Nov. 8--There's a creek in Haymount that winds through a park, dripping down from storm drain to storm drain, in a green gully between Rush Road and Parkview Avenue.

It's a quiet place.

As a kid, I caught my first crawdad there.

The trees are big and old, their roots sticking up and stretching out like ribs along the creek bank.

A yellow sign warns drivers: "Children At Play." But no one goes there much. You walk by. You know it's there, just there. The houses that rise on either side of the meander, along East and West Park drives, sit comfortably above. They're nice houses with nice yards.

On occasion, as I did as a teenager, you'll see a driver who will want to speed along the narrow parkway, challenging the S-shaped curves despite the posted 15-mph speed zone, just for stupid kicks.

That's about it.

This time of year, fallen leaves blanket the creek, which really is no more than a trickle.

That's been the story every fall, for as long as I know. It doesn't change. Part of Fayetteville doesn't change, either. For a community known for its transient military population, and in a city that loses many native sons and daughters to brighter lights and bigger opportunities elsewhere, there is a core of folks who stay.

Think of them or label them as you may wish, but kick this around as one abiding truth: How about a foundation amid shifting sands?

These people live here, love here, work here, invest here, play here, grieve here. But they don't leave. They keep the faith, hold to their roots and carry on.

Years down the road, after college, some of their children will come back home and do the same.

Which is why what happened in this neighborhood Monday night, there across the street from the little park with the little creek that never changes, in the horror of one shattered family -- four lives gone, just like that, day and night -- has brought so many people to their knees.

It's unfathomable; it's unspeakable. And, hauntingly, unknowable.

All you can do is wonder, and pray.

Publisher Charles Broadwell can be reached at cbwell@fayobserver.com or 486-3501.

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