In the spring semester of my sophomore year, the movie "Where the Boys Are" played -- about college kids going to Florida for Spring break.  Spring break was almost upon us, and I argued to my friends that Florida would not be such a great place to meet girls, because there would be too many guys doing the same thing.  I argued for Mexico - the beach at Tampico. 

My real reason for wanting to go to Mexico, however, was that a few years earlier I had met a Mexican girl in Denver - Gloria, whom I thought one of the most beautiful girls I had ever met.  Her kiss was still burning on my lips, and her image haunted my dreams.  It was two years before I could get back to see her.  By then she had married and moved away. 

I was hoping I would find another like her in Mexico.  So I convinced my brother, Clint, who had a car, and two other guys, Bobby, my dorm mate, and Jack, one year ahead of us, on Mexico as the more desirable destination for spring break.  Bobby, Clint and I were engineering students, and Jack was a psychology major. 

On Spring break, we all set out for Mexico in my brother's car.  Our car. a '54 Ford six cylinder, was already eight years old.  We made it to the border at Brownsville ok, but 100 miles south of the border the car broke down in the middle of the night. There we were, laughing like insane people, pushing that car down the road in the Mexican moonlight, miles from anywhere. 

Well, we were close to a little town called San Fernando, and in the morning had the car towed in for repairs.  We found a run-down, but cheap hotel for a couple of nights while the car was being repaired. While roaming around the town, which was pretty small, maybe six blocks each way, we met two young, and really nice-looking girls, about 18 or 19 years old.  I still remember their names - Natalia and Alma.  They were sisters or cousins -- school teachers home for Samana Santa (Holy Week), or what we call Easter.  They spoke pretty good English.  We made a date to see them later that evening at church. (That's about the only reason I ever went to church.)

Then we met their older brother, Arturo, who came out to look us over. He introduced us to some other girls -- one of them really a knockout -- like Sophia Loren, only prettier.  I still remember her name also - Marina.  They worked in Mexico City, but I didn't hear exactly what they did there.  Arturo set up a party for us and Marina and her friends.

Later on in the day I ran across Natalia and Alma again, and told her about the party her brother had set up with Marina and her friends, thinking that we would see Natalia and Alma there also.  Boy, did I step in it!  Natalia gave me an icy look, saying that they did not mix with those kinds of girls. Arturo got in trouble for introducing us to Marina and her friends.  The party with Arturo and Marina, and the church date with Natalia and Alma, were  all cancelled.

So we left San Fernando pretty disappointed, heading further south into Mexico.  If I learned anything to that point, it was that there were some very pretty girls there, and in Mexican eyes they came in two classes -- good, decent girls like Natalia and Alma, and bad, disreputable girls like Marina and her friends -- and that these two classes of girls were not to be mixed. 

 We only made it another seventy miles or so before the car broke down again.  The next town ahead was Ciudad Victoria (Victory City, to us gringos.)  I left the crew with the car while I caught a bus and went into Ciudad Victoria.  I found a garage that would tow us in and work on the car during the Holidays.  But it was going to take all week to fix it, and so we were stuck there for the rest of the Holidays, and going on to Tampico would be out.

After the car was towed in, and the repairs agreed on, we found some cheap quarters near the central plaza.  There was a nice restaurant across from the central plaza called La Urraca (The Magpie.) We were sitting in the restaurant eating when I saw a group of girls walking by.  One of them caught my eye immediately. 

There were other girls, like Marta and Yolanda.  My brother, Clint, and I went to Yolanda's house to eat lunch, with Yolanda rubbing her legs against mine under the table.  And Marta and Yolanda took Clint and I on a picnic on a dry river bed in the country, with a heard of goats nearby.  I probably could have made time with both of these girls, but I was really only interested in Maria.  

Then there were the girls of La Zona Roja (the red-light district) to visit -- memorable only in the sense that it our first encounter with that slice of life.  I think we spent all our spare cash there.

Towards the end of the week, it was time to make a decision.  We had to get back to school.  My brother, Clint, and I decided to stay with the car.  We would drive it back when it was ready,  The other two guys, Bobby and Jack, started back on the bus. 

 ~ ~ ~

Finally our car was ready.  They had replaced the engine's crankshaft, and put in all new bearings.  The Jéfe (chief) mechanic told us the bearings had to be slowly broken in, and not to drive the car over 30 mph the first 100 miles, and not over 50 mph the next 100 miles.  It was agonizingly slow to drive that car so slow.  And even then the engine would overheat, and we would have to refill the radiator several times.  Every time we pulled off the road to check the engine, we poked a whole in a tire and had to get it repaired.  Fortunately, there were plenty of tire repair shops along the road, and they were really cheap.  Finally, half up the Texas coast, the engine stopped heating up, and we could make some decent speed. 

Jack and Bobby had already arrived, and only missed a day or two of school.  Clint and I had missed a whole week.  We told the administration that we were sick.  But Jack and Bobby had already spread the story around that we were stuck in Mexico with a car breakdown.  The Dean of Men wanted to kick me out of school for lying.  But he didn't want to kick Clint out, because he had the highest grade point average in his class.  So he allowed us both to stay.

Missing so many classes took its toll.  I had to take make-up tests to stay in school  -- without any notes or time to study.  I flunked one course and made a D- in another because of that.  But all my other courses I did a C.  The D- and F dropped my grade average below a C, and put me on academic probation -- not allowed to work. I lost my job in the cafeteria. 

The next semester was really rough for me.  I had enough money to pay for tuition (only $300 then), but not enough for room and board, or to buy my texts books, even used.  Fortunately my brother was elected the president of his fraternity (Lamda Chi Alpha), which had just moved into their brand new building, leaving the old house they previously occupied (and still owned) pretty empty.  So I was allowed to bunk in the old house.  My brother made sure nobody ever asked me for rent.

Sometimes I didn’t eat for three days or more.  Once I got so hungry, I went to the school cafeteria after feeding time was over and asked if they had any food left over I could eat.  They took pity on me and brought me to the back and let me eat some leftovers.  After that, the lady that ran the cafeteria allowed me to substitute for absent workers, and earn a meal now and then -- enough to keep me alive, though on the lean side. 

