Eighteen reunions

Eighteen springs have zipped past since four friends from the class of 1965 decided to reunite for a weekend each spring at the floating house on Lake Bull Shoals.

That means the floating houseboat that belongs to Ken Reeves of Harrison, as of early May, had hosted us for at least 40 nights.

Don Walker of Springdale, Dr. Bill Dill of Fayetteville and I have pledged to hold our reunion until the last of us remains alive to toast the others with the bottle of 1965 port we pitched in to buy more than a decade ago.

We've watched ourselves go from leaping out of bed in 1996 to fish at daylight to sleeping in and waiting for breakfast by this year.

We caught enough fish again this year. But our intensity and pace have slowed noticeably since we watched our 65th years vanish from life's rear-view mirror. The downshifting is predictable, just Mother Nature whispering our names.

Each of us still works as hard as we ever have down in second gear, only in different ways.

Ken retired as the general counsel for FedEx Freight about the time he was being appointed an Arkansas Game and Fish commissioner. He says becoming a commish is more demanding than he'd expected, though he enjoys making a difference for others who enjoy the outdoors as much as he always has.

Dr. Bill the dentist still drills and fills and crowns part-time each week at his dental office. He appears poised to possibly be named to the state's Board of Dental Examiners.

Don still runs his thriving marketing business, only now from home.

And me, well, please keep on a readin', my friends.

While lower-key than others, this year's gathering in many ways was perhaps our best. We've grown more mellow and unconcerned with outdoing each other. We conceded years back that Billy will catch the most fish, followed closely by Ken. They both grew up on Bull Shoals.

We spent as much time eating and discussing plans for a 50th high school reunion as we did talking fish, wild turkeys or the regrettable state of our nation. Hey, those reunion things take planning and work. So in a 3-1 vote we assigned Bill (the senior class president) to recruit some help to make sure to have one for next summer.

Mostly, though, we spent time relaxing and reflecting on the aspect that's become most valuable in every life: Families and the friendships we forge, especially those that withstand the test of over half a century.

Fulfilling expectations

Should voting and taxpaying citizens expect their elected city council to follow through with its promises?

Is it too much to ask that public servants fulfill what the public clearly was led to believe when it voted eight years ago to pass a bond election to improve a city street?

Those are questions Fayetteville's council faces today after the city originally presented conceptual drawings related to the 2006 bond election that showed plans to widen Arkansas 265 (Crossover Road), with trees along the 15-foot-wide median.

But I searched up and down the widened 265 thoroughfare and couldn't find so much as a twig.

The original plan, according to former Mayor Dan Coody, who was in office at the time, was that the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department would leave a grassy median in widening the road to four lanes, while the city would plant and maintain median trees.

He said there's no doubt that the trees were very much a part of discussions and plans presented publicly when voters approved the bond in 2006.

The city engineer is quoted saying he remembers discussions about the city's plans to plant trees. Yet the expenses for that never got factored into the $15-plus million project.

So lately Coody's understandably been asking current Mayor Lioneld Jordan and today's council where are all those trees the voters expected.

Jordan was on the council during Coody's mayorship, where he voted to approve the Crossover widening project, and says he doesn't know how this fumble happened.

Jordan does appear to like trees. He even campaigned for office on a platform that included boxes of trees surrounding the town's perimeter, one news account said.

He says he's asked his staff to develop a funding plan to plant trees along the road, promising to finally git 'er done in whatever way is necessary.

Good for him. Count me among those pleased to know Jordan pledges to see the wishes of the voters in 2006 finally get honored.

Whether one supports the concept of a scenic, tree-lined boulevard, it's what voters approved, believing Crossover Road could be one of the prettiest in Arkansas.

What say we plant those trees?

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Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at [email protected]. Read his blog at mikemastersonsmessenger.com.

Editorial on 05/17/2014

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