I remember I liked going to church to hear “Jesus stories.” Jesus sounded like a nice man. And I liked that he seemed to get children. Or he didn’t want to see them suffer. Something like that.
Our elderly neighbor dear Reverend Oakley was always kind and approving of us kids, especially after we came home from Sunday School. I figured he was probably a good friend of that Jesus guy, too. Nice men tend to hang out with nice men.
Rev. Oakley was a war veteran and had a wooden leg. He let us knock our little fists on it and showed us the lower part. Rev. Oakley must have been very brave when he was a soldier.
I remember I loved singing in Sunday School. A favorite was Jesus Loves Me.
So I didn’t quite get my mother’s reaction when one Sunday after church, my sister and I pitched into an enthusiastic rendition of Jesus Loves Me for Rev. Oakley’s exclusive entertainment.
‘Jesus loves me, This I know, ‘Cause Old Oakley told me so” … We went on, “Little ones to him belong, They are weak and he is strong, “YEESSSS, Jesus loves me. YEESSSS, Jesus loves me, YEESSSS, Jesus loves me and then sotto voce and reverentially, of course, “Old Oakley told me so.”
It may have been my Uncle Scott’s fault.
He was a lovely man with a dry wit and frequently took it upon himself to teach us nursery rhymes.
A favorite went like this:
“Spider, spider on the wall, Have you got no brains at all? Can’t you see that wall is plastered. Get off that wall you stupid …… spider.”
Mom would “tsk, tsk” and my father would growl faintly and disapprovingly under his breath. My sister and I could not have been more proud than when we are finally able – word for word – to recite the whole spider poem that Uncle Scott had taught us. Uncle Scott was the best.
I long for the days of innocent wordplay. They seem unlikely to come again. Back then, there seemed to be respect for words and their power. To inform, to entertain, to amuse, or to confound. They were still largely innocent. At least they were to us kids who took such delight. in learning and reciting them. Which is silly to say, of course, because we were the innocents. We weren’t old enough to realize words could be weapons.
Memorizing poems used to be a thing in school. My mother used to recite countless poems verbatim. Such were the mandatories of her education. The Highwayman. The Charge of the Light Brigade. Others whose names have now escaped my memory.
For fun as teenagers, a bunch of us would sit around the living room with Ogden Nash books and read one or more of his poems at a time. Each poem was more humorous and delightful than the next.
Sounds archaic, doesn’t it? Today teenagers sit together anywhere and converse via texts. Language has been stripped down to its’ barest of bare bones. Which is a kind of code for decimation.
Perhaps that is why I cleave to my tale-telling posts. To defend the honor of words. To protect them from oblivion. To gently reminisce about Old Reverend Oakley and dear Uncle Scott.
Thankfully in holding up words, I am not alone in this undertaking. What will the world ever do if all the writers are gone?
Expressive Compulsive 