My Own Ballad Of Forty Dollars: Me & Marna

From the language school in Monterey in 1958
I hitched to San Diego to take a needed break
My older sister Marilyn had lived there for a while
With husband Jim and Marna, a seven month old child

They picked me up in a 54 bright green Ford two door coupe,
The back seat full of groceries, to feed the weekend group
With Marilyn in the middle and Marna on her lap,
Jim drove, me in the death seat, in my beat-up Army cap

We were driving to Ramona on a fast 4 lane highway,
I recall the sun was brilliant on that cloudless summer day
At 65 we smoothly cruised through mountain vistas wide
Till some guy ran a stop sign and hit us in the side.

The death seat door snapped open, in a blink of shocked alarm,
I hit the road at 60 per with Marna in my arms
I recall my sister flying by in a storm of milk and flour
As Jim one-handed steered the car so he wouldn’t run us over

On heels and butt I slid along but then I lost my grip
As Marna’s legs began to slide real low beside my hips.
Then suddenly we took a bounce and then we flew like birds
As Marna’s leg outside my thigh hit a concrete curb

Then everything was blurry and my mind and body buzzed
As I wondered what had happened and where the baby was.
In just about a second, four Navy Corpsman came
And loaded us on stretchers & made sure we knew our names.

You see, a Navy ambulance was just behind our Ford
They quickly gathered us all up and took us to their ward.
Marna’s leg was badly bruised, my sister cut her lip,
I seemed fine but my old jeans were split up to the hip.

We finally got all sorted out and went on home to eat,
Bruised and sore and all of us unsteady on our feet.
When I got up next morning I felt a little sick
I figured every inch of me’d been beaten with a stick.

I caught a bus to Monterey an 8 hour painful ride
I had to get back to the base before my pass expired.
When I signed in next morning I heard the top kick say,
Who dragged you through a knothole? You look like hell today.”

“I heard you went much further than the limits of your pass,
If you did and you admit it, the CO will have your ass.”
I was stiff and awful sore for just about a week
Then Top Kick called me in to meet a slick insurance geek.

He said “I want to settle and my client wants release,
Here’s a check for $40 dollars, cash it quickly if you please.
The top kick growled at me and said “I can’t believe your luck,
You took the world’s best friggin ride and got paid forty bucks”

Marna’s a grown woman now, she grew up warm and sweet
She’s got a loving family and every time we meet
I remind her that I saved her life and that she had all the luck
While all I got was a skinned up butt and a measly forty bucks.