Sometime during the last remaining days of summer just before school began, there was a beautiful August night. The beach had been our other major attraction besides boat racing and skiing and a couple of us wanted to go once more before the startup of school. It was around eight or nine in the evening, but no one wanted to go but Susan and Betsy Turcotte and me, so we told them they were going to miss out, and sure enough they did.

We didn't go to Port Aransas where the surfing was better. This was night time and we wouldn't be surfing. We went instead to North Padre Island a little way south of Bob Hall pier. There were very nice dunes there. Some over twenty feet in height. It was also about a half hour closer, which was our main objective. We went there through Corpus Christi and down Lexington Boulevard to cross over the canal. On the way we saw a fairly recently opened Suntide Refinery. It was around a mile west of all the other refineries packed in along the Corpus Christi Ship Channel. It was by itself on the highest ground around and was encrusted with thousands of green glowing mercury vapor lamps. Going to Port Aransas via Aransas Pass we never saw this refinery at night. Now we came upon it and we were in awe. It reminded us of OZ. It was so dazzling we could hardly take our eyes off it.

The Gulf was also presenting a spectacular show that night. The moon was not full, but gave off plenty of light. There were no other people on the beach so we didn't have to drive very far down the packed sand to find a spot all by ourselves. The waves were sparking in drops of gold. The breeze was mild and refreshing and the waves were only one to two feet, but the froth shimmered with gold. I have seen phosphorous in the water, but never in concentrations like that before. Every movement of water glowed in gold. We waded out to thigh depth and ran our hands through the water. It left a wake of gold. We scooped up the water with our hands and gold spilled out. Susan and Betsy ducked underneath the water and gold dribbled down their hair. Never have I seen it that bright since that night. We played in the water an hour or so, then headed back to the lake. On the way back we listened to the Stones "Jumpin Jack Flash", and I can still picture the second look at "Oz" on the way back while listening to Mama Cass sing her last song "Sing a little song for me". That song always brings back that night when I hear it.