COLUMBUS, OHIO’S
RIVER RATS KIDS©
By Linda Lee
Greene, January 17, 2019
We
were called “River Rats” when I was a kid. That’s because West Second Avenue in
our distinctly blue-collar, family-oriented neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio
marched right up to the raised east bank of the Scioto River, as it still does,
and we spent much of our playtime at the river. We gained access to it most
easily on pathways on both sides of the Third Avenue Bridge that spanned it, as
it does to this day. In what we called “Fly Town,” and today is officially “Harrison
West,” the blue-collar ambiance has transformed to an upwardly-mobile vibe, as
most of the remaining houses and apartment buildings of the area have undergone
slick renovations. During the last couple of decades, large numbers of them
were torn down to make way for stylish row-houses and condos, inhabited primarily
by young, childless professionals on view profusely on weekends jogging the
blacktop-paved streets. I visited my old stomping grounds not long ago and was
heartened to find that the street in front of the house where I lived for the
nine years of my childhood beginning at the age of six and ending at the age of
fifteen was still comprised of its timeworn original bricks.
I
snapped a few photos while I was there, and then sat in my car as old memories
swept over me. I recalled that back before agricultural and urban-generated
pollutants and other development threats made the water unsafe for wading and swimming, seining
for crawdads in the river at its shallow points under the bridge was a daily
task on hot summer days for us kids. Principally, it was a male-oriented
activity, but once in a while the boys stooped to allowing us girls a go at it.
Females wore skirts and dresses, and rarely shorts then, and I remember well kicking
off my shoes and pulling the hem of my full-skirted garment between my legs and
tucking it up and into its waistband and wading gratefully into the rapids of
the waterway. The goal for us girls was cooling off and impressing the boys
with our willingness to participate in their labor, even though once the crustaceans
were caught in the seining net, we wouldn’t touch them with a ten-foot pole.
Part of the fun for the boys was eliciting squeals of horror from us girls when
they scraped the icky, writhing things out of the nets and chased us up the riverbank
with them.
Shivers
of dismay prick my spine now when I think of the many times a gang of us inched
our way into the tunnel beneath the bridge. It seemed then never to end as it
bore east under West Third Avenue, but surely it is a judgment influenced by the
outsized imagination of an adolescent girl. It was dark and teemed with mold,
filth, and acrid leavings of the homeless who made of it their toilet and even
their nighttime dwelling. We never saw them, though, as homelessness was uncommon
back then—at least it was the case in our corner of the world.
We
lived on the kid-friendly streets then—not that they weren’t frequented by
cars, but there was a kind of unspoken contract between us kids and drivers
that allowed us full access to the streets as our playgrounds. Hardly ever were
any of us kids holed up in our houses, unless we were sick or grounded. After
school until dark, and summer vacations from early morning ‘til sundown, we
gave those bricks on the streets a workout. Kick the can, hide and seek, Cowboys
and Indians, jump rope, marbles, jacks, hopscotch—splashing in rain puddles—riding
bikes, climbing trees, picking through trashcans in the alleys—sledding,
snowball fighting, building snowmen and igloos, and on and on, the pastimes
were endless no matter the season, or the weather conditions. Never was there a
boring moment, or a longing for a friend.
Columbus, Oho,
USA, and multi-award-winning author, Linda Lee Greene has authored and published four books. All of
them are available worldwide in eBook and soft cover at online booksellers. Her
latest novel, CRADLE OF THE SERPENT (goo.gl/i3UkAV) was designated as a finalist in the 2018 American Fiction
Awards Competition. It was also awarded a 5 Star Review by Readers’ Favorites. In
addition, she was the winner of the 2018 Peter Hills Memorial Writing
Competition. Scheduled for release in early 2019 is her novel, A CHANCE AT THE
MOON. It will be available in soft cover and eBook at Amazon.com and other
online booksellers. An extensive exhibition of
Greene’s artwork can be viewed at www.gallery-llgreene.com.
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