By the first semester of my junior year, I recovered my grades and was taken off academic probation.  And I could work again.  But this time I worked in the student center.  I started as the bouncer in the billiards room.  They wanted me there because I was tough enough to keep order, and boot everybody out at closing time, including football players, which I took great pleasure in doing.  It always surprised me how many students had so much time on their hands to play pool all day.  Engineering students never had any extra time.  

The only drawback to working at the student center, versus working at the school cafeteria, was that I had to work a lot more hours - actually an eight-hour day, in order to earn enough to pay my tuition, room, and board. I didn't actually pay board because I continued living in the old Lamda Chi house for free.  I also managed to get my food for almost free.  

The job I coveted at the student center was short-order cook.  Eventually I was "promoted" to short order cook when one of student cooks dropped out of school.  Students would come in and order a ham and cheese, and I would make one for them, and one for me, and eat it when no one was looking.  I was in hog heaven on the grill.  Carl Blue, from my high school. also worked in the student center there. He had about as much integrity as I had when it came to bending the rules about food, which we considered an undeclared "fringe benefit."

The student center also had a coupon we could buy for $10, which the student cashier would punch when we bought food.  My ticket had so many extra holes punched in it, the student cashier finally wouldn't give it back to me, wadding it up and throwing it away. There must have been a hundred dollars worth of holes punched in it. I finally had to buy another one. 

 ~ ~ ~

The middle of the fall semester of my Junior year I was running very low on money.  An old Air Force buddy, David Scott, dropped by and wanted to head for South America for adventure.  I decided to join him and resigned from school.  We took off in his car heading south.  On the way through Mexico, I stopped to see Maria again.  I stopped at her house, but she was teaching at a rural school near a small town further south.  It was on our way to Mexico City, so when we got to her school, I stopped to say hello.  She was very surprised, but also very happy, to see me.  I asked her if she was inclined to marry me.  She said she was, but it was a subject I would have to discus with her family.   

Scott and I headed on to Mexico City.  After several hours driving through steep, winding, narrow mountainous roads, we arrived there.  We rented an apartment in Mexico City to contemplate our next move.  While taking a taxi to get a meal, the taxi driver asked us if we wanted to see some girls.  Scott agreed, so the taxi took us to a very nice neighborhood - to a mansion filled with beautiful girls.  I had never before seen such a high-class house of pleasure. 

All the girls were dressed to the max - all of them ranging from good-looking to beautiful -- not an ugly or even a plain girl among them.  And they all ran over to where I had taken a seat and told me their names, imploring me to choose them.  Not one girl was paying any attention to Scott.  He didn't seem all that irritated about that, which kind of puzzled me.   

I chose a girl named Violeta, who was a knock out.  We went up to a private room with a lock on the door.  After the first climax, I asked Violeta if we could do it again.  She agreed, providing I just pay her directly.  Some pimp kept knocking on the door telling us to hurry up and get out of the room.  Eventually we came out.  I kind of wanted to kick some pimp's ass, but this place probably had armed guards, and it would not be wise to carry a fist to a knife fight, if not a gun fight.  Anyway, Violeta had given me her phone number so I could see her on the side, away from this place.  I don't know whether Scott had chosen a girl or not, but he was sitting alone, n the fancy waiting room downstairs, with no girls around him, impatiently waiting for me. 

 ~ ~ ~

Back at the apartment, Scott laid out his plan for South America.  He envisioned robbing churches of their gold, buying or stealing a small boat and sailing it and the gold to China to sell it.  I had previously been on a caper with Scott that went decidedly awry.  I could only envision everything that could go wrong - such as a rat-infested foreign jail cell, a firing squad, a hangman's noose, or dying in a gun battle. 

It was then that I decided I wanted to marry Maria real soon, make some babies and settle down -- more than I wanted the life of an adventurer, who in all likelihood would wind up on the wrong end of a rope or firing squad.  I told Scotty I wasn't going on -- that I was going to marry Maria and return to the US.  He tried to talk me out of it, but I told him I would be heading back when our rent on the Mexico City apartment was up. 

Scott disappeared for a few days, leaving me alone in the apartment.  I decided Violeta was too expensive to pursue.  I was getting ready to just pack up and leave when Scott returned.  He told me had met some rich guys and went down to Acapulco with them.  They were still there, and he had come back up to get me.  I was interested in seeing Acapulco, and agreed to go if the flight was on roundtrip tickets.

On the plane ride down, Scott revealed the rich guys were homosexuals from Canada - one very wealthy old guy, and one younger, but financially-successful companion.  I'm not interested in the so-called "gay" life at all, but it was too late to get off the flight.  The gay "couple" were polite enough and not at all intrusive.  They didn't try to advance their sexual orientation on me.  But Scott seemed all to friendly with them. 

Acapulco itself was interesting, with some very nice places to visit, including the cliff divers, and some nice beaches.  One of the beaches had waves that would come in and tower over you - maybe ten or twelve feet.  I would follow the water-line down a fairly steep incline as the surf receded, then run like hell back up the beach to keep from being crushed by the towering incoming surf.  Once I got caught with a big wave about halfway up the beach, and I could feel the undertow dangerously tugging at my feet. 

Things came to a head at a dinner one evening.  Scott had admitted that he had some sexual encounters with the homosexuals.  I was already uncomfortable with the homos, and now I was uncomfortable with Scott.   One of the girls sitting near me (there always seem to be one or more girls seeking my company) asked me if Scott and the other two gentlemen were interested in meeting some girls.  I told her they were all "maricones" (Spanish for "queer").  She asked them in English "You are queer?" 

Well, that sort was the straw that broke the camel's back.  The homos didn't like the term "queer."  We had a mutual parting of the way.  I went to a room with the girl, and that night I booked a flight back to Mexico City.  Scott begged me not to leave, but I told him I just wasn't comfortable with his new friends and lifestyle.

