I was standing on the corner in Winslow, Arizona.

Seriously, I was!

I had just finished watching the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles and got off the train in Winslow. My Peace Corps mate, Denny Hildreth, lived in Winslow and worked for the US Forest Service. He was no girl in a flatbed Ford slowin’ down to take a look at me … but I took the ride regardless.

My college buddy, Jerome Welnetz, came from Galveston to join us. Jerome had visited me in Costa Rica and Denny, Jerome and I had some wild and fun times. So we thought we’d see what kind of mischief we could get ourselves into at the Grand Canyon.

As I recall, we spent the first night at the a National Park campground and ate tacos. We didn’t like all the company. So we drove around to the North Rim and did some wild camping off the road in some forest somewhere. Some adult beverages helped us through the night and no one complained of our loud singing.

I don’t remember much of what else happened except we did hike down to the river. It was rough going but we did find a waterfall where we could cool ourselves off.

We had to take it easy, after all.