Glorieta, New Mexico

                                                                        Psalm 121

 

                               
    I was at a low point in my life.  The year was 1966.  My college career was not going as it should. I had attended Northwestern University in Natchitoches, Louisiana in 1963.  I was depressed, did some bodily harm to myself, and flunked out.  Returning home, my dad told me that I could spend the rest of my life working on the farm or with his pest control business.  I had no idea what I was even doing on this earth, but made the decision to apply to Louisiana College in Pineville, Louisiana and try again.  Anything could be better than his option.  By 1965 I was a junior majoring in art education.  I had a setback.  My grades were poor except in my major.  I was on a downward spiral and all those life-long tapes of my insecurities and poor self-worth were playing in a continuous loop.  Friends had no idea that good ole’ happy-go-lucky Nippy was depressed.  I was a master at hiding my real emotions.  I seriously, but briefly, thought of dropping out of school or worse harming my body again, momentarily.   But what would I do if I did drop out?  What could an art major with poor math skills ever find to do?  Stay home and work for my daddy?  That would only make my poor self-image become even worse.  I had spent most of my life feeling I could not measure up to the potential I felt my father expected of me as the eldest son.  To make matters worse, he had already planned my summer.  I was to crawl under houses and search for termites for his pest control business.  I hated spaces under houses and had nightmares about spiders and snakes in those dark crevices.  

At my lowest moment, a solution came to me at church.  I still attended because I wasn’t ready to expose my true feelings to friends.  It was a Wednesday night at prayer meeting, and I sat there with a blank expression on my face not really believing in a God anymore.  There was a slide show presentation about summer jobs open to college students at Glorieta Baptist Encampment, the Southern Baptist Convention’s assembly in Glorieta, New Mexico, not far from Santa Fe.  My friend elbowed me in the side and said, “You would be great working there.  Let’s apply for this summer.  New Mexico’s weather must be better than ours and it’s near Santa Fe.  Beautiful art is there.”  I had never worked anywhere except for my daddy at his pest control or in hot, humid hay fields on the farm.  I had never even been away from home alone.  I told him, “No!”

WE applied and I was hired because my friend chose, at the last minute, to find a better paying summer job.  I was petrified, I had never been out west before and never taken off on my own.  I had issues with change, I was insecure, depressed, and mad at being abandoned by a friend.

 I had heard about Glorieta all my life while growing up in Emmanuel Baptist. It was a summer retreat for Baptists and their families to enjoy the mountains and fresh air of the west.  It was a place where one could pray in a beautiful garden filled with glorious flowers and streams; a place of learning, Bible study and singing; a place to hike down well-traveled trails, climb mountains and watch sun rises at dawn. A place to relax, take a deep breath and become closer to God.   It was a retreat.  People came from all over to spend a week at this peaceful haven in the Sangre de Cristo mountains.   Older teenagers from our church had worked there before and loved it.  When I discovered others from different Baptist churches in town would be working there also, I decided to be brave, friend or no friend.

 At Glorieta, college students took care of everything for these people during the summer.  The students worked in the dining hall serving tables, cleaning, and cooking meals.  They worked as maids in the different cottages, worked in the post office, gas station, gift shop, washateria, and at the registration desk.  There were students to take care of everyone’s needs, including recreation and the children.  This was the escape I needed to find my true self, to help my depression. 

Our job was to make sure the guests that came for the different weeks during the summer were comfortable.  It was hard work.  Especially in the kitchen where they slaved over hot stoves and delivered food to tables as well as scrubbed pots and pans.  We were the hired hands by day andexpected to attend church services every evening as well. 

When my junior semester was almost finished, I took a deep breath and cornered my daddy as to my change of plans for the summer.  He did not take this well, especially when he discovered the low pay I would receive. Words were said that didn’t help my self-esteem.  I needed to get away, to think with a clear head and perhaps I could discover myself away from the depressing state I felt I was in. It needed to be a summer of discovery.  I needed some breathing room. I stormed out angry.

So, I packed my bags and rode a Trailways bus to Santa Fe, New Mexico where I met a staff member that took me to the encampment.  I was inundated with self-doubt on that whole trip.  Until I arrived.  The scenery was beautiful.  The mountains enveloped me in their arms, and I felt at home. I felt that here I could be the real me, not the face I seemed to put on in front of others at home.  There was something about those mountains that made me feel safe. 

I had been assigned to work in the children's building.  This was the building where birth through sixth grade children stayed while parents had their own conferences. I was the janitor, assigned to clean and mop all the rooms each evening, empty trash and get the rooms ready for the next day.  Teachers from Nashville came each week to lead the children in a Vacation Bible school.   My mornings were free, and my afternoons were spent performing my janitorial duties.

