- For those of you assailed by doom-and-gloom, cynicism,
and working too hard to stop and sniff the roses, here is a true recollection
of magical proportion.
-
- For reasons unknown, I harbor a perplexing fondness for
days-gone-by and oldsters, and it is this mysterious affinity which has
often revealed insights to the human condition.
-
- Fifty miles from here, and 39-years as the crow of my
memory flies, Percy Wartman watched houses, families, and kids spring from
the land he'd farmed for years. Bibbed overalls hung from his tall, slender
frame and plummeted into archaic rubber boots checked and cracked with
age. Handkerchiefs sprouted from tattered denim pockets ready for service
to wipe an always sniffly nose or a chin occasionally moistened with chewing
tobacco. Crowning his country ensemble was a bedraggled engineer's cap
which shaded rosy cheeks suspended below droopy, Basset hound eyes.
-
- Percy radiated an unassuming, kind, and magical aura
. . . you could witness it during his daily one-mile stroll to the drugstore
for mail. While ambling along his roadside path squirrels and chipmunks
appeared from nowhere to greet him. Cats with tails in straight salute
would sidle up to his boots and then saunter along for a time; within weeks,
kids joined his enchanted entourage to talk about nothing and everything.
-
- I can still remember his old, frayed-around-the-edges
farmhouse. It resembled a cross between homesteader Gothic and the Munsters.
Nestled behind century-old trees the rambling two-story manse seemed a
little forbidding after dark . . . during the day it resembled a Rockwell
rendering on the Saturday Evening Post. It was as though it had been there
forever.
-
- In 1965, and at eighty-years of age, Percy was no longer
driving, but then again he didn't have to . . . people would drop by to
see if the oldster needed anything from town or if he'd like to take a
drive - it's what folks did back then. On the rare occasions he accepted
a ride his chauffeurs were treated to a round-trip chat about the way things
used to be, how he'd worked the land and planted the fields.
-
- Percy could often be found standing by his fence conversing
with parents and kids who harbored a fond fascination for the old man.
He was a thread which tied adults to their not-so-distant past. To kids
he was an ancient oracle.
-
- He possessed an uncanny ability to accurately predict
the weather, often saying a caterpillar or a bird or butterfly told him.
When it was hot and sticky he'd say it was 'close' and when a train whistle
blew in the distance, he'd listen intently and then precisely predict tomorrow's
weather. Today's meteorologists could use his arcane ability.
-
- No one knew what was inside the drive-shed beside the
old homestead, but Percy visited it daily. This caused a great deal of
odd conjecture between adults and kids alike. Stories rife with speculation
proffered many estimates of what dwelled within. From the macabre (kids
thinking he'd buried his wife there) to the peculiar (he counted his money)
there was no end to curious deliberation.
-
- Perhaps Percy had heard a ghoulish rumor whispered by
a child or maybe he was bedeviled by probing questions innocently asked
by their parents, but one fall evening Percy decided to open the old shed
for all to see. Like wide-eyed children filled with wonder, everyone followed
the old man to the shed. They stood in silent anticipation outside the
big door while Percy unlocked a side-door and slipped inside. A switch
was thrown causing yellow light to seep between the boards of the heavy
door. A latch was lifted and a bolt drawn . . . the large door swung slowly
open.
-
- A collective gasp was heard that extraordinary fall evening,
and despite the years that have passed I still marvel at the wonder of
it all. I'll not assail the reader's imagination by telling you what we
played witness to, but I will instead leave you an indirect hint held in
a few lines of verse taken from the song, 'One Tin Soldier'.
-
- "Listen children, to a story that was written long
ago 'bout a kingdom on a mountain and the valley-folk below . . . On the
mountain was a treasure buried deep beneath the stone, and the valley-people
swore they'd have it for their very own . . . So, the people of the valley
sent a message up the hill, asking for the buried treasure, tons of gold
for which they'd kill . . . Came an answer from the kingdom, 'With our
brothers we will share, all the secrets of our mountain, all the riches
buried there.'"
