From Gene’s Notebook

…water, we crave it, and then we hate it.

Along the Mississippi River flooded bottom-lands in eastern Missouri, I several times ran out of water, down to the last sip in the water bottle - no matter that is was warm, it was water, and then none, values in perspective ….

Just several feet from where the flood-waters stopped, a dark-haired river-bottom woman is mowing her thick lawn. I ask for water. She fills my water bottle. I glance at her, right out of a Southern
short story, that dark hair, but all I want is water ….

…and more bottom-lands, again, out of water; there is a home on a hill, and like the first home, the flood stopped short. I walk up the hill and ask two kids if there is an adult around to give me some water; they call their mom, short, and in a short dress; she fills the water bottle twice. Another character out of a Southern short story, and again, thirst trumps carnality ….

And down and down the river road, more water requests, more river women, more thirst, then satisfaction, that satisfaction of water when the bottle is empty ….

…thirst long gone, the dark-haired river woman, junked cars on dry ground, and the short woman in the short skirt, mud-splattered logging truck in the yard, rest sweetly in my mind ….