More rain today - I emptied another 1 1/2" out of the rain gauge around 3:30 this afternoon, and we've had some shower activity since. Much more rain forecast for overnight and tomorrow. I'm about ready to be done with this! Not only has it been a lot of rain, but it's coming so hard and fast it's causing flooding issues. Younger daughter in Parkville says the Missouri River there is up and running, with lots of debris. I saw it on this evening's news, and she wasn't exaggerating! Her home is high on a hill - but she drives right by English Landing Park on 9 Highway going to work.
I grew up in the hills of North Central Missouri - northern Carroll County, to be more precise, between the "Tater Hills" near Coloma and the "Mandeville Hills". Flooding wasn't something we had to deal with a lot. A little creek meandered through our farm, and I do remember a few heavy rains when it overflowed briefly. We didn't have issues with the roads being closed due to flooding.
What we did have, on occasion, were issues with the school buses not being able to get down the gravel roads due to mud. I remember a few times our neighbor's son came to my rescue by picking me up on his way to school in a big truck - I think there may have also been a time we went to meet the bus on the blacktop via tractor. There was a time or two after he graduated that I got off the bus (kind of was "dumped out", actually) on the blacktop a mile and a half from our house.
Probably the most memorable event was one muddy morning when our bus couldn't get up a hill about a mile past my house because the road was so slick. It may not have taken a lot of time, but it seemed like forever that the driver would back up, take a run at the hill, then repeat.......over and over again! Just about the time we all thought we might be sitting there all day, he got a run going that took us to the top of the hill and over. Whew! That was one day we were glad to get to school.
Ten and a half school years riding the bus left some memories, to be sure. Sometimes that ride seemed so long - other times, when the conversation was lively, it wasn't nearly long enough! There were the hot rides in the summer, cold rides in the winter when the heater just couldn't heat up the entire bus. There was at least one time we had to pull over and let a heavy storm pass through, on a day when there was tornadic activity in our area.
It was very different when we moved off the farm. I went from being the farthest point from school on our bus route to living next door to the school.....opposite extremes, for sure. I wasn't sad to lose that school bus ride, but there were some fun times on those rides as well. Even then, I still got to ride the bus as we traveled for music events, athletic matches, etc. I even suffered my first concussion on a school bus - we were going to a basketball game at another school, the driver hit a big pothole in the road, and someone's (hard sided) overnight bag bounced out of the overhead rack and landed squarely on my head.
Fun memories - I think!!
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