Oh, let me tell you this before I start my story for this week. I talked with my first cousin Peggy several days ago and she gave me some good news. Do you remember the story about seining for the little colored fish in the branch that flows between old Logan School and downtown Logan? Well, Peggy told me that the little fish are still in the branch. I was glad to hear that and would like to see them again. But I’m too old to outrun a snake if one should get after me. If you remember this is where Freddy Lee and I seined up a snake one time.
This same branch runs on down toward Ruby School, where there was a covered bridge before it was burned. But there is another road before you get to Ruby that turns off to the right and crosses the creek heading toward Shady Grove Church. The creek is a little over waist-deep at the point. It is deep enough to swim there.
There were three or four of us boys and we couldn’t swim, but we thought we could use a big tree limb and hold on to it and kick our legs and learn to swim. We geared up and gave it a try. The end of the limb I had went under and took me with it. I inhaled a lot of water before I got my feet on solid ground. After I got on dry ground I coughed and sputtered for several minutes and was scared about how close to drowning I had come. I saved my learning to swim in a swimming pool.
One more thing about this creek and I will leave it. On the left side of the road, a little ways down the creek there was a good place to fish. One day, my brother Dale, our friend Freddy Lee and I were fishing there. I caught a nice size catfish, and never having caught a catfish, I didn’t know about the big fins on each side of the fish. I reached for the fish to take it off the hook and that rascal stuck his fins out and gave me two big sticks.
I experienced a lot of dangers as I grew up. Glad I made it.
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