My Heart Still Cries Out
In 1958 the Yuba river in Northern California was flooding in the Sacramento Valley, while west of Yuba City the Napa River was raging wildly over its banks. It was at this time our family lived in Napa…way out on Brown’s Valley Road.
Our front porch was five feet off the ground
I remember standing on the porch…waters’ rising inch by inch,
Getting closer to the top and all kinds of debris is floating down Brown’s Valley Road.
As the water rose higher and higher, I remember saying this little prayer:
Oh lord, when my eyes go dim and my heart goes
still
my voice cries out, won’t you lay me down,
down on Brown’s Valley Road.
That’s where I first gave a kiss, got a kiss
And survived various near misses;
Like the flood of 58
Water is rising with mire and muck,
While 16 chickens are baptized to their final cluck
Regis
In 1968 when I toured Northern California, I recall coming to a place near Eureka where there was a creek running through a redwood forest. On a tree there was a marker showing that the water had reached over 80 feet from the normal creek bed. I recall seeing it on TV and in Life Magazine in 1958. Terrible.
Ron
Hurricane Andrew took away our condo in Homestead, FL. But we loved to tell the tale. Someday I will express what happened poetically.
John Michael