The Ballad of John ...
John was born a farmers son
and learned to work the lands
in rural Oklahoma where
they made life with their hands.
He learned to tell a story well
and all who listened know
of model T's, depression days
and silent picture shows ...
of wagon trips and cotton crops
and playing country ball ...
of thunder storms and blackjack trees
and harvests in the fall ...
of one room schools and butter churns
and following a plow
behind a team of stubborn mules,
he still remembered how.
The oldest of eleven then
what could the schoolboy do
but read his book behind a plow
and pray his rows were true.
John married young as some men do
and raised a family
of seven children, seven strong,
with quiet dignity.
They moved to Colorado for,
he hoped, a better day.
To make a life without a crop ...
to live another way.
Then out to California
a blue pacific dawn.
The war was recent history,
the grapes of wrath were gone.
They cut some grapes and pulled a mile
of cotton down a row.
They chased some water, pulled a plow
and danced with mister hoe.
They moved their share of sprinkler lines
then moved them all again.
They moved the mighty cotton plant from
row to sack to gin.
John lost his love one dreary day
but kept his stubborn pride
and lived another forty years
though half his heart had died.
And other loves and other crops
and other rows to hoe ...
and other losses other moves
and other pain to know.
Alone at last, yet not alone,
Louisiana bound ...
in southern hospitality
a final home he found.
A restful town, a peaceful life,
tomato plants to tend.
With books to read and tales to tell,
a better way to end.
With honor and integrity,
with unrelenting pride ...
with dignity John lived his life...
with dignity he died.
... And Bailey
Two Neighbors boys at Heavens door
paused there to share a grin ...
then one stepped out to start a life
and one came home again.
~ Wayne D. Neighbors ~
There are a lot of stories buried in this about; John playing country baseball as a youth; about having to quit school after elementary school to help on the family farm; about carrying a favorite book everywhere he went, reading it over and over; buying his first car and learning to drive on the way home; about a trip in a horse drawn wagon that the family took when John was a young boy; about my Mother's death at a relatively young age and my Dad's attempts to deal with that for the rest of his long life; about the moves from Oklahoma to Colorado and on to California and the obvious (in my mind) parallel with the John Stienbeck book "The grapes of wrath" (he didn't like the book -- "makes the Okies look like they were stupid, we weren't stupid".
Bailey at six months old now as I write this, sits on his Dad's lap and seems to watch "Baseball Tonight" on ESPN ... like father, like son like grandfather, like great-grandfather etc. John was a life-long baseball fan... a favorite was, fellow Oklahoman Carl Hubbel. One of the last people Dad met was my son Michael's new wife, Nikki. She was carrying his great grandson (Bailey) at the time. Dad died just days before Bailey was born. I like to think they crossed paths at the threshold.
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