Life along the river is something that in many ways helps define my life. With the exception of my four years in Oklahoma, I’ve been within a few minutes of a major river. Of course the Mississippi has been the biggest part of that and hence the levee memories. But I also really enjoyed the Hudson and making the crossing at the nearby TappanZee Bridge or futher afield at the Bear Mountain or George Washington bridges. But I must tell you, the view from high up on the levee was missing.
There are lots of levees in lots of places and everyone of them seem to take me a a walk down memory lane and somehow feel a lot like home. Recently, after a short highway drive, I was on gravel winding past sorghum, corn, soybeans and cotton. It immediately made me think of lots of summer days spent driving around in the Delta looking at the cows grazing on the levee, or the cotton, rice or soybeans just below.
The drive up top of the levee made me miss my old Jeep. And I have to admit being jealous as I pulled my small car to the side of the turnrow amidst all of the pickup trucks and began chatting to some of the people headed to work.
But just a few minutes after work, as everyone returned to their pickups, I got in my little car & a pickup blocked me in. The taunting started — but it was just the guys saying they wouldn’t let me out til I showed them how the hardtop convertible worked! I took back to the levee thinking it would be just fine, even if I missed that Jeep I had all those years in the Delta. Hope the current owner takes it up on the levee now and then and looks around!
By the way, the most recent work event I drove up to, guys were bummed I was in a rental instead of my own car. So maybe I fit there no matter what I’m driving! I’ll pass on the fresh air drive on the levee until the fall or something when temperatures are a lot more bearable!
A recent drive along an Arkansas levee
The Jeep I miss so much but got me addicted to fresh-air vehicles.
A spring on the Mississippi River when water was taking some of the levee.
Nice memories! I’ve seen your levees, and they looked inviting.
I have many memories of driving along the levees in eastern Arkansas with my dad. We would down there with four or five trailers in tow to round up someone’s calf crop. It never ceases to amaze me how you can just drive and drive and always be high up on those levees. Water on one side. Cattle and crops on the other.