Don and I spent the summer of 1948 at Camp High Sierra, in the Mammoth Lakes area. The camp was owned by the city of Los Angeles, and I seem to recall that we learned about the opportunity for working there from a bulletin board at City College, where we had met. We were hired as senior counselors, sort of chaperones for the younger counselors, who slept in gender-separated dormitories, while Don and I had our own little cabin near the lodge.

It was a great summer. We had been married in September of 1947, at a time when it was very hard to find rental housing. We lived with my mother for a brief period, then rented a room in the home of an elderly lady in Hollywood, then got the chance to go to camp for the summer. We grabbed at it!

My duties were to keep the office records, welcome guests, and just about anything else that needed doing. Don drove the sightseeing "bus", which was really a large flat-bed truck with rows of seats. He took guests on fishing expeditions, and to places like Bodie and the Devil's postpile.

On Saturday nights, a gang of us would pile into cars and meet down at Casa Diablo on Route 395 near the campground. It was a real "roadhouse" I guess, complete with neon beer signs, barstools, a jukebox and some rickety tables. We would dance and the guys would drink beer while the girls usually had soft drinks.

One such Saturday night, we were celebrating somebody's birthday, and it was quite late when we drove back to camp. Don asked me if I would drive, which I thought was odd, but said sure, I'd drive. We dropped passengers off at the dorms and went on to our cabin, where I began preparing for bed.

Suddenly I realized that Don was being very quiet. He had not said a word since he sat down on the edge of his cot and started to take off his shoes.

I looked over at him and said, "Is anything wrong, honey?". He looked up at me with big sad eyes and whimpered, "Some dirty son of a bitch tied a knot in my shoelace".

Like a dutiful wife, I knelt down and untied his shoelace, which had no knot in it, and saved my laughter for morning. It was time for bed.