Remembering a Friend Downtown
On Facebook and on this blog site, I have chatted with people who have churned up a bunch of memories. Steve Mattison and I typed back and forth in the past couple of weeks, and I thought back to the Cedar Lake days. When we were really young, Blue John Costner would load us and our innertubes all in the back of his truck and take us out to the lake to swim. (I don't know why we called him Blue John. Seems like his dad was John Costner, maybe?) Steve and Bobby Costner tolerated Celia and me pretty well, and I don't even recall one single near-drowning incident. But I do remember it was very important to have your own innertube 'cause Blue John wasn't going to waste any of his time going down town to pick one up. Well, one day I slipped off to the Mobil station to get a new innertube on a hot summer day. The walk made me thirsty, and I needed a Nehi Grape to make it back up the hill. So I paid a visit to one of my downtown buddies, Floyd Inman, to borrow the change for a bottle of soda. I must have been about 6 or 7 years old at the time, and I didn't want to carry debt, so I told Floyd he could just go down to the Pool Hall to get the money back from my Daddy because I wasn't allowed to go in there!
Well, Floyd couldn't wait to get down to the Pool Hall to tell all the men in the domino game about Bain's little girl being out on the streets begging! As it turns out, I didn't have to walk home that day because Dad found it necessary to take me home with several lectures along the way. Best I remember, the lecture ended with "and you don't need to tell your Mother!" Apparently, I wasn't the only one in our family who wasn't supposed to be in the Pool Hall that day!
Probably several years later, but still floating along in innertubes, Celia Jean and I floated across Cedar Lake while Bob and Steve swam to the other side. That was so long ago -- there wasn't an "other side" back then. It was just the natural lake side.
I'm glad I grew up with friends like Floyd and Blue John, and Celia, Bobby, and Steve - and parents like Mo and June! What a difference it has made in my life!
posted by Kathy Bain Dunn @ 8:04 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
That sounds like my dad, he always had fun, but everything he did was always in good taste. Anytime he could tell something funny about anyone, he jumped at the chance. He didn't go in the pool hall, as a rule, but I bet he didn't mind going in to tell Elmo something about his youngest daughter. Thanks for the memories about Floyd, tho it makes me miss him even more. I'm not blaming you for anything, because I'll never forget him anyway and all that he did for me, growing up and even when I was older, he was always there for me.
He was my best friend, right to the end. and would have been the best man in our wedding, had he held on just a little longer.
It's ironic you mentioned Steve Mattison. He stepped in as my best man when Cynthia and I got married. His brother Mike was the best man when I got married the first time. They both were like the brothers I never had.
Kathy, I remember you and your family very well, mostly from days at FBC. What a wonderful bunch of folks from which you have your roots. I also remember the Dunn brothers from the days they played ball with Judy Sexton's sons. I would not have wanted to have played football against those two warriors (Titans). What are those boys up to nowadays.
Colin, the Dunn boys are doing just exactly what you would have expected them to do. Mike is coaching football and teaching Senior English in Saginaw, Texas (just north of Fort Worth near the Speedway). Mike is a single man loving the Metroplex and all it has to offer in the way of sporting events, concerts, and steak dinners. Steve coaches football at University of Central Oklahoma where Roger Webb is the President. He is married to a gorgeous, Godly, Cherokee girl from Sallisaw who will finish pharmacy school in May. As you can read between the lines, I am incredibly proud of them - all three - having a daughter in law has been a special blessing after raising these two raw-boned boys!
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