Sweet Music From an Old Piano

We got this man here in Harper, Uncle Silas Wannaborough, that plays the piano by ear. It beats everything the way he can hear a tune one time and go right to his old upright piano and bang out the right notes. I mean almost anything. I was helping with the Food Bus program the other day, you know the one that has hot meals delivered to old folks, and Uncle Silas was on my route. When I got on his porch I recognized the tune he was playing as Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto. You know the one that starts out with bang, bang, bang before it smoothes out into beautiful melody. I waited until he hit the last note and knocked real loud on his door, he's kinda hard of hearing, doncha know? Kinda like Beethoven before he went stone deaf. I remarked on how pretty his music was and asked him if he had the sheet music for the piece he was playing. He said no he was just watching an old movie last night and they kept playing that tune throughout the whole show. He said he couldn't wait to get to his piano, an old upright with yellowing keys, so he could reproduce it. I asked him if he ever ran across a tune he couldn't duplicate and he said he couldn't get the notes right for songs by Rocky Manoff because he just couldn't understand where his music was going, or where it was coming from for that matter.

Enduring Love (Hollis)

Enduring Love by Ian McEwan
Picnic - runaway balloon - rescue attempt - hero killed - stalker - de Clerambault's syndrone - wife's disbelief - police disbelief - contract killers - mistaken target - gun purchase - letters - separation - resolution.

The Wrong Kind of Love

They hauled off Maudine Hickerston's youngest boy, Eugene Ray, yesterday. He was caught down at the bank with his hand in the till; ten to twenty in the state prison. Eugene Ray was one of those pampered kid you read about. His mamma breast fed him--even in public--until he was ready to be sent off to school. That caused problems 'cause for almost a year he begged his teacher to accommodate his need for milk on the spot like his mamma had done. He was always dressed in the finest clothes his mother could afford. It was obvious that she was going without things she needed to satisfy her little darling's wants. Eugene Ray was an unexpected baby, the last in a parade of six children. Only two months before he was born his daddy had deserted the family and run off with a woman he met while on a business trip to New Orleans. During her pregnancy Maudine came close to losing her baby on a couple of occasions. When he came I reckon he was all that was left of her former life, a little part of his daddy, and she wasn't about to lose that little part. In school he was known as a troublemaker and Maudine was constantly making trips to the principal's office to plead on his behalf. He was always coming home with things he didn't go to school with and convinced his mother that they were gifts from friends. She, of course, believed him because she had no doubt that people would shower him with treasures just because of who he was and how he looked. Yesterday, down at the sheriff's office, Maudine was there advocating for her boy. She yelled at a deputy for having the handcuffs too tight. They were pushing and shoving her child. She would see to it they were found out and punished. They weren't going to get away with framing her little angel. And to her boy she said, "Don't worry, Genie. I'll get you out. Somehow." Eugene Ray just looked straight ahead. He didn't even say goodbye.

Geography Lesson

Down at the library they have been giving out maps of the United States without names of the states on it. People, who want to, are given a page and a ball point pen and asked to write in the name of as many states as they know. And you know what? Most of the older people can get most of the names right. One seventy year old lady even wrote in the capitals of the states. The young people, not so much. I asked some of them what state New York City was in and about half gave me the wrong answer. When I was in school geography was a big deal. The teachers thought if we didn't know our own country we would not be able to understand how it works. The state that was written in correctly most often--with the exception of Mississippi--was Texas. I reckon that's because it's the biggest and the picture of the map of Texas appears on a jar of salsa that's real popular among folks around here.

Old Maid Face

I reckon y'all have heard the term poker-face. We have a nice friendly bunch that play poker together. We don't play for real money but have collected the play money from old Monopoly sets and use that. Some of us are better at hiding our emotions and do put forth a real poker-face. One of the members, Jaymont McFew, has a real problem with this issue. We say he has an "old maid face." We get this from back when we were kids and played the card game named Old Maid. The one that gets stuck with the old maid card at the end of the game is the loser. Jaymont, when he was a little boy, would reveal to us the fact that he had been dealt the card. His eyes would get big and he would start fidgeting in his seat and the sweat would pour from his grands. Today, he still acts the same except now he does it when he gets a good hand. In fact, the better the hand the more he reacts to it. I guess somebody ought to sit him down and explain this to him but I reckon we all get too big a kick out of watching him squirm.

How Maudie Gufferston Skipped Jury Duty

I believe when we are call upon to serve our country we should step forward and accept the duty. Maudie Gufferston don't think that way. She runs a little notion shop and can be found sitting in her rocking chair watching over her merchandise twelve hours each day except Sunday. She hasn't missed work--according to her statement--in over thirty years. When she was called for jury duty in a murder case she read up on ways to evade duty and tried several things to escape being selected. She took books by very liberal and very conservative and displayed them to the lawyers asking questions of the jury pool. She winked at one of the attorneys for the defense so that the DA could see her. Nothing seemed to be taking affect because she was still sitting there after about half the people had been dismissed. What sealed the deal was when the defense attorney asked her if she believed in capital punishment and she said, "Only if they promise to use a guillotine." She was back sitting in her little shop within the hour.

