Life Of Brian
1988
The Great Storm of 88
Who remembers it? It was termed "The Great Storm" of 88 by oceanographers because of the area that it formed. This was an 'extratropical' storm, and it formed in an area where extratropical storms usually decay rather than grow in intensity, according to an article out of Coastal Geomorphology. This storm hit landfall in our area on Jan. 17&18th. Meteorologists coined this storm as a "Bomb". The drop in pressure around this system was astounding. "Bombs", have at least a 0.7 millibar per hour drop in pressure. The great storm of 88 had a 16 millibar drop in pressure, in twelve hours! It was an anomaly for sure! The largest waves ever recorded near Channel Islands Harbor occurred during this storm. I really don't recall anything spectacular happening in the Ojai area from this event, however, I bet the Sevvies loved the rainy day. The eighth grade hit squad didn't operate in the rain! I honestly don't recall if any thugs in my class actually formed an eighth grade hit squad. I certainly would not have participated in anything closely related to picking on lowly seventh graders. I do remember not liking school all that much. P.E. was the highlight of the day for me, minus my time using the trough of course. There was also this big muscular kid who loved nothing more than to put kids to sleep using what he called a "Sleeper". He was an eighth grader and lucky for me, I was never his target. A 'sleeper' was a term used when you choked someone just to the point of them passing out. Then you'd let go and the victim would look like they were sleeping. Sometimes they'd flop around a bit. It was undoubtedly dangerous and when the teachers found out about it, they were adamant that the muscular kid refrain from these actions. We'd run almost every day, at least two laps. Some days the P.E. teachers would get a corn cob up their rear ends and make us run what they called the Rambo Run. I despised running if it didn't involve running after something or from someone. I didn't mind the Rambo run though. It gave us a chance to get off campus for a little bit. I would make the Eagles basketball team again. Our team was once again fairly decent. We'd have practices almost every day. When we did have practice, I'd just stay at school and one of my parents would pick me up and take me home afterwards. One evening however, my parents had a slight miscommunication about who was to pick me up. I sat outside waiting and waiting until it was getting fairly dark. There was another kid there luckily who was also waiting for his parents. His name was Randy. Randy happened to have ten cents and he gave it to me so I could call home. We did not have cell phones in 88. Nor did I ever carry money to use the pay phone on campus. If not for Randy, I probably would have died to the elements! lol. My parents were sitting at home after a long day of work and it finally dawned on them, hey! where's Brian at! It's getting dark. I was never worried actually. I knew they'd be by eventually to get me. It wasn't like I could walk home either.
Being a studly eighth grader was way better than being a Sevvie. No more hit squads, no more soap in our cakes. Aside from classes being really boring, I kind of enjoyed eighth grade a little bit. At the end of each day, I would go and wait for my bus to show up. My bus was the last one there it seemed like and so I'd be out waiting for a while after the last bell. One particular day, I witnessed a kid being bullied by another kid. They were both actually in the same grade! I don't know what it was about, but I couldn't stand any type of bullying. So, I intervened. Why wouldn't I have gotten involved right! I was a manly eighth grader! As I ran up to the bully-er, I went to push him away and he moved at the last second. This sent me hurtling towards a tree and I ended up falling down on to the ground. Now I was so mad that I couldn't even think straight. I quickly got up and tackled this kid. Once I had him on the ground I sat on top of him, his back against the ground, my face looking at his. I punched him one-time right square in the mouth. That's all it was. Nothing else happened. We both got on the bus and went our merry way. Unfortunately for him, he had braces. So, my one punch actually cut his lips up fairly good, and his mouth was bleeding quite nicely. I did not care in the least. He was bullying some poor kid who couldn't defend himself, and I stopped that from happening. The sugar on top of the cake was that this dumb kid was actually very mean to my future wife in seventh grade. I did not know my wife at that time, but the story came out after we had been dating for a while in the 12th grade. After hearing what he had done to her in class one day, I wish I would have punched him about seven more times. That incident would be the first of a few physical confrontations I'd have throughout my entire school career. I never got into a legitimate fight where someone actually tried to hit me back. I would however, experience being so mad that my ability to reason went right out the door, and violence ensued. Most of these incidents were somewhat justified. One I actually kind of feel bad about.
This year's family trip would take us to South Dakota. I think my parents actually took me out of school early for this trip. I remember bringing along a bit of schoolwork with me. I hated doing work at school let alone having to do it while everyone else was counting Antelope as we scooted across the interstate. Once again, we were in our car that didn't have A/C. I was sitting directly behind my dad who was driving. He was chewing sunflower seeds, and he had his window down so that he could spit out the shells. I just happened to be looking at him at the exact moment he went to spit out a shell. The wind actually blew the sunflower seed shell right back in to his lips! He didn't even have time to open his mouth any further. It just shoved right in between his tightly closed lips. lol. It was a one in a million occurrence for sure. We'd often listen to the band Alabama whilst traveling long days in the car. I'm not sure my mom cared for their music, but she tolerated it. Our relatives in South Dakota lived in a small little town. We'd swim in the community pool. We'd also go camping sometimes and of course we'd go fishing. I remember one night we all went to somebody's house and looked for night crawlers. These oversized worms were ideal for fishing. We stayed out at the river near Gettysburg on one such trip. My Uncle fell asleep in a recliner lawn chair and got severely sunburned. A very potent storm would come in one night and actually force us out of our tent and into the motorhome. The winds were very strong, and the motorhome felt as though it might tip over! The next day the fishing was even better. On the return trip home, our LTD would break down on us in the middle of Wyoming. We were east of Casper somewhere and my dad was actually hitchhiking to try to get into town to find a company that would tow our vehicle in for repairs. One of those big logging trucks actually stopped and just as he was climbing into the cab of the semi, my aunt and uncle showed up! They had left a little bit later then us. We had not discussed which way we were traveling home so it was of great coincidence that they just happened to be on the same interstate. My dad was not happy about hitchhiking and even less happy about leaving us alone on the interstate in our broken-down car.
