TIME FLIES

Time flies when you realize how far back it was when I moved from Dalton Gardens to Bayview nineteen years ago. It seems like yesterday except I'm much older now than then.

I was brought up to date with a Coeur d'Alene event which established a police sub-station on Sherman Avenue. I'm thinking why would they establish a sub station only blocks away from the main police station.

While perusing a discussion on Huckleberries on line dealing with the subject, I was politely informed that the police station was moved north to the northerly border of Coeur d'Alene several years ago.

It started me thinking about the old days when I  drove cab for Sunset Taxi. The night that I was driving Brad Hagadone and Tom Fisher late one night when I circled the block using an alley. I turned right twice and ended up at an ATM. Unfortunately, the right turn was onto a one way street that was going the other direction. The officer let me off with a warning.

The night I picked up a pedestrian who asked me to drive him up to Fernan Saddle. Since it was a strange destination, mid-Winter and late at night. Well it turns out he was a pending suicide. He had a bottle of booze with him and was going to sit in a snow drift drinking until he was drunk and dead from exposure.

I asked him why he wanted to do something like that and he replied that his wife cheated on him and he didn't want to live any more. As we approached the saddle, I managed to suggest that he might want to consider a smarter way like divorce, or counseling as an alternative. I finally said, "Look let me drive you back to town. I won't charge you for the ride, just don't do it." He accepted and lived to see another day. I never saw or heard from him again and have wondered these many years what happened to him.

Then there were the old days when I would drive out to the Fish Inn near Wolf Lodge bay to hang out.   When Sherman's was relocated into the old Ace of Clubs building when they were evicted due to the freeway being lengthened. Where Across the street was the "Boots and Saddle." Sherman's segued into a Mexican restaurant and now it is just a parking space, the building having been torn down.

Back when the freeway didn't reach Coeur d'Alene and about half way to Seattle, the freeway gave up  to a return to old Highway 10. Back when the Cotton Club was great hunting grounds for singles and yes, the owner was named Herb as well.

Back when I paddled a canoe up Wolf Lodge Creek a litte ways and started to catch Cutthroat trout, one after another only to find out the the creek was closed to fishing. Well, I got away with that but I learned a lesson. Read the rules before casting.

I moved away from Coeur d'Alene in 1973 and missed some of the infamous party spots that opened and closed while I was gone. A business failure in the 1987 recession landed me back in Coeur d'Alene with tail firmly tucked under me. Thence the taxi chapter of my life. I finally moved to Bayview in 1995, promptly forced the Farragut Park into opening the then coned off Hwy 54 by threatening to have them arrested if they didn't stop. withing 24 hours the blockade was gone and the road was opened to traffic. I then learned that many efforts including those from state representatives had failed.

That was due to a career in real estate lending which after financing the Captain's Wheel for the new owners, Im and Jeanne Campbell and The Nordstrom's.  eliminating  a long string of  contracts that with just one death would have tied up the title for years. I knew what button to push and did it.

Five years writing for the Spokesman-Review which left the Idaho Handle Extra dead. I recently learned from a unimpeachable source that they lost 50 subscribers in Athol/Bayview alone. It is very unfortunate that the print news industry sails blithely to it's demise, while wearing blinders all the way. Retirement followed and I spend a great deal of time gazing across the bay and counting my blessings, and sometimes like today, reminiscing  about how times flies.