Anyway, this morning he came into the library. Peth and I immediately put our heads down so to look busy. He still came right up to the desk and looked over us to Theresa who was busy staring out the window.
"Hey, it's been a while" he said to her.
"Huh?"
He spoke up so Theresa could hear which had the ancilary effect of allowing his voice to be heard in the row homes across the street. He kept this volume for the duration of his visit to the desk.
"It's been a while" he yelled.
"Yep."
"How you been?"
"Oh, them kids been drivin' me up a wall. One in 4 and one is 2 and one is the brother. You look all dressed up."
"Yeah, I've just come from a viewing at the such and such church."
Peth shot me a look from below the desk where she was trying to hide. We were in for it.
"Oh, well they're at peace now" said Theresa.
"Yeah. But the church sure is nice. You been out there lately?"
"Where is it again?"
"On such and such hill in such and such township."
"Oh for heaven's sake, I don't get out there."
"Well they really built it up. I remember when I was growing up..." My eyeballs rolled up in my head and I started siezing.
six minutes later:
"... my dad was the Presbyterian minister in the town, of course that was before he died, and in the chruch there were probably only 5 families and almost everyone was related to each other. It was just like the Flynn family. Everyone named Flynn is related to everyone else named Flynn if you go back far enough.
"Anyways in our church there were the Buckleys, the Canters (of course we were always wondering about them. Mrs. Canter used to tell her kids your Christmas presents are everything you can steal. Can you imagine? And two of the Canter daughters were prostitutes and one of them got killed by a john and I think about everyone of them did drugs. Can you imagine?), the Shileys, the Bakers, and the Morgans.
"So Mrs. Shiley's oldest, I think his name was Bill, married a Baker, so they stayed in the church and Cameron Buckley married a Catholic girl named Sue, or maybe Cheryl, I can't remember and brought a whole bunch of Catholics into the church. Can you imagine? I'll tell you my father was none too happy about that, but he still prayed for them and ministered to them even though..."
twelve minutes later:
"... was back visiting my high school and they had big gaping holes where the water fountains used to be. It's gotten so bad that they took out the water fountains! Can you imagine?
"Of course back in those days, when someone was sent to the principle it was for rough housing or chewing gum. Now it's for assault on the teachers. My old English teacher, Mrs. Richardson, told me this was her last year it's gotten so bad. 'I thought your class was bad' she said to me 'but that's nothing compared to what we go through today.' Can you imagine? I mean I just can't understand what's happening with the kids now a days..."
seven minutes later:
"...moved onto my block and they used to have protective covenants that prevented minorities from buying those houses, so after the Civil Rights Act of 1965, those covenants were illegal and so we had them move in. They just poured into the area in record numbers and the people on my block were complaining, but I will tell you this, it's the white trash that were the problem. I used to tell them that I never had a problem from any of the new people that moved in, only the white trashy trash that already lived there. Can you imagine? They were bigots! And I told them so, I did. Can you imagine? This other time they came over and asked me..."
Peth had roled off her chain and was a little puddle under the desk. I was still siezing. Theresa was still encouraging him, asking him questions and "um-hum-ing" as he went along.
I thought I would die. But then it ended with a "Well, I better get my work done."
In other news, I adopted a couple of kitties that needed homes. I will not be taking them with me on the AIDS walk.
Posted at 12:42 p.m.
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