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Monologue Mania Day # 1337 Lucky Day (for Friday the 13th) by Janet S. Tiger (c) Oct. 12, 2017
Lucky Day
(for Friday the 13th)
by Janet S. Tiger
(c) 2015 all rights reserved
(The 60ish - woman is of Japanese descent, but with virtually no accent. She is dressed conservatively, but has a bright red scarf and earrings that stand out. She waves to the audience)
Hello! Hello, fellow members of the Lucky Ducks! I am so happy you had me come to speak with you - this club has been my favorite place to come for years, and I wanted to kick off the anniversary celebration with a story.....about guess what?......luck.
My family has been a lucky one - from our first days in this country through today, Friday the 13th, our official meeting day for the Lucky Ducks......
As a founding member and former President, Vice-President, Recording Secretary and Publicity Chairman - not the same, but over the years......I decided to share this, which you might have heard some of before, but not all, because the latest part of the story, I just found out.
If you've been a member longer than two years, most of you have heard, from me, of course!, that there is a city in Japan called Kokura, which is famous because of what didn't happen there.
You see, Kokura had a large arsenal, and was actually the number two city on the list to be bombed by the atomic bombs. On Day one, if Hiroshima hadn't had clear weather, Kokura would have received the dubious honor of being the first city to receive an atomic bomb. But the weather in Hiroshima that day was good, so Kokura moved to the top of the list. And on August 9th, the next bomb was ready to be dropped on Kokura - the plane was above the city.....but there were clouds, and the plane moved to the next city on the list - Nagasaki.
Two days on a very bad list - two days saved by weather. Once good weather, once clouds. So there is a saying about Kokura luck......luck where you have no idea that luck is with you. But it is.
I have always considered Friday the 13th to be a lucky day for me, because good things often happened to me on this day.
But the time I am going to tell about was long ago, it was in 1967, when I was 16, and had a summer job after high school, before college.......a job in a Jack-in-the-Box, right by the beach in Los Angeles, not far from the Santa Monica pier......my first real job. Only 15 minutes by car but I had no car that summer and it was a long bus trip away - one transfer. One hour. More if you missed the transfer.
My mother wanted me to take the bus, but the bus was twenty-five cents - each way! That was $3.00 a week! No passes then, just quarters. And three dollars a week was a lot of money, money I could use for new clothes, and make-up and so..... I started hitchhiking.
And I was young, and it was not hard to get rides in those days. Everybody still hitchhiked....and many people stopped.....families, men, women, all types of people, mostly nice, some drove too fast....but mostly good people.
The day I remember was one where I had just bought a new blouse with the money I had saved from hitchhiking. It was bright red, and I knew the rides would be fast...especially from young men. Boys like red, their eyes light up when they see a young girl in red......
So I was just to the corner, and I had put out my thumb, and the light was red and cars were stopped, and I could feel eyes on me.....and all of a sudden I had the strangest sensation, a feeling that I should stop hitchhiking!
I had never felt this before, but it was, like a warning feeling, and I was surprised at how strong it was. I would never hitchhike again, this would be my last ride.....
It so happens, the first car at the light was a convertible, with a nice looking young man at the wheel. Bright yellow! It looked like the sun! Even though I knew I was not going to hitchhike after that day, I smiled at him, and he pulled over, and his name was Sammy, and he had just graduated from high school and the car was a gift from his grandparents.
He was very nice - he had a girlfriend, so we did not date that summer, but he gave me rides almost every day, and when he couldn't, I used the bus.....and told my mother we needed to get me a car.....
Which she did, for $50, an old Chrysler Windsor with a dashboard full of buttons, and I drove it until it collapsed many years later.
The week after I stopped hitchhiking, the first girl was found....dead for a few days, washed up on the beach.....a young woman, just a little older than me......I got chills when I read about it in the paper. It was close to where I worked......then a few weeks later, another girl, and a third, very soon.....the papers called it...the Summer Fun Killer......because he was killing the fun for everyone.....a terrible name for a terrible thing......
Now no one was hitchhiking.....everyone was scared.......but after the fourth murder, the killings stopped, and even though the police kept looking......the killer was never found.....
Sammy and I wrote to each other when he was away at college in the East.....and then, one thing led to another and we've been married almost forty years......
I have a friend, Sammy's old girlfriend - she married someone else while he was away at college, and everyone stayed in touch. She became a nurse, and she loves books about murders. The more gruesome, the better.
So I get her books about murderers for her birthday. The most recent was about serial killers, she just loves serial killers!.....and I noticed on the cover one was.....The Summer Fun Killer. He had been caught in Florida, for other murders......but I got a chill, and I started to read.
He had decided to start his killing spree that summer in Los Angeles, where he worked in a travelling show.....a carnival.....he was out driving.....
(She takes a deep breath)
And he saw a girl standing at a light, with her thumb out, and she was perfect to be the first.....she had on a bright red blouse.....and he thought how it would hide the blood when he stabbed her......
As I read, I thought, \lots of girls had red blouses who hitchhiked.....but then......he said the name of the corner.....it was the same one where I got the chill that day......but there was a car in front of him....a convertible....a bright yellow convertible that looked like the sunshine was driving.......
(She takes out a handkerchief and blows her nose)
When I read that, I knew.....I was the girl who was supposed to be his first victim......and the way I was sure? He had picked a special day to start something so unlucky - it was Friday the 13th,
I always thought that my Sammy and his yellow convertible were my Kokura luck - but now it turns out they were in more ways than I had ever known.
(She waves to the crowd)
Thank you - and be sure to have a lucky day!
(She exits, stops, looks back)
So, I tell this story because if you live, you really don't know if this minute, this tiny point in time, you are alive because you have had....Kokura luck.
(She exits. Blackout)
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First posted Day #639 Nov. 12, 2015
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Kokura luck is based on real history - http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2014/08/22/luck-kokura/
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Janet S. Tiger 858-736-6315 CaregiversAnon.org
Member Dramatists Guild since 1983
Playwright-in-Residence
Swedenborg Hall 2006-8
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