4a7wf6akq's Journal

A typical weekend lunch, which we called dinner...
A typical weekend lunch, which we called dinner (the evening meal was supper), included ham or a roast, corn bread, spinach or collard greens, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, peas, green beans or lima beans, fruit pie, and endless quantities of iced tea we drank in large goblet-like glassesI felt more grown up drinking out of those big glassesOn special days we had homemade ice cream to go with the pieWhen I was there early enough, I got to help prepare the meal, shelling the beans or turning the crank on the ice-cream makerBefore, during, and after dinner there was constant talk: town gossip, family goings-on, and stories, lots of themAll my kinfolks could tell a story, making simple events, encounters, and mishaps involving ordinary people come alive with drama and laughter

Buddy was the best storytellerLike both of his sisters, he was very brightI often wondered what he and they would have made of their lives if they had been born into my generation or my daughtersBut there were men's omega watch lots of people like them back thenThe guy pumping your gas might have had an IQ as high as the guy taking your tonsils outThere are still people like the Grishams in America, many of them new immigrants, which is why I tried as President to open the doors of college to all comers

Though he had a very limited education, Buddy had a fine mind and a Phin human nature, born of a lifetime of keen observation and dealing with his own demons and those of his familyEarly in his marriage he had a drinking problemOne day he came home and told his wife he knew his drinking was hurting her and their family and he was never going to drink againAnd he never did, for more than fifty years

Well into his eighties, Buddy could tell amazing stories highlighting the personalities of dogs hed had five or six decades earlierHe remembered their names, their looks, their peculiar habits, how he came by them, the precise way they retrieved shot birdsLots of people would come by his house and sit on the porch c c purse for a visitAfter they left hed have a story about them or their kidssometimes funny, sometimes sad, usually sympathetic, always understanding

I learned a lot from the stories my uncle, aunts, and grandparents told me: that no one is perfect but most people are good; that people cant be judged only by their worst or weakest moments; that harsh judgments can make hypocrites of us all; that a lot of life is just showing up and hanging on; that laughter is often the best, and sometimes the only, response to painPerhaps most important, I learned that everyone has a storyof dreams and nightmares, hope and heartache, love and loss, courage and fear, sacrifice and selfishnessAll my life Ive been interested in other peoples storiesIve wanted to know them, understand them, feel themWhen I grew up and got into politics, I always felt the main point of my work was to give people a chance to have better stories

Uncle Buddys story was good until the endHe got lung cancer in 1974, had a lung prada logo removed, and still lived to be ninety-oneHe counseled me in my political career, and if Id followed his advice and repealed an unpopular car-tag increase, I probably wouldnt have lost my first gubernatorial reelection campaign in 1980He lived to see me elected President and got a big kick out of itAfter Ollie died, he kept active by going down to his daughter Falbas donut shop and regaling a whole new generation of kids with his stories and witty observations on the human conditionHe never lost his sense of humorHe was still driving at eighty-seven, when he took two lady friends, aged ninety-one and ninety-three, for drives separately once a weekWhen he told me about his dates, I asked, So you like these older women now? He snickered and said, Yeah, I doSeems like theyre a little more settled

In all our years together, I saw my uncle cry only onceOllie developed Alzheimers and had to be moved to a nursing homeFor several weeks afterward, she knew who she was for a few minutes a dayDuring gucci watches for women those lucid intervals, she would call Buddy and say, Oren, how could you leave me in this place after fifty-six years of marriage? Come get me right nowHe would dutifully drive over to see her, but by the time he got there, she would be lost again in the mists of the disease and didnt know him

It was during this period that I stopped by to see him late one afternoon, our last visit at the old houseI was hoping to cheer him upInstead, he made me laugh with bawdy jokes and droll comments on current eventsWhen darkness fell, I told him I had to go back home to Little RockHe followed me to the door, and as I was about to walk out, he grabbed my armI turned and saw tears in his eyes for the first and only time in almost fifty years of love and friendshipI said, This is really hard, isnt it? Ill never forget his replyHe smiled and said, Yeah, it is, but I signed on for the whole load, and most of it was pretty goodMy uncle Buddy taught me that everyone has a storyHe told his in that one necklace chanel sentence