 ~ ~ ~

I returned to the US, and went down to New Orleans to find work, hoping to make a lot of money before marrying Maria.  I found a job just outside New Orleans in Kenner, Louisiana.  The company, Walker-Jones Diesel Electric, was a start-up that bought junked train engines, rebuilt them, hooked them up to a generator, and sold them to the oil industry.  Lynn Walker was the chief operating officer, and Jones was a silent partner funding the start up.  They already had orders for the equipment they were building.  I was hired as the first engine was under re-build. 

Lynn Walker was an electrical engineer in his fifties or sixties, with three fingers missing on one hand due to an industrial accident.  He designed the electrical interfaces for the generators, which were built at another location.  The company was basically outdoors, with a single, large, high-bay tin shed where the engines were rebuilt.  It was summer, it was hot, and humid.  We worked twelve hours a day, seven days a week.  The company furnished us overalls to wear over our clothes.  But they made it all that much hotter and sweatier (if that's a word.)  All you had time for was to make a sandwich in the morning, a shower in the evening, and after you ate dinner, you were so tired, all you wanted to do was sleep.  

The train engines were huge, twelve-cylinder diesels that had been scrapped by the railroads.  The engine block was about twelve feet long, six-feet wide, and eight feet tall.  The piston head alone weighed one-hundred pounds and it was so big you could barely put your arms around it.  I could carry one on my shoulder fairly easily.  Everyone else put them on a dolly to move them.  The old engines were completely stripped down and all new components installed.  My job was a helper - which meant do whatever I was told, such as cleaning engine parts and helping any of the skilled labor that needed help.

While Walker was on site quite a lot, his foreman, Earl Penny, who was a master mechanic, ran the shop, as well as assigned jobs to everyone.  Earl had a son named Ricky that also worked there.  Ricky was eighteen then, and other than appearing anemic and slight of build, the only other thing notable about him was his girlfriend, Cheryl.  I was the only worker with any college at all.  All the rest were tradesmen -- welders, mechanics, tool drivers, or roustabouts - all with years in the oil exploration business. 

When I first started working at Walker-Jones, I stayed in a truck stop, which rooms on the second floor.  The bathroom was shared.  After a week, I found a run-down motel a few blocks down the road on Airport Road - well within walking distance, so I didn't need a car.  The motel was a wooden frame structure with asbestos shingles on the side -- probably built well before World War II.  Renting by the day, it would have been too expensive, but by the month it was reasonable enough.  It wasn't big, but it had a kitchenette, a big bed , some chairs, a table, and a TV.  And, of course, a private bathroom, with a shower, but no tub.  

Ricky asked me where I was staying. so I showed him.  He surprised me by bringing his girlfriend, Cheryl over.  Cheryl was a nice looking girl - a pretty face and nice figure - much to my liking.  I thought maybe Ricky brought her over because he wanted a place to have sex with Cheryl.  But he soon was passed out on the bed from bottle of booze he was drinking.  So instead, Cheryl and I became intimate.  In fact, that first night, I woke up in the morning with Cheryl sleeping naked next to me, and Ricky on her other side next to the wall - still out from his binge drinking.  It was already time to get to work, or otherwise I might have climbed on top of her again.  As it was, I woke the two of them, and they scrambled to get dressed.  Ricky took Cheryl home, and I left for work. 

After that, Ricky's dad, Earl, called me "Stud."  I never really ever understood their casual attitude toward sex.  Maybe that was the way Ricky wanted it, because he seemed to make excuses for Cheryl and I to be alone together on a number of occasions, including suggesting that Cheryl and I shower together.  That was OK with me, as I didn't see any negatives about Cheryl, and I wasn't being disloyal by hiding anything from Ricky. 

Cheryl seemed to genuinely like Ricky, and the two talked of getting married.  Yet neither Ricky nor Cheryl had one qualm about her making out with me.   It was a if she had the best of two worlds -- a guy she wanted to marry (Ricky), and a guy she liked making love to (me).  And Ricky also seemed satisfied with the arrangement -- a girl he wanted to marry, and a friend who could keep her satisfied, because he couldn't.  But that wasn't something I would have reciprocated - I would have never shared my woman with anyone. 

That went on for several weeks.  Ricky would ask me to take Cheryl places.  I actually met her family.   But eventually Ricky and Cheryl broke up.  Ricky stopped working at Walker-Jones, and I didn't see Cheryl again.  I kind of missed her.  I wasn't in love with her, but she was very pleasant to be around, and lovely to make love to.   

 ~ ~ ~

One of the skilled workers on site was a Cajun, a welder called Frenchie.  I asked him how he learned to speak French, and he replied the better question was how he learned to speak English, since few people in his family spoke any English at all.  Frenchie was about my age.  He came on site a little before my brother, Clint, came down to work for the summer.  I learned quite a lot about welding from Frenchie, but becoming a welder wasn't in the cards for me.  

Lynn Walker had learned that I was an engineering student, and had some drafting experience.  So he pulled me out of the yard, and set up a drafting table in the shop.  My assignment was to draw up the equipment we were manufacturing.  The drawings would be used as display material for prospective clients.  I was making exploded views of the equipment.  It was physically less demanding work than the yard, and I had a higher status, though no additional pay.  

My brother, Clint, was an electrical engineering student going into his senior year.  I convinced him to come down and work during his summer vacation.  He and Lynn Walker seemed to hit it off well.   I don't think my brother had to work too hard.  Walker took him around with him, explaining how all the electrical equipment worked.  It was as if Clint was Walker's apprentice and protégé. 

The three of us, Clint, Frenchie, and I, also hit it off well.  Frenchie suggested we throw in together and rent a nice apartment.   The place we chose was too expensive for any one of us by ourselves, but together it would be only a little more than we were paying separately for motel rooms.  It was a really nice, large apartment in a fairly new, all brick building, fully furnished, with wall-to-wall carpeting, three big bedrooms with walk-in closets, central air conditioning, and a really nice kitchen with all new modern appliances.  It was the at that time the most modern place I had ever lived in, and the first time I ever lived in a place with central air conditioning. 

