In those days Kevin Rooney was driving an old 1953 Chevy sedan, a real classic with a big, distinctive grill, and round shape and dark blue color.  It was greatly admired and he kept it running pretty good most of the time.  I always liked it a lot.  Well, about then he happened to acquire another Chevy of the exact same model and color, which he bought cheap, mainly, I guess, to have spare parts for his first car if he needed them.  Well, the second car didn’t run but he had it parked in the driveway of his and Rachel’s house in Santa Cruz.  He’d pull his first car in beside it and the two identical cars would, of course, elicit double-takes from passers-by.

            “They look like bookends,” said Kevin.

            So, he got the idea to do a “photo-tableau,” always casting about for new Triple-A projects, and did a little sketch of his two cars holding up a collection of giant books, cardboard, of course, on his front lawn.

            We all thought it was a riot and headed to Santa Cruz one sunny Saturday in the spring of that year.  He had gathered a bunch of used cardboard and we went to work constructing some flimsy “volumes,” painted in bright colors and propped them up between the cars, all our favorites: “Huckleberry Finn” (for me), "All About Annuals" (for the gardener, Rachael), and “Fanny Hall” (for, I guess, Kevin).