It’s a funny thing but whether or not you believe in God, Heaven ‘n Hell, life in the hereafter or whatever, it still has a major effect on human behavior....

Changing Times....

The computer ‘n the internet are wondrous things...at least for those of us who have only the most basic understanding of ‘em...I wuz born in the age of steam...steamboats that plied the rivers, steamships that sailed the seven seas, steam engines that pulled the trains...’course, by the time that I arrived the steam age wuz ‘most over...

it got extended a little bit during the war years when most of the petroleum went into the war effort but after the war, the steamboats disappeared ‘n wuz replaced by diesel powered boats...the giant steam locomotives disappeared ‘n wuz replaced by sleek new diesel engines...’n the rockets that we’d heard about signalled the coming of the jet planes...’course, there never wuz any steam powered aeroplanes anyway...no matter, what it wuz, wuz times a-changing...

“The only thing constant is change.” That’s a truism ‘n there ain’t a lot of them...the times are forever changing ‘n that’s the only point I wuz making in this long-winded approach to what I started out to say....Thanks to the computer ‘n the Internet, I read my hometown paper ‘most every day...well, at least the obits anyway...kind’a hard to express the feeling that you get when you read the obits ‘n find a name out of your past...someone you knew...someone you were friends with in that long ago time...Paul Bradley wuz that name in the Portsmouth Times t’day...Paul wuz a high school friend...he ‘n his brother, Elbert...

Paul wuz the same age as me tho’ he wuz a year behind me in school ‘n Elbert wuz his younger brother...Paul wuz dark ‘n Elbert was durn near blond enuff that he wuz almost an albino...both of ‘em married their high school sweethearts ‘n both marriages ended in divorce tho’ it’s a given that when you’re young, it’s impossible to see that rocky road that lies ahead of all of us...I didn’t see much or even hear much of Paul ‘n Elbert over the years...I went back home in the late ‘80s ‘n run into Paul at Druthers Restaurant in South Shore...we didn’t know each other but since I wuz there with someone that Paul saw on a regular basis, he came ‘n sat down with us ‘n we re-introduced ourselves...I hadn’t been in South Shore in over 20 years at the time ‘n Paul asked me where I’d been...”California” I replied. “Well,” he said, “I knew I hadn’t seen you around for awhile.”

Well, I remember Paul ‘n Ruthie ‘n Elbert ‘n Berniece ‘n in my mem’ries, they’re still young ‘n happy...kind’a funny how memory does that to a body.

“Gaily I lived as ease ‘n nature taught,

And spent my little life without a tho’t,

And am amazed that Death, that tyrant grim,

Should think of me, who never tho’t of him.” Rene Francois Regnier