grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

in His Heaven

By

Nana
Frances Johnson Creecy

I believe places have energy left behind from memories of a prior time. Good energy or weird energy, happy or toxic. When we make our annual trip back to Norfork Lake, we always visit the little cove where our dock is still hidden. We troll the holy water there, inspecting the gravel road leading down to the lake, studying the rocks we explored as kids and trying to make out our cabin through the overgrown vegetation. Regrettably, Papa Creecy sold the house and dock when Nana was sick in the early ’80s which made us sick too. The dock is still there, possibly abandoned, and although we don’t own it any more, it will always be ours.

It’s now barely afloat in our once perfectly secluded cove back before Buzzard’s Roost became so developed, when there were no loud jet skis to disturb the peacefulness. That dock was our home base each magical summer. We loaded up the boat in the mornings with John Deere coolers full of ice and cokes and hot dog fixins’, set out to Jordan Island in search of sand and sun and returned to end the day back on the dock sunburned and waterlogged. Sometimes we read books or napped there lulled by the rocking of the lake, and at night we looked for shooting stars, lying flat on our back on still damp beach towels. The stars are more brilliant over the dock. 
Me and Staci on the dock.

As kids we explored every inch of that dock including underneath. We spent hours swimming between the floating barrels that supported it and fishing between each boat stall. Nana once fell asleep on a cheap orange plastic raft and floated away so far from the dock we had to pick her up in the boat. I can still hear her laughing. We shot bottle rockets and Roman candles on the 4th of July, listening to country music on our portable 8-track tape player. Our laughter and music echoed from one end of the cove to the other. It probably still does.

One summer we found a flat wooden board in the storage closet on the dock. A gift from the lake gods? It was simply a rough piece of plywood painted white with a faded red stripe and a scratchy rope that served as a makeshift handle. Splintery, hard, homemade, unsafe and fun as heck. We had no idea how it came to be in our storage closet, but we claimed it. Daddy pulled us on that board behind the boat driving way too fast, especially after a few Schlitz. We screamed, “faster, faster” holding on to dear life and our bathing suit bottoms. Clearly, Daddy’s goal was to drown us. It may have been his favorite thing about the lake. As we skidded over the wake almost passing the boat, the water skinned our legs like carpet burn as we eventually shot off head over heels into the lake.  If we were lucky, we were still wearing our bikinis when we surfaced with sinuses full of lake water. Later we bought a real boogie board made of molded, curved plastic meant for riding the waves. It was boring.
Daddy
true farmer’s tan

The countdown has started. It’s almost time to visit our cove and recharge from the energy of the lake. A mere 57 sleeps!

talya

Musical Pairings:

“That’s the Way Love Goes”, Johnny Rodriquez
“Summertime”, Kenny Chesney

“God’s in His Heaven, All’s right with the World.” Robert Browning

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Comments

  1. Maybe I will make one of those construction paper chains like at Christmas time to count down the days of summer until we go! 🙂 Which “cabinet” are you staying in this year – LOL

  2. What is Thomas studying? If I didn’t know better, I would say he’s checking his IPhone. (I want the snoring cabinet.)

  3. I was way behind on the blog but while here in Fayetteville I have found some new followers for you as soon as I get Paula to forward the blog site.

  4. We will go home on Wednesday morning. It would be great to hook up with you on Tuesday if it works out for you. 🙂

  5. I love this one! For my family, it was Greers Ferry Lake. We made a trip there every year! i still take Mom and Dad sometimes. It’s always been my place to “recharge”. I love the blog!

    • It truly is! I guess, as we get older, I’m learning more and more how appreciative I am for the traditions our parents brought us up with! The longer I work with kids the more I realize what a blessing it is!

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