Squeaky bridge

I walk along the highway shoulder six mornings a week.  It’s a 1/4 mile long shoulder and I hike over and back three times.  In the middle is the Bull Creek bridge, so I get to walk across our beautiful creek six times each morning.  I don’t let myself stop, except on the final pass, when I do pause to study the waters and look for my friends, the soft shell turtles.

A couple months ago, a team of highway workers came and spent half a day carefully sweeping and then spraying the bridge and the vertical sides of its concrete side walls.  After studying their procedure for a while, I finally determined that they were sealing its surface, although  I couldn’t figure out why they would do such a thing now.  This is the “new” bridge, but it’s been there for about six years.  I would’ve thought one would seal a bridge a few months after it was constructed, but I guess not.

The bottom line is that now the bridge squeaks when it’s wet, and this fall has been quite rainy, so it’s wet about half the time I’m ready to walk on it.  The effect is the same as when you go into a store (like Wal-Mart) with wet shoes and you loudly squeak at each step; but in that case you only squeak for a minute or so till your shoes dry out.  When I walk the bridge when the pavement’s wet, of course, my shoes stay wet the whole time, and I make a very loud “reek, reek, reek” noise every step of all six passes.

Thankfully, the bridge doesn’t squeak when it’s dry.  Maybe we’ll be having some dry mornings soon.  Although if it would SNOW, I wouldn’t mind the wet squeaking!

 

Of suckers and ironing

You see, I don’t fish.  Therefore, I don’t know all details involved in fishing that are OBVIOUS to die-hard anglers, and so I probably made a fool of myself this morning.  However, that is okay, because I learned something, and I really do love to learn.

I was walking on the late shift today, and around 8:35 AM, I watched a full-sized pickup – towing a bass boat, of all things! – pull down into the tiny dirt parking area beside the bridge.   It rained hard a few days ago, so the creek is up, but it’s still only a couple feet deep – not to mention rock-strewn – so I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what these guys were up to.

Earlier this week, when it was three-and-a-half feet deeper than it is now, you might have been able to float a bass boat in it, but there’s no way even in high water that you could launch at the bridge.  Between the parking lot and the dirt area next to the creek are several carefully positioned boulders that totally prevent vehicles from driving to the water.  What were they going to do?  CARRY the bass boat to the creek?  At least my walk would not be dull.

Over the next few minutes, there was much to-do in the area of the trailer hitch.  Stuff, including a cooler and five-gallon bucket, was unloaded from the back of the truck.  Then on my next pass, what to my wondering eyes should appear, but an ironing board by the trailer’s right wheel!  WOW!  These guys were obviously smart enough to realize they couldn’t launch their boat into the creek; so instead, they were going to knock out a little ironing.  Their wives would be proud.  Personally, I can respect that in a man.

Next, out came some kind of electric (gas-powered?) knife.  It sounded like a distant lawn mower.  Maybe it was a Saws-All.  Heads down, the men began going after whatever was on the ironing board.   They’d saw for a few seconds, pause, closely examine whatever it was, put some of it in a large Zip-Loc, and then – horror of horrors – fling the rest of it up into the grass beside the bridge abutment. Not only that, every now and then they’d fling what looked like long plastic bread bags up into the grass, too.  I was stunned at their littering boldness, and I was beginning to get angry.

We happen to be sticklers about not littering, and the idea of these yahoos throwing their fish guts and plastic bags all about down near the creek really got my goat.  I made a mental note of their truck’s license plate number.  Then from the bridge overhead, I called down:  “Yo!”  They looked up.   Pausing till there was no traffic passing, I hollered, “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t throw your litter into the grass.  Just haul the litter out with you.”

One of the guys motioned about with his Electro-Knife and hollered something back at me, but a vehicle passed just then, and I couldn’t hear what he said.  They both kept staring at me and talking and waving and pointing with that knife.  They really didn’t look all that thrilled to see me, and I confess that I felt a bit intimidated.  And of course, with my less than perfect hearing (but surely it was really the traffic noise, right?) I was still unable to understand them.  I decided that Lone Sweaty Woman probably shouldn’t walk down and go eyeball-to-eyeball with Men Wielding Knife, so I just turned and walked on home.

