South Carolina

I remember driving I-95 both ways always traveling through South Carolina

There are multitudes of firecracker and cigarette outlets all along the interstate

Once as we were approaching the Georgia border we lost a tire on a trailer

we were pulling and we had to find a tire

We have driven through Columbia, where my mother graduated from High School

She was an orphan and went to a Catholic Girls School there

My mom was the 4th from the left in the top row right behind the Bishop

We once stopped on New Year's Eve in our 26 foot motor home at a rest area and

had a delicious ham

We stopped because it was so foggy we could not drive any further

We have driven from Greenville to 1-95 but never on to Charleston where

I once had a teacher from

South of the Border is a wonderful tourist area and

we have stopped often and usually eaten and purchased gas

I know this is tobacco, cotton and simply farming area but I can't seem to visualize it as such

I do remember large areas of green wooded forest

I remember stopping at truck stops and there was a gambling game

where you put a coin in the machine and it might knock other coins out

You could win a small amount and sometimes we did

I used to visit my Uncle and his family in Belvedere and played baseball there one summer

When I was very small I lived for a short while with that same Uncle

There was a "black" school built on land he owned behind his house and

he was unhappy about it

Later I remember visiting him with my parents and

we went to an Augusta Minor League Baseball game

As a college freshman at Georgia Southern

I would sometimes spend the weekend in North Augusta with my cousin

Most of my memories are vague and not really warm but more disturbing

Again I remember mostly flat wooded land with a lot of firecracker stands and cigarette sales

Very few pictures and no real desire to return