When I embarked on reliving and putting down in words these experiences from 1985 and 1986, I didn't know how much I would really write about these experiences. There were so many opportunities for me to opt out of writing or talking about the experiences, as I had done in the past. As I approached my 70th birthday, however, I felt the need and desire to tell the story that I've always wanted to share and hadn't. In some ways, it's a pathway to closure on the things that happened and the things I did. Some things I/we did were and still are (to me) extremely erotic and unlike anything I experienced before, or since. And some things show what others could see as a remarkable lack of judgment on my part and those who were around me.

Believe me when I say that I had no idea of what would occur when I made the plans to return from Portland, Oregon on an AMTRAK train just so that I could claim that I had been through North Dakota as part of the "50 by 50" goal. That goal was to reach all 50 states and 50 percent of all the county and county equivalents by the time I reached age 50. I had hoped to reach the 50 state goal in 1985 knowing that the county goal was much more difficult to achieve.

This, to the best of my abilities and memories, is the recreation and recollection of what happened long ago. I've broken it into many parts and it is a very long read. I hope that in my telling of this story you get not only the sense of what happened, but how it felt to me and what feelings were and have been shared with me about the experiences.

I hope you join me in this journey.