Bobby J ...... lvan White

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Bobby J. Ivan White

I lived on a ranch close to Hearst Castle, far up San Simeon Creek. Going to school took over an hour by bus, two times a day. Bobby J. was the only other teenager who lived up that canyon. Naturally, Bobby and I were friends (actually, we had no choice). The problem was that Bobby could sometimes be a real flake. He usually invited me to his ranch when his parents were gone. I remember one time when Bobby invited me on a Saturday. That meant I didn't have to shovel out the chicken house. I should have been warned by the episode with the ranch pickup. Also, there was the time Bobby started the bus spitting contest. One time we missed the bus and spent night in the metal box-like city jail. Bobby was indeed a flake, but he was the only game in town for me. I walked the four miles to the ranch and found him in the barn. He was excited about a small cask and a' padlocked wooden box. The cask was black powder and the wooden box contained dynamite. The black powder burned brightly but the dynamite had magic appeal.

Bobby had the padlock key, but alas, there were no blasting caps.

He was disappointed, but he did give me a stick of dynamite.

As I walked home I thought of ways to explode the dynamite. The next day I showed the dynamite to my younger brothers. The dynamite was stubborn, we burned it, hit it with rocks and a hammer. We finally gave up and I took it home and put it in my clothes drawer. Eight months went by and spring cleaning arrived at the ranch. I was surprised when dad came out of our bedroom with the dynamite. He actually looked pale and there was an unpleasant look in his eyes. The stick looked all discolored and greasy as he asked where I got it. I tried not to look at the dynamite stick as I confessed my sins. He told me to walk down to the canyon and throw the stick into a thicket. If I dropped it, he warned me, it could blow up and me with it .. I carefully carried the stick to the canyon and threw it as far as I could. (I've always wondered if some animal took a bite and blew itself up.) Later, dad told me that old dynamite could be unstable and very dangerous. He also reminded me that I was the oldest and responsible for my brothers. Later that year he blew up a boulder

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with dynamite and it was scary. The next year our dad, the gypsy, moved on and I never saw Bobby again. Years later I took my family to Hearst Castle and Bobby's mother was there. She said Bobby had married a butcher's daughter and now owned the butcher shop. I just couldn't go to see that imaginative mind in a butcher's apron. It was far better to remember Bobby fondling that stick of dynamite, with that wild gleam in his eyes!