I made friends.  We became close to each other during our free times between new people arriving.  We participated in groups that led evening worship with songs, dramas, and just fun mini retreats for ourselves and for the evening services. 

 I became one of the leaders in the drama group, where we rehearsed and performed for ourselves, we even made a film for the convention that was distributed to churches everywhere.  We performed skits, comedies, had talent shows, and evening devotions around a campfire.  We became a close-knit family of college students enjoying hard work without the stress of studies.

 It was fortuitous that I would be assigned the children’s building.  It must have been God’s plan.  I loved working with children.   Each week was different and equally exciting.  Music week had all the best church musicians lead the evening services, Sunday School week had great Bible teachers, WMU week and Brotherhood week had excellent speakers.  I joined the choir and sang at the evening conferences.  I was beginning to let down my guard and allow my friendly self-re-emerge.  I no longer felt so self-absorbed or depressed.

Instead of being on my own in the mornings, I began hanging out around the children’s building to see if they needed help.  When a teacher needed a third hand in a classroom, I became an aide.  I helped cut and paste and work on their bulletin boards. It wasn’t long before I was leading the children on hikes around the area while teachers prepared a new lesson.  I became a baby whisperer when a child in the nursery couldn’t be calmed. 

 I became more than the janitor at the children’s building. 

 I found time to climb “Old Baldy” in the dark and watch the sunrise peak over the mountains huddled close to friends for warmth.  And then it happened.  It was here in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains overlooking the campground that God breathed new life into me.  We sat silently on an outcropping of the mountain, feeling the wind surround us, pulling our sweaters tighter around our shoulders for warmth.  We had a brief devotion and prayer for the day. The sun was just peaking over the mountain in the east.  That’s when I felt His presence.  It was there that He spoke to me.  He breathed new life into me.  It was a very vivid moment.   I left that mountain a better person. 

The summer of 1966 became one of my favorite jobs ever.  At the end of the summer, we elected favorites.  I was not expecting it, but that summer I was elected one of the favorites.  I left there with lifelong friendships and a new respect for myself.  I had a motivation to continue school.  I didn’t need to return as the quiet, reclusive art major.  The summer I dreaded had become a turning point in my life. 

I may have felt God breathe on me in those New Mexico mountains, but it was only later that I

realized he was breathing on me that night on the mountain and when a friend encouraged me to step out on faith and apply for the job.  

We never know what paths we might travel on our journey, but I do know that by my opening myself to God that He began directing my path.  

I think it sad that today Glorieta Baptist Assembly no longer exists but am ever grateful that I have treasured memories and life-long friends. 

Oh, I still have my doubts and insecurities, even depression on rare occasions but I know that by staying close to God that I can weather anything.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

                                          Memorial Day Tribute

                                                                             Vietnam

 

In the Army, I was trained to be a Photo Lab Specialist and looked forward to developing film for the Army, even in Vietnam.  But, when I first arrived in country and sent to the 199^th Infantry Brigade, they informed me that the brigade did not have a photo lab.   In training, I had been told that without a lab I would be sent to the front with the “grunts” and required to take pictures as well as fight. I was petrified.  It was a relief when I was sent to the Information Office, the newspaper office, you might say.  There the Lieutenant in charge reassured me that the job was available.  He referred me to the Sargent in charge.  The Sargent in charge said there was one problem.  Someone else wanted the position too.   A photographer, who had been in the field fighting for half a year also wanted the job.  We were both a specialist 4. The job required a Specialist 5.  The Sargent had to decide who would be assigned the position.  He asked us both to go build a bunker outside the building.  Being new in country and army life, I obeyed without question, while the other guy refused and told him off.  I got the job and a promotion which involved collecting the negatives from the photographers in the field then have them developed next door at Long Binh. before delivering the photos to Saigon to be censored (or not).  I would then send them out to UPI and AP to be published in the newspapers in America.  I was working in a newspaper office with reporters.  A great job on a secure base.  One of my extra duties was to travel with the General on Sundays to visit the wounded, from our unit, in the area hospitals.  I could learn to like this job, I decided. I was here in Vietnam, not even a year in service and had been promoted to Photo Lab Specialist 5.  All this was so very new to me, not having been around military people my entire life.  I had received the rank of PFC upon completion of my photo lab training, another promotion to E4 the same day for my grades and now to an E5 a few months after my last one. 

