Chapter 7

I had to be at the Convention Center Saturday morning by 11 to cover The Sports Nutrition Convention to photograph the body builders and any prominent sports athletes that might attend, as well as conduct interviews. I hung around until almost 7 that night, and spent Sunday there from noon until it wrapped up at 5 o’clock. Melody spent both days on the beach and each day I found her asleep in the room when I got back. After rousing her each night we went out for dinner and found a place with live music. We had fun like kids on Spring Break. Starting Monday morning I had to take and then submit 60 to 75 good shots and that was to cover me as far as the syndicated beach-tease pictures until the fall colors really took effect in the Northeast in about another month. My agent had a company who did state postcards and scenic calendars waiting for new shots of fall. Upon finishing that, I was on my own to submit things I felt were worth a look, unless I got a “real” assignment.

In past years I gave my agent unsolicited submissions and he had been able to keep a little money rolling in for me until it was time to get through Fall colors, ski bunny and snow scene assignments. Now with Melody in tow, she DID have to report to Towson for a few days each month so we planned a 2 week stay there and then she would “move in” to my house overlooking the Hudson just North of The City.

A car trip to Towson from New York would be 5 hours and unless my work interrupted, we would always make those trips together. We would be forthright and wide open to all friends and relatives about our relationship and how serious it was. She usually stopped in on campus once a week, just to see people she worked with, but only “had” to be in person for interviews with perspective students and meetings. Now, if she was closer to a student from NY, she would go see them and arrange a campus tour if they seemed seriously interested. I suggested that as long as she maintained a residence there we should spend a week every month in Towson so she could be in touch with friends and work. Melody didn’t entirely agree with that arrangement, but it was open for discussion.

We had booked flights out of Tampa back to New York on Friday and we spent every day on Clearwater Beach enjoying ourselves, all the while taking snaps and taking naps. By Thursday afternoon I had sent in over 120 photos to my agent hoping he could approve most of them and maybe have a little backlog. The syndicate must have been happy because I didn’t have to pay one person for permission to print.

It was a great week of getting to know each other, and of course making love. We were still in that honeymoon mode, going 2 or 3 times a day. In the morning it was coffee, showers, 69, and to the beach. Between 1 and 2 we would order lunch to be delivered to our room. We would go up and meet the delivery man, eat and make love, then back to the beach for naps in the cabana. Late afternoon snaps when most of the families were leaving and couples began to arrive. Around 7 when they would pick up the cabanas for beach cultivating we would go to one of the beach eateries, usually Frenchys, (after we found Vicki had left to go back North), have a light dinner with many rum concoctions. Once we got back to the room we usually stripped, showered, and spent the night playing some sort of sexual games with each other until I was no longer able to hold off. Then it was cuddle off to sleep. Life was fun again and we were making the most of it. If Piper Lee was watching over me (us), I’m sure she would approve. She loved making me happy and I was that for sure.

Melody still had pangs of guilt about finding love so fast, but they were mostly brought up to her by old friends (ones she knew through Frankie) and Frankie’s family. She would cry to me after hearing from them saying, “What was I supposed to do? Just let all my feelings go by and sit at home and knit until the year was up? I didn’t pursue the “us” we have, it was thrust upon us. When I tell them it’s as if Frankie was talking to me, they say I’m imagining things to ease my conscience.”