When I wasn't drawing up anything inside the shop, I would wander around the yard learning how to operate the heavy equipment.  I learned how to operate a truck-mounted "cherry picker," which was a hydraulic crane with a sliding boom extension.  It had out-riggers on the side that could be extended to stabilize the crane.  I started off as a swamper on the cherry picker, which meant I was the one to pull out the out-riggers and screw them down, as it was a manual job -- not hydraulically operated.  I only needed to be shown once how the controls worked, and from then one I operated the cherry picker by myself.

I also learned how to operate a cable-and-drum type conventional crane.  It was also truck mounted, but had a conventional fixed, trussed boom.  It wasn't hydraulically operated.   Instead it had levers that engaged brakes and clutches on drums that wound up and released the cables.  It took a lot more skill to operate.  I was operating this crane, unloading some steel trusses off a flat-bed delivery truck for a new shed, when Walker came out and started yelling at me to move faster.  I yelled back that I didn't want to move faster for fear of injuring someone or damaging the steel trusses.  That escalated into a shouting match between us that culminated in me quitting, and he firing me. 

 ~ ~ ~

I wasn't out of a job more than a few days before finding a better job a little closer to New Orleans.   It was a surveying job with Offshore Surveyors, who contracted with oil companies for surveying services - primarily drilling barge relocations out in the Gulf of Mexico.  I had completed my surveying courses at college, and could operate a theodolite (a precision optical instrument for precisely measuring angles.)  I was hired on as an instrument man.

I now needed a vehicle to get around.  So I found a '57 DeSoto car for about $300 that seemed to run OK.   It was one of those monster-finned beasts put out by Detroit in the late 50's. It had a push-button control for the automatic transmission.  It only got about 13 miles per gallon, but gas was cheap back then.  The car was only about seven years old at the time.  But cars back then depreciated in value very fast.  Most were so poorly made they were ready for the junkyard by  then, but the DeSoto was in good enough shape.

By then, it was the end of the summer.  Clint had gone back to school, and Frenchie had also quit and moved out of the apartment.  So I moved to another apartment in New Orleans proper -- off of St. Charles Ave, near City Park and Tulane University.  It was one of those older, ante-bellum, but extremely well-built and maintained, large wooden two-story houses with high, steeply gabled roofs that made the building much taller.  It had a covered, outside stairway leading to the apartment on the second floor.  So I didn't have to disturb the owner downstairs with my comings and goings.  The apartment was fully furnished, and had two bedrooms, a living room, bathroom, and kitchen - a very comfortable place - not as large and modern as the prior apartment. but nice nevertheless, and much more affordable for me by myself.  

I wasn't there but a few weeks when Bobby Hancock, my former dorm-mate at Louisiana Tech, and fellow traveler to Mexico, showed up.  I don't know how he knew where I was in New Orleans, but it was a pleasant surprise, and he was interested in sharing the apartment with me.  He had just quit school, and wasn't going back.  He moved in and found a job in New Orleans.  Rather than put him on the lease directly, I just had him pay half the rent cost directly to me.

Offshore Surveyors was a family-run business.  The operating head of the company was an old guy - Mr. Armstrong, fairly pleasant to work for and easy to get along with.  His wife apparently fronted the money for the business, and was the secretary and treasurer.  She was a bitch to work for.  Fortunately. I didn't have to interface with her much. 

Armstrong had retired as the chief of the surveying department of one of the larger oil exploration companies in New Orleans.  The company he retired from decided to outsource their surveying needs because there wasn't enough work to keep an in-house staff busy all the time.  There were some other oil exploration companies also outsourcing their surveying needs, so Offshore Surveyors had a ready-made client pool, and we kept fairly busy. 

Offshore Surveyors had an employment contract that required us to be on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week.   That meant I could not be more than four hours away from a phone at all times.  If I was going to be somewhere else for longer time, I had to call in where I could be located.   In return, we had a guaranteed minimum salary, whether we worked or not. 

My first project with Offshore Surveyors was laying a pipeline across the Mississippi River down around Venice, Louisiana, which was about the end of the road - as far as one could drive down river.  When we arrived in Venice, and stepped out of the car, a horde of giant mosquitoes descended upon us, and I must have lost a least of quart of blood right then and there.   We set up our instrument on the other side of the river, and worked in eight hour shifts out of a tent.   I must have used three bottles of insect spray in one eight hour shift to keep the bugs off.  I'm not sure which was worse -- sucked dry of blood by mosquitoes, or poisoned by mosquito repellant. 

The actual assignment for us was to keep the pipeline laying equipment on its designated permit line, and to survey its precise location as it was buried.   Pipelines are completed in sections that are welded together.  The sections of the pipeline crossing the river were also encased in concrete -- to better protect them, and also to weight them down so they sank to the bottom of the river.   It was a twenty-four hour a day operation.  It doesn't take a long time to just lay a pipeline down.  But it does take awhile to bury it in a river like the Mississippi.  The permit to cross the river required the pipe to be buried fairly deep under the river bed.   That was to keep the pipe from being uncovered from scouring during high river flooding, or ship's anchor from snagging it.  

 ~ ~ ~

Being a survey instrument man is fairly easy work, if you knew what you were doing.  The downside was that of necessity you had to be stationed in a location with a line of sight, which inevitably meant being exposed to the weather, which seemed to always be at an extreme -- either too hot and buggy, too cold and windy, or rain and lightening.  At least out in the Gulf, there were no brush lines to clear.   After the pipeline job, all my other projects were offshore - either relocating a drilling barge, or precisely locating where a well was actually drilled.

When you were out on the Gulf, you couldn't run a survey chain ( a 100-foot metal tape) from one location to another to measure distance.  The only way to measure distance over water then was to triangulate from known points.  We always had at least two theodolites on known points, and sometime a third point if it was available, or the angles were small.  One of the important things to know were the precise geodetic coordinates of each well head, platform, or structure in the Gulf.  From there, you could always extend your position by triangulation. 