Most days were quiet and normal.  I received the negatives from the photographers in the field, went next door to have them developed while the reporters wrote their stories and once a week, we took a day trip to Saigon to be censored or not.  On weekends we lounged around the pool on our off hours.  Sundays I attended the early interdenominational church services just a few buildings down from our newspaper office and traveled with the General.  This is a story about the one day I will never forget.  April 1, 1970.

                                                                

It was a Friday in Vietnam.  I woke up in the bunker that I called home, the same bunker I helped build, which had assured my working here instead of at the front fighting with the “grunts”.  Aside from a few April Fool's jokes with my friends, the day seemed to be no different than all other Fridays in Vietnam, at first.

            Being the weekend, I was looking forward to Sunday where I knew that after the church service I would go back to the office, gather my camera, and wait for my Sundays with the General.  The General’s aide stopped by to inform me that today, April 1, 1970, a Friday, the General wanted to visit the hospitals today instead of Sunday, be ready in an hour.  This was unusual.  We only visited on Sunday afternoons.

 Brigadier General William Ross Bond was a decent guy.  He wasn't aloof like other Generals I had seen.  He made you feel like you were somebody and that you weren't alone in this war. He spoke TO you and not AT you.  My job was to just silently take pictures of him with the wounded soldiers, so they would have a record of his visit and a picture to send home to anxious loved ones. I always had plenty of Polaroid film on hand for these visits.  I didn't just silently take pictures with General Bond, though, because he encouraged me to also speak and visit with the men.  He felt it was important.  So here we were, the General, his aide, and me making rounds in the hospitals visiting and reassuring wounded men.   I had been doing this for half a year already and it seemed quite ordinary for me, a Specialist 5, and he, a General, to board his helicopter, gunners on each side of us and fly to the wounded every Sunday. We became friends on those flights.  Sometimes we talked about nothing in general, other times about his family or mine.  It was like going on a Sunday drive with a friend. 

                                             So why was today different, I thought. 

                                   

               When the General was ready, I met them at the heliport and off we flew. 

First, we visited one soldier who had been gravely wounded, displaying stitches from neck to groin.  Then another from our unit who had lost a leg.  When I first started these visits, I couldn't look the soldiers directly in the eye because I felt guilty that I was in a secure position in Vietnam, and they had been living in hell.  I became accustomed to visiting and offering a word of prayer. 

We had made several visits when we received a call that the 199^th was fighting further north with several wounded on the ground without a medivac helicopter nearby.  General Bond, without any hesitation, decided that we should leave immediately and help rescue those we could.  It would be extremely dangerous. 

As the helicopter took off Gen. Bond said, “Drop Blair off at the base, first.   We might have some information to send him and he’s without a weapon.”   I was grateful.

 Returning to the office we waited for any information that might come in.  We were anxious.   Two hours later we got word that my friend General Bond was dead along with everyone else on his helicopter.   Gen. Bond had ordered the pilot to land so they could help rescue wounded soldiers.  They were fired upon.  

                     General Bond was carrying a private in his arms when he was shot.  

                           

 Chills ran up and down my spine and I cried.  I had lost a great friend that I only briefly got to see on our Sunday afternoon flights.  I lost friends that were also on the helicopter with the general and his aide.  This thought shook me to my bones knowing that if he had not decided to drop me off first, that I would have been one of the causalities too.  Life stood still.

We had a memorial service at the base later that week.  I felt so guilty.  Why did they die instead of me? This was an experience that many soldiers have when their friends have been killed and they were spared.  I was no different. 

For several years, I lived with that guilt and silently kept it inside. I had bouts of depression. Gradually, I came to terms with my feelings and was able to talk about the war.   

             I am a grateful person that my life was spared.  My faith helped me weather the storm.  I learned to look on the bright side and talk of my Army days as joy and fun.  The dark side doesn't seem dark anymore.  I know what these soldiers feel when they return home without a friend.  I also feel their guilt and pain when I hear their stories.  I am grateful that, but by the grace of God, it wasn't me.

Sometimes I get sad and cry on Memorial Day for I feel the pain so many have suffered. 

I thank you, Lord, for all men and women in the armed forces who put their lives on the line every day to make America the free country we so love.  Thank you for those who died and for their families.  Their sacrifice was not in vain.  

Without General Bond's decision to leave me behind I would not have ever met Frances or been married or had Marty.  I would not have ever met Marty's wife Kristi and seen their two wonderful grandboys Jonah and Micah.   Life would have been so different for my family this memorial weekend. 

                                                    I am a grateful person. 

