Bodies
The first time I held a dead man’s rotted skull in my hands led to a valuable lesson about why some secrets stay buried.
Here is another chapter from my yet-to-be-published autobiography…
The first time I held a dead man’s rotted skull in my hands led to a valuable lesson about why some secrets stay buried.
It was a sunny weekend afternoon in Somers Point, New Jersey in the Fall of 1985. Most of the leaves have turned brown and settled onto the ground for the season. Hurricane Gloria had just subsided a couple weeks back. The National Hurricane Center called it the ‘Storm of the Century’ due to its intensity. Many sectors of the Eastern Seaboard were devastated and there were a record amount of evacuations. Where we were living in Atlantic County on the South Jersey shore, the most we saw was rain, flooding, and a lot of wind.
On this particular day, I was tasked by my father to do some serious yard maintenance. Normally, this time of year, I’d merely be raking leaves. This day, I was collecting branches, twigs, matted mud-covered leaves, and the occasional bird and squirrel carcass.
I was fifteen years old. My afternoon, thus far, consisted of watching reruns of ‘Monty Python’s Flying Circus’ replaying on our local public television station. Dad was insistent that I do this yard work so that we could both chill and watch ‘Beverly Hills Cop’ that evening, which he had just rented on Betamax. Movies and television have always been my inspiration, so yard work it was! Dad and I both loved cop movies accompanied with tin roof sundae ice cream and air-popped popcorn. That was the goal. To get things done and chill that night watching Eddie Murphy be a funny badass.
The home our family was renting at the time was made of brick and situated awkwardly into the woods. My dad was a former New Jersey State Trooper turned private eye who investigated counterfeiters (yes, like the fake Rolex watches, knockoff purses, and phony T-shirts). Due to numerous mob contracts on his life, Dad preferred to live sunken into the woods away from the normal street view. So here we were at 1234 Somewhere Avenue, Rear, Somers Point, NJ 08225. The rear designation was due to a garage located in front of us. Our house was surrounded by trees and a challenge for every pizza delivery guy. In fact, we always got the discount when Domino’s couldn’t get us served in 30 minutes or less.
So the sun was still shining and I wanted to get this over with. As I made my way into the backyard our dog Sherlock, a German Shepherd mix, scrambled out with me to do his best to assist. Sherlock was a dutiful dog. He stood by my side and looked interested until he saw something worth gnawing on. Before long, Sherlock got busy on a number of branches while I settled into debris collection. My Radio Shack version of a Sony Walkman was playing the cassette of the Rush album ‘Grace Under Pressure’ through my orange foam headphones straight to my willing ears. Their next album ‘Power Windows’ was due to be released any time and I was psyching myself up for it.
Three hours and two cycles into my cassette later, I had four bags of refuse piled up and maybe two to go. As I got deeper into the yard, I saw two clear sets of bricks that appeared to be organized into rectangles but, after this storm, they were in shambles. So I started plucking away at them. The more I progressed, the more I thought there was some sort of buried treasure. So I kept grabbing bricks and piling them up behind me. As the bricks disappeared in front of me, I saw the moist gravelly soil increase in softness as I dug. Normally, when you dig, it gets more difficult the deeper you get. But here, it got easier. I figured it was probably not a buried treasure, but somebody buried something here and I’d be darned if I didn’t get to the bottom of it.
I continued to fling bricks and other debris behind me as I furthered my mission. I was about three feet in and, all of a sudden, I saw it. A human skull. I looked back to my companion Sherlock and he was chomping on a bone that, at this point, had surmised was the humerus from the arm of a person who was long-dead. I quickly grabbed the bone from Sherlock’s jaw and he shuddered. I pet him so he knew he wasn’t in trouble. I looked around. The sky was starting to drizzle. What was once a sunny afternoon was becoming a wet, gloomy Saturday evening.
My younger siblings Jennifer and Jason were inside and I didn’t want to freak them out. Me, at 15, felt like I could at least protect them before I let Dad in on the crazy news. As Sherlock watched over me, I placed the dead man’s humerus and skull back into what was apparently a makeshift grave, and then placed all of the bricks back where I found them.
I walked into the house and saw Dad sitting in his hammock reading a magazine. Yes, Dad had a hammock in the living room. He preferred it over a recliner. He even decorated that corner with a palm tree and a fake parrot.
“Dad, I need you to see something.” I say.
Dad replies, “How’s it coming , Son?”
I replied, “Almost done, but I ran into an issue. Can you come out back?”
What happened next would be chiseled into my brain forever. Dad followed me out to the grave site and I showed him what I found. I’ll never forget.
“Okay, Robbie. You did a good job letting me know about this. Just get the bags down to the street for pick up.”
After I completed my task, and Sherlock concluded his job as my honorary workmate, I showered and got cleaned up for Saturday evening. As promised, Dad and I watched ‘Beverly Hills Cop’ which, turned out, is still the greatest action-comedy ever made in my not-so-humble opinion. We laughed and bonded. We also both had huge bowls of Tin Roof Sundae. That was our favorite, me and Dad. Vanilla ice cream with fudge swirls and chocolate-covered peanuts. We watched our movie and then I slumbered right there on the couch and he in his hammock. Me and Dad having a sleepover movie night? That was my version of heaven.
I didn’t ask him about the dead guy(s) after that.