High points from El Camino Real

Folks along El Camino Real enjoyed their first near perfect weekend in quite a few weeks.
It was just in time for the start of summer vacations.

After the winter and spring we have just come through, it sure felt like we had earned.

Our prayers go out to our neighbors in Oklahoma and Arkansas as they attempt to get through and rebuild after the catastrophic storms they have been going through over the past week.

I’m sitting at a picnic table on the Redneck Riviera writing this column cussing the seaweed and being thankful there are no mosquitoes.

I started to take this week off but I had six bits worth of news all stored up that I needed to get told.

When I first started writing this column I was Justice of the Peace and the Hall of Justice (I nicknamed the JP office this because I was a big Superman comic book fan in my younger days) was located next door to the Pic N Go convenience store by the red light on the corner of El Camino Real and Highway 69.

The manager of the Pic N Go was my friend, Ouida Murphy.

She was the sweetest lady and we had a special bond because she went to school with my Aunt Maybelle over at Glover in Weches.

Weches folks are pretty much all like family whether they want to claim each other or not.
I liked claiming Ouida.

Working next door to each other for so long, we had to help each other out on occasion.

If Ouida had to go to the bank or the restroom, she would call me and I would walk over and mind the store until she got back.

In later years I moved on to be the County Judge and Ouida retired.
I found out this past week that my friend Ouida had passed away at the age of 84.

You had to love Ouida and for that reason the world is going to be a little sadder knowing she isn’t in it.

Please keep her sons, Ronnie and Marshall and all the rest of her family, in your prayers as they mourn her passing.

Another one of my favorite people from when I was Justice of the Peace was Texas Department of Public Safety Trooper Ron King.

Ron was the most laid back fellow you would ever want to meet and I always loved talking to him when he came by the Hall of Justice.

Ron was a simple man with simple likes and I could relate to him.
Later on Ron went to work with vehicle inspections and went around to all the garages making sure that they were inspecting cars right.

He was the inspector’s inspector.
I haven’t seen Ron in a good while, so I was shocked the other day when his cousin called to tell me that he had passed away on May 16.
Ron spent a good part of his life in the service of others helping to keep our highways safe.

Ron was 72 years old. Please keep his family in your prayers during this time of loss.

Robert E. “Bob” Boyd Jr. died on May 18 here in Alto.

He was the last one of R.E. Boyd’s boys. Terry, Roy, and Charles Tab Boyd have passed away over the past few years.

Lynn Arnold, their sister, is the only one of the siblings still living.

I haven’t talked to Bob in a good while, but we use to visit regularly when I passed by his house on Lovers’ Lane on my way out to the farm.

He was always nice to me. Please keep his sister Lynn and his family and friends in your prayers as they mourn his passing.
The Lynches Chapel Cemetery Homecoming is this Saturday, June 1, 2019.
Load up your tables and lawn chairs and come early so you can get set up and visit with old friends and family.
Lunch will start at noon, so get something good cooked up and plan on being there.

Cemetery dues are now due.

Annual dues are $15 a grave, and made payable to Lynches Chapel Cemetery Association. Mail to: Nan Glaze, 234 CR 2920 Rusk, TX 75785.

For 22 years now I’ve been stressing the importance of taking care of our cemeteries and teaching our children about their responsibilities to their ancestors.

I said that I wasn’t going to say too much about my grandson Sawyer in the newspaper because I didn’t want you folks to think I was bragging or anything.

I guess I’m going to have to eat my words.
We took Sawyer to the beach this weekend and the look on his face when the first wave came across his feet was priceless.

He absolutely loved it even though the beach was covered in seaweed. He is 14 months old, but he loves the water. It was almost impossible to get the smile off his face the whole time he was there.

He would play until he couldn’t go any longer and then he would just fall out.

Building wonderful memories is what life is all about.

Enjoy those babies because they don’t stay babies long.

I hope you and your family had a wonderful Memorial Day on Monday. The summer is just beginning, so make plans to spend all the time you can making memories with your family.

I want to wish all of our area graduates the very best of luck as they take the next step forward in their educations or their careers.

Things aren’t going to be easy, but you have to keep on trying and pushing forward.

You might not end up where you thought you were going to be, but hopefully you’ll end up where you are happy, loved, and useful.
Congratulations!
I guess its time for me to get my stuff packed up and get back behind the pine curtain before it gets dark.
If you have some news that needs telling then give me a call or shoot me and email.
I’ll see ya next week! And remember, You can get everything in life you want if you help enough other people get what they want.