This is our spot on the Trinity. Every year the high waters rearranged the sand bars and the configuration was entirely new. The diving rock on the right burned hot in the summer sun. Excellent for roasting your bones if you stayed in the cool water too long. You can barely see it but there are stones below the surface maybe 10 to 12 feet down. Diving for white rocks was a common game and running across the bottom with a big one in your arms another.
In the late afternoon the breeze whirled slow circles of leaves down the gorge. Pollywogs could be found in shallow pools and a fresh spring to drink from was nestled in the ferns. Gramps often left a watermelon there in case we couldn't last to supper. Of all the things we miss of childhood I am convinced it's unanimous we all miss the Trinity. Going back individually never quite feels the same as it's the voices of others that makes the place.
Never a broken bone or terrible fall or near drowning occurred. Danny sliced his leg once wipping his blade on his leg while cleaning fish. Standing in the shallows once I got caught in quick sand up to my knees but everyone said it was my imagination. Gramps handed me the end of his pole and said just lay into it. Pulled downstream and there was nothing to it.
And all the while I was having fun I was dreadfully homesick. I looked south over the mountain and grieved even when I was a young adult.
