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%u00a9Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights ReservedHOW TO LEGALLY QUOTE FROM THIS BOOK90 Jack Fritscherto drive back alone. The sex talk hadn%u2019t much disturbed me. I ran into that all the time. I wanted to be alone to figure out Dempsey.I must have been driving slow because they passed me on the way back to town and called me the big hairy speed demon on the way to the beach in Mike%u2019s old Ford. It was Friday, so the beach was a lousy place to eat, because we couldn%u2019t eat meat even if it was a holiday weekend. Even Rip and Kenny ordered peanut butter from the hot dog stand that was playing John Philip Sousa march music, and we all kind of goofed off sort of singing, %u201cAnd the monkey wrapped his tail around the flagpole.%u201d%u201cYou don%u2019t eat meat?%u201d I asked.%u201cI have like enough,%u201d Rip said, %u201cto confess.%u201dThe sandwiches lay like a rock in my stomach.Two cute blonde girls in shorts and tops walked by. %u201cHi, Ripley,%u201d they said, running off, giggling in undisguised appreciation of his build and his face. He had what a priest should have.Rip and Kenny sloshed on into the water diving head first and splashing a group of pretty girls. I said I%u2019d better wait. A radio commercial jingled in my head. %u201cDon%u2019t go swimming alone, because you can%u2019t reach a phone. When you%u2019re in Davey Jones%u2019 locker, it%u2019s too late to call. So don%u2019t take chances. Learn all the answers. Learn swimming today at the YMCA.%u201dI was always treading water, alone, waiting, perfecting my backstroke, biding time for something. I was jealous of boys with red goatees who chewed peanut butter and jumped splashdown into lakes churning up the water, racing past my sidestroke with a freestyle Australian crawl.In the Ohio winter, I ached for summers in the sun, beaches, bongo drums, and a beatnik beard. But I was drowning in inhibition and obedience. I was going down for the third time with purity. I was a seminarian, a theological student, and certain things weren%u2019t mine to expect. Hell! Why couldn%u2019t I be the first beatnik priest? I rolled onto my back in the sand. I had more than all those other boys. I had something. Not everything, but something larger than life. I rose to my elbows. They were all wilder than me, the boys who bought girls Cokes in the park and lay with them on beaches. I had always adjusted to this social difference as my special lonely way of life. They could all change faces for each other to get what they wanted.I was pledged to stay constant. I spent my vacations with maybe one or two theological students from around Peoria, or was left alone with one of them, like Mike and I were now. We wore modest boxer trunks and swam together like little fish for protection. Sometimes we seminarians talked,