Memories of Blue Shark

My first memory of Dave goes all the way back to second grade. You see, my parents and I lived in the White Oak apartments from 1975-1982. From kindergarten through first grade I went to Jackson Road. David, along with Phil and Mike G were in both of my classes. Then, Montgomery County decided that the boundaries for the school system needed to be changed and I was "on the wrong side of the tracks". So, I had to go to Cresthaven Elementary for the beginning of my second grade schooling. We later moved to Eden Road in the winter. I can remember actually moving in and seeing David and some of the other kids playing up the street and my mom asking them where they lived and basically "hooking me up with friends". Later that week, I went down to Davids house and re-introduced myself. I think I basically said something like, "hey remember me? I was in your first grade class and I need someone to play with..." or something to that effect. Thus began our many adventures on Kathryn/Eden Rd.

Many of the following events actually took place, but because they happened so long ago, I know that they are probably not in chronological order, but they're close:

The Falcons Weekly: This was our neighborhood paper. I think it was more about setting up some kind of office in Davids basement, where I wouldn't be surprised to still see a paper sign that reads Falcons Weekly Office. I remember actually going around and knocking on doors asking people for a subscription. Our first (and only) issue, which probably still exists somewhere at the Holts, was about a page and a half long, and our lead story had something to do with Kevin Carter building a new bike jump at the basketball court where many of the neighborhood kids would convene.

Baseball Cards: David and I had an obsession (for me the first of many) for collecting baseball cards. My favorite player was Cal (obviously), Dave's favorite was Eddie Murray. We loved to trade our collections back and forth. David was always so much more knowledgable about the players and the cards than I was, probably because of his older brothers (mainly Bruce), who already had extensive collections. Basically David probably ripped me off a couple times. I remember getting really angry one time, and probably a little jealous, so I took one of my Eddie Murray cards and forged his signature on the card, in hopes of getting a real good trade or just to rub it in that I had such a valuable card. Also, one of the weird role playing "games" that we used to do, was to set up my basement with all of our cards and baseball memorabilia and pretend that we owned a baseball card shop, reminiscent of "The House of Cards" in Wheaton.

Kerry Flagg and the Spikes: This was one of our first of many combinations of a band. I believe that Andre Gary was the drummer and Dave and I were the singers, I don't think we ever actually had Kerry "in" the band, but we just used his name. Actual song titles: Skinny Boys (They can fit through closed doors), and Tommorrow is Today (The only lyrics being Dave singing Tomorrow is today tomorrow is today ehh-yay-eee-yay-eee-yayyy - also completely improvised). There were MANY more songs actually, possibly as many as 8-10 and they WERE recorded and MAY still exist. I know we had given the "master copy" to Cindy. Later, we had heard that Q-107 was having a "battle of the bands" in which bands had to send in recordings to the radio station in hopes of getting a record contract. Yeah, we did that as well, but no recording contract!

Redman and Blue Shark: At some point we had shifted our television watching to mostly "You can't do that on television" and old "Batman & Robin" re-runs. I guess we had it in our minds that the neighborhood needed some homegrown heros to save all of the kids from bullies and pranksters. We came up with the names Redman (my alter-ego and the name I thought of), and Blue Shark (Dave's much cooler name). My mom was our "Alfred" and the only one who knew our true identity. Our "cave" was my bombshelter in my parents house. So one day we get all dressed up in our costumes. Now picture this, me in my red sweatsuit, red wool-knit hat and swimming goggles, and David in an all Blue sweatsuit with a blue wool hat and sunglasses in 95+degree summer heat. We march down the street to Andre Gary's house to collect for past due "club fees". Yes, we had a number of clubs and forts along the way as well, all of which had "dues", but none of which were ever paid by Andre. So we get to his house sweating profusely in our costumes, knock on the door, only to find Andre's sister Lisa answer the door cracking up. We say "Is Andre here?", "No!", "well, tell him that Redman and Blue Shark are looking for him!", and we walk away. As we are about to turn onto my street, we see Andre's parents Volvo coming toward us and we say to eachother "don't even wave at him". We look over to the car as he is passing us and we can tell that, 1. he knows its us, and 2. he is excitedly, and proudly holding his brand new "Purple Rain" album in the window so that we can see as the car passes.