But, my goat having been got, I really wanted someone bigger and uglier than me to tell those guys to stop littering by the creek!  So I called the Taney County Commissioner’s Office and asked who I should call to report someone littering on public property.  That nice lady connected me to the sheriff’s office, and that gentleman listened to my story and said he’d send a deputy out to talk to me.  I told him I didn’t want the guys arrested or anything; I just wanted them to stop littering by the creek.

Some few minutes later, the deputy phoned.  I told him my story while he listened patiently.  Then he responded, “If they’re cleanin’ fish and throwin’ the guts and carcass in the grass, well now, that’s not litterin’.  That’s all biodegradable and the animals’ll eat that stuff.”  I thought, but did not say, “Yes, but what about the stench until they do?”

He continued, “It’s sucker season, and them suckers go on up those creeks this time o’ year.  And they’re big fish.  They’re probably cleaning a load ‘a suckers.  Now when ya’ fillet them suckers, ya’ pull out all the meat.  That’s probably what they’re puttin’ in the plastic bag.  Then, the skin, you peel that down, but it’s still attached to the carcass, and them’s big fish, them suckers, so when you toss out that skin, why, it stretched, and seriously, it’ll stretch to about twice as long as the fish.  That’s what happens what you fillet ‘em.  So what you seen that looks like a bread bag when they threw it is probably that skin still atached to the carcass.  But that’s not litterin’, cleanin’ fish and tossin’ the guts in the woods or on the ground.  There’s nothin’ illegal about that.  Now, one thing is, you could call Conservation.  Becuz if they’re catchin’ fish illegally, or if they don’t have a fishin’ license, now that would be a crime.  But you’d need to call Conservation on that.”

He was really quite polite and very patient with this obviously totally ignorant city girl.  I thanked him for calling me back and told him that my main concern was just keeping the land around the creek clean.  He assured me that the foxes and coons an’ such would take care of that.  He reiterated that no crime had been committed, but that I could call the Conservation department if I thought they were fishing illegally.

Now, how I, a confirmed non-fisherwoman who doesn’t even know how to GET a fishing license, much less whether suckers are in season this week, would know that is beyond me.

So, thus ends another interesting anecdote in Taney County living.

Ya’ll come back now, ya’ hear?

Fishing frenzy?

Our little creek continues to see lots of morning action from seekers of fish.  At least, I assume it’s fish they seek. And considering that I’m only walking back and forth on the bridge for about 30 minutes each day, I would guess that what I witness is only a small percentage what actually goes on in the name of angling.

A few days ago, a rotund, bald-headed man was seen down by the bridge doing things I personally have never done:  carrying a white five-gallon bucket from creek to car trunk, unloading miscellaneous items from the trunk and spreading them on the ground, carrying something that looked like a cage and something else that looked like white feathers upstream a ways, pressing through the muddy undergrowth to the very edge of the creek, bending down and spending a relatively long amount of time (5 minutes?) to do something seemingly difficult with the “cage” and/or “feathers,” tossing the “cage” (on a rope) into the creek, then pulling it back out and tossing it again.

That was all pretty puzzling.

Today he was back, but this time, there was another man with him.  The second man wore hip waders.  The rotund, bald-headed man evidently had no shame, relieving himself in full sight of any traffic on the bridge.  (I did turn away as soon as I realized what was going on!)  He then donned hip waders and very, very carefully spread out on the ground behind the gray Honda (MO UA9F 4E) something that looked like a mesh hammock, but which I assume was actually a fishing net.  It had wooden bars attached to each end, and little black things along the long sides.  Leaving the net there, he disappeared back under the bridge.

Meanwhile, the second man returned to the back of the car and neatly folded the net up, end to end, as one would fold a large tarp.  On my next pass, all I could see was a white five-gallon bucket on the bank.  I guess the fishermen had gone back under the bridge.

This all occurred at the public access on the upstream side of the bridge.  There’s another access about a tenth of a mile away on the downstream side, and there has been a lot of morning traffic in and out of there, too.  Notably this morning a shiny black pick-up which spent about 12 minutes down there.  Maybe those guys have strung down there to catch what the rotund, bald-headed man and his companion miss.

