Swimming . . .

Do you recall who taught you how to swim?  I do.  My mentor was Lindy Boggs.  I learned on the Gulf Coast at Long Beach, MS out in front of the Boggs family compound.  The owned a strip of land, I think since the Civil War, that ran back from the Gulf of Mexico to the east-west railroad tracks.

My father's business partner and cousin, Stanley Morrison was married to Claire Boggs, who was Lindy's sister-in-law.  The business partners had two big meetings a year, one at Easter and the other at Labor Day.  Generally they got together in Long Beach for Easter and New Roads for Labor Day (at our house).

Lindy is my cousin, second cousin.  Her mother was a Morrison.  So the Morrison's are intertwined with the Boggs family, sometimes related, sometimes just kissing cousins.  Stanley Morrison was also a second cousin.  You can imagine that there are double cousins involved.

At any rate, Lindy got me to over come my fear of water and I began swimming.  I can remember ducking my head underwater and seeing a crab skedaddle away from us.  I only swam a few yards but I had conquered my fear of water.

Later I can recall taking bigger chances while swimming of Louis Morgan's pier.  But by then I had a great deal more skill and capability.  And even later I demonstrated my skill by swimming across the big pool in Monroe, LA.  My aunt T (T is for Thelma), my mother's oldest sister had a standing wager that if we could swim across the pool we would get five dollars.  Five dollars was a handsome sum in those days.

Alas the Monroe pool and Louis Morgan's pier are long gone.  Destroyed by storms and age.  There was even a pier of sorts in the Gulf in front of the Boggs domain, it too is long gone.  But I can still swim.

Lindy by the way was later to serve 11 terms in the US House of Representatives and was Bill Clinton's Ambassador to the Vatican.  She was always a great friend to our family.