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

                

        AUNT DOLLY MAYO

Proverbs 17:22.    A merry heart doeth good like a medicine.

 

  She was a Nazarene preacher’s wife, my great aunt on my mother’s side, my grandmother’s baby sister to be exact: the Hoffpauir branch, the ones from Rayne, Louisiana.   She and her husband were such opposites in so many ways.  She was five feet tall on a good day with the proper shoes on and Uncle Claudius was at least six feet five.  She loved good food, good conversation and lots of laughs while he looked as if bread and water were his only staples. 

They were Jack Sprat and his wife in every sense of the word.

 Uncle Preacher, as we called him, was stern and erect, with a permanent expression that looked like a dried prune.  Don’t know if I ever saw a smile on his face.  He was the kind that probably wore a suit and tie (dark ones of course) to bathe in and certainly wore one to bed.  How he fell in love with Aunt Dolly is a mystery that is still discussed in family circles to this day, or better yet how in the world did she fall in love with someone so stiff and boring.  They appeared to be a total mismatch, but I sensed there was deep love for each other, somewhere.

Aunt Dolly loved a good joke and was constantly creating ways to shock someone, especially her husband.  She adored playing the devil’s advocate.  “Lighten up, Claudius,” she said one weekend when we were visiting, “People are tired of hearing that they are all going to hell every Sunday.  They might listen more to your sermons if you weren’t so stiff.  You must bend, baby.  Bend.  There’s some interesting stuff in that Bible if you would just tell them about that instead of pointing fingers and calling names, condemning them for their sins that they must have done during the week.  They need to hear the Good News, not your wrath.  Preach the New Testament, Claudius,  not the Old.   They need something to discuss over dinner to ease their digestion, for Christ’s sake.”

Uncle Preacher gave a disgusting huff, stood, stretching his six-foot-five frame adding an inch or two, looked directly at Aunt Dolly, with eyes glowing with anger.  He said, “Lucinda Beulah, I’m embarrassed that you have such evil in your heart to say such things in front of the family, and in front of these children.”  Then, looking at us, he continued, “If you will excuse me, I must retreat to my study and spend the rest of the afternoon on my knees praying for your dear aunt’s soul.”

Aunt Dolly just laughed and replied as he exited the room, “Now, family.  What joyful mischief shall we get into now that his lord and master is retreating?  We should do devilish things so he will have a reason to really pray for our souls.  I’m sure he will point fingers at us at church tomorrow.”

Aunt Dolly loved playing the piano and singing.  The louder the better and it had to have a decent rhythm.  None of those droll ole’ hymns for her, no sir.  If she played and sang Bringing in the Sheaves then, honey, they brought those sheaves in a-dancing and a-jiving and rejoicing all over God’s kingdom, and loved bringing them in.  She put a honky-tonk rhythm into everything she played.  I loved her dearly. 

When we got to church Sunday morning, Aunt Dolly received word that the pianist was sick.  Aunt Dolly decided to fill in without informing Uncle Preacher.  As people solemnly filed into the church, expecting to be listening to a quiet hymn , or as Aunt Dolly described it, a funeral dirge,  they were shocked as Aunt Dolly pounded on those keys, singing at the top of her lungs, “I feel like hell.  I feel like hell.  I feel like hell-ping some poor Soul.  Do you feel like hell, yes feel like hell, feel like hell-ping some poor soul?”  The people had something to talk about over dinner that day.

*Note: Aunt Dolly and her sister, my grandmother Ruth George often collaborated on hymns.  Grandma wrote the words and Aunt Dolly the music, peaceful church music.  Not sure if I have a copy of any of them.  Grandma has a book of poems she published titled “Walking on the Glory Road”.      

   

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

                                   AUNT LUCILLE

Luke 15:8-9 Or what woman, if she has ten silver coins and loses one coin, does not light a lamp, and sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it?  And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin which I had lost.’

                                
            Aunt Lucile, my daddy’s baby sister, lost her teeth in the lake, while feeding the ducks one afternoon, at the Blair family reunion and never being one to go down defeated, she decided to retrieve her choppers since they were only a month old, and she had not finished paying for them.

Into the waist deep water she jumped, clothes, shoes, hat, and all.  She began scratching in the mud searching for her teeth.   Aunt Lucille bent over headfirst exposing her large, wet rear looking like the ducks around her as they too bobbed for food.  The rest of the family, noticing the commotion at the lake, gradually moved closer to observe just what that dang-nab fool Lucile is up to this time.

