Written By Kenneth Kinder

A short time back I wrote a newsletter about some of the liberties I took as a juvenile. Many of them were inter-twined with and around motorized vehicles, two and four wheels, and if you count tractor trailers the wheels are to numerous to count. After reading these newsletters, my youngest child, a daughter thought she had to respond to some of these articles. In this article she refers to a period in her life when she was wild and woolie and full of fleas. Seriously I love her statement about parents, because today (she are one), and as the old saying goes, history has a way of repeating itself, or coming back to haunt you.

This is her story. I find your stories so amusing dada. It is funny how you find your delinquency cute, but my harmless tangos with the law are another story! Let me tell one............. Once a fourteen year old daughter decided to drive her boyfriends truck-let me mention she is very responsible and an even better driver. Anyhoo-one,two,three,she is barely going over the speed limit and WHAMO- the fuzz decides to pick on her and pull her over. Well this fine young girl has to deal with her parents, actually her pops, who just can’t seem to understand when his kids break the rules or even the law.....hum. Well dad does find out and surprise, he is conveniently available to take his baby to traffic court, all along though he is very quiet and disapproving. His youngster is thinking all along, “he just doesn’t understand what it is like to be young,(because everyone knows that parents are born old and have no friends)”. Maybe it was the stress of the day or a little de-ja-vu from sitting in the courtroom, but dad loses his mind momentarily and upon exiting the courthouse asks his youngest daughter to drive home so he can evaluate her driving abilities, HIS SILENCE WAS HIS APPROVAL!

Well her time on earth has almost doubled because she will soon be twenty eight, and all things being equal (she should be twice as smart.....hum) but I think I will drop this line while I am still ahead. She has developed her driving skills to a degree that I would feel comfortable in having her as my cross country driving partner on a big rig, and I could never share that experience with any-one besides my brother Neal. She has also given me two of the best travel buddies I could ask for, my grand-children.

Speaking of these grand-children, we have been watching them two day’s a week for a couple of weeks, and now that things have gotten back to normal, we have dropped this obligation and I was surprised when our son-inlaw Doug came by around six P.M. the other day. I had just gone out to get our mail and he pulls up to the curb, and then follows me into the house. Jessica is with him and she had on her roller skates, so I thought she was here to display her skating talents. I don’t recall exactly what we were discussing, but something I said caused Doug to call me dumb and dumber. I can’t say that he was wrong in his assessment because I don’t recall what I said. Where I do think I was in good company was when Doug looked around and asked where is my baby? As a matter of fact his baby was at his house in the care of his baby sitter, who at this late hour in the day was hot enough to explode because smart and smarter was at the wrong location. As for me the dumb one, I knew exactly where my baby was (Doug’s wife) she was on her way home from work to relieve the baby sitter.

The picture below was taken about the time this story took place. You can tell by the worn texture of the photo that I have carried it in my wallet all these years. I had just gotten home from work at the refineries in the bay area, and Alta was all dressed up for the junior prom. There was a limousine outside waiting to take her to pick up her date. She said, dad I want a picture with you cause you are my special fellow. So dirty bibs, stinky body and all here we are. I had been gone for a week at this time.