PERHAPS YOU ARE

tiring of hearing about "the river" Reader Dear, so I will make this the final episode, for now, in this little saga of the Warwick. This photo shows the most familiar view of the river throughout my growing-up years. It was what the family saw as we looked from the living room windows, and very similar to the view from my bedroom window. The house sits on a hill, so the yard spreads out and downward to the marshy area, just beyond that low row of trees. Our access to the river was via the pier, but this was the view that we "lived by".

If clouds threatened precipitation, we would keep an eye on the river. One could easily see evidence of the rain advancing over the water. "Here comes the rain!" Whoever spotted it first would shout the warning, and there would be a mad dash for the clothesline to retrieve any laundry hanging there to dry.

When I was a child, the oyster boats still came to the Warwick, and the men working on the boats would use long tongs to gather the oysters from the riverbed. Sounds were very easily carried uphill from the river, and many mornings I woke to the voices of the oystermen talking to one another. Their words, which were not quite intelligible from that distance, were interspersed by the low put-put-put of the boat motors as they moved from one location to another. I recall it as a familiar and comforting sound.  It was definitely one of the "top ten" sounds of my childhood, along with the whistling and singing of my dear dad, and the laughter of Betsy, my friend next door.

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