When she came up for air, my daddy, Cecil, said, “Lucille, what the H-E-double-toothpicks you doing in that lake with your large, wet bottom exposed to God Almighty in front of our family at the annual reunion, embarrassing you-know-what out of us?  You can see your drawers for Pete’s sake.”

            “I’m just trying to get my choppers back,” she snapped.   “I was feeding these dang ducks and one nipped me on the finger causing me to say some words I didn’t even know I knew.  That son of a duck made my dadburn teeth fall in the water.  I’ve been looking forward to eating Ella’s fried chicken all day and I ain’t about to go gumming the rest of the afternoon.

My cousins and I wanted to join in the search as well and almost made it into the lake before being harnessed by our parents.  Brother Bobby and cousin Rodney did manage to escape the reaching arms, making a huge splash, soaking a couple of furious ladies.

Again, Aunt Lucille bobbed under searching in the mud, emerging for air several times, before ducking in the water again.  After a bit of wallowing in the now muddy lake, she shouted, “I found them!”   About that time, the duck that nipped her in the first place, spying something shining in her hand, quickly flapped his fat body over and with one swift move swallowed the teeth. 

Everyone fell over laughing.

Aunt Lucille fumed.  “I’ll be danged if that son of a…pardon my French... #%*#*#$%&#…duck keeps me from eating Ella's fried chicken,” she yelled.  “Help me, boys, don’t let that duck get away!”  

 Bobby, Rodney, and Aunt Lucille immediately jumped back into the water, scattering the rest of the flock before they grabbed the culprit that ruined her afternoon.

                   We had roast duck added to the menu before the day was over.

                                                       

 Note:  This story is fictitious, although the characters are real.  Knowing our family this could have really happened.  Right cousins?  Truth!

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

           

             THE DAY DADDY JUMPED INTO THE

                                  RED RIVER

 

 

                                It was a Sunday in 1950 or 1951.  It was spring. Just after Easter. We were living in the Paradise community on the Pineville side of the Red River.  We moved there when I was four and stayed until I finished the third grade.  Our church, Emmanuel Baptist, was downtown on the Alexandria side.  There were six of us. Four free-range children…well, three.  Jane was a baby.We were running late for church.

 I must have been seven or eight years old and Becky around nine.  Mama was already frazzled.  She had put a pot roast in the oven on low to cook while we were at church, and in the process, while herding us, had spilled flour all over her dress, slipped on some cooking oil on the floor while shooing the dog making her twist her ankle.  She was yelling for us to hurry and get to the car while wiping off the flour and rubbing her ankle.  Daddy was already honking the horn which made her yell at us more. 

Becky slowly walked to the car reading a book.  Baby Jane was crying in her crib, I was fully dressed but barefoot.  My brother, Bobby, six, was no where to be found.  Mama yelled for daddy to stop honking that horn.  It didn’t help.

She was close to becoming a patient at a mental hospital.

Hobbling around and shouting, “Get in the car.  Now! I don’t care if you’re barefooted. Where’s Bobby.  Someone grab Jane and make her stop crying. Cecil, we are coming.  Nippy find your socks and shoes.  Where is Bobby.  I must teach Sunday school and need to be in a good mood.  Who’s missing? You kids are driving me crazy. STOP HONKING THAT HORN!”  

At last, she found Bobby, and my shoes while ushering us out the door.  Still fussing a mile, a minute.

We managed to get into the car without much trouble. We were off and daddy stopped honking the horn.  The six of us were crammed into the car.  I sat in the middle of the back seat, shoving sister Becky to move over because I needed more room.  She ignored me and continued to read.  Jane was in the front seat with mama and Bobby was crawling around the floor under our feet and irritating us.  There were whines of “Mama, Bobby’s bothering me.  Mama Becky won’t move over.”  She had had enough and began reaching, with her free hand, into the back seat trying to swat whoever was kicking the front seat.  “You children are going to be the death of me yet.  It’s Sunday!  Can’t you at least behave for one day?  I’m a mess already and I must teach Sunday School and the lesson is Children obey your parents!   You heathens would cause Jesus to go crazy.  And, Cecil, honking that horn doesn’t help…”

All this bedlam was going on when we reached the river.  We barely got on the bridge when the traffic stopped.  People were getting out of their cars and looking over the railings.  “Something must be wrong,” daddy said. 

Becky, looking up from her book said, “There’s a boat acting funny.  Look, daddy.  Some people are in the water.”

  There was a boat circling round and round with no people in it.  It was making larger and larger circles.  People were standing on the riverbank and doing nothing.   Daddy got out and looked.  He saw the two people floundering in the current of the river with no one trying to rescue them.  People were just yelling and pointing. 

