Eldridge

Eldridge was a classmate occasionally through the first six grades. That was before they divided us by learning ability. He was just a bit below the top tier but fairly bright. Real nice guy, never in any trouble or had any kind of problems. His family was one what they called "prominent" which as mostly social status and money - most of the time the two went together but not necessarily.

He had a cousin about the same age, we was in the same grade anyway. She was pretty but flat-chested - not a problem until we were in high school - and we somehow got pretty familiar on the bus and she was the first girl I kissed - and anyway time went by and I don't know that happened to her. I know what happened to him though. His daddy as a pretty prosperous insurance agent, one of them where if you had the area franchise you was pretty well off if you didn't screw things up. Raised Tennessee Walking Horses and all, had a company that manufactured horse trailers. Seemed to have a lot of money but that wasn't always certain in that particular scenario. Working in a bank for a while you learned something about who had real money and who didn't. Anyway they did all right and the insurance thing was a pretty guaranteed thing in those days as long as you didn't screw it up.

Some people did screw it up and lost it but for the Barkers it went on until it was time for the old man to retire and leave it to the son. OK, good enough. Eldridge took the helm of the insurance agency and his dad spent more time with the family and the horses and other business enterprises. Eldridge married his high school sweetheart and ran the insurance agency.

She was a hottie as they say these days. Sweet girl too but I knew her rather casually and so don't know how accurate that assessment is. Women are like that and men are the way they are so you never know except in the long term. Anyway she was a good-looking gal and I expect Eldridge was attractive to women. He wasn't ugly so I guessed he was all right for the women of the opposite sex. And there was the money.

They were apparently happily married for a few years. Eldridge was running the insurance business and all was going well. A guy named Stevie opened a business in Twin Falls. A dance and gymnastics thing, teaching little girls to be cheerleaders and majorettes and dancers and things. Most of the time those were women who had been cheerleaders or dancers or whatever in high school and maybe college and came back to their hometown to teach younger generations. A man doing it was less common.

He had his studio in a strip mall there on the main drag - it was fancy as strip malls go and most of the businesses were upscale for the place. I didn't think about it until one day some commented that Eldridge had been caught in lagrante delicto with Stevie.

Now scuttlebutt was that she was shocked and outraged and real soon filed for divorce. That was accomplished and there wasn't much noise about it and it seems to have gone down that way. Eldridge pretty much disappeared - the insurance agency ended up with another owner and that must have hurt financially. I knew a few homosexuals who were in prominent families and while it was common knowledge they didn't make a big deal of it and neither did the normal people. Live and let live. But Eldridge pretty much disappeared. At least when you have money it's not so bad but sometimes I wonder about their lives when they go that way.