Don’t think I don’t know what goes on in our neighborhood!

Sign of the economic times?

This morning, I did my one-mile walk, as I do six mornings every week.  I walk on the shoulder of our highway, from our house for a quarter-mile, across the creek to a point where the shoulder ends.  I do two laps which equals a mile.  Sometimes I do more.

I always enjoy walking across the creek (four times) because it changes all the time and I get to see all types of flora and fauna.  There used to be a soft shell turtle that swam around right under the bridge.  This spring one or more beavers traversed the east bank, leaving sawed-off saplings in its/their wake.  Often, a great blue heron is wading for breakfast, and sometimes I get to see him take off and fly upstream.

This morning, an old, beat-up car was parked in the gravel “lot” beside the bridge.  The trunk was open.  I saw some things that may have been a bait bucket and cooler on the ground behind the car, the back left door stood open, and someone was sitting in the driver’s seat.

On my second pass, the occupant looked up at me, making eye contact.  I just kept walking, but on my third pass, the man was out of his car, walking along the edge of the creek, carrying what looked like a new black fishing net.  Not a hand-held net on a stick, but an armload of netting, with a bright yellow border.  Curious.  Was he setting a net in the creek?  It has rained a lot lately, and the creek’s running high and fast.  Nobody fishes it much, because the only fish in it are quite small.  However, once in a great while, we do see someone with a pole at Big Rock.  They don’t seem to catch much.

As I crossed the bridge for the final time on my westward return home, the beat-up car passed me heading east, very slowly.  The driver looked at me, and I will tell you that he had some weird blue eyes.  Rough looking car, rough looking guy, but maybe he’s just trying to put food on the table in rough times.

911

There are three kinds of people in the world:  those who love meetings, those who endure meetings, and those who hate meetings.  Wanna guess which category I fall into?

Last night was the annual business meeting for our ministry, and it was held at our dining room table.  Larry and Jory joined Scott and me in person, and Rick was present via Skype.  We started at 7:08 PM (being the secretary I would know those details) and Scott hoped to end by 9:00 PM.  I think we all realized that was a joke, but we did finish about an hour earlier than our usual adjournment time.

The night being relatively young and tomorrow (today) being Off Day, I decided to type up the minutes while they were relatively fresh in my meeting-overloaded mind.  It does take a while to translate all that discussion into somewhat rational bullet points under OLD and NEW BUSINESS, so I was still hard at it when Scott came into the office around 11:30 PM.  Suddenly, I heard him say, “Oh… wow… that house is on fire!”

My depth perception isn’t great, and I had my glasses off since I’d been working at the computer (my mid-range specs were down on the piano, and I can’t focus on the monitor with my bifocals), so when I looked out the window, at first I thought it was the Ipock’s old trailer.  They’ve lived in a double-wide mobile for several years, but recently built – with their own two hands! – a larger house right beside the mobile.  He had mentioned to me the anticipated cost of moving and selling the mobile, so for a split second I thought maybe he had set fire to it!  But then I thought aloud, “He wouldn’t do that; he’s a volunteer fireman!”

No, this inferno was a bit farther away.  It was David and Tiffany’s trailer down on Irene’s Lane, and it was a horrific blaze that lit the night sky so brightly that I could clearly see cars (not just their headlights) through the trees on 160 up the hill a half mile away.  Scott grabbed the phone and called 911, and while he was talking to the operator, he saw Michael Ipock go down there.  There weren’t any other folks or fire trucks down there yet, so Scott took Josiah and drove down to see if they could help in any way.

They really couldn’t, but they did get a little info from David (son of Carol, whose husband went wack-o with the gun a couple weeks ago – in the house directly across the street from the one now on fire) and Reggie (Carol’s brother, who lives next to her and catty-corner to the blaze).  Evidently it started with the clothes dryer.  David, his partner, Tiffany, and their two young sons all got out, but one boy was burned – we don’t know which boy.  The younger boy is the one who was trapped in the house with his grandma’s suicidal husband so very recently.

