Attribution: National Weather Service/NOAA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
By Bill Stokes
Kickass, the doorstop dog, gives the keeper space to remember his long-ago snowbird days when Sarasota and Siesta key were exciting winter destinations. The keeper’s lifelong pal Al and wife Pat lived there as anchor hosts. Other friends assembled for beach fun while the keeper launched his boat out at Snook Haven and cruised the river, once with grandson Beau as a guest. There was the time as a wade fisherman when the keeper stepped into over-his-head water under the highway bridge and the time as he wade-fished at night when a woman shouted out of the darkness, “There’s gators out there.”
There was lunch one year in nearby Venus with Tony Earl—beer was served, and there was a sad-ending occasion at the Sarasota Hospital one year when Mike Royko was a patient as was the cancer-fighting keeper’s wife Betty.
It was all another life, another time, rich in fading memories that are invulnerable to hurricane ravaging and making the point that the keeper’s current non-migratory, incredibly rich life with Phyllis conditions him to really look forward to “enjoying” yet another Wisconsin winter in place.
Photo by Bill Stokes