Standing guard over the old train-stop, the venerable old hotel resists the consuming embrace of decay, it waits like a deserted lover for familiar footsteps that will never return. The sound of dancing feet and gay laughter can never again resound in the dance hall, and the splashing delight of swimming children is forever more replaced by the solitude and quiet of moss and tadpoles. We sit quietly in the evenings on the front porch when summer begrudgingly gives way to fall. We sit with our grandchildren and listen intently for some shadow of the music that used to drift up from the springs when we were younger, but the cherping of crickets and the calls of lonely birds bedding down for the night remind us that time marches on, and things never stay the same. ...from a book i'm going to finish someday.... Denise Bolden-Albayaty Clairmont Springs