Alright, today I introduce a new category of posts here at LTG entitled “Journey through the Past”.  As old men are wont to do, I find myself thinking frequently of the past.  And I’m often surprised at just how much I’ve forgotten about my life.  Sometimes when I get together with old friends or the kids they’ll tell stories that I would have never remembered on my own.  It seems to me losing your memories is an especially sad thing because what are we except a collection of what we have done, places we’ve been, and events we have experienced?

I have boxes of photographs, mostly stored away safely in the garage.  When I return to the states next year I have good intentions about sorting through them and uploading the ones that trigger a long-forgotten memory.  And then I’ll tell the story.  I have no illusions about these stories holding much interest to anyone who happens upon this woebegone blog of mine.  But then, I’ve been blogging for going on seven years with little of interest to say.   I’d call that a freakin’ tradition!

So, let’s get on with the first story in “Journey through the Past”, shall we?

That’s my son Kevin at 2 years of age back in 1980.  We were living in the beautiful mile high city of Prescott, Arizona.  I was carrying mail for the Postal Service and was president of the local branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers.  I was big time into softball in those days, and founded the Mile-Hi Softball Club, the purpose of which was to drink beer and play ball, pretty much in that order.
But enough about me (ahem).  We had purchased our first home at 202 San Carlos Road and life seemed like it could go on that way forever.  Turns out it didn’t of course.  Things happen, but just as importantly, things don’t.  And it was one of those things that didn’t happen that I remembered when I saw that picture of Kevin.

As you can see by the Google Earth map above, our street was a narrow dirt road.  About 1/8 mile up from Gurley Street, one of the main thoroughfares in Prescott.  You can kinda sorta tell that Gurley has a curve on both sides from where San Carlos enters.  This made entering Gurley pretty treacherous as you couldn’t see oncoming traffic until it was on top of you.

One day little Kevin got it in his head to go visit the house where we used to live.  On the other side of Gurley Street.  The Deputy Sheriff who found Kevin standing in the middle of the road with traffic swerving to miss him said it was a miracle he hadn’t been hit.  I’m not really a man of faith, so as much as I’d like to believe in guardian angels and Providence and such, I’m thinking it was just pure blind luck that Kevin lived to be the fine young man and father that he is today.

Had luck (or whatever it was) not been with us that day, everything in my life would be different, and not in a good way.  Being a parent is without a doubt my greatest accomplishment, but oh how it makes you vulnerable to the whims of fate!

And that’s the story I remembered today.