My Friend Little Johnny
When you’re 80+3 (and I made this milestone just yesterday) there are indelible memories that stand still in time. You want to keep them there. One of mine was the rebuke from a 9-year-old missionary kid I met, oh, possibly 64 years ago. Here’s the poem I wrote about this. Coffee Break Mrs. B’s home is above the King’s College Vocational shop where old vehicles sit, The smell of grease and occasionally, gas fumes greeted us. Men with wrenches in their hands, And red rags in the back pockets of their coveralls, moved about making repairs, clanging metal. Ludy, a mechanic, would slide under the blue Chevy pickup That has certainly seen better days. It was not easy to do, as he was a bit corpulent. But he worked magic with vehicles. An old, rusty harvesting combine imported from Kansas many years ago, Sat by the shop, against the wire fence, Looking like a monster of a machine. During the rice or corn harvest season, Faithfully...