Vonda Kay Van Dyke, crowned in 1964 as the 1965 Miss America. She is now married to minister David Tyler Scoates, and lives in California.

Arizona's ultra conservative Senator Barry Goldwater was the Republican nominee for president in 1964. Another Arizonan, Vonda Kay Van Dyke, received national fame in that year when she was crowned Miss America. Both visited my home town of Boise, Idaho that year.

I was 18, and freshly graduated from Borah High School. I saw my life leading in no particular direction, so I took the path of least resistance and enrolled at Boise Junior College. I never met or even saw Barry Goldwater that year, but I had the thrill of meeting and actually shaking the had of the most beautiful person that had ever been in our city when newly crowned Vonda Van Dyke came to town.

I was decidedly neutral on the subject of Miss America. Watching the Miss America Pageant was a ritual my mother imposed at our household. Neither my father nor I were enthused by the pageantry, but we watched nevertheless to see the first ever puppeteer crowned as Miss America on our 21" black and white television screen.

Not long after that, we learned that Miss America would be visiting Boise's First Methodist Church, and that I, as a member of the youth choir, would have the opportunity to meet her.

That I was a member of a choir, and a church choir at that, would be a surprise to those who know me now. I am not and was not religious. My father gave religion lip service, but my mother insisted that the proper upbringing of their only son included weekly attendance at "our" church. First Methodist became "our" church a number of years earlier when my father concluded that the preacher at our former church, the First Baptist church, had been looking directly at him when the sermon addressed the failure of some members of the congregation to contribute their full 10% share to the offering plate.

Although it was "our" church, I was the only one to attend it regularly. This was by no means voluntary. My membership in the church choir and the twice weekly visit to the church which it required were the result of intense negotiations at my house which, if I recall correctly, was my part of a deal which involved my retention of certain privileges, and later a car.

As if raging hormones, adjusting to impending adulthood, and searching for a direction for my life weren't enough to plague my adolescence, my epidermis was destined to be my special challenge. As fate would have it, no sooner had the adolescent acne had begun to subside than I was plunged into the throws of dealing with my first wart.

It started as a small bump on the bottom joint of the thumb on my right hand. At first it looked like it might turn into a pimple, but it never got red. It just got bigger. And bigger. In a matter of a few days it was almost as large around as the eraser that comes on a pencil. As it got bigger, it got rough and ugly.

I tried everything to get rid of it. Though I am not one prone to self mutilation, but I am an inveterate scab picker. Scabs are the reward one gets to compensate for the pain of a wound. I learned early in my childhood that you get to a scab early enough, you can pick it and it will grow back and contribute many more hours of entertainment.

The best scab I ever had was from a substantial gash across my right knee about five years before the wart came into my life. I blame my brand new Schwinn bicycle for that fall. It was a beautiful machine and a major step up in size and status from my faithful old, scratched and dented 24 inch red Schwinn that it replaced. The bright blue frame and gleaming chrome fenders of the new Schwinn gave no clue to the danger of the 3 speed drive. On the maiden trip down the alley behind our house, I intended to test the limits of my stylish new mode of transportation. Half way down the alley I started the test. As I stood to put all my weight on the right pedal as it reached the highest point in its cycle, I heard clunking of gears as the chain jumped out of the sprocket. The resistance to my weight abruptly gave way and my foot slipped off the pedal and plummeted to the quick moving dirt and rock alley surface below. In an instant my prize possession lay in its side, wheels spinning, chrome scratched, and handle bar twisted 45 degrees out of alignment with the front wheel it controlled.

My right pant leg was ripped half way across, and oozing with deep red blood from my knee. I don't recall how I made it back to the house, or the concerned first aid I received from my mother. But I do recall the enormous scab that formed, and how it could be repeatedly removed to be replaced in short order with a slightly smaller and equally pickable smaller scab. It wasn't just the size that set this scab apart. The dried blood infiltrated the gauze pad my mother used to cover the wound, so the pad had to be cut from the wound to change the dressing. This left a scab reinforced with cotton fibers from the gauze.

Because of my scab background, I felt well equipped to deal with a wart. Poking at it, picking at it, even cutting didn't hurt. The wart seemed composed of mainly dead skin. If it wasn't dead, it at least didn't have any nerves. It did bleed. It bled a lot. It bled enough that I could only slice about half of it off before I could no longer see what I was cutting. I tried knives, scissors, and razor blades. The razor blades worked best.   Eventually I did manage to carve the wart completely  off.

