Honorable mention: “Life at the Edge.” photo by Bill Akstens “Girls in Fall.” story by Liz Lydic
A sensible decision with unfortunate consequences by Liz Lydic Of course, you don’t get it at the time. When you’re young and something happens where you live, it feels far away from you. It’s a lifetime before you recognize the thread from this to that, that one thing made the other. When you’re young, you think you know what could happen in your town. You know what isn’t supposed to happen. For a month, everything was better about Mira Costa. We could walk across the street and be in Hermosa. Our parents were relieved we were further from the preschool. Some of the public school kids were nice. It was great, and we knew it at the time, until Homecoming weekend 1987, when, of course, everything changed. A passenger in a Volkswagen van on Artesia rolled down his window and stuck his tongue out between his fingers arranged in a gesture we knew was inappropriate but didn’t yet know why. “Holy cow, that’s Dan Fieldman,” I yelled, and we all ran. The van, probably driven by Dan’s older brother, accelerated, leaving behind blasts of a struggling muffler and the chorus of ‘Shakedown’. A breeze heated instead of cooled us. Hot air scooped up dirt and bits and signified something coming…
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