The Wishing Well by Carol G Oliver

It was a sleepy little town tucked away in the palm trees, orange groves and huge oak trees. The main road was four lanes but still named a Boulevard, which for the year 1972 seemed to advertise possible growth.

There was a cull de sac of eleven houses where all but two of the heads of the household were on military bootstrap. All were officers attending the university in the city nine miles away. It was a wonderful time of year and a great place to live. About every month or so they would block of the street and have a block party. Everyone had a hibachi grill, which they took to a central house along with the food for a cookout for their family. Then when they all sat down to eat they shared the different dishes. After great camaraderie and visiting the children and adults would play ball in the street or badminton in one of the back yards and of course almost every other house had a pool. This was a time when fences were unheard of and you could go from house to house without a gate. Our house was right in the middle of the block and its really distinctive feature was a wishing well, Where everyone at one time or another felt compelled to make a wish and drop in a coin. This money we used to buy something for the block parties that everyone could enjoy.

However the innocence of those days evaporated as the military folks got reassigned and the civilians began to move in, First there appeared fences to separate property lines, no longer did the block parties exist. The two original civilians remained but the other houses were sold and resold and the personality of the block seemed to change. There was however one new unwelcome addition and that was the busybody (an old man) who seemed to take it upon himself to be the guard dog for the block. At first he was regarded as harmless, and easy to ignore. This was a short-lived and he became increasing difficult to comprehend. Retirement was not necessarily good where he was concerned for he had too much time on his hands. His children were all gone and his wife still worked. Of course age was not kind to him for a man 70 years old he found it more and more difficult to find projects to keep him occupied. This is when with his wife soon to retire they decided to sell their home and move into a condominium. So their quaint little house went up for sale. Before long they had moved and the house sat vacant. It was right in the middle of the cull de sac with nothing but the signs of the realtors to exhibit signs of life, due to the economic downturn. Life went on as usual, the neighborhood became older and more sedate. Children came but for visits to see grandparents, and friends who still lived in the other part of town. But the only children who lived on the street were the rentals at the end of the cull de sac.

Every now and then some people, who live a few blocks over, come to walk their dogs on the cull de sac. The whole block is beginning to look like mostly retired folks live there, except maybe for four houses on the entire cull de sac. Long gone are the days of block parities, cookouts and games of baseball in the street.

Occasionally we learn about people who have long since moved away, for instance one evening a knock came at the door. When we answered it there stood a young man in his thirties, tall straight and handsome. We did not recognize this stranger not even after he spoke. He had to introduce himself again and it was the young boy who had lived next door and moved away nearly twenty years ago. He had been a shy and awkward youngster who had attached himself to our own children, I used to help him with his schoolwork and his mother and I had become close friends. But life had not been kind to them; her husband had been killed in a car accident and left the whole family without support. He did not believe in life insurance and had always considered tomorrow the day to start saving for a rainy day. My friend Sherry had been the breadwinner for years. Johnny told us how he had gone into the navy, his sister married and his mother sad to say had become an alcoholic and died of cirrhosis of the liver. He came to tell us about the family but mostly to thank us for helping him back in the formative days, because if he had not had that help he would have dropped out of school instead the Navy gave him a good life and a solid future.

Looking back can many times be difficult and you feel a sense of loss. I have heard the expression that change is progress. Quite personally I would rather go back to the days when neighbors were friends, block parties held for newcomers and children stayed in touch. I look back to our friendly, homey cull de sac.

© Carol Oliver