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CARNIVAL DEL MUNDO…

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A 1971 “FLASH-BACK”…

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When I was back in college, an old buddy from another Faternity and I would sometimes go hitchhiking on the weekends, just for the fun of it. We’d just pick a direction and go! On one such weekend trip, we were caught in a really bad storm on the Oregon Coast. Rain-drenched, we ducked for cover from the torrent of rain, in a little burger shop to get…what else?… a burger, Coke, and fries (a hamburger joint a few blocks away from the picture below, as I remember).

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An old man (in his 50’s) came in. As he entered, he saw us sitting there. Fixing his eyes on us, he walked over, with a really serious look on his face. This old guy began to talk to us. I’ll never forget what he said. He said… “Boys… I’m gonna tell you something. There’s something you should know. You need to be really careful about what you wish for in this life. Because you can have anything you want in this life. Anything at all! Riches…women…fame… whatever you want! You name it! Because if you want it bad enough…you’ll get it! Believe me…you’ll get it! But there’s one thing you better think about…” It seemed like this old guy was bursting at the seams to get this warning off his chest. It was like he had some sort of epiphany that shook him up so bad, that he had to warn somebody. But why us? Maybe we reminded him of himself, when he was our age. Who knows? Anyway, the man continued… “You better be sure you really want it. Because if you want it bad enough…yer gonna get it! Yep”, he said, “Yer gonna get it!”. And then…as abruptly as he appeared…he was gone, as it now seems! After this, we were left speechless. As I said, the man seemed to be speaking from his own experience. His eyes were round as saucers. Like he’d just seen a ghost! And he said it with such conviction, that we just sat there in silence.

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But the rain finally stopped, and we hit the road once again…forgetting all about that little encounter in that little Oregon Coast burger shop. Off to our next adventure!

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Depoe_Bay_shoreline_and_southerly_main_street wikipedia GNU license

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THE NEXT 8 YEARS…

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Well, to make a long story short, I left college in the third year, ‘just in the nick of time, before college left me’! Though we were from Salem, Oregon, my parents were now in Klamath Falls, Oregon. I went to work for my dad and mom, who had just started a buffet restaurant. And it was a raging success! A real ‘goose that could lay golden eggs! We were located a few blocks from the main highway from Reno and Vegas, to all points northward. Besides a healthy local trade we got tour buses galore from Oregon, Washington, and Vancouver B.C. carrying senior-citizens down to, and back from Reno for 3-day excursions. And Klamath Falls was the natural stopping point for lunch, for those tour-buses, and for all the other travelers. During the heaviest months we got maybe several hundred or more bus-loads a week. Well, the bus people as we called em, would spread out to the 3 or 4 restaurants in the shopping center. But we often got the bulk of them. Besides that, we got lots of travelers from that same highway, for lunch and dinner. So the point is…business was good! And life was good! And so was the money…good!

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HUGH BABY…

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As I said, the money was great, and before long, I had decided that money was the answer to my problems. I thought this world was a giant carnival. “I had bought a ticket to the stars”! The restaurant was my main supply of money.

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But beside that, I had a lot going for me in this world. I had various talents and advantages. On the weekends I played piano from time to time at local steak-houses/piano/dance bars. Well, I guess you could say… the world was my oyster.

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And the world seemed to challenge me, “Go for the gusto!”. That was the mantra-of-the-day. “Do ya think you got what it takes?”, was the unspoken challenge issued by so many of the worldly authorities. I looked at those of the world who seemed to be winners in life. I looked at guys like Hugh Hefner. “Man! That guy has it all!”, I thought to myself.

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Photo of Hefner courtesy Wikipedia & Alan Light. Click for link. .

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I saw money as being the key to my success. Money could buy for me those things that I thought desirable. It could buy houses, lands, travel, attractive women, security…and whatever pleasures and needs would get me through life.

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DRIVEN FOR SUCCESS…

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And so each day on my break, I would speed from the restaurant right down to the newspaper office, and get a newspaper direct from the press as soon as it rolled off the machine. Sometimes I would stand outside the back door of the newspaper office, tapping my feet, waiting for the first paper to come out. I wanted to be the first person in town to see what new fixer-upper house was for sale. I was driven. Real estate was my means of achieving wealth. It was something I understood. The concept was simple: buy a house at a low, low price and sell it at a higher price. Not to mention that with new paint, carpeting, and whatever else it needed, these houses brought an even higher price.

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MONOPOLY! That was the name of my game! And for a guy in his twenties, I was pretty good at at that game. I began buying houses on Baltic Avenue, and after a few years, I was buying stuff on…oh…maybe Park Place; well…uhh…Park Place as far as what little podunk Klamath Falls had to offer! (In jest, we referred to our little town as “Kalamity Flats”, in one or two songs we sang down at the clubs on the weekends. You know…songs like “Car Wash Blues”…by Jim Croce.

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“Well all I can do is-a-shake my head,

“You might not believe it’s true,

“That workin’ at this end of “Kalamity Flats”

“is an undiscovered Howard Hughes!…”

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(Jim Croce’s version says, “Niagra Falls” in place of our version…”Kalamity Flats”)

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But don’t get me wrong…Kalamity Flats…I mean Klamath Falls is a nice town! Nowdays, anyway. Snuggled next to the Cascade Mountain Range. Sportsman’s Paradise! Nature at her best! And anyway, it’s not the “shoot-em-up-and-drink-em-down-wild-west-town” that it once was.

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But I didn’t have time for all those things. I knew what I wanted! Wealth! And as I said, the world seemed just like a carnival; a “Carnival Del Mundo”, if you will. And I wanted to ride that “Ferris Wheel to the top”. And so I bought a ticket to the stars. Well, that’s what I thought. But now I found out it was really just a ticket to Hell!

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