Garage doors in Swartz Creek opened a half hour before the next shift started at the GM plant in Flint. Most all of my friends had at least one parent employed in the auto industry. Once as a five or six year old, knowing my dad didn't build Buicks when he wasn't home, I asked him why he didn't have a job. Jobs...yes there were a whole lot of them back then. Making Chevys and Buicks and parts for Chevys and Buicks.
But as to my fond memories of the City of Flint - here are just a few...
My dad and I took frequent trips to downtown Flint to visit an eye doctor who must have been some sort of specialist or maybe an experimental mad scientist, I wasn't quite sure. But as a kid who started out almost blind in one eye, never had natural depth perception, and had a lazy eye that practically looked back at my brain, I guess I needed some special help. Anyway, there was much to enjoy about these excursions into the city. Lunch at the original downtown Halo Burger - a tiny place squished between bigger places, with jukeboxes at your table and damn good burgers and fries. I remember the corduroy sound of passing cars along brick streets, and gazing up at the Citizens Bank building, with that mysterious globe on top.
I enjoyed numerous trips into Flint over the years to visit such cultural gems as the Sloan Museum, which was an incredible walking tour of the history of the automobile. The Flint Institute of Arts, which included a cool kids area where you could actually be in a museum touching stuff and doing things! But for me the best offering in this arts campus area of the city was the Longway Planetarium. I recall actually being quite frightened the first time I went there for a star show, but over time and to this day I appreciate any opportunity to take in a planetarium show. And there was the time my mom took me to see a stage production of one of her favorite musicals, Fiddler on the Roof. That would also be the night she was the target of a barrage of scornful glares from Jewish mothers sitting nearby as I asked in my best stage whisper, "Mama, ... what's the Sabbath?" I remember enjoying the show ... probably more than she did...
And how could I speak of my fondness for Flint without mentioning the Genesee Valley Mall? A trip to the only mall in the area meant new clothes, new shoes, and of course climbing on the frog. I'm not going to even explain that last bit. It's there for those who share the memory...
It seems I always left Flint feeling better than when I arrived. Sometimes quite literally. For Flint's McLaren Hospital was our destination when I would have to be rushed in at one or two in the morning with a severe asthma attack. I'd receive a shot of something that made my lungs work again. Panic driving in, relief driving back. Thank you, Flint.
Yes, thank you Flint, for still being at your best when I needed you most. And also for taking care of my mom, a Flint girl, until she met and married my dad. If you hadn't done a good job of that, well, let's just say there'd be no me to be typing this thank you. Better days ahead my friend...
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