The woods...

Long before the Methodist church made a parking lot out of it there was a great park at the end of our street. Before the city made a park out of it there was a really cool stand of woods with a creek running through it at the end of our street. We were absolutely forbidden to go anywhere near these woods for fear we would fall in the creek, be eaten by a bear, or possibly have more fun than was legal in 1956. For these very reasons we spent every waking moment planning a trip to the woods, sneaking off to the woods, or running and playing with total abandon in the woods.


The day was a perfectly beautiful spring day when Glenn and I felt the urge to make a trip to the woods. It may have been okay if we had bothered to tell Momma where we were going….of course if we had told her we would have been forbidden to go. It makes perfect sense to both of us even today that our reasoning was sound in sneaking off. We scooted out of the house with no problem. When there are five kids in the house it’s barely noticeable when two go missing. We made it to the woods and were having the time of our lives within a few short minutes.

Had we known this would be our last trip to the woods we would have soaked it in with every breath. Too many times in life the things we love are taken from us with no warning. After less than an hour Momma came looking for us. She found us. She had a switch in her hand and a mean look in her eye. Glenn was able to run because his feet were actually on the ground. He was only four though and never gave running a thought. He decided his best approach was to hide behind a weed. He was spotted in a very short second.

If I had been on the ground I would have run halfway to Bedford before I stopped. Unfortunately I was mid-swing over the creek on one of the grapevines hanging from the oak trees. And, I was swinging toward a very irate Momma. I thought about letting go and falling into the creek. I would have survived with only a couple of broken bones. In the end though I landed right in front of her and took the first bite of that switch right across my skinny legs like a man. Being a man was short-lived however. I was squealing like a girl after the second or third hit. Glenn wet his pants while I was whipped so he got a couple extra licks for that. The walk home was rough. We were still getting an occasional swat as we worked our way up the hill toward home. We had never counted the kids we knew on the block until that day. There must have been a hundred of them. They were all outside as we went by. They were all watching. They were all whispering, “there but by the grace of….” or something of that sort.

We kept our distance from the woods while the wounds to our legs and pride healed. It must have been at least a week before we ventured down there again. To our shock and sadness there were bulldozers tearing those woods down to make way for a new city park. Our hearts were broken. We vowed we would never step foot in that park. Then we ran home as fast as we could before we were missed.