Sometimes Quality Just Ain't Enough

You know that old saying about the three most important things in real estate are: Location, location, location. Well that holds over into other things in life too. We got these two brothers that live out in the county. They are good singers and do impersonations of famous stars. One does Elvis and he is always getting calls to do his act. He's pretty good but not half as good as other people I have seen aping Elvis. The other brother does Ernest Tubb. He looks like him, sings exactly like him, and has all the moves and characteristics that Ernest displayed on the Grand Ole Opry. This brother rarely gets a call for his services. He was telling me the other day about his frustration and I told him the old real estate adage. His reply was, "Huh? I ain't got no property up for sale." Then he just shook his head and walked away.

Picking Out a New Computer

I got what they call a laptop computer. I fool around with it some, but as y'all know either Dorothy or Hollis types out what I have to say every day. The screen on my laptop is getting dark in certain spots and Hollis says it is on its last few weeks. It ain't the money so much as it is the waste of computer life that keeps me from going ahead and getting a new one. And I don't want to bother with learning all about what I need and how long it will last. I know that next year what ever I buy will be replaced with something better. And I got to decide whether to get what they call a mac or a pc. I told Hollis if I do get one he will have to decide what to get. He said he would and when he was here this weekend he left something on my desk that was a good clue into where he was going with his decision.

Exit Ghost (Hollis)

Exit Ghost by Phillip Roth
Old-man fantasies - return to New York after eleven years in rural New England - impotence - diapers - diminished brain - He/She dialog - E.I. Lonoff character based on Henry Roth? Bernard Malamud? - Bush reelection compared to Macbeth - liberal's dismay at election result - George Plimpton memorialized - Biographer's rights/responsibilities - Title from stage direction--Exit Ghost--from three Shakespeare plays.

High Priced Fruit Bowl

You young people probably don't know but getting your hair cut once a week (usually on Saturday morning) was a real necessity in the 1940's and 1950's. When I think about it I don't know how the barbers were able to handle the hoard of customers showing up during the sixteen hours they were open. You had to wait. There was no getting somebody to hold your place while you ran out for a coke or lunch or anything. I can't begin to tell you all the stories I heard and all the life's lessons I learned while sitting in the hard steel chairs waiting for my clippings. I always went to Harbie Benston's shop. Except for one Saturday when I was working on my granddaddy's old Buick and let the time slip by. I was always good at changing the oil and stuff like that and granddaddy would give me a quarter or maybe even fifty cents for doing the work. Haircuts back then were fifty cents and I was always glad for the extra money to help pay for my weekly spruce up. But this one Saturday that happened to be the day of a big school dance, I goofed up. By the time I got to the barber shop the chairs were all filled and they had put up a sign: No More Customers Today. I remembered a little barber shop down by the railroad tracks that was run by a man named Reaves Rentlowe. He was the only barber and he charged just a quarter for a cut. I figured I had no choice. That night at the dance I noticed how everybody was staring at me and snickering up a storm. Finally Billy Jazbrow got me off to the side and told me my hair looked like somebody had taken a high priced fruit bowl, put it on my head, and used it as a guide to trim my hair. The next week I got on the train and went to New Orleans and bought me a pair of barber scissors. They cost me twelve dollars. Since then, to this day, I cut my own hair. I still went to the barber shop, but just for the stories. They were so busy they didn't seem to mind losing my business.

Smoke Free Campus

You can count on Curtis Ray Ickleburg to come up with some funny stuff. He's the one with the hearing problem that gets a lot of things mixed up. Yesterday, down at the barbershop he was real upset about an article he read in the Harper Bee, our local newspaper, about one of the state universities being made a smoke free campus. He said, "Now, I smoked since I were twelve year old, but it ain't a good thing. You know they says it causes cancer. We was always told it would stunt your growth, but never nothing about cancer. Now peoples know better and they giving away free cigarettes to our young'ns what are trying to get educated and is the hope for our future. It just ain't right. I think they should charge more at colleges and not give 'em away." Somebody asked if they should just up the price on all cigarettes everywhere. and Curtis Ray said, "Naw, just at the schools. I can't afford to pay no more than I do now."