He threw off his shoes and his suit coat as he ran across the bridge, yelling at us to stay in the car.  He rushed past people shoving them out of his way.   When he got to the levee, he tore off his tie and began removing his pants while hopping on one foot and shouting for people to move.  One man in the water was going under. 

AND THIS IS WHEN DADDY JUMPED INTO THE RIVER!  

Diving into the water, he swam toward the two in trouble. Daddy dove under and found the man that was sinking and brought him to shore.  He went back and grabbed the other man and brought him to the edge.   It took some effort to rescue the men, but he managed to get them to the banks of the river where others helped pull them up to safety.

Daddy was quite tired and out of breath, but he quickly grabbed his pants and rushed back to our car picking up his clothes as he returned.  It happened so fast that people weren’t sure what happened.  People were looking around wanting to thank the rescuer who seems to have disappeared.  The police arrived. The traffic began moving, daddy got dressed and we drove on to church.  Letting us out he said that we didn’t need to say anything about what happened, that they would find out soon enough.

 The next day the newspaper had a picture of him running up the levee with the headline, “Mysterious man saves people from drowning.”

People did recognize him, and he was eventually awarded a medal from the mayor.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

        PERCY, SIGN LANGUAGE AND JESUS

                       John 14:14 If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.

                                           

                                  Pelican drawn by Percy while I worked with him.

Back in the 70’s, I was an art therapist at a mental hospital, dealing with anything from depression, schizophrenia, alcohol and drug abuse.  Friends used to ask, when discovering I worked at a mental hospital, if I was a patient or a therapist.  I usually replied, quoting a co-worker, “You just watch which one goes home at the end of the day, then you’ll know who’s crazy and who isn’t.”  It was a very interesting part of my life.  I have many stories of life on the edge of sanity.  This however is not one of them.

Just north of Forest Hill, in Rapides Parish in central Louisiana was Camp Claiborne, a former U.S. Army military camp during World War II.  Not much is left of this camp except a few abandoned buildings, some sealed off with fencing. Many streets still exist as well as parking lots and footings of original buildings.  Today, there is a 26-mile, hiking, walking and biking trail.  There is evidence that unexploded ordnance on the property still exist.  This area is now owned by the United States Forestry Service.

 The late England Air Force base, in Alexandria, was actively using this remote area as a practice bombing area for the fighter planes in the 1970’s.   I used to drive in that area hoping to watch the planes drop their explosives.  All I ever experienced was the noise as they exploded, and it was loud. 

                                  

Percy lived in this area.  Alone.  Percy was deaf.   I really have extraordinarily little information as to why he lived alone but I do know that he did not know any sign language and used only his primitive signs to communicate.  Percy was scared from the noise which he felt and saw as the planes flew overhead. He, apparently, was also frightening people around the area that didn’t know him and thought he was mentally ill with his weird hand gestures.  Percy was brought to Central Louisiana Mental Hospital and placed in my care.

 I think he was sent by God.

Frances and I were taking sign language classes at Emmanuel Baptist since the church had a deaf ministry.  We learned to meet and communicate with deaf friends all around the area.  Frances excelled in learning this language, possibly due to her French heritage and using her hands whenever she spoke. She eventually became an interpreter for our church services.   I got by.

 I now had a deaf man in my art therapy class.  Percy needed to learn sign language.    I managed to understand his home-made signs and taught him some of what I knew.  I taught him the alphabet.  I needed more help so I decided to call on our friends, deaf ministers from the Assembly of God, to see if they could visit and try to understand Percy’s signs.  They were given permission to visit my therapy class.  Together the three of us worked on communicating with Percy.  It was obvious that his signs were only home-made and not American sign language.  So, Percy and I had sign language lessons.  The two ladies came twice a week and we began with basic signs.  I worked with him daily.   I felt as if our daily lessons were like Ann Sullivan as she taught Helen Keller to communicate.  Frustrating at times, but extremely rewarding at others.  He mimicked the signs, but I didn’t see that look on his face as the light that comes on when understanding.  I showed him the sign for airplane.  He panicked and began crying and holding his ears. It was obvious that he had been traumatized by the airplanes practice bombing the area.

Meanwhile, the head of my department was trying to arrange a place that would take Percy since after evaluation it was determined he was not mentally ill.  Our hospital was not equipped.  Percy needed a place to teach him not only to communicate, but some basic human skills, like cooking, and cleanliness, so he could learn to function and eventually live in a half-way house.   A place in St. Louis, Missouri was thrilled to work with him.  He would have to fly there.  I reminded my boss that Percy was terrified of planes.  Every time we used the sign of airplane, Percy would panic.  He’d immediately run and hide under a table, making his handmade signs, covering his ears, crying, and shaking like a leaf.