The first fire truck arrived at 11:51 PM and several more plus the fire chief (and the Branson Daily News SUV) followed.  Most of the fire trucks went straight to the house, but one turned down the creek road.  For the next hour and a half (at least) they worked continually, going back to the creek again and again to fill their tanks.  The flames would die down for a while and it would all just be smoky; then a sheet of flame would shoot up again – maybe as high as 25 feet.

When the family had fled their house, they had gone to Reggie’s, and we saw an ambulance leave from there.  I assume it was taking the boy with the burns to the E.R.

Although I hate to admit it, I suppose there may be some value in meetings.  If we hadn’t been up so late dealing with ours, we would have been asleep, and who knows when someone else might have noticed and called 911.

A little action in the ‘hood

January 19th was a full day in our little world.  That morning, Jessica’s wisdom teeth were forcibly removed from their happy dwelling places (blog worthy and to be addressed in another post), and that afternoon there was a great deal of traffic on our little gravel road.  Here’s a letter I sent one of our neighbors after the fact:

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I spent about 1.5 hours yesterday afternoon standing out in the cold in our backyard along  the gravel road, staring down toward Irene’s and trying to figure out what was going on.  Andrew had told me there were four sheriff’s vehicles in the restaurant parking lot and that an ambulance had gone down the creek road.  That made NO sense, as there’s nothing down there.

We ended up with a total of SEVEN law enforcement vehicles that I could see from our yard, (three in LaShell’s driveway and four more in various locations along the lane) plus the ambulance that remained parked on the creek road down under the bridge for a long time.  There were never any sirens, and no gunshots were heard.

A local news reporter came by and I flagged him down.  He said he’d been listening to the police scanner for about an hour (it was almost 2:00 PM then) and that “there was a man in the house with a gun threatening to kill himself, and he had a child in there.”  It seems to have been Wendell, Carol’s new (rather hot-headed) husband.  That same reporter later told Eva that the woman had called 911 and left the phone off the hook, so officers could hear what was going on in the house.

An SUV I’ve never seen came down the road and went down Irene’s where it parked for a while.  When she came back out, I stopped the woman to ask if she knew what was going on.  She was fairly rude, told me she wouldn’t talk about it, that it was a family situation, and that I could talk to the police.  She drove off in a huff.

Tiffany drove in, parked a while, and then drove out.  When I talked to her, she said there hadn’t been school for her youngest son that day, that she had had to work, and that she had asked Carol to watch him.  But Carol and Wendell got into a fight, he threatened to kill himself, and Carol called Tiffany at work.  They had gotten Seth out of there (he was in the car with Tiffany), but Wendell was still in there.  She said the cops had said they were going to take him to the hospital, bit Tiffany thought they should take his (expletive deleted) self to jail.

Eventually, the ambulance went slowly down to Carol’s house, and they brought someone out on a stretcher and put him/her into the ambulance.  We didn’t know who it was.  There was no rush, so it clearly wasn’t someone who was critically injured.  Maybe ten minutes later, the ambulance drove slowly away.

Next we saw Judy walk back to her house, and then Reggie took Carol and they drove out.  We stopped them, too.  Eva asked Carol if she was all right (yes, but she was crying), and I asked what was going on.  Carol said Wendell had gotten sick and they had taken him to the hospital.  Then she rolled up the window and they drove off.

After another long time, the cops finally began to leave.  I tried to stop the first one, but he ignored me.  The next one told me that he wasn’t authorized to tell me anything, but that if I’d flag down a certain sheriff’s black truck, that man was the officer in charge of the investigation and he could tell me what was going on.

So, I flagged down that last truck and asked my question again:  “Can YOU tell me what’s going on in our neighborhood and why we’ve had seven law enforcement vehicles and an ambulance here for so long?”  He was very polite and friendly and replied that yes, he could.  A man had had a medical situation and because of accusations by family member(s), they (the cops) needed to take every precaution.  No one had been hurt, everything was okay, and the man would hopefully feel better soon.  Then he looked me right in the eye and said, “you know how stories get started.”  I said, “yes sir, I do.”  He said again that everything was fine, wished me a good day, and drove off.

It made the local news here the following day.

So much for a medical situation.  Not only do we have probable drug dealers in the ‘hood; we have crazies with guns.  Of course, guns per se don’t bother me, but the crazies surely do!  Never a dull day in Walnut Shade!!!

