creek Monster" was going to jump out and grab me. But it never did because my heart would start racing and I was run as fast as I could. Then I would jump onto the front porch and in through the front door. My dad would always ask me, "What's wrong?" And I would say, "Aw, nothin'."

About a year ago, I had been thinking about this movie a lot and how it had horrified me as child. So I decided to order a copy of it on eBay or Amazon.com. I don't remember which one I ordered it from to be quite exact. But anyway, when I received it in the mail a few days later, my wife and I watched it and I thought, "Heck, this ain't that scary! This is so stupid!" I wondered what made me so scared as a kid when I watched it. However, a little bit of the sensation of horror did come back to me as I watched it though. It cause me to be able to relive the movie a little bit in my mind and remember how I felt when I was a youngster. But too me these days, the most interesting aspect of the movie is the movie itself-the success of the movie and how it was made on such a low budget turning a gigantic profit for its creator, Charles B. Pierce, an advertising salesman. Mr. Pierce who was from Texarkana (Texas-Arkansas border town) borrowed $100,000 from a local trucking company and used an old movie camera and hired locals (mainly high school students) to make the 90 minute film. He actually filmed the movie in the Fouke, Ark., area swap lands. In the last 38 years, the movie has generated approximately $20 million dollars and still can be found on DVD. Another modern-day, horror flick along the sames lines with a low production budget and incredible success is "The Blair Witch Project" from the 1990's. These type of movies usually find a way to tap in the psychic of Americans. Movies like this always seem take place out in the woods or out in the water somewhere with natural surroundings. It's one of those things that makes you ask each other, "Is there something out there?" which can run chills up and down your spine every time for sure.

Here's what the back cover of DVD says, "Is the monster still on the prowl? A 1970's documentary-style drama questions the existence of a hair 7ft tall Sasquatch-type monster that lives in a swap outside of Fouke, Ark. According to the locals the monster walks on two feet, has a characteristic smelly odor and kills chickens, cattle, dogs and livestock but so far it hasn't killed any people. The monster supposedly harassed two families in the late 1960's, but since then few have seen the monster yet it can be heard in the swap at night. Actual interviews with the area residents tell the tale. Could be real or a conspiracy of a backwoods community looking for attention."

If you want to see an old, somewhat, scary flick, this movie could be for you. You may laugh at the silly acting and how country the actors look, talk and etc. However, you have to keep an open mind and realize how amazingly, this low budget movie caused such a stir at the time in America's psychic in the early 1970's. It is similar to the scare tactic that the movie, "Jaws" used to horrify the holy, you know what out of Americans and kept them away about America's beaches in the middle 1970's for a while. You probably won't be able to find "The Legend of Boggy Creek" at your local video rental store either. You will probably have to buy it on eBay or Amazon.com like I did, if you want watch it.