Graduation day would come around before I knew it. It seems as though it wasn't all that hot on my day of commencement. The ceremony was in the morning so maybe that was the reason. Nothing sticks out in my mind about this graduation. I recall actually being kind of nervous about going to Nordhoff the following year. I wasn't planning on trying out for any of the sports teams. I figured I simply wasn't good enough to make any of the teams. I had become good friends with a kid named Laurence. His parents owned one of the Chinese restaurants in Ojai. I invited him to spend the night one time at my house up the Hwy. Little did he know, I planned for us to sleep out in the bushes at the end of our driveway that night. I had dug out a little spot just up from a drainage that was dry except for when it rained. When Laurence found out about this, he was a little concerned. His concern was turned to pure fright when it got dark. Every little noise sounded like a bear was approaching us when in actuality it was probably no bigger than a wood rat! He was a trooper and held out the entire night. My guess is that he probably remembers this event even to this day. On warm summer nights I would ride my bike around the campground. No helmet, no light. On one such occasion as I descended from the upper camping area to the lower, some dude decided it was a good idea to lay down in the middle of the road. Lucky for us both, his buddies were talking loudly standing next to him. If they wouldn't have been there, I would have totally run him over. Not only would I have hurt him, but I too would have gone catapulting off my bicycle on to the hard pavement. Did I stop riding my bike at night? Nope! It did make me think though. I'm sure I went about my rides a little more slowly and with more caution. It was fun being in the campground at night. My dad had told me that anyone standing around a campfire would be totally blind and not be able to see anything in the dark for a few seconds when looking away from the fire. This is totally true. I saw a lot of drunk campers rambling on about something or another sitting around a campfire. With nothing else but video games at home for entertainment, the campground was my entertainment. All of this hiking and biking and rock hopping up and down the creeks got me into really good shape. We had a woodburning stove in our house for heat. Lucky for us, we could just walk up the canyon and cut up trees that had fallen and were dead. There was an abundance of them for some reason. As the years went by, we'd have to go further and further up the canyon to find wood. While my dad would cut the trees with his chainsaw, I would load it all up in a wheelbarrow and haul it back up to the house. This distance of hauling was probably three football fields or so and at the very last section of the trail was a little hill. I'd have to get a run at this hill due to the weight from the wood. On the front of the wheelbarrow, surrounding the wheel, was a metal bar. This was there to protect the wheel, I guess? Well as I geared up to push up this last hill one day, that bar nosedived in the dirt and the wheelbarrow came to an abrupt stop! This is where I tested the notion that things in motion stay in motion! The wheelbarrow stopped, but my body continued forward, and I slammed my knees right into the back of the metal bucket of the barrow. It didn't hurt too bad. Just another injury to add to the list of many. Once I had finished hauling the wood back up to the house, I'd begin splitting it with an axe. All of this was very good weight training and improved my cardiovascular endurance. If I wasn't hauling wood, splitting wood, riding my bike, or hiking all over the place, I spent most of my remaining time playing video games. That time was very limited overall. I spent hour upon hour outdoors.
Home costs remained similar to 87's prices. The average cost of a home was around $140,000.00. The cost of a new car jumped up a couple of grand to $14,185.00. Models included the Ford Taurus, Escort, and the 1988 Ford E150. Honda made the CRX and the Accord to name just a few. Food costs. Let's start with something just about everyone loves... bacon. The price of bacon has increased 156% since 1988. One pound of bacon set you back $1.90 in 88. Keeping with percentages, gasoline prices have risen over 200% in the last thirty years! Gas in 88 averaged just 0.96 cents a gallon! Milk is one food related item that really hasn't gotten that much more expensive. Between 1988 and 2018 milk prices only rose 32% from $2.19 to $2.89 a gallon. In 2024 however, milk is now almost $5.00 a gallon.
In conclusion, 1988 was another fairly stellar year in my little world. Next year I'd enroll in Highschool and become a lowly freshman. The span of ten years which I have mentioned might be the best time in or lives, was quickly coming to an end. It never fails, the older you get, the more responsibilities you have, the more you tend to stress and worry about things. I absolutely loved where I lived. School wasn't too bad either. And I had a very supportive and caring family. Lucky indeed I was.
"In some ways, one's own family is the most oblivious. But what's so important about knowing? In the end, what helps you overcome obstacles isn't brains, but someone who will take your hand and never let you go. In the end, that's family. Even for heroes. The people they go back to in the end is family."
- Deok Sun
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