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We live about one-tenth of a mile from the house where all this happened.  Thank God no one was hurt or killed.

The Creek, Chapter 12: The Fax

After mailing off my letter to Mr. Local Dietz bright and early Thursday morning (right after the neighborhood meeting on Wednesday night July 23) we waited. I decided that Mr. Local Dietz would surely receive my letter, sign it, mail it promptly in my SASE, and we should have it back within a week. When it didn’t arrive in by the following Friday, and as the mercury got closer and closer to 100, I said a prayer and called Mr. Local Dietz.

Yes, he had received my letter, and he would be glad to sign it, except for the fact that it had come up at the neighborhood meeting that IF a property owner decided to prosecute a trespasser, there was a very slight chance that that property owner would have to appear in court. Mr. Local Dietz worked and was unwilling to face the possibility of having to miss work to appear in court, and until he had power of attorney from his brother, Mr. Out-of-State Dietz, he just couldn’t sign my letter on that technicality.

We talked a bit and he told me that there were articles in every issue of the local paper (we don’t take the paper) about the Bull Creek/Blansit Road/Big Rock affair, that the whole thing was becoming a big mess, that Carol O had talked to him about someone putting in another road down there, that one of the commissioners (who shall remain nameless, but I did vote for his opponent yesterday and the opponent lost – sigh) told him that the neighborhood meeting had been illegal, and that he was waiting for calls back from both Carol O and his brother, Mr. Out-of-State Dietz. In the meantime, he suggested I call his brother. Hmmm… He gave me the number and with fear and trembling, I dialed.

I got his voice mail and left a message.

The following morning, while I was out watering my tomatoes, Jessica hollered from the front porch, “MOM! Mr. Dietz is on the phone!!!” As best I could given the toe, I hobbled quickly to the phone to speak with Mr. Out-of-State Dietz. He was just as nice as his brother. He asked where I lived and I described our location. He said my family and I were welcome to use his property to swim. I thanked him for that, but reminded him that we could not take advantage of his kindness unless we carried with us to Big Rock his signed written permission for us to be there.

Then, get this. He asked for my email address and said that on Monday he would fax his permission to the Taney County sheriff’s department and email me a copy of the fax. And he did!!!! Monday morning, I had a pdf  attachment giving our family and our guests (including those from Africa!), when they are accompanied by a family member, to swim at Big Rock! That night Scott took the kids and the fax-stuffed baton and went swimming. The toe prevented my partaking of the joy, but I will soon. They were down there for about an hour and half, had the place entirely to themselves, and no sheriff or deputy came to question them.

Thus endeth the saga of The Creek.

The Creek, Chapter 11: The Neighbors

As anticipated, some 19 neighbors (including Yours Truly) plus the Sheriff, the Prosecuting Attorney, and the Presiding Commissioner met at 6:00 PM at Carol S’s home to discuss the whole issue yet again.  This meeting was initiated by Carol O, who decided the commission wasn’t going to do anything, and so it was time for the neighbors to unite and start prosecuting the trespassers.

Among those in attendance were local residents who own six different tracts of creek-front property, two outsiders who each own creek-front property but who live elsewhere, and four local residents who don’t own creek-front property but who are concerned about the situation, (or who just want to be allowed to swim it in the creek, for crying out loud).  I suppose you can guess that I was the only attendee in the final category.

I did take notes, but I will spare our readers that particular tedium and just hit the high points here.

I was duly impressed by the sheriff.  He is built like a sheriff, he sounds like a sheriff, he’s very calm, he’s very well-spoken, he’s very experienced, and you would NOT want to meet him in a dark alley (or up a dead-end creek road).  He patiently explained for the umpteenth time what the landowners need to do (post their property, either with no trespassing signs and/or purple paint, and then call him when there there are violations), and what his department can and can’t – or will and won’t – do.  It was all very logical, and who can argue with good logic?  Well, I for one.

A mere three minutes into the meeting, when the sheriff explained that he and his deputies would be forcing all trespassers to leave, I raised my hand and asked if those who had received permission from the landowner to swim there would be told to leave.  Yes, they would, because there’s no way for a deputy to know to whom the landowner has given such permission.  I then extended to him my sample letter and asked if a person confronted on the property in question produced such a letter for the deputy, would it suffice to allow the person to stay there and swim?  He read over the letter and said, yes, it would.

