ROADSIDE ATTRACTIONS 4 Turn off Highway 14 onto County Road 15 and in less than an 8th of a mile you'll spot these on the right side of the road. Now always and forever County Road 15 is for me the Lock 6 Road, because that's what used to be at the end of it. Now if you continue until the asphalt ends and then onto the dirt road for another mile you'll find what's left of it. Not much. A boat ramp, an artesian well. The lock and dam were demolished in the 1950s when the newer series of fewer and larger dams were built on the Black Warrior River. Now there is no house or yard connected with these lilies. One thing about them: they must keep on keeping on. These escaped from what used to be the yard of George and Mae Springer and his father and mother. George has been gone since the 1960s, Mae maybe a decade later. |
Their house used to sit back behind all this growth. The house is gone now, another of Sawyerville's ghosts. George Springer farmed and he also owned and operated the cotton gin that was such a delight and playground for us kids growing up back in the middle part of the last century. He also owned big scary dogs who would bark excitedly at anybody who turned up at the gate. One always waited for Mae to come out and calm them down before entering. |
I love to see spider lilies alongside roads marking places where once people lived. It is somewhat humbling to realize that they keep on coming up even when those who planted them are long gone. In the springtime one sees patches of daffodils that do so as well, but my sense is that the spider lily can outlast the daffodil by many years. Maybe it is because spider lilies need no attention whatsoever. Except perhaps the pleased attention of the passerby who notices. |