We followed the same procedure as a geodetic survey - turn an angle six times to the right, and six times to the left.  Then average the angle turned.  Despite the apparent precision in the angle so averaged, the target you were focusing on through the theodolite was always swaying to and fro,  So was the platform your instrument was set up on.  So you also had to estimate the center of the sway observed to center the vertical cross hair in the instrument.  Not only that, but each angle turned had to be within a certain error tolerance of the last angle turned.  After you do this for awhile, you get to a point that you can calculate rather easily in your head where your next measurement should settle.  

Being an offshore surveyor was mostly boring.   There was a short car ride to get to the office, then a long car ride of several hours to get to the the boat.  Then hours, and sometimes days, on the boat to get to your survey station.  Then more hours of waiting for the second instrument man to get to his survey station.  It only took at most fifteen minutes to set up the theodlite, and maybe five minutes to turn all your angles.

The boat we usually rode was a converted fifty-plus-foot shrimp boat.  It was big enough to house twelve people and carried a two or three man crew consisting usually of the captain and the cook, and sometimes a mechanic. It was diesel-powered, and fairly sea-worthy.  The boat was equipped with radar and We often were out in twenty-foot seas (wave height - trough to crest).  Our contract didn't require us to work in seas over six feet.  But usually we worked in seas up to twelve feet.   

We usually fielded a survey party of four or five -- three or four instrument-rated men, and a party chief.  One of the party usually ran continuous position calculations and error checking, one person coordinating with the client's representative, and the party chief keeping an overview on the entire survey operation.  The client was restricted to his federal government-issued lease area, and going outside the lease limits could have serious consequences, such as having to abandon his drilling operations, and suffering heavy fines.  The survey crew had a heavy responsibility to advise the client accordingly, and be correct on positioning and repositioning drilling barges.   

We had two-way radios to communicate with each other -- big bulky units with a big bulky battery.  The radio equipment was in a carry-bag, and about as heavy as the cased theodolite instrument and tripod.  When the boat came up to a drop-off point, usually unmanned platforms or well heads, you had to hold your radio equipment in one hand and your theodolite case and tripod with the other hand, and step onto the docking platform while the boat was heaving up and down with the waves.  You had to have firm footing, quick reflexes, and good balance to pull it off.  If you miscalculated or slipped, you could lose several thousand dollars of equipment, or even lose your life.  If the seas were heavy, I would usually jump off as the boat was moving downward, rather than upward -- so if you fell backwards, you would fall back into the boat, and not be crushed by the boat.  

The Gulf was never calm.  There was always some wave and wind action going on.  Sometimes the seas (waves) were one to three feet, which was considered calm, and jumping off from the boat to the platform was relatively easy.  But sometimes the seas were well over six foot, and it was up to you whether you were going to attempt to step off the boat onto the docking deck on the platform   

I called it a docking deck, but you really couldn't tie up to it in heavy seas.  A better name for boat access would be "landing."  It was usually just a two or three foot by six foot steel grating attached to the structure above the water line, but below the main deck of the structure.  If it was a well head, the main deck might only be six foot by six foot, and maybe twenty feet above the water surface.  If it was an old drilling platform left in place, the main deck might be fifty or one hundred feet above the water line. 

If the platform was actively drilling, then usually there was a small electric crane with a personnel basket that was lowered down to the boat.  The personnel basket consisted of a ring for your feet and a cargo net to hold on to.  You placed your equipment inside the ring and your body on the outside of the ring and cargo net.   The crane operator would time the boat heaving in the waves so that he lifted off just as the boat hit its high point on the waves.  That way you wouldn't be crashing into boat on the next wave.

The boat captain would always approach the landing point from downwind or down current.  That was so if the engines failed, the boat would be moved away from the structure, and not crash into it -- which might damage both the boat and the structure, as well as maybe injure or kill someone.  It took a lot of skill to keep that fifty-foot boat close enough to the landing point to jump off, but just far enough off the structure not to be hitting it.

 ~ ~ ~

Along about the end of September, and into early October a hurricane formed in the Gulf of Mexico, heading for Louisiana, and all operations in the Gulf had had shut down.  I took that downtime opportunity to drag my '57 DeSoto, which wasn't running, up to Shreveport, Louisiana, to my father's used car lot.  He had a '55 Lincoln without any title that someone had traded to him for some used car parts.  Without a title he couldn't sell it, nor even drive it.  Another reason he couldn't drive it was that the battery was missing.  I had a car that wasn't running either, but at least it was titled in Louisiana, and he would be able to sell it.  So I traded my '57 DeSoto for that untitled '55 Lincoln. 

At that time, the state of Mississippi was not a title state.  It was, in fact, a haven for car thieves to bring in out-of-state stolen vehicles to dispose of.  We did not have instant title searches or inter-connected computers in those days.  So I put the Desoto's battery in the '55 Lincoln, and drove it over to Mississippi, made out a fake bill-of-sale, and got a highway-use registration certificate and tag, which is all the state of Mississippi issued,  With that, I drove back to Louisiana, and got a Louisiana title, license, and tag.  

In the meantime, my dad had started tearing down the engine in that '57 DeSoto.  He said the pistons were so frozen up, it took him a week of coaxing to break them loose.   It appeared that  someone had put sugar in the gas tank.  On learning that, I bought a locking gas cap to make sure that didn't happen to the Lincoln.

The Lincoln needed a little more than just a battery.  The exhaust pipes were corroded and one side had a big hole in it.   The brakes were also leaking fluid.  It worked well enough to drive it back to New Orleans after the hurricane had dissipated.  And plenty of work after the hurricane kept me too busy out in the Gulf to get the car fixed.

I told my mom and dad, who were separated and living apart, that I was going to marry Maria, and I showed them a photo of her.  My mom just said she hoped we would be happy.  But my father advised me not to marry her.  I asked him why, and he just said he didn't think she would be happy living in the US.  Well, I was long past listening to my parents for advice, so I just said I was marrying her anyway.