VICTORY!!!

For me, the rest of the meeting was gravy, my primary goal thence becoming to request Mr. Local D to sign a letter for me, with auxiliary goals of having as many other owners as possible also sign them, so that if anyone with our last name were to inadvertently edge a toenail onto posted property, s/he would not risk ending up in jail.

I heard numerous passionate pleas in the next hour and forty-five minutes.  Several of the owners went back to beat the dead horse of why on EARTH can’t the road be CLOSED?!?!?  Closing it would save the county all the hassle of patrolling it, all the cost of maintaining it, etc., etc., etc., ad nauseum.

Mr. Presiding Commissioner (our friend Chuck Pennel) calmly explained that there were properties at the end of the road for which that road was the only public access, and besides, it frankly just didn’t sit well with him to close a county road.  “Harry”, one of those owners, was present and also said he did not want it closed.

There was extensive talk about gating it.  The neighbors suggested that the gate could be closed all the time, or the sheriff could close it at 8:00 PM after chasing all the trespassers out, and then re-open it every morning.  Chuck reminded us that if that were done, and he really did not like that idea either, not only would all the landowners have to have keys, all the county maintenance workers would need keys (because it’s still a county road), and all the county emergency workers would need keys.

The idea of putting up a sign to say that there was no public access to the creek via Blansit Road was presented.  Of course that would not actually be  true, because the low water bridge at the end of the road IS a public access.  The sheriff said that anybody could put whatever sign he wanted on his own private property.

The sheriff also strongly encouraged each land owner to post his property, either with signs (for which, if and when trespassers are caught stealing them, they can be charged, prosecuted and forced to pay restitution – though it could take months) or with purple paint “blaze” marks on trees.  Evidently purple paint is universally known and accepted to mean “private property, trespassers will be prosecuted.”  I did not know this, but with all the hot air in that room I was not about to admit my ignorance.

Our friendly prosecuting attorney, in shirtsleeves and loosened tie, also came across well, explaining procedures clearly and helping all of us learn exactly what happens legally when people trespass others’ property.  I was favorably impressed, and although both he and the sheriff are running unopposed, I plan to vote for them.

The resident landowners clearly want substantial county action NOW (or last month), but because many people have been swimming and partying at Big Rock for at least 50 years (for the most part, without a clue that they’ve been trespassing) – and some of those present admitted that as teens they had personally done things like racing up and down the creek road, getting drunk at Big Rock, and going parking under the bridge – it’s highly unlikely that things will change significantly before weekend.  Today is Thursday, and weekends do seem to occur on a fairly regular basis.

There were other fireworks on the side – the family whose well is probably not in compliance with DNR’s (Department of Natural Resources) requirements is claiming that the asphalt fill that the county used to build up a small section of Blansit Road after the last flood will leak oil into their well, and then, Chuck, who will pay for my well?    Oh, give me a BREAK!

Another member of that family – at least I think he’s married to the family member he’s living with -  stuck his head in the room to holler at the sheriff, prosecuting attorney, and presiding commissioner the following direct quote, “I JUST HAVE ONE THING TO SAY.  YOU GUYS AREN’T GOING TO DO A D*MN THING FOR US TILL ONE OF US GETS KILLED!” and then stomped our of the room; a fact for which I, at least, was thankful. I believe his reference was to a recent killing in Arkansas over a trespassing situation.

Then we had comments about the state highway patrol officer who somebody claimed to have seen sitting in an unmarked car down the creek road on personal property with a lady who had long brown hair. . . and the speaker guessed they had a right to do whatever they wanted but she sure didn’t want them doing it on her property.

One resident owner complained that if they put up a sign saying that the creek road property was private, then they’d have people knocking on their door (they happen to live closest to the Highway 160 bridge) all the time asking for permission.  To which the sheriff replied, “Sir, that’s just part of owning creek-side property.”  Good for you, Mr. Sheriff!

