Exhibition Of Power

Above, Mitch and Armand with space shuttle test vehicle "Enterprise" at Edwards Air Force Base in 1977.

Clocking over another year in one's life causes a person to think back on past adventures or incidents (at least it does it to me). The following happened when I was 19 and living in Hawthorne, California. It came to mind this week.

I posted this back in 2005 at my high school alumni Feedback forum:

For the borrowed car story thread, here's one:

Cougar Mitch Geriminsky (HHS '72) borrowed his brother Les's (HHS '74) 1968 Chevy Bel Air. It was all souped up. One night in 1975, Mitch and I were driving home in it on Hawthorne Blvd. in Lawndale. We stopped at a signal near the Lawndale Pet Hospital. A guy in another souped-up car pulled alongside of us. Both drivers looked at each other and started revving up their engines. Suddenly, we get the red lights from a sheriff's car and both Mitch and the other driver were arrested for "exhibition of power" or some such. The officer told me to drive the car home. So I did. This was about 1:30 am. When I got home, I went to wake my parents up to tell them what happened. I was met with riotous laughter from both of my parents. They were both asleep and when I told them Mitch was arrested for "exhibition of power," they thought I meant that Mitch was arrested for exhibitionism. That's why they both started laughing. I ended up calling Mitch's dad and he had to go bail him out. The charge was later dropped, though. To his dying day, my Dad still laughed about that night.

Good times!