The hurricane came and went, and I drove the Lincoln down to New Orleans,  Summer morphed into Fall, and Fall morphed into a very early winter.   You might think that winter out on the Gulf would be balmy and mild.   But I am here to report that when those cold, northern winds come blowing down, it was brutally cold.  Being a surveyor, you are totally exposed to the wind, and the dampness over the water allows that cold to penetrate right through your clothing and chill you to the bone.  There is nothing on the water to slow the wind down, and you get the full fury and chill of it. 

The coldest I have ever been was out on a gas platform in the Gulf during one of those blowing northerners.  It was so cold we were rotated in every three hours.  Even then, it was so cold, I lit a fire on the gas platform (which was forbidden, because of the potential to cause an explosion) to keep us from freezing.  Whichever side you turned to the fire was so close, holes burned in the cloth, while the opposite side was freezing -- so we were frozen on one side and singed on the other.        

 ~ ~ ~

Along about the third week of December, I decided it was time to head for Mexico, and Maria.  So I asked Offshore Surveyors for a leave of absence so I could go down and marry her and bring her back.  Armstrong said OK.  I asked for a letter of reference, which I would need to show that I was gainfully employed when it came time to get a US visa for Maria.  Armstrong's wife wrote a letter and put it in a sealed envelope.   I left New Orleans with about $700 dollars in my pocket.  There would be a payroll check waiting for me when I got back, since our payroll checks weren't issued until a week or so after the work period covered. 

The trip down to Mexico wasn't without incident.  The first thing that happened was the part of the driver-side exhaust pipe fell off, and the un-muffled engine exhaust was making one hell of a racket.   It wasn't to bad when the engine was idling, but really got loud when I gave it the gas.  A Texas Highway patrol stopped me for the noise, but only gave me a warning ticket.

About the time I got to Brownsville, Texas, on the border, the brakes were leaking fluid badly.  I was having to throw the automatic transmission down to low to slow the car down, and then pump the brake pedal like mad to pump up enough pressure to brake.   It was a weekend and there was nowhere to get repairs.  I look around Brownsville for another '55 Lincoln to "trade," but saw nothing.  

I crossed the border at Brownsville, Texas, went through Mexican immigration, and on through Matamoros.  About half way to Ciudad Victoria the brakes on the car went out completely, and I could not stop no matter how hard I pumped the brakes.  I was going down a pretty steep incline when I saw a Mexican bus pull over and stop on the road about a half mile ahead to let some passengers off.  I took my foot off the accelerator, but the car wouldn't slow down.  I could feel my heart jump and begin to race a little.  I shifted the automatic transmission into a lower gear, and the car started slowing from the engine drag.  Then the bus ahead started up and moved on ahead of me.

A little further ahead I went up a steep incline and crested a ridge.  Then the car started down the ridge on the other side.   A heard a thumping noise from the passenger side of the car, which got louder and louder.   I threw the transmission down in to low gear, but I couldn't get slow enough.  I then through the transmission into reverse, and the car slowed way down, and I heard something pop in the transmission,  I saw a place to pull off the road safely in the dirt, and the car finally stopped. 

I got out of the car to see what it was that was making so much racket, and discovered the front wheel lugs had loosened, and the lug holes on the wheel had been deformed, allowing the wheel to wobble.  I checked the trunk for the spare and discovered it was flat.  It was maybe four O'clock in the morning, and I was contemplating what to do when a Mexican Tourist Aid truck came up and stopped to see what was the matter.

The Tourist Aid guy help me load the flat spare tire into his truck, and he took me into Ciudad Victoria, where I dropped the spare tire at a shop for repair.  By that time it was around eight AM, and I made my way over to Maria's house. 

 ~ ~ ~

Maria's mom gave me some 'heuvos rancheros' (fried eggs with a spicy tomato sauce) for breakfast.  We talked about Maria and I getting married.  Later in the day I met one of Maria's brothers, Renato, about my age.  At first I heard him warn Maria "Cuidado con este gringo" (Watch out for that foreigner.)  But after he learned I was there asking to marry Maria, he gave me a warm welcome and an Mexican abrazo (a male to male hug).

later on I met Maria's oldest brother, Emilio.  He was about six years older than I, and a graduate mechanical engineer with a fairly good executive position with a group of companies in Mexico with American ties.  He and his wife suggested Maria and I wait until I graduated before marrying.  They reasoned that then we wouldn't have to struggle with school and supporting a wife, and maybe children.  

But I argued it was better for Maria and I to struggle together, and that doing so would make our bond stronger.  I didn't say it, but I needed to be married - to be grounded, to keep me from drifting off to the wild side.  Maria also wanted to go ahead with the wedding.  Maria's grandfather, who was a full-blooded Christian Arab from Lebanon, ask why she wanted to marry me, because I didn't know how to sing or play the guitar.  (Well, what do you expect from a man pushing ninety?)  It was decided that we could go ahead with the wedding.

I got a room in a cheap hotel for the night.  The next day, Renato and I took the repaired spare tire back to where I had left the car.  It didn't appear that anyone had bothered it while it had been sitting there for two days.  We took off the damaged wheel and put the spare on, and then drove it to a shop in town.   I got the brakes fixed, and it took some looking, but we finally found a replacement for the damaged wheel.  I also got a temporary fix on the exhaust. 

But the transmission had a broken low band, which also took out the reverse gear.  There wasn't any shop in town that had the parts to repair it.  Fortunately, It didn't affect the drive gear, and in a automatic transmission, it didn't matter because the variable hydraulic coupling also acted to ease the car from a low ratio into a higher gear.   It did mean, however, that I always had to park so I could pull out forward, as I wouldn't be able to go backwards except by pushing it by hand. 

Maria and I and her family started checking on setting up the wedding.  Mexico at that time required everyone to first get married in a civil ceremony.  That was the official, state-recognized marriage ceremony.  It was then customary for Catholics to have a second ceremony in the church.  These two ceremonies were usually scheduled to occur on the same day.