Someone else (Carol O, I believe) complained of all the noise, trespassing property damage, drugs, drinking, etc.  The sheriff said, “Ma’am, drugs and these other problems are EVERYWHERE in this county, not just up this creek road.”  And I could have clapped for “Harry” (who owns a half mile of creek frontage and does not want the road closed ) when he added, “I live in BRANSON!  And I have people walking through my yard, leaving litter, shooting fireworks at all hours, drunk, and doing drugs everywhere all the time.“  Amen, “Harry,” and get a life, Carol.

Finally, and most disturbing to me, were comments from two different families about the fact that they would NEVER allow THEIR kids to go to Big Rock, how they had seen our kids going down there, and how horrible it would be if something happened to one of them; the clear and pressing implication being that no one in his right mind would want to swim there because of the nasty people who go there.  These comments did manage to unhinge me for a few hours after the fact, to tell the truth, but to their faces I simply said, “I hear you.  I understand your concerns.  I respect your viewpoint.”

With extreme restraint I managed to refrain from telling them that each person has a right to raise his own children as he sees fit, and that neither they, nor the sheriff, nor either of the Messrs. D would be held responsible if something happened to my child.  Good night alive.  Do these guys really think that after 18 + 16 + 14 + 9 = 57 parent/years of life I don’t give a rip about my kids?!?!?  Come ON!

In the end, two owners turned down my request for a signed letter of permission to access the creek via their land, but the one who mattered the most, Mr. Local D, said that he and his brother, Mr. Out of State D (who owns the land at Big Rock), were fine for us to swim there.  He said if I sent him a letter he’d sign it.  I mailed it off this morning, so hopefully in a few days we’ll be able to beat this heat in the cool waters of Bull Creek at Big Rock.

And this afternoon, Andrew and I bought a length of PVC pipe and two caps, so now whoever goes to Big Rock will have a nifty “baton” in which to carry his permission slip.

The Creek, Chapter 10: The Blue Truck

Under the 160 bridge, on public property, there’s a little gravel turnoff from Blansit Road, where, if were so inclined, you could drive in the loose gravel up under the bridge. However, a number of years ago – perhaps about five years ago when the new bridge was built? – the highway department installed some enormous boulders so as to prohibit one from driving down the turnoff and into the creek. The boulders are positioned so that it is absolutely and completely impossible to get around them.

Now, when you turn off Blansit Road at that point, you can only go about 25 feet before meeting the boulders. There’s room there for maybe six cars in the remaining “parking area” if you sandwich them in tightly.

A few mornings ago, I was walking back and forth across the bridge as I always do, and I saw a blue pickup parked down there. It was about 7:00 AM, and there was no one in or near the truck. The amazing thing is that it was parked on the other side of the boulders; the creek side. It was facing the boulders with its tail toward the creek.

How it got there is a one mystery, and how it will get out is a bigger mystery! While I walked and sweated, I had plenty of time to hypothesize about both. Because the far side of the creek is very steep (60 degrees?) and very high (20+ feet?), it could not possibly have come down that way. It clearly did not vault the boulders from the near side either. The only other options were that it rose up from the center of the earth or that it was dropped from a helicopter.

If the former, its bed would have been full of mud and rocks, but the bed showed only a toolbox and some crushed soda cans. That left the latter, and I can see it now: You know those truck commercials where the truck is sitting on a mesa in the middle of the Grand Canyon (or somewhere similar – as if there is any place similar to the Grand Canyon), and there’s no way on God’s green earth that it could have gotten there?  Well, I am thinking that some wealthy Branson entrepreneur was bored and decided he could have fun by using his personal helicopter to lower the blue truck down beside the creek.  Either that, or he lowered from the bridge with his personal crane, swinging it out a bit to position it where it now sits. . .

. . . Or sat.  I started this post after the neighborhood meeting Wednesday night, during which the blue truck was discussed at some length.  In fact, the sheriff said he’d go check out the truck as soon as he left the meeting.  However, when I walked across the bridge this morning, the blue truck was GONE!!!  Helicopter?  Crane?  There are four indentations in the gravel where its tires were, but aside from that no tracks or signs of scraping or pulling or driving or anything else.  Maybe the earth swallowed it up a la Korah.

