Sometimes I have nothing. Sometimes, the memories flood my mind, a tsunami of tsouris. Like today, when my Facebook feed had a three-year old post about Parksville.

Parksville is in upstate New York, in the rounded hills called the Catskills maybe 90 miles north of New York City. Maybe a bit more. It’s down in the dumps now. But it wasn’t always that way.

My great-uncle Sam lived in Parksville. To me, a Bronx street urchin, that side of the family — my paternal grandmother’s side — was rich. That is, they did not live in the Bronx. They lived in Queens, which was hoo-hah compared to our down-at-the-heels NYC quadrant. “Francis Lewis Boulevard” conjured images of tony private houses, garden apartments, kids who got braces, foo-foo dropkick dogs.

Sam had a house in Parksville. Not just any house. An old house on a secluded gravel road with a 360-degree porch, gables, turrets, interior staircases, and land, Katie Scarlett, LAND!

Out back was a barn, with an old hayloft, that he converted to a garage. One of his cars — he had several — was a metallic grey Sedan de Ville Cadillac. A/C. Power windows. Red leather seats. Uncle Sam let me sit in that car, with the a/c on, when us po’ relations came a-visiting.

There, I played in the fresh air, with my cousins Dory and Betty. Dory was older than me. Betty and I were about the same age. Where are they now? I have no clue, another family mystery. Why didn’t my parents keep the relationship going? Hell, why did they do anything that they did?

Sam was a WWI aviator. One of the guys in the Snoopy outfits in those single-engined planes with the machine gun synched with the propeller to rain fire at the enemy. He seemed to be a kindly old gent without the accent of his generation, with a cool house, “rich” kids and grandkids, and an awesome Caddy. That’s how the eight-year old me saw him.

But that house! One day, me, Dory and Betty went exploring in the woods beyond the yard. We found a little trail, and carefully side-stepped the poison ivy. There was deer poop, salamanders, thorny ferns. We weren’t in Kansas anymore. Heck, I wasn’t on University Avenue anymore!

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In the distance, the sound of gently running water. What could it be? Dory was brave. “Shhh, follow me!” she said. And we did.

Like Indian scouts, we advanced, careful not to snap a single twig. The water got louder. Finally, there it was. A rushing stream, with darting fish, frogs, lichen lined rocks.

Beside the stream, on a rusted metal bridge chair sat an old man in stained white dress shirt, worn black pants, black leather shoes, wearing tsitsis and a yarmulke. He turned his gray stubbly face to us kids, and smiled.

Then he offered us a water glass. “Taste,” he said. “Taste the vasser.” Betty and I checked with Dory. She shrugged.

“OK,” I said. And the old man dipped the glass into the stream and filled it with Parksville water. Dory took a sip and passed the glass to me. I drank, and passed it to Betty.

We all smiled at the old man. It was the coldest, sweetest, most delicious water I’d ever tasted. It was fresh. It was pure. It was our secret elixir.

We kept that secret from the grownups. We never told anyone about the old man of the stream, and his holy water.

I never saw him again. By the time I was ten, I never saw Dory, Betty, Sam — that entire side of the family — again. I started to hatch my escape scheme even then, for I yearned for more episodes of life beyond my Bronx, beyond Sam’s Parksville yard, deep into the woods, with mysterious people who held life secrets.

Thanks to Maxene Spindell, who runs the Catskills Facebook group that ran this Parksville post. It was a writing prompt that unlocked a precious memory and, for that, I am grateful.