It was then I found out that I would need to go to Mexico City to get a permit to marry Maria (because I was a foreigner.)  I wanted to take the bus, but Renato and a friend of his, Felipe, wanted to go with me and drive the Lincoln to Mexico City.  Against my better judgment, Renato, Felipe, and I set off for Mexico City in the '55 Lincoln. 

 ~ ~ ~

The drive through the mountains to Mexico City was long and arduous.  The road was comprised of steep inclines, and hair-pin turns, as well a full of heavy-laden trucks, busses, and in general slow-moving traffic.  Many parts of the road were under construction.  About two hours into the trip, I inadvertently hit a pile of sand in the road that a construction crew had deposited.  It rocked the Lincoln up on its side on two wheels to almost a 45-degree angle.  I came down ok, and at first it didn't seem anything was wrong. 

But as we came into a small town, and I pushed on the brakes, there was nothing there.  I pumped the brakes, but absolutely nothing.  We weren't going very fast, a little more than a walk, but we were going down a mild decline.   We all stuck our feet out the doors to try to stop the car, but it was just to massive for us.  Then I saw a side street that had had a slight uphill incline and turned into it and the car came to a stop.

I maneuvered the car over to a flat spot well off the street, and Renato, being a mechanical engineering student, started looking for where the problem lay.  we could see brake fluid all over the rear passenger-side wheel, but no where else.  I had some tools in the trunk, and Renato proceeded to remove the wheel, then pulled the split axel completely out of the rear axel housing.  

That was an unnecessary step, because I saw immediately on inspection of the rear brake that the return spring had fallen off its pegs, allowing the brake piston to move too far and leak all the fluid out.  So I set the return spring correctly,  Renato put the  split axel back in its housing and bolted everything back in place.  Then we put brake fluid in and bled the air out.  And we were good to go. 

But after that harrowing experience, I tested the brakes frequently to make sure we had brakes.   I can testify that few things put your heart up in your throat as pushing on the brakes on a steep, winding mountain road, and finding no brake pressure.  I used to have nightmares before that experience of going down a mountain with no brakes.  I'm sure that was just a symbolic subconscious warning of letting my life be reckless and out of control.  After the actual experience happening twice - once on the mountain going into Ciudad Victoria, and again on the way to Mexico City, I never again had any nightmares about it.

 ~ ~ ~

Shortly after sundown, a dense fog descended on the road, and we barely could safely drive more than five or ten miles an hour at best, and often were moving at a crawl, barely able to see the road three feet ahead.  I was getting tired, so I let Renato drive most of the way in the night, while I slept in the back seat.   The distance from Ciudad Victoria to Mexico City was only about 300 miles as the crow flies.  But by road it is almost 400 miles.  In the states, that would be at most an eight-hour drive, but It took us a good twelve hours or more. 

When we finally arrived in Mexico City, it was daylight.  We made our way to the proper Mexican government office by trial and error.  The office staff had pretty much disappeared because of the coming Christmas holidays.  And we were told it was too late to process any permit.  We were walking away when one of the office girls ran up to us and told us for a fee of two-hundred pesos, she could get the permit for us.  Renato got really angry that I would have to pay what amounted to a bribe.   But I was more sanguine about it and gave the girl two-hundred pesos,  She returned in about twenty minutes with the permit.

A week later, we were back in Ciudad Victoria.  I got very cheap room from Felipe's parents.   It was at one time a hotel with many rooms, each with a private bathroom.  But none of the toilets in the rooms worked anymore, except one shared toilet in the main house.   It wasn't ideal, but it was cheap.  And I needed to save my money as much as I could.  As it was, I was running low fast. 

With the government permit, The wedding details had been firmed up for the civil ceremony, but the church ceremony had run into a snag - the priest was refusing to marry us - because I wasn't Catholic.  Renato and Filipe, unbeknownst to me, went to the priest, and threatened him with the notion that I would beat him up if he didn't agree to marry Maria and I.  I didn't really give a rat's ass if we got married in the church or not.  And I would have never threatened a priest.  But the priest did agree to marry us, but not give us mass. 

Everybody seemed happy with that, and the wedding details were set.  Well, almost set.  Everything was going to cost more money than I had.  So I sat down with Maria and her family and pulled out my cash, and told them that it was all I had, and we would still have to have some left to go to Mexico City to get a visa and drive to the US.  I argued for just a small civil ceremony,   But the family was set on a big wedding.  Emilio had agreed to pay for it, so I couldn't really object.  

So we got married in the civil ceremony by the early afternoon, and in the evening had the church ceremony.  And long into the night all the many, many family members and relatives partied and celebrated.  Maria was a virgin, and she didn't want to be "deflowered" in her house, or even in her home town.  Her mother urged her to go with me to a nice hotel, but Maria was reluctant.  So I kissed her understandingly, and I went back to my hotel room alone.

The next Morning Maria and I set off for Mexico City in the '55 Lincoln.  The trip was long, but otherwise uneventful (thank goodness.)  I found a reasonably-priced hotel in Mexico City.  This was the first time for Maria and I to be alone together.  All other times before, we were always chaperoned.   Before, We were allowed to kiss, and sometimes, when a back was turned, we snuck a passionate embrace.  But that was about all. 

In the hotel room, the first time was kind of difficult.  Maria was all apprehensive about being impaled on a large, painful object, and afraid of maybe bleeding to death.  I undressed her and sensed her fear and apprehension.  I laid her down on the bed and caressed her as I crawled over her, entering her slowly, trying to be gentle.  She was whimpering and cringing from the pain of her hymen ripping apart.  I was about half way in when she asked me, crying - "How much more?"  I showed her with my hands spread apart about twelve inches - "This much more."  And then she burst out sobbing. 

That was really mean of me, because I was almost all the way in by then.  I felt really guilty climaxing by myself, with her in pain.   But by the second time we made the next morning, she was tolerating it better.   The second night she was feeling no pain, and beginning to like it.    