Jackson Road Talent Shows: These took place every year and it was a major assembly of students showing there wares in song, dance and various skits. We took part in two shows. The first was simply titled "Painter Comedians", where we wore overalls and those old "Duron" paint hats that you got free when you bought paint at the local hardware store. We stood on small step ladders and mimed painting (i'm pretty sure we actually had paint brushes and paint cans) while telling really stupid jokes we got out of an old "Highlights Magazine". For our second year, we simply showcased our singing skills with the classic "Best Friends", accompanied my Ms. Barbara Strang.

The Amusment Park: This was another one of those, lets get rich schemes that just never really panned out. We had the idea that we could make some kind of ride in Dave's backyard that we could sell tickets for to all of the local kids. I think we may have spent two days on this, and the most we came up with was a red "radio flyer" wagon that we would push people around in and ultimately down a very small hill that we lined with plywood for a smooth ride. Also, we had a sprinkler that the kids could run and play through, as well as Dave and Steves super cool playhouse that I can still remember Mr. Holt building in there backyard.

The "Infamous" St. Johns Dance: Going from sixth grade to seventh grade is usually a pretty big transition period for many kids. Luckily we had Sunji, who was one year ahead of us already there, so we didn't really have to worry much. I remember the night before school started for us at White Oak, getting a call from Dave. He questioned "So what are you going to be like this year?" "HUH??" I replied! Later that year we started going to St. Johns dances which were every other Friday night I believe. On one particular night David, Shannon, and I got a ride from Mrs. Holt to the dance. I don't remember much about the dance, as they were all pretty much the same. Didn't they ALWAYS end with "Stairway to Heaven" and a bunch of the older kids making out? So we are on our way out the door, when Shannon makes a comment about Daves hair. Ever since I can remember, Dave just did not get regular haircuts (at least until high school or thereabouts). His hair would grow out over his ears and he would just look a little more shaggy than most. So Shannon says something about this, and Dave gets fired up and starts chasing after us. This was one of those "two's company, three's a crowd" type things, where Shannon or I would make fun of Dave and the other would in-turn pile on. Classic middle-school stuff. Anyway, Dave picks up this huge tree-branch and starts swinging it around and with every swing he yells "OWWWHHH". We heard this and Shannon (I swear it was Shannon) starts yelling "OXXXX" after every swing/yell from Dave. This went on for basically the whole mile home, most of the time it was me running from Dave.

As I think back to most of Bruce's eulogy on Monday, I keep coming back to those glorious days on the baseball field playing in High School. A couple months ago, my Mom gave me a huge scrapbook with tons of pictures and old school papers dating all the way back to pre-school. Something that I found tonight that had me laughing out loud was the Springbrook Baseball 1992 stats. I went right to Davids Pitching stats for that year. Heres basically what it reads: Holt: 1 game, .66 innings pitched, 5 runs 1 earned, 1 base on balls, 10.61 ERA, 2 HitByPitch!!!! Now that is hilarious! Luckily for the rest of Montgomery County baseball, he improved on those stats senior year!

Finally, just to show how sincere and heartfelt David was in his final days/months/years, I have to share this story that had me really choked up when Bruce was doing the eulogy. As he said, one of Dave's favorite pastimes was too look up baseball stats in his Baseball Encyclopedia. It usually would happen when we were just chatting about a player and he would say something like "well lets see how many actual games so and so played". And, he would pull out his 1995 Total Baseball book that was never to far from reach. MANY times I would say to Dave, "man, I really need to get one of those books", and I would always tell him when I would find a used one and never buy it because it was too old. So one day I get a call from Dave and he's like "dude come over, I got something for you, your gonna LOVE it!". I get over to his house and sure enough, he pulls out a BRAND NEW Total Baseball Encyclopedia and hands it to me. I'm like "what's this?", and he says, "it's yours, I was down at the museums today and I saw it and thought you might like it...". And, I am absolutely STUNNED. He could've just given me his old one and kept the new book and I would've been ecstatic. What a friend!

There are so many other stories about Dave, but i'll leave those up to everyone else. I'll miss you Blue Shark!