Old times, old friends… I watch these marathon runners on TV running twenty six miles around two hours and think back if they could of timed us out on how fast us Freeport, Tx white boys could run when the east side black boys on their side of Freeport, Tx was on your heels and catching up on you to whip up on you for evading their territory. Yes those were the days when I got dared to cross that line back then and got my little scrawny butt whipped a many a time back in them days when you stayed on your side of town. As time passed and we got older it all changed and one of my best friends in High school Named Calvin Kelly he and I hung out together played basketball and he even taught me how to box properly and it never stopped amazing me how agile he was and limber and me I was wound up tighter than a coiled wire. Calvin and I were inseparable all the way through High school and he and I even took a free bus ride up to the big H city in Houston,Tx to join the army and about thirty of us eighteen year old skinny and unfit boys showed up and every one of us was gung ho and ready to see the world until a drill sergeant got in my face and made me drop down and do twenty pushups for talking back and not addressing him as sir. This drill Sergeant was having fun with us boys and he really wanted me bad I could tell just so he could chew me up and spit me out from head to toe so we took our physicals and all but three passed and then we took the test and Calvin and I and a bunch others had failed the test and we were leaving to get on the bus and that drill sergeant came up and put his hand on my shoulder and told me they made a mistake on my test and I had passed and Calvin could retake it so I knew something was surly fishy going on so I sweared in and Calvin retook the test and passed and he sweared in too and they told us we have to come back and swear in a second time and we will become property of the united states army so we went back to Freeport,Tx and both of us in time had changed our minds and we soon went our separate ways and I always wondered what it would have been like to of pursued a military career then. I instead hot tar roofed worked as a cook for a Kelly’s restaurant at Surfside for awhile till it burned down and that guy Mr. Kelly could sure paint his paintings were so beautiful most of his work went up in flames the walls inside that restaurant were murals and dealt mainly with seashore and shrimp boat backgrounds and I loved his style. I started working for Ziebart rust proofing cars in Freeport, Tx for about a six months and that was the nastiest job I ever worked at and Mike Rowe on dirtiest jobs would of loved it back then. I got on with Mundy industrial services in late 1975 and worked there two years and got hired on in 1977 to Dow Badische and they added the two years on so until 2004 and a lay off after twenty nine years that is where I am still at out in the plants and praying for a Dow position in the plant I am working in now at plant B in the EO/ EG Pilot plant. I think back on those days and it toughened most of us young boys up to walk around bruised and bloodied lip from wrestling in the grass after getting jumped on and learning to defend yourself from the onslaught of some pretty tough ole Freeport boys back then and I ate my share of dirt and split lips and black eyes but I thank God for all the good and tough times we did share through all the trails of teenage to manhood back then in Freeport, Tx. A lot of my buddies are gone now Kemp Wall my truly best friend growing up has gone on to be with the Lord and Andy Camp one tough cookie back then, Johnny Husky, Ronnie Clarke, don’t know where they are today or Calvin Kelly for that matter and Steven Cartwright and all his Sibs the old Jones Creek clan I hung out with for years, many old faces from the past are just faded now and I see a few on Face book we are older and times have changed but deep within our minds there is that little kid in all of us full of spunk and just hiding there inside and could still be unleashed if we were to stop our busy lives for a moment and remember where we came from and maybe just pull your vehicle over as you are passing through Freeport and just once more take a walk over to one of the many levees and as you reach the top of that grassy crest and a southeast wind may be blowing in your ears with echoes and shouts of kids playing back then and close your eyes for a moment and remember when you may have slid down that same levee or wrestled your way to the bottom and wiped of the grass and dirt and ran up and did it all over again.
Posted on: Fri, 15 Aug 2014 09:09:56 +0000
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