Good-Old-Days Syndrome: I Has It

[thumper_tx]

Though I grew up in Houston, where there never was a cruising scene, I spent many weeks in Paris TX with my cousins. In the late 60's and early 70's, the cruise was from the Bowling alley on 271 to the Sonic Drive-in on which street I am not sure. I enjoyed the cute girls acting silly, the hot cars, the craziness of it all. I was back in Paris in March and drove the old cruise streets and it was gone. No kids hanging out in the Bowling alley parking lot, no one cruising the Sonic, the Sonic was actually half empty. What do the kids do now? Maybe you can't go back, but when I think of those times, I am always smiling, it was a great time, not quite an adult, but not a kid either. When it comes to memories like this, I think we only remember the good times, not remembering any of the bad...maybe that why I smiling as I write this.

Thanks Tim for starting this thread.

There was a huge cruise route over on the north side along Jensen drive.
A burger joint on each end. Princes was on one end and I cannot remember the one on the other end. Burgers were 3 for a buck and 2 dollars of gas was good for hours on Sat evening.
Middle 60's.
Those were the days..only we did not realize it at the time.

 

[_RG_]

From the other side of the mirror...

Airforce kids came and went. Most were great folks and made good friends but you always knew they'd be transferred in a couple of years. They might have been born in Spain, Okinawa, Germany...mostly just names at the time. Their dads made great scout masters and we got truck loads of all kinds of cool camping stuff from the military.

No cruising, really. Maybe an evening trip down Nelson rd. to the Medina river crossing. Drink a beer or two and listen for the ghosts of all the folks who'd drowned or been shot around there. There were the remains of an old stage coach stop on the road to San Antonio. Legends told of the time when slaves were being transported and they'd chained them up inside. One night the building caught fire. Some said you could still hear the chains rattling and the moans of the slaves. Or the old railroad trestle there where a bunch of kids had gone out on one night. A train came around the bend and they took off running - not a legend. Most didn't make it and ended up in the river. You could still hear them falling some nights.

Weekends were times for doing stuff. Grab a rifle and go kill an armadillo or some rabbits. Take the dogs and go hunt up a few quail or run a trap line along the creek and watch for arrowheads. Set some lines in the river for a flathead or a good channelcat or just go shoot gar under the shade of cypress trees with a 22. Saturday night at the rodeo arena. Bull riding for five bucks and a dance afterward. Maybe somebody might have a keg in back of their truck.

Hook up a boat and invite a couple of highschool cuties to don their skimpiest suits and go ski all day with me and my partner in crime. Jump off the rock cliffs and swim under the caves. Ah, the things that went on in those cool shades and echoing walls.

Living for the day...devil take tomorrow. The devil was in southeast Asia... It took my friends and sent some back. Sure, we were immortal as all young people are but don't go over to Jerry's place anymore. He was a tunnel rat and now something ain't right. Rodger's missing and they don't know if he's a POW or not. Don't talk about it around his brother. I missed it by a year...too young.

Go back? NO. Been there...done that...glad I made it out and lived to tell about it. Some of us didn't. Bit of tractor seat philosophy: Nostalgia and fretting the past is similar to running a rear mounted cultivator. If you're looking back worrying about mistakes you might have made, the row ahead is surely an embarrassing disaster.