Charles Writes: Baby You’re A Rich Man Too

 And one afternoon in late July

On a day that does not seem

Like so long ago but really it was

A serious long time ago and

I had a magical experience on that day

With a girl beeing a girl

And me beeing a boy

Around a girl beeing a girl

And I think we had a moment in time

And I remember that time like it was yesterday

And like all of the rest of remembering it has

Been such a long time of remembering that I only

Remember the good times

When I was 17 my friend David and I were out at Omak Lake on a summer afternoon and one thing lead to another and we started to dive off of these rocks on the shore of the lake and we tried to dive like the native divers in that Elvis Presley movie about Acapulco and we dove straight into the water about 15 feet down and somehow we thought this was great fun so let's go dive off of some run-down old wooden bridges that span the river that are even higher than these rocks and that summer we drove around the valley on hot afternoons to these old wooden bridges and we dove like winged athletes from these rickety old bridges that spanned the Okanogan River in towns like Malott and Riverside and we dove from about 20 feet  up in the air and this gave us such a thrill and our young muscular bodies were stretched out into an arch as we sailed off of the bridges and hit the water with better form after each dive and we were improving divers but mostly we were having a blast and beating the heat and feeling very alive in our 17 year old bodies and yes I felt afraid at times but I was never going to tell anyone I was afraid so we just kept on diving and driving around the county looking for bridges to dive off of and one day we decided to dive off a bridge that was not too far from my girl friends house and I called her on the phone and told her where we were going to bee at 4 o'clock that afternoon and it was a perfect day to dive into the river because it was hot and the sky was a clear cerulean blue and David and I were steadily diving off of that little wooden bridge near Tonasket that day and as I was getting out of the water late in the afternoon and climbing back up on the railing of this seldom used bridge when my girlfriend showed up in a car driven by her smiling older sister and her best friend who had a great laugh and was a lot of fun was with her too and my girl friend had her hair in pig tails and she had on a over-sized striped shirt combined with the short shorts and I couldn't take my eyes off of her and the girls thought we were funny people to be diving off of these old bridges and they poked some good natured fun at us for beeing goofy boys and then I decided to demonstrate to the girls that no this was a sport and we were athletes and the girls laughed about that as well and I just had to show them how cool this diving was and I took a majestic leap off from the railing of the bridge and soared into the water and when I came up for air in the river the girls gave me a cheer and they clapped and when I got back on the bridge the song "Baby You're A Rich Man" was blaring out of the car radio of the older sister's car and I hear those words of the Beatles now in my head just as clearly as I did on that afternoon and I thought yes I did feel like one of the beautiful people at that moment.  My girlfriend came over to me and kissed me on the ear and told me that she was really looking forward to me taking her out on Friday night and I stood there in my wet cut-off jeans with water dripping off of me and I thought oh my god yes chasing girls around was really what my life was all about and this moment put my life into focus for me and yes I thought, "Baby I'm a Rich Man Too!"

And even though we lived far away from where the world was a happening place my friends and I were happening and alive and sharing in what the rest of the youth in the world were sharing in in the 1960's and yes again I need to say we were rich in our beeing young and alive in that moment.

-- Charles