By the third day, US Embassy re-opened, and we went together to ask for a US visa for her.  Being next to the US, Mexican spouses of American citizens had special expedited rules for spousal immigration visas.  There was no specified waiting period, but there was a queue of applicants, and the US Embassy personnel advised us it would take three months or more to process the application.   They advised us we could get next day service at the US Consulate in Tampico. 

So we checked out of the hotel and set off immediately for Tampico.  From Mexico City, Tampico was about two-hundred miles, as the crow flies, or two-hundred fifty miles by road.  We made Tampico by evening. I found a cheap hotel to stay in, but Maria didn't like the place - and worse, didn't want to make love there. 

The next morning we found the US Consulate office, and in less than an hour there, I had all the forms filled out.  I opened the envelope that Offshore Surveyors gave me that was supposed to contain a letter saying I was gainfully employed.  Instead, the letter said I was a good employee and had voluntarily resigned.  I showed to the clerk, and said I guess it was useless, but I was going to quit anyway and go back to school and get my civil engineering degree.  The clerk handed the letter back to me, and told us to come back the next day to pick up the visa.  We didn't need a passport for Maria.  The Consulate was going to issue the "green card" directly to her.

The next morning, we reported to the US Consulate office.  The clerk, who was the same Mexican national we spoke to the day before,  asked me for thirty-five dollars, which was the application and processing fee,  I reached in my pocket, but I did not have that much on me.  The clerk looked at both of us - maybe like we were hopeless children.  Then he reached in his pocket, pulled out thirty five dollars, and attached it to the form. He had us sign the receipt for the VISA, and gave a package with the Visa in it, saying we had to give the package to US immigration at the border, and they would then keep some of the package, and return the rest, and the visa to Maria.  He also gave us a note with his name and address on it.  He said, in a very kind voice - "Send me the fee when you get it." 

And that is how Maria got her US "green card." 

 ~ ~ ~

With her "green card" packet in hand, Maria and I headed back to Ciudad Victoria.  Now that I was "family," Maria and I were given the back bedroom in her mother's house.  No more hotels for me, at least at her mom's house.  That afternoon in our "new" bedroom, I was caressing Maria and wanting to take her clothes off and make love.  She didn't want to do it because her mother was nearby.  So I pulled the crotch of her panties aside and entered her.  She almost fainted from the pleasure, and had her first orgasm.  Her panty binding was cutting into my member, though and it wasn't all that pleasant for me. 

From then on, Maria didn't want to get out of bed, and we made love several times, all night long and into the next morning, both of us reaching several orgasms.  She was very happy to orgasm, and I gather she told her mom and sisters how wonderful it was.  She also wanted to get pregnant right away, and so we took no precautions against it.  I also wanted us to have children right away,  Even if I didn't know exactly how I was going to support Maria, a baby only needs a mother's milk.

Then it was time to pack up and head for the US.  Maria packed up all her clothes in a couple of suitcases and a couple of boxes, some Mexican food stuffs, and a carton of Dos XX beer for me.  In no time at all we were at the border, and stopped for Maria to process through US immigration.  An hour later we were on the road again, heading towards New Orleans.  Twice, inside the US, at about twenty miles and fifty miles inside the US, Immigration agents stopped us and checked Maria's papers, but had no issues with them. 

I drove straight through to New Orleans, without stopping except for to fill up with gasoline, to eat, or to nap a half hour or so now and then, and once, on a deserted stretch of road, make love to Maria.   Maria crawled into the back seat and slept most of the way.             

We reached the apartment in New Orleans in mid morning.  we unpacked only some of our stuff, because we weren't going to be staying more than a day or so.   Bobby was at work, so we had the place to ourselves.  There was some food in the refrigerator, so Maria made us a lunch.  Then we both took a shower and jumped in the bed for a nap, and a couple afternoon delights.

Later in the evening, Bobby came home.  I told him I was going back to school, and he could have the apartment all to himself.  But Bobby was also planning on moving on, and would be leaving before the month was up.   I went downstairs, and gave the landlord the bad news.  But Bobby had already talked to him, and he already had a new tenant lined up.

 ~ ~ ~

I drove up to Shreveport and introduced Maria to my Mom and Dad.  My mom was pleasant enough, but my Dad was a little too friendly - like maybe more than a little bit enamored, as well as tipsy from drinking too much.  So my Dad was off limits as far as visiting with Maria again.  Otherwise the introduction went OK, considering Maria spoke no English.  Fortunately. by this time my conversational Spanish had improved considerably.

I called my brother, Clint, at the college, and asked him to look around for an apartment for Maria and I.  When Maria and I arrived in Ruston, Louisiana, where the college was, we met with Clint.  He told me I needed to apply for married student housing, right away to get on the waiting list - but there wasn't anything available presently.  He found us a suitable apartment in Downtown Ruston.  It was the second floor of an older wooden house. 

The great thing about this place was that the monthly rent was only thirty-five dollars.  I didn't have that much in my pocket just then, so Clint paid the first-month's rent for me.  A few days later, my last paycheck from Offshore Surveyors came in, and I has enough money to enroll in school, pay the tuition, and pay Clint back. 

A few weeks later, another check came in from Offshore Surveyors - for eight-hundred dollars.  That was back pay ordered by the US Department of Labor for unpaid overtime.  Someone in the company had complained about not being paid for overtime.  Some of the company thought it was me.  But I never made a complaint.   Some of the workers gave the money back.  But I remembered the useless "employment" letter Armstrong's wife gave me, so I kept the money.

A few months later, an apartment in the married student's housing became available.  These were old World War II family housing thrown up by the US Military for a training camp.  The training camp had been deactivated, and the family housing turned over to the college.  While they were old, and perhaps a little dilapidated, the were livable, and the rent was only ten dollars a month, including all utilities.  

There were a lot of Spanish-speaking students in college.  I introduced Maria to those that I knew personally.  The most important for Maria was a couple from Panama - Fernando and Estella Calvo.  They had two small daughters, Linette and Miriam.  They became our best friends, and Maria's lifeline in her strange new country.