-
- Of course, the treasure in One Tin Soldier was a message
of hope buried beneath a stone: "Peace on Earth.' For those of you
who've ever wondered who/what/if you are, you know the things seen that
night. To those who've not yet discovered the true treasures in life, I
can only offer, "Listen children, to a story that was written long
ago . . ."
-
- And now . . . for the rest of the story.
-
- After the previous column, in which I aroused the reader's
imagination as to the contents of that old drive-shed, I had a single question
put to me several times: "What was in that shed?"
-
- That sole question gave rise to numerous insights, not
the least of which is the fact that many people are reading the paper.
Another insight suggested the hint I'd provided regarding those contents
may have been too loosely associated with the body of the story.
-
- According to Webster's, treasure can hold a couple meanings.
"Treasure n. and riches hoarded up; a person or thing much valued.
* vt to hoard up; to prize greatly."
-
- I will ask you, so the end of this piece will hold proper
impact, to consider treasure as something not of the physical realm but
of the heart.
-
- We've all heard the axiom of one man's junk being another
man's treasure. This postulation actually points to a difference in perception
and it is with this understanding I will reveal what laid within that old
drive-shed 50 miles from here, 39-years ago, in a nondescript neighborhood
from long, long ago.
-
- The darkness was split by soft yellow light seeping between
the weathered boards of the drive-shed doors. Inside, the old farmer caused
the streams of yellow light to momentarily blink as those outside traced
the route of his silhouette to the door's locks. A bolt was drawn, a latch
lifted . . . the old doors swung slowly open.
-
- A collective gasp was heard that extraordinary fall evening,
and despite the years that have passed, I still marvel at the wonder of
it all.
-
- "Step in folks," was Percy's warm invitation,
"and look around." The group moved slowly forward, each transfixed
by an article which had seized their particular attention. The writer within
compels me to describe the contents as volumes of pages from Percy's life-book
. . . the child in me recalls it as "neat stuff."
-
- Off to the right, was a 2-cylinder John Deere tractor
restored to pristine condition. Along the walls were pictures, teams of
horses - every team he'd ever owned. Their tack was there too, worked daily
with saddle soap. Soft and subtle, it was as though it was new, strong
as the day it was purchased - the buckles you could see your face in.
-
- Oh, he had toys too - two Radio Flyers that I personally
touched, in prefect shape. Lamps and lanterns adorned the walls... a Tiffany
Lamp hung from the ceiling boards over the tractor - again, in perfect
shape. Stored in wooden boxes were the dishes his wife and he received
their wedding day. Silverware bought when "they were doing well,"
sat polished in red, velvet slots within a decoratively carved walnut case.
Boxes of 78 records lined the bottom shelf of one bench perfectly stored
in original covers. Old radios, phonographs, papers, magazines, several
Coke machines, old porcelain-covered signs, war posters, and on and on
. . . there was nothing from his life which had not been cleaned, polished,
and stored in the old drive-shed. An ancient one-frog plow sat perfectly
preserved ready for use - the type the farmer would walk behind as the
horse plodded along.
-
- Percy invited everyone to handle the objects, "
. . . use them, they all work." Then there were rows and rows of tin
soldiers, in their boxes - not a scratch. I could type for hours telling
you what was there, in fact, it is easier to list the things that were
not there - no cynicism, dishonesty or indifference. Several misty-eyed
fathers took their sons by the hand to toys they'd had as children, told
them a bit about them, their adventures, their youth, and "the olden
days."
-
- Then there were the rows of dolls his wife had kept,
Raggedy Anns, and hand-painted porcelain-faced princesses. I recall being
puzzled by the sight of grown mothers wiping tears from their eyes, others
softly sobbed as they gently twisted from side to side while hugging them.
Alas, I have now come to understand they were hugging memories of fathers
who'd worked extra hours to insure their baby daughters had one, the mothers
who made one, the days they received one - their youth.
-
- There is magic in this world, I witnessed it that night.
It's the reason I write many of the stories I do
- . . . so that folks may remember, if only for a moment,
the wonder of it all.
-
- _____
-
- For more of Lea's wonderful essays...
- http://rense.com/Datapages/lea.html
|
