Sand In My Shoes

Stately palms, like a sentinel on watch stood near the train depot and with the slightest of breeze, would wave its frons in greeting to those who passed through the small hamlet where I grew up.

My cousin James and I were the inseparable two-some, forever exploring each nook and cranny of our small community. We roamed the white sandy lanes from the gator infested waters of Lake Hancock to the John S. Barnes packing house, where the familiar hum of machinery dropped oranges into bins, then plucked up by fruit packers and layered into flimsily wood crates to be hauled north by rail.

James and I would gopher hunt in the small white, sandy field, void of vegetation other than stinging nettles and sand spurs that separated my house from the train depot, or we would slip into the Guava grove and crawl beneath a canopy of guava limbs heavy with velvety fruit as we silently crept alone the pine needle strewn ground, ever fearful of Bloody bones who lived just beyond the guava grove.

We walked in groves of citrus as far as the eye could see, then followed our footprints indented in white sand back, toward home. We climbed tangerine or orange trees and dodged the sharp thick thorns as we sat perched in the tree. We reached out and plucked an orange and bit into the soft sweet flesh as sticky juice burst forth and driped from our chin and trickled down our small hand.. Or how the scent of tiny, white petaled orange blossums sprang forth to release heavenly fragrance into the air.

Massive limbs of Live Oak trees branched out, like a garled hand snaking into the unknown. We reached up and pulled from low lying branches arms of red bug, infested moss we would later regret; as we neared the lake in search of arrow heads left decades ago by Seminole Indians.

These are memories of my childhood I hold close to my heart.