In the movie "Braveheart", there's a crazy Irishman who claims the entire land mass of Ireland as "my Island". Well, I claim this Y-shaped oak tree standing at the end of Island View Avenue in Long Beach, Mississippi, as "my Oak Tree". When my family moved to Long Beach in 1980, Dad pointed it out on one of our first trips into town as we turned onto Island View from Beach Boulevard (Highway 90 to locals). He told me it was my landmark. Even if it was dark or if I missed street signs, when I saw that Oak Tree, I knew I was almost home.When I would come home from college, a lot of times I'd take the beach route intentionally just so I could pass by my Tree. Now that I live halfway across the country, passing by my Tree on the way to the house is a ritual. Since Dad's death, on every trip home there are two places I go by myself. Biloxi National Cemetery is one; this corner of Island View is the other.
I have no idea how old my Tree is. I just know it was here way before me, and I hope it'll be around long after I'm gone. It survived Hurricanes Camille, Frederic, Elena, and thankfully Katrina. After the 2005 monster storm, I drove home with supplies to help out family and friends. After making sure everyone was safe, I anxiously waited for the National Guard to lift restrictions on access to the beach - I wanted to make sure my Tree was still standing. It wasn't until a subsequent trip home that I was actually able to get to the end of Island View and see that, indeed, my Tree had weathered yet another storm. Traffic on Beach Highway must have thought I was some environmentalist freak as I actually hugged the Tree.
And I found Dad was right, yet again:
For a while after Katrina, there were no man made structures along Beach Boulevard, no familiar buildings, no street signs. Navigating along the beach was a frustration even for life long residents. However, as soon as I saw my Oak Tree, I knew I could relax. It was my landmark. I was almost home.
1 comment:
Wayne, this post brought a tear to my eye. I thought you would be interested to know we almost lost the live oaks along 90... One very early morning, in the first few days following Katrina, Brent Warr, then the brand new mayor of Gulfport, drove down highway 90. As no one slept much in those first days after, it was obscenely early and the sun was barley peeking out. But, even with the early hour, MDOT trucks and equipment were already lining the highway beginning work. As highway 90 was closed to all non-essential traffic, they basically had the highway all to themselves. They had orders to cut down all of the "dead" oak trees along 90. (MDOT had declared them all dead without any professional assessment.) Brent asked them to stop, but was told he had no authority over them...which was true. He literally stood in front of the bulldozers while he called Gov Haley Barbour's cell phone, waking him. Between the two of them, they managed to stop the work that day...but only after MDOT had cleared almost a mile of live oak trees. After that, Brent and several of the other mayors, Billy Skellie included, went to the federal DOT office, in DC, to save the remaining trees. Turns out, MDOT had been wanting to take the oak trees down on 90 for several years...in order to widen the road all along the coast. We all felt as though they had "snuck" down there while everyone was worried about food, water and shelter and tried to take something very precious from us. One of the arguments the mayors used was the fact that the trees were often the only landmarks left for miles on the beach. However, the primary reason was because, "the coast had been beaten up so badly and the trees were all we had left on the beach". (I was told the mayor that presented this argument cried as he explained how important those trees had become as a symbol of hope and continuing life for the people of the coast.) They won the battle on that one and our live oaks remain.
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