Thursday, November 1, 2018

My Redacted LIfe: Chapter 38 (Cont._2)

 What did a young married couple do back in the fall of 1972 when they had no spare money to spend, i.e. neither pot nor window? Oh, we were making money enough, but spare cash went into saving for a home. The GI Bill offered substantial benefits in a home mortgage and I intended to take full advantage. So, recreational outings were both creative and inexpensive. We saved and improvised.

Brenda introduced me to a cheap pastime. The area in which her family farm sat was rich in Native American history. A sluggish wetland called Baker’s Bayou was the center of much ancient activity. After a farmer had plowed a field rains had come, one could walk around and spot artifacts rising to the surface of the earth. We would collect specimens and store them roughly by location. Later we learned that the major collection points coincided roughly with bases identified by the state archaeologist's office. The effort produced much fun at little cost.

I suppose collecting them was insensitive, but by now they would have been pulverized into unidentifiable bits of stone by the huge farming rigs.

Brenda’s dad, Julius, told us of being a very young boy and talking to a very old former slave who said he could remember the last Indian family that lived on the Bayou. One morning they had simply disappeared during the night. Figuring placed the time somewhere in the late 1850s. An archaeologist acquaintance, who once helped us categorize our collection, considered the ages and verified that the story could have been true. I’ve thought about it many times over the years, the continuity of history and all.

While we were walking the ruins of a past civilization, I was working to control the nature of the next civilization. It struck me as how little impact the ancients left on the land and how much power we now possessed to enact change. Maybe the role of my profession wasn’t to design paradise, but to ward off hell. It made me think.

In the meantime, Brenda taught, I travelled the state, and, after a rain, we walked, hand in hand, over the remains of a past civilization of people who had no doubt worked, loved, and dreamed of a future. I suppose, perhaps, that one day some life form will walk over the remains of our efforts to lead a meaningful life.

Wonder what they will find?

Cars probably. Lots of
rusted old cars.


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