St. Louis could not take him for at least a month.  My job was to continue the sign language lessons and convince him to fly.  I had a friend who had a small plane that was willing to fly Percy around the area, if we could convince him to get on the plane.  This was an extremely hard task.  I eventually got him to the point where he did not run and hide and cry when seeing a picture of an airplane or see my sign for plane.   Percy, meanwhile, had mastered concrete thoughts and we needed him to understand abstract concepts.  I worked with him by trying to get him to understand where he would be going.

The ministers from the Assemblies were concerned about his salvation.  They began trying to teach him about Jesus. (I realize that this being a state institution, I was not supposed to cross this barrier, but I did). They were met with a blank expression.  He already knew the signs for “love” and “me”, but the word “Jesus” was met with confusion. We continued daily signing “Jesus loves me”, pointing to a picture of Jesus on the cross.  He would mimic the signs and smile and nod as if he understood which is a common thing for deaf people to do.  I was not really convinced he understood.

                                                      

The day arrived for us to fly in my friend’s plane.  We drove to the airport.  I was to be the one to fly with him and the pilot.  We looked at the plane.  Touched the outside, peeked at the interior. Looked at the propeller. I signed that he and I would get on the plane and fly around. He shook his head.  I asked him to get inside.  He balked at first but after I boarded, he followed. We sat a while.  The engine started.  He grabbed me.  We took off.  As we became airborne, Percy looked at me, made the sign of the cross and signed “Jesus loves me” while pointing up. He then placed his hands in a prayerful position and closed his eyes. He understood the abstract concept. He knew about Jesus.  Maybe he learned it somewhere in his past for we never learned about his history, or maybe we taught him.  Either way, I beamed.  Percy looked out the window after that and did not appear afraid.  

A month later I took Percy to the airport and helped him board a plane to St. Louis.  He smiled and hugged me, and we said our goodbyes.  I did learn that he became a star pupil and made great progress.  I thank God for this angel that crossed my path and became part of my story.

© Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.

                              

                 THE COUNTRY GROCERY STORE                

                    

 I grew up in the fifties when life was tranquil.  It was a time of freedom where everyone knew his or her neighbor, doors left unlocked.  Children rode bicycles with abandon anywhere in town. 

There were trees to climb, horses to ride, creeks to explore, secret places to hide under the canopy of pines where we would sit for hours telling secrets or gossip.

We had the pure freedom to be ourselves, southern kids, “raised properly”, according to our mamas.  We were raised to care for each other.  Neighbors cared.  People cared.

My daddy was one of those who cared, always helping people.  Most of the time incognito. If someone needed some cash to tide them over for the month, my daddy would quietly take care of things.  He would pay utility bills or monthly house payments and never let the person know who the anonymous donor was.  Having grown up poor, daddy had a heart for those in need.

                                    This story is one of those adventures.  

 We were living on the edge of town on Jackson Street Extension.  It was considered out in the country then.  There was one house on either side of us and lots of land that went all the way back to Prescott Road.    We had enough land to raise cotton and corn as well as a pasture where we kept our cows and horses and a few pigs.  The cows were milked twice daily and many times the evening milk went to someone down the street who had four kids and trouble making ends meet.  I remember riding my horse to deliver the milk. 

 Daddy was always helping others when he could. He thought no one knew, not even mama or us kids, but we did, he couldn’t hide anything from us.  Since the majority of those helped didn’t know their benefactor then he never asked for any payment in return.  He liked it that way.  Staying incognito.

There were occasions, however, where he would help someone with the stipulation that they would pay him back. If they were capable, he expected them to hold to their end of the bargain and pay what they could and they did, usually in exceedingly small amounts and most of the time at the crack of dawn or late at night. 

So, we became used to living in a goldfish bowl; used to having company appear at all hours of the morning.  Daddy was a state senator at this time and the country folks would appear, as the sun was peeking over the horizon, to see THEIR senator and the city folks would be calling late at night to see THEIR senator.   This happened all the time.   Mama would smile politely and offer them coffee while she went and waked daddy. After they left, he would say, “Just helping a friend”.  Mama usually retorted, “Then you get your lazy self-up and open the door and make the coffee!”

            One Saturday morning a man appeared at daybreak.  He had walked most of the way since his truck had broken down.  The man owned a grocery store out in the country.  The only one for miles around and he needed help.  His son had gambled and owed money that he couldn’t pay. There were threats. The man was afraid he would lose the store.

