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Beyond the Byline: Like the flood mud, the memories still stink

WILKES-BARRE — Gone — everything was gone. And it would never come back. It will be 53 years since Hurricane Agnes swept away most of the memories I had of life before June 23, 1972. The mid-1960s to that fateful June day in 1972 really are difficult for me to even want to try […]

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WILKES-BARRE — Gone — everything was gone.

And it would never come back.

It will be 53 years since Hurricane Agnes swept away most of the memories I had of life before June 23, 1972.

The mid-1960s to that fateful June day in 1972 really are difficult for me to even want to try to remember. My mom died on the day before Mother’s Day in the year I was to graduate from high school — 1968.

Those were extremely difficult times. My dad and I were lost. We really didn’t know how to cope without my mom around.

So one day my dad asked how I felt about moving out of the only home I had ever known. It was difficult to be in that house after my mom died. Everywhere we looked there were memories — lots of memories that were partially saved in several photo albums we had.

There was the kitchen where my mom cooked and baked and served meals.

And there was the living room where she would hang Christmas garland made out of red-and-green construction paper.

And there was my bedroom where she would serve me ice cream on most mornings before school.

There was the little stand where our black dial telephone sat and where my mom would call Jack’s Market to order that evening’s dinner.

There was her sewing machine in one corner and her jewelry in a drawer by her dressing table.

There was the screen door that led to the front porch where she would sit under the shade of our big maple tree and talk to neighbors across the street.

Too many nights crying myself to sleep, always hoping I would wake up from this nightmare and Mom would be there — for me and Dad.

So we decided to move off the hill, down to Main Street. Before long, as we continued to put our lives back together, the sirens blared on this June night. We went to Aunt Betty’s house on East Shawnee Avenue and waited.

The flood waters came, staying there for days. Finally, the water began to recede. I vividly remember the brownness of the streets and the lawns.

And I clearly recall the stink. It was awful.

Now came the time to return to our apartment on West Main Street. I remember walking in and seeing how everything was just gone. What was left — which wasn’t much — was covered in mud, soaked in river water.

And everything had that stink.

All that was important to us was gone.

Gone were my record albums — of the sixties, man.

Gone were my baseball cards — Mantle, Mays, Koufax, Aaron, Clemente, all the stars of the sixties.

Gone were all my clothes, my diplomas, baseball gloves, sneakers, even my underwear.

It was all gone.

And also gone were all those photo albums. The ones that contained all my connections to my past — the photos of the O’Boyles and the Kraszewskis — all the people I knew growing up and those who were around before I was born.

Pictures of my mom.

All were gone.

All was lost.

And just four years after my dad and I lost the only person we felt we couldn’t live without.

Every street in the floodplain had piles of flood mud-covered garbage stacked out front, waiting for the Army Corps of Engineers to take it to a landfill. Every day, this process continued as everybody’s lifelong memories were piled into dump trucks and taken away.

So don’t be surprised when I tell you that I, for one, cannot celebrate the 53rd anniversary of Agnes.

Not at all.

Living through the Agnes Flood of 1972 was — and still is in a word — humbling.

Here we were, my dad and I, living in a trailer, faced with the task of putting our already broken lives back together.

Never did we miss 210 Reynolds St. as much as we did in the aftermath of Hurricane Agnes.

One more thing that I lost in June 1972 and will never get back is that feeling of security — the feeling of safety found in a mother’s arms. The feeling that no matter what, everything will be okay.

That’s what I lost in May 1968 and then again in June 1972. That’s what most victims of Agnes lost.

I just can’t feel like I did before Agnes — no matter how hard I try.

The brown, muddy, smelly river water clearly showed me the reality of loss.

And like that smell indelibly embedded in my memory bank — it stinks.

Reach Bill O’Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle.



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