Up Early The 10th Day Of March Thinking About Wandalyn & The Garden Of Angels

We are already almost a third through the third month of 2011.

You can't quite tell it by looking out my viewing portal on the world, but this 10th day of March has dawned with another blue sky morning over North Texas.

It is only 40 degrees out there this morning. It barely got above 60 yesterday. Today I am taking a day off of my morning swim.

I slept well last night, nothing like the previous night's horrible insomnia.

I've been intending to mention, but keep forgetting, til now, I heard from Wandalyn again. This time with good news.

My one longtime reader may remember Wandalyn is the lady who's daughter had been murdered, with the murderer never caught. Wandalyn has had trouble getting any sort of closure on the tragedy that had left her so grief stricken. Wandalyn thought a cross at The Garden of Angels might help.

But, when Wandalyn met up with the guy who supposedly oversaw The Garden of Angels she was told a cross would cost a minimum of $150, with the guy trying to guilt Wandalyn into going for the deluxe $400 version.

The Garden of Angels website indicated a cross was $40 and gratis if one could not afford one.

Well, below is the message from Wandalyn with her good news about The Garden of Angels....

I received GOOD NEWS today from Amy's grandmother, Carolyn. After a board meeting this morning, they decided I would get a cross for my daughter for $40. It will be ready in about 2 weeks. I was so happy to hear this, after all I just went through. I told my story to a mother who has a cross at "our garden of angels". I had asked her if she was pleased with the gardens. She said she was. She gave me Carolyn's phone number. I called her and told her my story. She said she was so sorry that happened. She said I would get a cross for Tina and that she would present the cross story and the flag story to the board, when they met Saturday. Thank you for your interest. I read your blog. You presented my problem good. It's nice to know someone listens to an old lady nowadays. The flag was donated by "Joe" from Grand Prairie~the flag came from Illionis, though. I can't wait till I get Tina's cross out there. Maybe, since Spring is just around the corner, the Volunteers will began to appear and the Garden of Angels will once again look like your webpage. I surely hope so. I'm planning on being one of the Volunteers to appear at the next cleanup the last Saturday of the month.

Thank you again,
wandalyn

The First Day Of March Wondering About Wandalyn Getting Scammed At The Garden Of Angels

It's the first day of March. Spring is only 20 days in the future. When it should be warmer than it is right now in my zone of Texas.

It is only 6 degrees above freezing this morning. I think I'll be skipping the morning swim this morning.

Remember last month when I mentioned the Garden of Angels and Wandalyn's hope to get a cross installed there as a memorial to her murdered daughter?

Well. I got email last night from Wandalyn. She had gone to the Garden of Angels and met with its president, a man named Greg Price. To get Wandalyn's cross Price wanted Wandalyn to sign a contract. At the bottom of the contract was the pricing options for the crosses.

A cheap cross for $150. A better cross for $400. Price said, "You do want the $400 one right?"

Wandalyn told Price that the Garden of Angels' website said the cross cost $40 and gratis if one could not afford it. Price told Wandalyn that he told them to take that off the website, "but I guess they didn't do it."

Wandalyn became very uncomfortable with the Garden of Angels experience at that point. Understandably so.

Wandalyn also told me the Garden of Angels is in really bad shape. The fountain no longer spouts water, the drunk driver destroyed gazebo is still destroyed.

And Wandalyn said the most tattered American flag she'd ever seen was blowing in the wind. Wandalyn put an ad on Craig's List asking if anyone could donate a flag to a memorial. A guy named Joe, in Illinois, then mailed Wandalyn a new flag, which she then gave to Price when she met him.

I wonder what's happened to the group that used to meet monthly to work on the Garden of Angels? And at what point in time the Garden of Angels turned into one guy's money making scam?

Helping To Get A Memorial In The Garden Of Angels To A Texas Murder Victim

I have likely mentioned The Garden of Angels before on this blog.

The Garden of Angels is a memorial to murder victims, built on the site were Amy Robinson's body was found.

From a plaque near the entry to Garden of Angels...

This is the place where Amy Robinson was taken and murdered. She was kidnapped by two co-workers while on her way to work. Because she did not like to be alone, others decided to put their loved ones in the garden with Amy.

I long ago made a webpage about The Garden of Angels on my Eyes on Texas website. That webpage usually Googles #1 or 2. Which is what brought about a rather poignant email this morning from Wandalyn, the grieving mother of a murder victim.

This is what Wandalyn wanted to ask me.....

How would one get the name of a murdered loved one put on one of the crosses in the garden? My daughter was murdered in 2000. I visit, often, the place where her body was found. I'm 62 now, and that place is very scary. I go alone, because no one wants to go with me. My daughter was 31, when she was murdered. The crime remains unsolved to this day. I miss her very much. I've often thought about making a memorial there. With no money and no one interested in helping, that's all it's been, a thought. It's dangerous there and very scary, so I don't go as often now. viewing the angel's view of your park, looks so much like the thoughts I've had. My health has gone downhill, since she was taken from me. I have no closure. If you can point me towards the path to take, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you for your time. I hope I haven't wasted it.

I was able to help Wandalyn in her quest to add her daughter to The Garden of Angels by pointing her to The Garden of Angels website.