 Daddy helped with the agreement that he pay him back a little each month.

The man paid a small amount to daddy for several months but then stopped payment even though he still owed daddy a large amount of money.  Even daddy and his generous heart couldn’t let that pass.  Rather than cause the man any embarrassment, my daddy made an agreement with the store owner that he would take payment out of merchandise. the man agreed and daddy told him that my mama would be making regular visits to get groceries free of charge.  He was to tally the amount on each visit, give the ticket to mama and that amount would be taken off his debt.  This would continue until the debt was cleared.

Daddy just assumed that mama would drop her busy schedule to go grocery shopping in the country.  She was already busy with humorous book reviews for the book club or being a hostess for the music club.  Her life was busy teaching Sunday School.  She was active with church committees. She was busy writing articles for magazines.   This was a huge assumption on daddy’s part.  

She hit the ceiling!  “It’s easy for you to say,” she fumed.  “You won’t be the one driving to the boonies and buying groceries out in the country.  How am I ever going to find this place?  I have a life, too, you know!” She did not want to drive out to this small store for groceries. 

The house was tense for several days.   

As usual mama eventually gave in and went.  Since I was the eldest son, and the only one gullible to go with her, I went.   There went my trees to climb, horses to ride and creeks to explore.  Instead, I would be on an adventure somewhere deep in the pine forest. 

Mama was used to small stores for little items needed if we ran out of something, like Tommy’s grocery down the street, but her main shopping was at the A&P grocery store in town.  Mama was not happy about traveling an hour just to get a few items.   But the man owed them money, so she went.   

 The first Saturday, we traveled down the highway to the country road which wound itself all over the place.  The pine trees were thick as ticks on both sides, and it gave an eerie vibe.  We worried what would happen if we had car trouble.  There were no vehicles traveling down this road. How would anybody find us way out in this dark wilderness.  The day was creepy and scary and overcast.

Mama found the store eventually and bought crackers, bread, and canned goods, lots of canned goods.  We loaded up on anything that didn’t need refrigeration.  The man rang up the groceries and gave us the ticket.  Mama looked at the amount and almost cried.  “This will take us a year of Sundays to ever get things settled,” she moaned.  On the way home, mama called daddy every bad word she could think of, mostly under her breath, in between sobs of why.  “Why?” She’d cry while hitting the steering wheel.  “Why?”  

Every Saturday we trekked through the pine forest to this godforsaken store and bought what we needed, mostly canned vegetables week after week, month after month.   One week mama bought a case of pineapples for an upside-down cake. She was entertaining some ladies from church the next week and needed a dessert.

 The day before her Sunday school party, mama opened a can of pineapples.  Something was wrong.  They were brown and smelled.  She opened another can.  It too was nasty.  Mama looked at the expiration date. It was way over the expiration date.  She looked at the other canned items that we hadn’t used yet and discovered they too were expired.  Why was this man selling bad goods?  Why wasn’t he receiving new shipments? She was furious as she sent me down to Tommy’s groceries to buy pineapples.  I went on my horse, of course.

Mama was determined to get to the bottom of this.  She asked the grocery owner who delivered his groceries.  He told her.  She called the warehouse that delivered them and received little help.  She ended up calling the main office of the Dole Pineapple Company.  They sent a representative up from New Orleans.  He discovered that some of the workers, the warehouse owner’s son included, were pushing some of the cases to the back of the warehouse and at night delivering them to small groceries out in the country and collecting the money for themselves.  

                                                       The warehouse ended up being shut down. 

 

                                   

We received several cases of pineapples every two weeks for a year as gratitude for bringing this to their attention.

 

 Mama used every recipe she could find so we could have pineapples at our meals.  We, meaning the children, were sick of pineapples after a few weeks.  Mama made everything she could think of using pineapples. She gave some to friends.  After a few months she had had it and eventually thought of a shelter downtown and donated our pineapples to the shelter that fed homeless.  Thank goodness.

Mama still spent her Saturdays driving to the country for about a year buying groceries, while daddy still, quietly, continued helping others in need.   We children continued our free-range roaming and life eased back into its tranquility.

At daddy’s funeral there were many people that told me what a blessing my daddy was because he had helped them when they needed it most. How thankful they were for his help. They praised him for his generosity.  I can only imagine how many others felt grateful who had no idea where their help had come from.  

Be kind to your neighbor.

 © Nippy Blair 2015. Posts and pictures on this blog cannot be copied, downloaded, printed, or used without the permission of the blog owner, Nippy Blair.