Somnambulation

As y'all know I volunteer down at the county library. It has its rewards, particularly in getting information for myself.  We got this man who is known for his sleepwalking. I looked it up and found out it's called somnambulation. Sleepwalking has been going on for years like Lady MacBeth who wandered all around the castle at night. Josh Bowhowell, who read about this in school, used to joke about this scene as when she kicked the dog out of the house by saying, "Out, damn Spot." This local fellow that sleepwalks has been found in a woman's bedroom on three different occasions. This is a young woman who lives at home with her mamma and daddy and works down at the bank as a teller. The young man who somnambulates lives at home with his parents too. He goes to the community college down the road. Both households took measures to prevent him getting out of his house and into hers. They used locks and security alarms and nothing seemed to work. Turns out it was all a trick the young'ns had cooked up to be together. Her daddy sat up one night hidden behind a living room chair and caught his daughter dismantling the alarms and unlocking all the locks and letting her lover in. As punishment for both they made them get married. Just joking, Dorothy.

Madama Butterfly

This weekend we went to New Orleans. After lunch at Galatoire"s, we did some shopping but the main thing we did was go to the opera. Madama Butterfly was playing. I have seen all of Puccini's works and this was the fifth time for me to see Madam Butterfly (I left the "a" off because nobody I know pronounces it.) Dorothy had never seen it except in a movie we have at home. I am sure we both enjoyed it because all the way home we hummed the Humming Chorus.

Hugo, the Beer Dog

We got this old dog (he's been around here for over ten years) that we call Hugo. This all started when we noticed no matter where you go he's there, so we kinda turned "you go" into Hugo. Poetic license, doncha know? Hugo is real bad to bring things into our yard, like other people's papers. He has a particular fondness for beer cans. We have never seen a soft drink can, only beer. Neither me nor Dorothy drink beer, at least not on a regular basis. I have one now and then but never keep any at home. Dorothy has never, that I know of, even tasted beer. The only thing she likes in the alcohol family is a white wine now and then. But Hugo likes beer. We don't know exactly where the beer cans come from but I am always amazed at the variety of beer, both foreign and domestic, that he comes across. The other day I was clearing brush down by the lake and found a stash of cans along with the remains of a dead possum. We figured Hugo threw a party for some of his buddies. I have always thought of him as a very popular creature among his fellow canines and this discovery did nothing to change my opinion.

Korea Acting Up

I see on TV that things are getting pretty hot over in Korea. As y'all probably know I was over there during the Korean War. And hot is the last thing I think of when I consider that place. I saw more snow and walked through more snow than I ever want to again. The reason I had to leave and come home was because of the cold. I got frozen feet and still suffer from a burning pain on the soles of my feet. I never wear sandals or go around barefoot because my feet look so ugly. My best advice is to walk softly but carry a big snow shovel when dealing with those people leading that country. One of the maps they showed on TV was the lights at night. South Korea is bright and has electricity in all area while North Korea is as dark as it was in the middle ages.

Which Comes First

I heard this morning that people can't get jobs because they don't have enough on-the-job training. And they can't get on-the-job training because they can't get jobs. It's what they call a catch 22. Or which came first the chicken or the egg? A dog chasing his tail. When I was just a young'n one of my friends had an overprotective mother. She was always afraid he was gonna get his eye put out with a baseball gone awry, a misfired BB gun, or even the chance he would crash into a low lying branch. She was also extremely concerned about drowning. I actually heard her tell the boy that he couldn't go swimming until he learned how to swim. This friend came to one of our class reunions a few years back (I am an honorary member of the high school class of 1949, even though I did not go that far in school.) The guy had so many hangups I can't begin to tell them all. Seemed like all he did was throw salt over his shoulder, step on only the darker tiles on the floor, and avoid a little black cat that was hanging around the door of our meeting place. He told me he never got married because he never found anybody he thought would work out. Back to those jobs, looks like to me somebody somewhere has just got to use common sense, pick out an applicant that looks like they would be a good worker and a fast learner, and take a chance now and then.

Spring is Beautiful, but....

This morning down at the cafe everybody was sneezing their heads off. A lot of folks had red eyes and those who wear contact lens kept popping them out and running to the rest room to wash them off. Spring is beautiful around here, don't get me wrong, but a lot of miseries come along with all the prettiness. This morning I dropped by the library and looked up pollen in the encyclopedia. Some of the pictures are real scary. One looked like a yellow golf ball that was covered with spikes. You can see how much that would hurt sitting on top of a contact lens in a fellows eye. I am going to take as many pictures of the countryside as possible. Then when all the pollen has washed away I can sit and admire them without the sneezing, coughing, and tears.

The Groom is a CPA

One thing I always get amused at is how people make presumptions from faint information. Like the wedding we went to, several people commented that the bride and groom must be real "country," in the worst sense of the term. In fact, the groom is an accountant with a big firm in Atlanta and travels all over the world figuring out how to save his clients money. The bride teaches high school English and sings with the Atlanta Opera. They both grew up on a farm (he in Australia and she in Georgia,) met at a square dance, and most of their relatives do not live in a  city. A farm wedding just seemed like a good thing. They are going to Tahiti on their honeymoon and will stop off in Australia to visit his family who could not make the trip to America for the wedding.

