Tilt-a-Whirl

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Some guys have a code they live by, some guys don't.

John Ceepak? He has a code.

Me? No code. Not unless you count my ZIP code or something.

I took this job because I'm twenty-four and Sea Haven is, as you might've guessed, a sunny haven situated by the side of the sea-an eighteen-mile-long barrier island crammed with motels and beach houses and bait shacks and ice cream shops called stuff like “Do Me A Flavor” and the “Scoop Sloop.”

Tourists come here to soak up the sun, lick down orange-and-white swirl cones, and bury each other neck-deep in hot sand. My hometown is best pictured on one of those perky placemat maps dotted with squiggly cartoons of buildings like The Shore Store, Santa's Sea Shanty, and King Putt Golf.

It's Saturday in Sea Haven.

I pull into the parking lot outside The Pancake Palace at 7:30 A.M. When I was in high school, I worked here as a busboy. Now I'm what they call a summer cop. I help out during the muggy months when the population of Sea Haven, New Jersey, quadruples and then quintuples and then you need a plastic pass pinned to your swim trunks to even think about walking on the beach.

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