Saturday the wife and I drove up to her company gathering at Smith Lake. Friends, family, co-workers, and a few munchkins thrown in just enjoying a day at the lake. Swimming, eating, drinking, skiing – in short, having fun. Even a thunderstorm didn’t dampen the fun. In fact it did a good job of flattening the water for another round of water sports. Time to ride the wakeboard. I was told I was tearing it up. Funny, seemed different from my perspective but I reached my ultimate goal: walking away unscathed. It was an extremely good time all around and it ended too soon.
On the way home we stopped in at a Sonic drive-in diner. Seemed an appropriate move as we were in a drop top. Burgers and shakes just like the old days when kids used to hang out at such places without fear of anything. It made me think of the old 1962 Buick Special convertible that I grew up riding around in. Dad’s first new car. It’s still sitting in the garage up at the farm waiting for its third resurrection. Drive-in movies, drive-in diners, muscle cars, rag tops – seems we lost all that somewhere along the way.
Sure we had problems in the 60’s and 70’s most of which involved Vietnam in some shape or form but even so it was a simpler time. At least we were safe at home. All of the bad news in the world was coming from lands far away. We could go to the local drive-in without worry that one of the cars present might be loaded with explosives driven by a twisted man on a mission, headed for paradise to meet his virgins. All of America was hijacked on that September morning the towers fell, our way of life in an open society changed forever. Hopefully we can reclaim it but until then I’ll continue to enjoy the moments that remind me of exactly what we lost.
{ 1 comment }
While I grieve for the “good ol days”too, there are not many Americans that even know that we are in the war of our lives and our way of life.
We tend to lose sight of that fact, the fact that 9/11 has faded from most people’s memories and they see “the War” as that mess “over there” in Iraq.
Americans live in such insulated little bubbles. Bubbles where they live with their family, job, hobbies, money worrys and worrys about how much they don’t have that they want.
We as a Nation, as the Republic we should be, won’t understand and get the fear that we should already have, until thousands more of us die.
That is a sad, very sad fact.
Papa Ray
West Texas
USA
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