Country Wedding

We are on our way home from a wedding in North Carolina. It was what you may want to call a country wedding. The bride had on a pretty white dress that came to just above her knees and she had on Pepto Bismol pink cowgirl boots. Her bridesmaids all had boots, all a different color. The groom had a western style suit with a sky blue neckerchief. It was his college color. The groomsmen had a neckerchief with the colors of their school. The flowers were wild flowers and the ceremony was in a barn. I was worried the whole time because they had over a hundred candles burning around all that hay. I was using my best defensive thinking keeping in mind how I would get Dorothy out and also as many of the animals as I could. I forgot to mention they left several animals in their stalls and they sang along with the ceremony. The bride and groom came up on two horses and left on one. But I found out they didn't have to go too far because the groom's truck was parked a short piece down the road. After the hitching (somebody had put a big sign on the door of the barn: THE HITCHING POST,) we were treated to a big outdoor meal. It was like one big pot luck dinner with dozens of casserole dishes filling the tables. The bride was one of Dorothy's sister's granddaughters.

Goat Farm

Like I was saying, Dorothy and I went to the Carl Sandburg House on our way to this wedding. The thing I was most interested in was the goat farm. Mrs. Sandburg was well known for her high quality goat's milk. I think they said there were three kinds of goats she raised. Everything was clean and tidy and I made up my mind to get me a goat or two when we get back to Harper. I got the area in mind where I want to build the barn and the pasture land is right ready for grazing. Might get a sheep or two for the shear pleasure of it. I already got a name picked out for my first boy goat. I plan to call him Mutton Jeff. I don't figure too many of y'all (especially the young ones) will catch on to that one but I put it down anyhow.

Carl Sandburg House

On the way to the town of the wedding we were invited to, Dorothy and I stopped by the Carl Sandburg House. It is in North Carolina just north of the South Carolina line. Dorothy knows by heart a lot of Sandburg's poems. All I remember from school is the line about the fog creeping in on little cat feet. One thing I learned was Sandburg only went through the eighth grade. As you may remember I only went through grade seven and one-half. I wish I would have learned years ago about the fact that he did so well with so little education. Maybe I would have been motivated to write a few poems myself. The thing that interested me most about the Sandburg place was the goat farm. I'll talk more about that later. This morning we were watching TV and this newscaster came on that looked, to me, a lot like Carl Sandburg. Sandburg died in 1967 and this news fellow was born in 1970. It got me thinking. Could people come back from the grave? Then I realized how silly this was when I saw one parted his hair on the left and the other on the right.

A Pretty Downtown

Dorothy and I are on the road. We are going to a wedding in North Carolina. Last night we stayed in Greenville, South Carolina. Greenville has one of the prettiest downtown areas that I have seen. It shows what the citizens of a community can do when they get together and more importantly work together. The treelined main street has sidewalk cafes, statues, and other works of art. All the buildings have been cleaned and painted in a scheme that blends beauty and functionality. There is within a block or two a city park with a bridge over running water. Close by is a minor league ballpark with a small attractive stadium. We stayed in a first rate hotel and ate at one of the downtown restaurants last night, We enjoyed an excellent meal with prompt and courteous service. I was really impressed with downtown Greenville. By the way, as you may have recognized, I gave Dorothy license to write this the way she wanted.

April Fool

I ain't usually one to pull an April Fool trick on a friend, but I got caught up in one of those "harmless" little pranks this morning. For several weeks Wendell Wattsboro has been bragging about his rabbits and how he plans to have a rabbit ranch on his four acres of land. He bought a boy rabbit and a girl rabbit and put them together to do what comes naturally. And he has had minimal success.  A few weeks ago people started collecting rabbits of all shapes and sizes. Early this morning while Wendell was down at the cafe having his breakfast we kept distracting him by getting him to tell more about his rabbit plans. We egged him on by trying to downplay all his grand plans. He was getting steamed and finally told us just wait and see, within in two months he would have hundreds of bunnies running everywhere. While we were holding him at the cafe a bunch of men were bringing over all the little rabbits they had been collecting and turning them loose in the big fenced in area Wendell had prepared for his warren. We did such a good job of prodding old Wendell that he invited us all of to his place to see what a big deal he was making. Several of us went in several cars. When we pulled up and Wendell saw his yard full of furry critters he stood google eyed and was speechless except for saying, "You gotta be kidding me." Then that little lightbulb that pops up over a person's head when he see the light popped up. I thing the main clue was the little bunnies that had been colored blue, pink, and green for Easter.