Blizzard of '61

Our current weather condition reminds me of the Ice Storm of March 1961. When the storm came it was during the night. In March, we woke up to a frozen white Winter Wonder Land. I worked in Atlanta at the time and it was too dangerous to try to drive to work. So, I called in. So did all my friends that were not away at college. We went out to play on the frozen slippery terrain.

Larry Southern got a near worthless used car from his father's car lot and we rode around and learned a lot about the physics of driving on slippery ice. We went to Town & Country Shopping Center, which was empty of customers' cars because of the weather and used the wide open spaced parking lot as a training ground. We would spin, get speed up and slam on the brakes en enjoy the slide. Later we tried climbing a steep hill and I forgot what happened but it put an end to our riding that car. 

The steep hill was leading off Powder Springs Street across from Garrison Road. We were just a block or two from the Marietta Country Club. We got the idea of going up to the golf course and sliding down the big hill there on the green. When we walked up to the Country Club we realized we were not the first ones to think of sliding down the hill on the golf course. Many kids were there sliding. They had serving trays they were using that they slipped in and got from the dining or kitchen area of the club. Other kids had flattened big cardboard boxed, and even one group of kids brought a car hood they rode on. I tried a serving tray, a cardboard flat, but finally got the not so bright idea of riding down on a round red Coke sign, which the face of it was facing the ice. I started down the hill, picked up speed, and for some reason the Coke sign started to spin, or I should say the Coke sign and I started to spin faster and faster.

The Coke sign became a runaway out of control Coke sign. I couldn't get off or guild it. At the bottom of the hill is normally a pretty little pond. That day it was partially frozen . I hit the pond, it may have skidded to put me more in the middle, then sunk. 

It was thigh deep in cold icy water. I walked out. The fun was over.

I needed dry pants. My pants were sloshing and about to get stiff with ice. I was walking.
Sometimes I can be resourceful when it comes to surviving. I sloshed and crinkled my way across town to Colonial Circle, where Mrs. Latimer lived. My friend Gene "Jenky" Latimer was killed in a drag race the previous May or early June. I knocked on Mrs. Latimer's door. She was happy to see an old friend of Jenky's. I told her my pants were wet, could I borrow a pair of Gene's pants. She gladly gave me a pair, which I went to the back and changed into. Then Mrs. Latimer baked us some banana-nut bread, which we had with hot apple cider. 

Still, each time I ride by Colonial Circle off Fairground Street, or eat banana bread I think of that day.