Growing up on the edge of the Mojave Desert was not without dire dangers in the fertile, if not volatile, imagination of a teenage boy. Aside from all the obvious elements of terrifying fauna involving sharp and pointed things, there was another mysterious aspect that, to this day, still leaves me drooling and dumbfounded at the lack of answers. I lost pants there. Twice!

Beyond the normal dangers of Laundry Day in our house, which had a dryer populated with the usual gremlins, frizzards, and mugwort that made regular culinary use of my socks and underwear, it was something even more illusory that it ate my pants. . He didn’t live in our dryer, but as a 14-year-old boy, he was prone to satisfying my mother’s insistent curiosity by giving her the must-see inside the malicious dryer in question. And of course, to satisfy my own hormonal unbalanced reasoning and assessment, it was usually good for four or five other inspections in addition to my mother’s mandatory “suggestive” number. The machine did not produce pants, which was good because I didn’t remember putting them there, which is also good because my mother often accused me of the same thing, but I digress.

My missing pants had a more mysterious and other-dimensional look and, to my chagrin, their “disappearing into action” look never seemed to involve a chance encounter with Farrah Fawcett or Pat Benatar that I was sure they could both hear. my telepathic urges her person to ask for the carnal desires of a teenage boy. Ahem … some socks were sacrificed out of necessity to this fantasy, but in order to maintain my mother’s staunch Catholic sanity and my desire to avoid telling the sordid story to a priest in a small dark box with uncomfortable furniture, I felt that it was safer to do so. just quell my mother’s suspicions with the inevitable tales of nefarious cravings for cotton sagebrush in the dryer. Thank goodness he never checked under my mattress, although he also had a very good story prepared for that curious phenomenon that involved my brother.

The dilemma of the missing pants was never satisfactorily resolved, and while you were unable to convince my mother that she was not lying about her unknown whereabouts, I found it even more disturbing about the circumstances of her mysterious loss. Let me explain.

I grew up within the park boundaries of the Silverwood Lake State Recreation Area in Southern California in a unique transition zone where the San Bernardino Mountains seemed to be slowly devouring the westernmost edge of the Mojave Desert. The towns and villages closest to me, as I lived in the park’s employee residence area called Cedar Circle, were Crestline, about ten miles southwest of my home in the mountains, and Hesperia about 18 miles to the east, which in 1979 he was essentially nothing more than blue hair living in a few mobile home parks sprinkled sporadically around a slightly green blonde-colored nine-hole golf course. For added desert decor and entertainment, retirees had a Stater Bros. Supermarket, post office, and small airport that always caught my eye because I don’t recall seeing any planes in it. This, of course, required keen observation skills of which my father was prone to repeatedly point out my grave fault, although I did make a small appeal for my father’s approval by asking him for some for Christmas once. I was convinced that I never acquired these skills because almost every day I obsessively looked at myself in the bathroom mirror and never saw anything cute.

So it was in this scenario that I lost my pants. Again, twice, but not for not having tried a good, solid three times. But luckily for my butt, my dad’s belt never had to get over the explanation for a missing third pair. I don’t think he would have liked the answer anyway, as that region of my anatomy had a tendency to muscle relax in times of distress.

It was at this age, between the ages of 13 and 15, that the lost pants phenomenon occurred. The Cedar Circle residence area sat comfortably in a narrow valley about a quarter of a mile wide at the base between two ridge lines known as Cleghorn Mountain to the east and Cajon Mountain to the west and merged gently into a little geological slope. deep. bowl about a mile north in an area known as the Cleghorn Saddle. This area fascinated me to no end. I was called to it. Except for a small ranch outside the park boundaries in that area, there was really nothing there except poplar trees and yucca stalks with their tall tassels piercing and fluttering in the Santa Ana winds scented with sage and mesquite. I found myself on weekends riding epic high-adventure expeditions fortified with an old nap bag stocked with supplies for at least three days consisting of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a can of soda, a sling of my own invention and a mangy. Flannel shirt that I had refused to get rid of despite all my mother’s threats of double serving of beans.

After having spent the better part of 8 months thoroughly exploring this region and all its nooks and crannies and possible “secret places that were good for forts”, I came across a curious place that was only there twice. It was a particularly pleasant Saturday in May, that after having spent a good hour going up and down hills and valleys avoiding rattlesnakes and scorpions, that a glow from the distance caught my attention in the midday sun. Naturally, I was curious and, seeing that I was not overwhelmed with any form of adult supervision, I ventured to the bright place against the best wishes of the imaginary adult. When I got within a hundred yards of the bright spot, it turned out to be the sun shining on the rusted metal of a corrugated steel roof over a rough clapboard hut or shed that was surrounded by six other similar outbuildings. The buildings were separated by a narrow path that ran between two small buildings on the east side and three or four buildings on the west side. There was enough room to drive a small vehicle between the little shacks with about two feet on each side to spare if there were ever people stupid enough to build a road around here, but as it was, the potential for more stupidity was there as here. it was, the huts in question before me.

This place immediately struck me as strange because I had been here several times and never remembered seeing it. In my mind I called it Ghost Town because that’s what it looked like. Nobody was there. There was also a slight glow like when one sees a mirage on the far horizon. Against my better judgment, my curiosity prodded me like a stick in the back and I walked towards the neglected little town. I immediately found it very disturbing that there was no sound other than that of the wind. No Raven screamed and no Scrub Jays spat out their high-pitched croak of disapproval. It was just me and the strangely gleaming huts standing sadly in the blazing desert sun. He was about to enter one of the barracks that had a rickety door that swayed lazily in the breeze when a fun, illuminated blue sphere about ten inches in diameter slowly emerged from behind one of the sheds on the east side of the road. I stared at him in disbelief as he slowly meandered about four feet off the ground around each and every hut. As I stood at the entrance to the southernmost hut, the orb finished its strange patrol and headed towards me. My person did not like that at all. I had this sudden urge to get out of there when suddenly my forehead feels a sharp pain. I look up to see the bottom of my brother’s upper bunk just two inches from my nose from my own bed’s point of view. I was asleep ?!

I tell you in all seriousness that I had actually gone on a field trip to this strange little town. I had planned the hike to the area in question and told my mother my whereabouts if I didn’t return for dinner, which, of course, no adolescent has ever threatened with success. The confusion was setting in pretty quickly when I pulled my legs out from under the light blankets and began the second half of the mystery. I was looking at random for my pants, which in this situation, if normal, would have been equally randomly thrown on the floor next to my bunk, very close to the burning smell of my sneakers.

I found the sneakers, but my pants were nowhere to be found. I pulled out a pair of shorts, slipped them on, and began to undertake the first of several frustratingly fruitless searches for my pants that I was convinced were still somewhere in the house. I gave up after half an hour of searching and rearranging the furniture cushions. Also, my mother was getting upset and when she asked “what the hell was she doing?” I was immediately forced to tell her exactly what the hell she was doing, although the more I looked, the more convinced I was that she was doing it. not knowing.

This is the first of two nearly identical scenarios that unfolded two months apart in the early summer of 1981. So notoriously confusing can the legendary memory of teenagers be, I swear to you these events happened. It was after the second time that I took a good friend with me to show him this mysterious little Ghost Town and for the life of me I could never find him again, leaving my friend thinking he was a delusional Loon, although he was convinced. that he was standing in the same place where the little village once stood.

I never saw the Ghost Town again. I didn’t find my pants after either occasion, either, but I’ll never forget the tiny gleaming buildings that were guarded by the fun, illuminated blue orb that called it home.