A big, forbidding steel gate like
a Federal Prison on rollers in
the neighborhood stands guard
at the entrance to the narrow way
which leads to the prize of sixty-one
feet north and south out of the thou-
sands and thousands of miles of shore-
line of The Big Lake. The gate and the
straight and narrow way and the stairs
and the sixty-one feet are the only things
the sixty-two neighbors have to share.
If there had been one less neighbor,
every house in the neighborhood
could have gotten its own twelve inch-
es of sandy frontage six feet deep with
glorious sand along The Big Lake, but
as it is, each house is entitled to elev-
en point eight inches. And even though
they are neighbors they get real possess-
ive over their less than one foot of front-
age. The neighbors placed a really big
Keep Out/Private Property sign on the
big, forbidding, steel gate with the heavy-
duty lock. They have to give the comb-
ination to the big, heavy-duty lock to
the neighbors if they pay their dues,
even if they complain a lot about each
other taking up way too much space
and encroaching upon their eleven point
eight inches. On the other side of the sign,
it doesn’t say anything. That’s the side
Woody Guthrie would have liked: “As I went
walking I saw a sign there and on the sign it
said, ‘No Trespassing,’ but on the other
side it didn’t say nothing. That side was
made for you and me.” God looked at the
gate and the big, heavy-duty lock and
the sign that proclaimed Keep Out/Private
Property and listened to the squabbling
in the neighborhood and said, “I shall
cause the waters to rise and I shall
take back all the sand on the beach
so they won’t have eleven point
eight inches six feet deep of my
beach over which to fight. They
can stand in the cold water of
The Big Lake for as long as they
can stand it.” And God said,
“I, too, like the other side of that
sign. This beach, this sand and
this land were made for you and
me.” Woody looked over and
strummed a G chord and the angels
all sang the anthem America should
have made its own: “This Land Was
Made For You and Me.”
bobdahl 
Well said Bob … “mine, mine, mine” – it’s the Great American Sickness these days, and growing worse … like some kind of horrible bacteria eating away at our soul. Appreciate the commentary about the “sign” and “which side is for us.” And the sooner that damn beach is swept away, the better it’ll be … a part of me just wants to say to those greedy people, “Shame on you!”
BTW, we’ve got the same crap here in SoCal … some folks have tried to privatize the beach front of their property … but folks are fighting back … one even created an app to help people find the access points – go to the beach front by their expensive monuments to themselves and have a party.