The Sentinel, Memories Long Ago 201128

      I am not sure how out of the blue a memory comes to me and makes me happy. This story is one of those memories.

      In the spring of 1968 mom and dad sold their home in town. They had purchased a new home in the city, but it was still under construction. They moved up to our clubhouse on what was called Brick House slough. (I never knew why it was called that, but it was basically a backwater off the Mississippi river.) They lived there all summer long. Dad still worked in town, but grandpa was retired, so he and his daughter (my mother) went fishing every day. My siblings had what amounted to a huge park to play in and very few people around to bother them. There was a speed boat there for use and they could swim all day long. Mom said it was the best summer of her life. Dad got to barbeque any time he wanted and there was always a project for him to work on, so he was happy too. I had reenlisted in the navy and was stationed at the naval technical training center in Millington, Tennessee so Joyce, Annie and I were able to visit with my parents and Joyce’s mother on some weekends. Life was pretty good up there. Some neighbors had retired and were living there full time. It was an inexpensive place to retire to and their clubhouses had been set up for year round weather conditions, while ours was not at all ready for winter. All in all it was an idyllic place to be back then.
      Time went on as it usually does and in 1985 Joyce Annie and me were living in California and decided to make a trip back that summer to see Joyce’s mother and my brother Tom and his wife Sheri and their daughter Gina. We were visiting Tom and his family. I suggested we drive by the old clubhouse to see it. They replied that I might not like what I see, but I persisted and we drove out there to look around. Everything looked pretty much the same, except there were very few cars there for a summertime. Sheri explained that a nearby dam built some sort of cooling station just north of the area and the effluent from that station heated the water in the slough and few of the fish survived and those that were left were deemed by the state as not edible. So a once wonderful refuge came to a bitter end.
      Those things happen in life. We had a tremendous load of fun there during our time, but I feel sorry for those who by that time were missing out on the wonderful time we had there.