Where's My Mountain?

    I don't know what we had all expected today, but things definitely surprised me.

    We had planned to do a few things. One of the items on the list was to take my grandfather to the mountain where he had played as a child. 

     Sigh.

     We were within 10 miles of the mountain when we had a flat tire. This mountain is in the middle of NOWHERE.

     Fun.

     It was comical that I had not seen another car for at least half an hour and suddenly, there was a stop sign. The roads were not paved, but there was a stop sign.

     I giggled to myself wondering what rush hour might look like in this area.

     Okay, so back to the mountain.

    We approached from a direction that made it appear as if there was one mountain. It looked a bit like this.

    My grandfather is reminiscing about playing on that mountain.. He stops talking when we turned toward the mountain.

    It was supposed to look like this:

    

    He had called it Saddleback Mountain. It was supposed to look like two mountains together.

     What we saw from the new angle was this:

    "What did they do to my mountain?" He is shocked!

     I have to say, I was pretty shocked. I didn't know that sometimes mountains were disassembled.

     We continued to drive and when we reached the other side, there were piles of rock and gravel. The mountain was now in pieces no larger than a car tire.

     He had wanted to tell us his stories while hiking up the mountain. There would be no hiking as there was also a large fence encircling the entire mountain.

     His disappointment and shock were very real. As we drove away, he quietly said, "I think the last time I played on that mountain was 74 years ago. My brother and I used to visit a rattlesnake den on the side of the mountain."

     I spun my head at him. "What?"

     Why would kids want to play near rattlesnakes?
     "It was a different time. When our mother sent us out to play, we would walk or run all the way over here. She couldn't call us on our cell phones. We just came home at dark. I don't know if she even knew we went to the rattlesnake den."

      What?

      Things really are very different for my children than they were for him.

     He turned his feeling of disappointment and sadness around. He told my daughters stories about milking cows and showed them the same barn where he had been kicked by a cow.

     Bittersweet. He was inspired to tell more stories, but I believe he was also feeling like more of his life was being erased.

     I learned a lot today. My grandfather talked about his childhood as if it were just last week. His memories are vivid.

     This area has been ravaged by many storms throughout this last century and both of my grandparents still found the area very familiar. Apparently, not much has changed.

      And lastly, I saw with my own eyes that mountains really can be moved.

    
    
      



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