The Day I lost my Sister at the Nudist Camp

There goes my sister up and out of the car before I could shut off the engine. I can see the last traces of her as she bounded down this unknown trail with this perfect stranger. I’m sitting there with my mouth open flabbergasted at her impulsive nature. I shouldn’t be; she’s been that way all her life.

A few years into flying as a TWA flight attendant in the 70’s, I took a vacation in Hawaii along with my mother and my sister. The second day we flew in a small airplane to the big island to swim on the black sandy beach that the island was known for. Diana and I, with our one float, climbed down to the beach area; my mother stayed up on top of a rocky ledge. As some guy was hiking by, my mother asked him if it were safe for Diana and me to swim at this particular beach. He replied that the area was known for its rip tides. By that time we were far enough away to see our mother jumping and waving, but not to hear what she was saying. So, with a hoot and a holler, Diana and tore into the water with our float, and sure enough the waves quickly took us away. We were too stupid to realize what was happening. We just knew the waves were cool and big! Eventually, we got back to land. (No problem!)

To return to the original point where we embarked, was quite a hike, as we walked along the beach. At places, we had to climb over rocks, when the beach would disappear. The waves would crash upon us covering us with tons of black sand that the water carried. After the waves receded, we spat out a couple of mouthfuls of black course sand and continued with float in hand moving over the rocks. At last, we could see our mother up on top of the rocky edge. She had her hands clasped as if praying, and when she saw us, I think she jumped ten feet. Seeing her wave furiously, we waved gallantly back, and, then, 1, 2, 3, we bolted into the ocean again.

The next day our Mother rested at the hotel, and Diana and I explored another island. With a rented car, we set out on our next adventure. A young lady was hitch hiking, and Diana demanded that we should pick her up. When this young lady explained she lived in a “tree camp” of sorts, Diana jumped enthusiastically to the opportunity of exploring this idea of living in the trees, and asked our hitch hiker if we could see it. The young lady obligingly replied yes which leads me to my first paragraph.

As Diana scampered off, I took the time to put personal items in the trunk of the car, locked the car securely, and sauntered down this pathway. I had not gone more than fifty feet when I bumped into a gentleman without one stitch of clothing on him. Making eye to eye contact with this guy, I asked if he knew which direction my sister had taken. He pointed at some passageway, and off I went. Meanwhile my sister returned to the car and finding I wasn’t there, she headed back into the camp. I landed at the beach, saw some “free souls” working on their tans, and asked if they had seen this "dressed" person wandering around, and they pointed me to another foot path. How long were we at the Taylor Tree Camp? About an hour…It got to where I didn’t even have to ask, these laughing people just pointed. Finally finding each other, we managed a good laugh ourselves! To this day, I don’t remember the trees.