Old September brings back many good memories

Joe Bowyer

Tonight, Sept. 11, as I started upstairs to get my article done, I looked out of the bay window in the kitchen and there stood a doe helping itself to the wild cherries lying in the grass in front of my house.

I called Janie, and we sat down at the kitchen table to watch her for a bit, and while we were watching, her two fawns came loping up from the direction of my popcorn patch and joined her. Deer sure love wild cherries.

After they fed for a few moments, they walked off toward my son Steve’s house where Brandy was sitting on the porch with one of their big German shepherds. They walked brazenly back to the end of the popcorn patch nearest Steve’s porch, nibbling on one of his small maple trees on the way, and paying no attention whatsoever to Brandy or the dog. I get the feeling they assume they are in no danger here, which is true. We love to watch them, and wouldn’t harm them for the world. It is amazing, though, what instinct tells them.

I love September. It brings back so many good memories, of picnics, and hayrides and school starting. I remember the smell of new clothes and new books as we mingled with the friends we hadn’t seen all summer long. I can’t say I was crazy about school, but I didn’t mind it. School was easy, and I enjoyed the basketball season and the tournaments at the old Berry Bowl. The quick walk to the Double Dip and the movie with a favorite girl or a gang of boys between the afternoon and the night session on Saturday. Those were the good old days; days that today’s students will never know. I am sorry for them, because it was a good time, the best of times. We were fortunate to have lived then.

Things are much different today in America. Time took away a lot of things, and seven years ago today, the terrorists struck our country, murdering indiscriminately our young, our old, our friends, our neighbors, and now things can never be the same, because they took away our complacency. I suppose if the terrorists had known what they were stirring up, they might have thought twice about what they were doing, but they had been at war with us since they murdered the first American, which was a long time ago, and they were allowed to get away with it. I guess it was the wrong signal.

A lot of Americans don’t believe in this war, but if we can bring freedom and democracy to just one country over there, or perhaps two, the dictators are finished. Three of my immediate family served in Iraq, which makes it personal with me. Thankfully, they all came back. I don’t know what I would have done if one of them had lost his life. My heart breaks for those who do lose loved ones.

As far as I am concerned, for the record, the whole of the Middle East isn’t worth one American life, but it seems that America is always fighting to help others depose some dictator who has run amok, or some country trying to overrun another. Whether we are right or wrong, we do it because we think we are right. I guess being jumped on by people who slaughter aimlessly and without any reason except hatred is cause enough to go to war.

Still, I long for the good old days before our country became so divided. Democrats on one side of the aisle and Republicans on the other voting down party lines is no way to run a country.

I hope whoever gets elected this year, they really change the way our government is run. I would like to see every congressman think only of the good of the country. Americans need that, and they deserve it.

If the tone in Washington changed, then old guys like me could hope our children might see our country have the strength of being united again. We wouldn’t have to worry about their safety and what might become of them.

Guys like me could fish peacefully in the old holes where we once fished with our willow poles while our feet dangled in the cool waters of Pipe Creek. Our only worry would be whether the fish were biting or not, and our grandchildren could sit beside us with a pole in their hand instead of a gun.

They would no longer hear the cannon or the rockets, and we could watch the dragonflies and the water skippers together, as we try to tempt a big black bass or a goggle-eye to grab our bait and run with it. Wouldn’t that bring heaven down here?

Joe Bowyer is a columnist for the Pharos-Tribune. He can be reached through the newspaper at ptnews@pharostribune.com

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