Searching

Searching was inspired by yet another cousin from across the creek. Cousin Wayne was several years older and lived in a different community which I considered distant then. Every year at reunion time we would get together play ball and swim in the muddy pond at my mother’s uncle’s farm. My two cousins from the river cousin Rick and the rest of the family would make the journey in cars with out air conditioners filled with all types of country cooking and gallons of sweet tea in stone crocs. All through the years due to my closeness with the cousins from the river I really got to know Wayne. Through the years we played ball on opposing teams and went to opposing High Schools which will cloud a young person’s better judgment. On 3 December 1968, the announcement came that Wayne was KIA in a Firefight while in an engagement with the enemy in the Peoples Republic of Viet Nam. This time the trip was not the same. Upon viewing him in the casket, I can still remember the sense of reality that came over me. The next weekend like always I was back with my with river cousins and learned that the older one had received his notice of induction. We were all thrown in to the realization that his younger brother and I would be next in line. With no end to the war in sight at that time, everything seemed much different. All the things we loved to do together now all seemed empty. We did continue to hunt and fish and now engage in a new past time, raising hell and chasing women. Eventually everything past by and somehow all of us survived. We all eventually drifted into our own lives and life went on. After many years and the death of my younger cousins Rick and Larry, I had an opportunity to visit The Wall, I began to revisit past times that I remembered. This series of events caused a big change in the way I would think. All those river experiences, trips on vacation and the amount of fun that we had with meager funding all started a inspiration that would consume me like a Wild Fire. The fun we experienced back then were improvised out of whatever junk we could find and made complete by our imaginations. We made the best of what we had, and I remember those times as some of the best times that I have ever experience. I thought then as I do now that I was the richest person on earth to be able have those experiences with the two people that I hold so dear in my heart even after all those years. They taught me so much and didn’t even know it at the time. Even though we knew people at school laughed at us because we were Rednecks it was ok because we knew we were Rivernecks and I can proudly say that I would not trade those experiences for all the gold in the world. This song visits the growing up part of a young boy’s life when all the uncertainty of change becomes evident. It also has inspiration for Cousin Wayne’s family and the supreme sacrifice that was made. Last it revisits the journey from childhood straight to adulthood as was the way things were back then. I will never forget those times and intend to write a book about them.

                                                       RAH © (p) 2005