The Creek, Chapter 9: The Carols (O and S)

Having been told sequentially by Carol S, Mr. Local D, and Presiding Commissioner Chuck Pennel that a neighborhood meeting was in the works and that Carol O was the force behind it, I dug out a number for Ms. O and left her a message. A few days later, she returned my call and was quite friendly about the whole matter.

Now, since I don’t own any creek-front property and am not as directly impacted as those who do, and since Ms. O is in latter category, I chose to listen much and speak little. That ended up being a wise choice, as I could not have gotten many words in edgewise. Once Ms. O began talking, she more or less continued for about 20 minutes.

She told me of all the awful things she has witnessed firsthand, including “70 people on the gravel bar the Wednesday before 4th of July.” She said there were three or four tents down there at 5:00 PM, a huge awning, lots and lots of people, vehicles everywhere – both on the road, beside the road (on her property), and on the gravel bar – and lots of coolers. These folks were preparing for a long July 4th weekend.

In another instance she was accompanied by one of the commissioners who is up for re-election to put up some No Trespassing signs on the creek road side of her land. They met some folks who were trespassing, and when that gentleman told them it was private property and they’d have to leave, they (more or less) told him where he could put it. He then called the sheriff, and evidently these people had the nerve to smart off to the sheriff! That’s a lot of nerve.

She went on and on about her fence torn down and her property defaced and all the noise and gunshots and fireworks and so on. I listened.

She told of the various times she and friends have gone down in the back of her property and sat in lawn chairs just to watch and document what goes on. I listened.

She reiterated that the commission evidently wasn’t going to do anything, so it was time for the neighbors to take action. I listened.

She then invited me to the infamous neighborhood meeting, and gave me the time and place. Wednesday at 6:00 PM (a church night!!!) in Carol S’s yard. It had to be then, because the prosecuting attorney and the sheriff had conflicts on other nights, and she didn’t want to wait too long to get something done. I thanked her.

When she had slowed down a bit, I asked her if any of the commissioners were going to come to the neighborhood meeting. “NO!” she replied in a shocked and guarded tone. “The commission just doesn’t seem to want to do anything about it, so the neighbors are going to have to band together to get something done.” I told her I would be at the meeting, but I honestly didn’t have the nerve to ask her if it was all right for me to invite Chuck Pennel, the presiding commissioner. I guess I was a chicken.

The next day, Carol S came by with a flyer about the meeting to be held at her home. She went on about all the drugs down there and how her grandson had found a pipe. She said we just didn’t need all that drug stuff in our neighborhood. I chose not to mention (her home’s extremely close proximity to) the one house in the neighborhood where I am fairly certain drugs have been used and/or sold for years. I thanked her for coming by and told her I would be at the meeting. And once again, I chickened out on telling a Carol that I’d like to invite Chuck.

As Carol S was walking back to her car, Scott said, “Did she say it was okay for Chuck to come?” I told him I had not asked her, and he ran after Carol. He told her he’d like Chuck to be there, that he was our friend, etc. She said she didn’t care, so we took that as a go-ahead. I later called Chuck and invited him. = )

The Bull Creek/Big Rock problems didn’t start yesterday, and they didn’t start last year or whenever Carol O bought her land. They have gotten steadily worse through the years. Ms. O is just a nice lady who has been hit in the face (or, more accurately, in her backyard) with it this summer, and she’s determined to rectify the situation.

I can respect a woman who takes action on such a thing. I still remember my one-woman crusade some 16 years ago to rid our suburban Little Rock neighborhood of a massage parlor where more than shoulders were being massaged. Three doors from my house, this woman was “practicing” every hour on the hour, and without exception her only “patients” were men. We were eventually successful in driving her out of town and getting her “massage” license revoked, but it took months of daily observation, pages and pages of documentation, and untold hours of sitting and waiting to speak in meetings of the Planning and Zoning commission.

I truly hope this creek situation can be resolved more easily, but I rather suspect it will take some long-term effort. I just want to work with my neighbors, and not against them, because when the party-ers go home on Sunday evenings, we neighbors all still live here! I wonder what (if anything) will be decided at the neighborhood meeting tomorrow night, and I wonder what the “climate” around the creek will be after the August 5 primary election.