Homeward bound.....

There are people who say, “There ain’t no hereafter, when you’re dead, you’re dead.” And, y’know...they might be right. Then again, they might be wrong ‘n there’s a lot of people who believe in life after death ‘n all that it entails....the golden streets of paradise or the firey furnace....the yin ‘n the yang, so t’speak....People talk about the streets of Heaven being paved with gold but that’s only because gold is highly prized among the so-called civilized peoples of this world.....Me, I kind’a like the cindered ‘n graveled streets that I grew up with ‘n the few sidewalks were really just adjoining paths of packed earth, smooth ‘n cool on bare feet....Now, anybody that grew up in Beattyville ‘way back in the mid-twentieth century knows that it was many things but it sure wasn’t a heaven on earth....it was a working-class community with no bus service, very few telephones, ‘n partly because of the war, darn few automobiles gasoline being as scarce as it was at the time...men ‘n women walked to work ‘n walked home at the end of some awf’ly long days....it was a time of scarcity, scarce necessities ‘n even scarcer luxuries....hard times with a war in Europe ‘n in the Pacific....a time of paper ‘n tin can drives, of Victory gardens in ev’ry backyard, a time when people feared the delivery of a telegram ‘cause telegrams never, ever brought good news...hard times, anxious times for adults striving to put food on the table, to lay in a supply of coal to stay warm in the long winter....BUT for a kid to run barefoot all the long summer day, to wander the green hills or the riverbank,
that was Heaven...I think maybe youth is the Heaven that we all seek ‘n I think maybe death ain’t really death but just another transition to one more youth....
‘Course, you can believe whatever you want to believe, it’s your life ‘n your death ‘n you should make of it whatever you will....when my Dad got close to death, he asked me if he was dying...I told him he was ‘n he asked where he was going.....I told him that I expected that he was going to Heaven as he’d never done anything really bad to anyone....he smiled ‘n said he guessed he was going home.....
I have an old friend that’s going home soon...I hope he has a good trip......