From Laric Beckman

Hello, Friends and Family of George Cokinos ~

I first met George and Bebe in 1968, when I was 12 years old. 1968 is the year that they ~ together with Ray and Irene Stone ~ built twin oceanfront houses on North 1^st Street, South Bethany, Delaware ~ the same street that my family had a beach house since 1962. (How lucky could I have been? First things first, the Stone’s son Stacey and I began learning to surf in 1969, a sport I continue to thrive on till this day.)

What struck me about George was that for him, life was fun. At 12 years old, I had never seen that in adults before. My earliest memory of George was honoring his invitation to Stacey and me to pop over for a pancake breakfast. Once seated at his dining room table, George began cooking flapjacks; as they became ready, he flung them like Frisbees at our plates. Some landed on our plates; some landed near our plates; some hit the nearby curtains and landed on the floor; some merely hit the floor. It didn’t matter. Life was fun.

Everyone knows how strong George was. He SQUASHED Stacey and me during our adolescent years. “The Claw;” “The Dutch Rub;” “The ~ ‘the shovel only missed my toes by a ¼ inch!!!’” Etc. Well, the years passed; Stacey and I were 15 and 16; we were feeling strong ourselves. Once, during the summer of 1971, I spied George from the Stone’s deck, reading a magazine in a beach chair down on the beach. “Look how vulnerable he is; LET’S GET HIM!!”

Stacey and I snuck down behind him and threw him out of his chair. Stacey and I jumped overtop of him; we met eyes and knew we were in control; for a second, there was no doubt. WE HAD HIM! However, within an instant, my face was smashed in the sand; only my left eye could see Stacey’s legs flailing uselessly in the air. It was reversed; both of us had been pummeled. That was the last time I ever physically messed with George.

I’ll close with George’s favorite story about me. One day in the summer of 2004, I saw George down by the ocean, entertaining some six or seven-year old kids. As I approached, I realized that he was explaining “sand crabs” to the youngsters. He had a large sand crab in his hand. George asked the kids, “Do you want to see something funny?” My arrival had been fairly sudden; George simply looked at me and commanded: “Open Wide!” Without thinking, I opened my mouth wide; and George threw that sand crab into my mouth as if it were a grape. I pretended to chew, and I fooled those kids; they thought I ate that sucker.

Papou never stopped describing his enjoyment of that moment….

All the best to everyone