Dayne, holding “Southwest” (you’ll meet him later), is casting a burly man shadow on the established year for Southwest City – 1870.

Southwest City, MO, isn’t usually on one’s vacation destination list. It’s named Southwest City because it’s literally in the very southwest corner of the state.

But this was where we spent the night, parked in an empty lot. Our reason for stopping here came the next morning, Memorial Day.
We headed to Dave’s Supermarket to buy some fresh flowers. Then drove down Choctaw Rd. to see Cousin Mabel’s house. She passed away years ago, but folks in town still remembered which house was hers and were kind enough to share. Mabel, Grandma’s cousin, didn’t have an indoor toilet until the late 70’s/early 80’s.

It’s sad how run-down it is now. The current owners aren’t concerned at all for the state of Mabel’s home. I’m sure it was darling in its day.

After that, we took our flowers and headed to the cemetary.

This is the driveway into the cemetary. It’s just beautiful, especially with the flags for Memorial Day. So shady and peaceful.

That’s where Mabel is buried, but it’s also where my grandma (Christina’s) is buried. She died in ’11, and four years ago, while on a family road trip, we stopped by with Christina’s side of the family. My sister, Leslee, and my mom got to be there together and see where she was buried. But it took us a long time on a hot afternoon that August of ’14 to find it. Thankfully, this time we knew right where to go.

We put flowers on Grandma’s mother’s grave an sister’s grave, as well. They’re all buried there together. We put flags, too, since it was Veterans’ Day. My grandpa was stationed at Pearl Harbor when it was bombed, so he and Grandma both survived that horrible time.
It’s comforting to know they’re resting there until Jesus returns. The next thing they’ll know is Jesus coming in the clouds to take them home. And no, our flowers won’t last long, especially in the Missouri heat, but it was nice to leave something pretty by their headstones.
While driving to Cousin Mabel’s house, we saw some teenage kittens along the side of the road. Being animal lovers, we of course noticed. But we also noticed they were playing with something. That “something’ happened to be a pond turtle. And he was on a path to be run over if he didn’t make an abrupt u-turn.

We rescued him and headed for Honey Creek, which runs through the northern end of town. Dayne named him Southwest. The boys and I took Southwest down to Honey Creek and set him down in a nice spot. He didn’t agree. He tried to climb out. So we picked him up and took him to an even nicer spot. Southwest started crawlling out to head for the road. He obviously was bent on adventure. We decided to take him across the road that runs through town and put in him over there. Maybe that’s where he’d wanted to be?…It worked. He so cutely paddled with his stubby legs and we soon lost sight of him in the taller creek grass. But we’d see the tops of blades moving and know where he was. Knowing our little man was safe and sound, we departed for Mansfield. Who knows when we’ll be back, but it was nice to spend some time in a place special to our family.

The last place we plopped Southwest, there was also a goose family. Being the social butterfly he is, we’re sure he quickly made their acquaintance, and we’re quite sure they’re friends now.

At the southern end of Southwest City, you’ll find the OK state line.

Right after taking the above picture, we crossed the road to the gas station we parked at. As soon as we crossed the two-lane country road, a white Chevy pickup flew by. And I mean flew!! They were going at least 75 mph. What was going on? If you’ve ever watched the old TV series “The Dukes of Hazard”, you’ll be able to visualize precisely what came next. A police car, sirens blaring, was chasing this truck through this windy country road that runs south out of Southwest City into Oklahoma. It was just like the Duke boys were outrunning Roscoe P. Coltrane. The truck whizzed by. Three seconds later, the police car. And just as in “The Dukes of Hazard”, these Duke boys got away. Up the road we heard a loud screeching of tires and watched as the white truck put on their brakes and turned back to make a sharp right turn onto another country road. The police officer drove right by the turn-off. He turned around up the road and came back slowly. It seemed he knew which way they’d gone. He stopped at the gas station. We asked him why he didn’t pursue. He said since they’d crossed the state line, it was out of his jurisdiction. Those Duke boys….they knew exactly what they were doing. But had we been crossing the road on foot, and particularlly Ean on crutches, just ten seconds later, we’d all have been mowed over by the truck. It was a good lesson for our boys to witness. And hopefully those Duke boys won’t have to injure or kill someone before they change their ways.

On our way out of town, it was fun to see a Spanish SDA church.