BRIDGE TUNNEL
A bit over 17 and a half miles from the DELMARVA Peninsula to Newport News, Virginia, over and under the water, and one lane in each direction it was not fun to pass another vehicle and less fun to be passed. The trip usually began at about 3.00a.m. with a short nap on one of the man made islands until the sun came up, continuing on to Good Christian Dave’s Diamond Spring and bottling plant where the 180 five gallon bottles would be unloaded onto the conveyor belt and run through the wash and sterilized before being refilled, blasted with ozone and capped. The ride home was always treacherous being about 3500 pounds above the gross vehicle weight for the one ton Ford Econoline van with a single axle. The challenge was to get back across the bridge tunnel without breaking down, back onto the Peninsula where the earth was flat. Once back to the storage trailer the truck was mostly unloaded and restacked with crates of glass bottles and cases for the next days delivery or the trip north on the Peninsula and across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, the biggest hill, to Fort Meade where Mountain Valley would be loaded. The supply from Hot Springs, Arkansas was trucked in by Earl, Mr. J’s truck driver. He had a big truck and many Ford econoline vans to serve the Baltimore/Washington DC area and the White House. The summer was driving and stacking and lifting and carrying and I seldom saw the ocean only in passing Indian River Inlet in Delaware, another hill.
The tai-chi ch’aun classes were in the Autumn and Spring and then twice a week until the entire form was second nature and a few people actually stuck with it and learned the form—a very few. In the Autumn of 1992 the possibility of a video was discussed between The Professor, a senior student Earl and myself. I volunteered to produce and direct and soon we had a project. The Professor wanted the Wife to participate. Dancer True would be the second woman since there were none in the classes that had stuck with it enough to learn the complete form. I worked with Dancer True on the choreography of the form over several weeks along with her intense lessons with Earl and the Professor.