I asked Wandalyn to keep me posted. I'll go take a picture of her daughter's Garden of Angel's memorial after it is added. If you want to help with The Garden of Angels you can make a donation from their website.

The Garden of Angels has grown hugely since I first saw it early in this century. I don't think I've been to The Garden of Angels since 2003 when I was there with my cousin Kristi. We'd been to Joe T. Garcias, where we had too much of the Mexican food called Margaritas.

Kristi lived in Dallas at the time. She was new to Texas. I drove backroads all the way back to her place near where the American Airlines Center is now. Those backroads took us by The Garden of Angels. So, I stopped.

Kristi totally freaked out. She would not enter The Garden of Angels. She said she felt spirits there, unhappy, unsettled spirits.

Kristi's grandma, my aunt, was murdered, brutally, in the early 1980s. She is in her own Garden of Angels, along with a lot of my relatives, in a cemetery in Lynden, Washington.

Dallas & Fort Worth Visions With River Legacy & The Grand Canyon of The Trinity River With Egrets & Gardens Of Angels

You are looking at the Grand Canyon of the Trinity River, in Arlington, in River Legacy Park.

I was not quite in the mood to go riding the mountain bike trail, quite yet, after just recently recovering from last Sunday's unfortunate mountain bike incident.

So, I biked the paved trail to its end near 360. Some day, likely long after I am no longer in Texas, that trail is supposed to continue past 360 and ride along side the Trinity River, heading east to connect to the Dallas Trinity River Trails.

Dallas is getting some new trail footage, I believe, along the Trinity River. You would not know it if you only read Fort Worth media, but Dallas has its own Trinity River Vision. In fact, Dallas had its Vision before Fort Worth sort of copied the Dallas Vision. Only the Dallas Vision remained fairly clear while the Fort Worth Vision developed a case of Macular Degeneration. After Fort Worth copied the Dallas Vision, to the point of pretty much using the same name, with the Dallas Vision, I believe being called something like Trinity Vision Project. Fort Worth's became the Trinity River Vision. Then the Dallas name changed to Trinity River Corridor Project.

Where Dallas will have a big lake, Fort Worth will have a pond, where Dallas will have 3 signature bridges, Fort Worth will now have 3 ordinary bridges. I do not know if Dallas added inner tubing and wake boarding to their vision and that that is how Fort Worth came to add those two activities to their vision.

Dallas is a bit further along seeing its vision than Fort Worth is. Bridge work is currently being done in Dallas. I don't know if the Fort Worth Vision even sees, yet, where their 3 bridges are going to be doing their bridging.

Anyway, back to River Legacy Park. I know I've mentioned it before, but it is worth repeating, because I like repeating myself, but when I first arrived in Texas, I was not too long into my exile, before I discovered River Legacy Park. On my way to discovering River Legacy Park, I came upon my first homicide scene ever. A guy had been murdered and his body thrown out at the intersection of Trinity Boulevard and 820, ironically, very close to where I live now. But at that point in time I lived about 15, or so, miles to the north.

Several years later I was driving east on Trinity Boulevard and came upon a bizarre scene with a lot of crosses. It was the Garden of Angels, a memorial to murder victims. I webpaged what I saw. Below is the blurb from that webpage regarding my first murder scene.

One day in 1999, not long after moving to Texas, these Eyes on Texas headed to a park called River Legacy. The route to that park was Trinity Boulevard. At the exit from I-820 to Trinity Boulevard police were seen, with crime scene tape, with a body outlined in the grass, like something from a TV show. After that a makeshift memorial was built on the spot where the body was found. It grew to be quite elaborate. At some point it was scaled back and a small permanent memorial was built. The cross you see here is for that victim, Marty Klozik. His family and friends have added many items.

Years later I took my cousin Kristi to the Garden of Angels on our way back from having too many margaritas at Joe T. Garcia's. Kristi's grandma, my aunt, was a murder victim. Kristi became very unsettled, freaked out, actually. The Garden of Angels is built where a murder victim was found, with that victim being the first Angel in the Garden.

Anyway, like I was saying before the Garden of Angels interrupted me, I know I've mentioned before that when I discovered River Legacy Park it had not been long open. I was surprised at how few used it. Within a few years a bridge was added across the Trinity, with about 5 new miles of paved trail. Now, likely 10 years after I first biked River Legacy it is crowded.

As in, today, there were a lot of people biking, walking, pushing strollers, bikes pulling baby on board strollers, roller blading, skateboarding, jogging and likely one or two types of motion I'm forgetting.

Oh, fishing and boating. I saw a group of 3 attempting to put in a big canoe at the boat launch on the north side of the bridge. They gave up due to the river being way below the boat launch and being very muddy. I doubt the river is deep enough, right now, for boat floating.

I also saw two big white birds fishing. Are these Egrets? You can see them in the above picture, on either side of the mouth of Hurricane Creek as it drains into the Trinity River.

I saw a guy fishing. Are the fish safe to eat in this section of the Trinity River? What would make the fish here safe to eat when they are not safe to eat in the section where J.D. Granger holds his Inner Tube Happy Hours?

When I get to J.D. Granger in a blogging, I know it is time to shut up.