It healed nicely, and the skin quickly grew back and with only a couple of scab cycles. Unfortunately the skin didn't stop growing. In short order the wart was back, as big and as ugly as before. Possibly it was even bigger and uglier.

The situation was serious. I made a visit to the doctor. He started by injecting the base of the thumb with Novocain causing my whole thumb to swell up like a balloon. While the procedure to follow was not painful, the injection was very unpleasant and he seemed determined that every square inch of my thumb would be immune from pain.

Once the thumb had swollen to what seemed like twice its normal size, and was entirely numb to the touch, the doctor took out a device which resembled a small electric soldering iron. The cord from the device ran to a silver box the front of which had a switch, a gage,  and a single large knob. The nurse wrapped a band around my wrist which had another cord running to that same silver box. My wart, I learned, was about to be electrocuted.

The doctor flipped on switch on the silver box and adjusted the large knob. The box emitted a hum, and I knew the time had come for me to say goodbye to my wart. The doctor repeatedly touched the wart with the probe at the end of the device to my skin. I heard and saw sparks which reminded me of the equipment that gave life to Elsa Lancaster in the Bride of Frankenstein. Little puffs of smoke emanated from my thumb, and the smell of burning skin filled the room.

In less than 5 minutes, the electrocution had been completed. I left the doctor's office with a swollen and bandaged thumb, but I left wart-free.

The wound was black, rough, and deep compared to my carving efforts. It took longer for the skin to grow back to cover the burned area, but it did grow back. And, it kept growing until the wart too had grown back, definitely bigger and uglier than ever.

That was the state of my hand as I stood in the reception line to meet and shake the hand of Miss America, Vonda Kay Van Dyke. I looked down at my hand. The wart was uglier and more noticeable than I had ever seen it. It was situated on the top of my thumb so that when I extended my hand for the mandatory handshake, it would be the most visible part of my entire anatomy. There it sat, poised to challenge anyone who might attempt to shake my hand.

I felt like a leper. I imagined Miss America extending her hand for mine, then recoiling with a jerk when she spotted the disgusting lump on my thumb. I pictured her face filled with disgust at the despicable person who attempted to thrust his disease ridden digit into her delicate hand. I saw all the room turning to see the what had so disturbed Miss America's sensibilities.

The line moved forward, and I felt my head spinning. Then I saw her. She was radiant. I could easily see why she had been chosen Miss America -- with or without the puppets. My mouth was dry as I resolved to step forward, come what may. I had a vague understanding that warts were communicable. While I didn't think that one handshake would transfer a wart, I couldn't discount the question running through my mind, "Would I be the one to give Miss America a wart?"

Then I looked down to her hands. She was wearing gloves. Not just gloves, but formal, full length, elbow to fingertip, 100% wart-proof gloves. In the First Methodist reception hall in 1964, there may indeed have been a god.

Me, at the store in 1964 after amputation of the wart.

It was my turn. I stepped forward. I looked directly into her eyes. She looked into mine. She said something through her smile, I have no idea what. I said nothing. She extended her hand, and I extended mine. Our hands touched, and she continued to smile and look into my eyes. I felt as though she saw no one else and nothing else in the room except my eyes. She was gorgeous, and for a split second, she looked at me as if I was the only person there.

Then it was over. My turn was up. She released my hand, and I stepped away. She had not noticed the sixth appendage to my hand.

Of course, I still had the wart. I kept the wart through two more carving attempts. Then, one day when I was at work demonstrating to a customer how easily the screen slides in and out of an aluminum frame window, my hand slipped -- mainly because the screen did not slip in and out as easily as advertised. My thumb slid down the sharp aluminum edge of the window frame. Suddenly the frame was covered with blood. I excused myself, pinching off my hemorrhaging thumb with my other hand and made a dash for the restroom, leaving the customer examine the window by himself.

In the restroom, I ran water over my thumb. As the blood was washed away, I saw my wart hanging by a thin thread of skin. I pulled it off and watched the stream of bloody water carry it down the drain. I wrapped my thumb in a paper towel and returned to the sales floor. I did not make the sale.