It was 1974, and the streaking craze that had inexplicably swept the whole country was in full swing. Everybody had heard about it and seen stories -- tastefully covered up in the films -- on the news. There was even a song about it that they played every day on the radio back then. But for me it was still something that only happened to other people. I mean, I had never for a moment thought about streaking myself, taking off all of my clothes and running naked through a crowd, since I had always been told by my Mom that my body was a sacred, secret thing that I had to save for the right person and the right time; and it was just my luck that I had never seen anybody else go streaking in front of me.
So, it was 1974 and it was a Sunday afternoon, I remember, pretty late in the afternoon. I had driven over to pick up my younger brother, who was then 19 years old, from his summer job at a roller skating rink in the next town over from where we lived.
The road that connected the two towns wound through mostly woods along side of a stream that shared a name with the road. On a Sunday afternoon, the two-lane road was deserted, and the most you had to look out for were deer crossing from the woods on one side of the road to the other.
As I drove home with my little brother that afternoon, up ahead I thought I saw a jogger, which was strange, because we were far from any houses or buildings in either direction. I don't think I had ever seen a jogger on this part of the road before. He was coming towards us, on our side of the road, and as we came around onto a long, straight stretch of the road and approached him it very quickly became clear that it was a totally naked man! At last, my first streaker!
"Look, Jordan, a streaker!" I squealed. "Oh Jesus," was his response. I think little bro felt more than a little bit uncomfortable looking at a naked man along with his big sister. "That is so funny," I exclaimed, and it truly was nothing short of hilarious how the man's penis -- apparently somewhat aroused, judging by its length and thickness, but by no means fully erect -- flopped and flailed around as he ran. I myself was a little bit embarrassed at being there with my kid brother seeing this, or I probably would have rolled down the car window and waved at him, or slowed down and honked the horn, or something.
The runner was young, I would guess in his early twenties, close to my own age, and he was slender and fit. No belly bulge and no love handles on this one. His hair was almost shoulder-length, in the style of the time, and it, too, flopped around as he jogged nude, okay, "streaked," on the side of the wooded road toward our approaching car. He had just the lightest bit of hair on his chest and belly, blending down to a full bush that topped his flopping, turgid thing. I looked right at his face, but he didn't return my gaze, instead seeming to focus somewhere off in the distance. I didn't recognize him, but I have to say he wasn't hard to look at.
We passed the naked runner, and I looked in the rearview mirror to get a view of his rear, pumping rhythmically and almost comically as he jogged along the berm of the road away from us in the broad daylight. Pretty firm, I thought to myself, as his nude backside finally passed out of view.
My brother caught my glance at the mirror. "Look at you, checking out his butt," he teased me. "You're a pervert!" I felt my cheeks redden, but he was right. I had just checked out the butt of a nude man I didn't know from Adam. And to make matters worse, I had done it while my own younger brother was sitting right there beside me in the family car.
About a quarter of a mile ahead of us there was a side road that ran up the hill to our right, and at the intersection there was a patch of grass. There was a car parked there -- no doubt belonging to the streaker; either that, or this man we had seen running along the road in the nude was out for a very, very long naked run, incredibly far from where he had left his car and, presumably, his clothing.
The side road ahead of us climbed up a little ways to a three-hole municipal golf course, and there was a little gravel parking lot there, with nothing between the parking lot and the road we were now driving on except those woods, and the stream, and of course the naked running guy, wherever he had gotten off to by now.
I don't know what got into me just then, but I flicked on the turn signal at the last moment and made the right turn to head up to the golf course. "Let's go have a little fun," I said to my brother, who still seemed to be a little uncomfortable at having shared an eyeful of nude male with his own big sister. He didn't say a thing. But because I was always coming up with crazy ideas of things for us to do together, I don't think he quite knew yet what it was that I had in mind.
I parked the car in the little gravel lot for the golf course and got out and swung the driver's side door closed. I could just barely make out the road where the streaker had been, down across the woods and through the trees. My little brother was still in the passenger's seat of the car, showing no signs of moving. "Come on, bro, let's go for a little walk," I urged him.
"No, thanks," was his firm reply. He folded his arms across his chest and shifted in his seat to avoid my eye. He was catching on.
"Oh come on, silly."
He showed no sign of moving.
I upped the ante. "I'll buy you a pack of cigarettes if you come with me. Come on, it'll be fun. He has to come back to his car eventually and we'll just watch from the woods to see what happens. Come on, this is the first streaker we've ever actually seen."