Down the road from where we lived in Provo and where we
would later come to visit my grandma and grandpa was some sort of
huge shallow irrigation canal that went right past a park. It was
about 12 feet wide and just a few inches deep and every ten feet or
so it had little steps. So being free made it particularly in my
'Other Mother's' price range and we would load up and go down and
wade for hours while she read her book in the shade. It was really
slow-moving, shallow and fun to play but a one time somebody came
along and drank a bunch of beer and smashed the bottles on the sides
and ruined it for everybody. From then on that they put up a little
fence around it and signs that said it was full broken glass and that
nobody could use it anymore. I think that is when I decide that even
if you were a good tax-paying republican you couldn't just smash up
your empties anywhere you wanted all willy-nilly, you should do it in
an abandoned lot or up the canyon somewhere.
