Author Thomas Wolfe reminded us that we can’t go home again.  He was right but, by golly, you can go back to where home once was and that’s what I did this past June.   I more or less reluctantly responded to an invitation to attend  a reunion of my graduating class from Crooked Springs High School.  I had only been to the very first such gathering some years earlier.  They’re being held annually now since we’re approaching the age when members are likely to become permanent dropouts at any time.
 
image via wikipedia

I loaded the pickup and struck out north on I-75 bound for Cincinnati, a quick turn west on I-74 and an hour later I’m at what once was my old Indiana home.  The operative phrase here is “once was.”  Not much remains of the Crooked Springs I left behind.  All the Mom and Pop grocery stores are gone, Chippy’s card parlor is there but it’s a diner now.  Both taverns have been torn down and, for that matter, so has the school building we came to commemorate.  The First Church of the Redeemed Brotherhood is still going strong although I noticed the Baptists have built their own church on the outskirts of town.

There were 18 of us in my graduating class–10 girls and eight boys (I think that adds up right).  At the reunion there were 12 attendees–10 brought their spouses making a total of 22 revelers.  Three former members were each given a moment of silence before we began our meal which was catered by Millie and Dollie, owners of the Downtown Diner where we gathered on this auspicious Sunday.

Millie and Dollie are sisters–one married with kids, the other a maiden lady.  I never knew them but I knew their daddy enough to wave when I saw him.  Their diner used to be in the old general store on Main Street but the owner, the president of the town board, evicted the girls when he got a better money offer from the U.S. Postal Service which wanted to moved the post office into that building.

The old card parlor had been boarded up since the owner died and the girls got up the money to buy it.  The community rolled up its collective sleeves and helped with time and elbow grease to create the new diner just down a side street and across the railroad tracks from the old.  It looked like a restaurant but if I closed my eyes I could see farmers and locals and me playing rummy and partner seven-up just like in the old days.