Life, actually…
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Listen to Jim’s Red Clay Diary podcast: https://youtu.be/Rjs7gKIU36k
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or read his story…
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CAUGHT WHISTLING UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF LIFE
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Roy Rogers is standing horseless on the big white movie screen before me. I’m just a kid sitting in the darkened theatre, watching Roy’s every move.
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I munch my popcorn slowly, since I can only afford a small bag, since I must share it with brother Ronny, since there is only one watered-down cola drink between us.
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Roy-on-the-screen has just punched out a bad guy. Now he needs to rush to the defense of a far-off damsel in distress, but where is his pal Trigger? Roy wipes away the smudge on his cheek, grabs his white hat, and whistles loud and clear. From outside the screen, a beautiful palomino races to his side, barely slowing down as Roy hops astride. They gallop to the rescue to save the day.
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A whistle is all it took.
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Ronny and I sit through Roy’s movie a second time, impatiently tolerating the animated cartoon, endless previews of coming attractions, and episode six of an action-packed serial.
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I can’t wait till Roy whistles again, since I’ve never been able to whistle like that. My whistles are kind of under-the-breath affairs that don’t pierce the air. Whistles that never produce a golden horse with spangled saddle.
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Ronny and I step into blinding sunlight and head for the bus stop, knowing we have to be home by late afternoon. I whistle a tune much like the kind produced by Bing Crosby to accompany his songs. Ronny hums background music in imitation of the movie score.
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Bad guys and good guys alike are always backed up by dramatic music played, I suppose, by an orchestra just out of screen shot.
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Now it’s today, countless decades later, and I hear Roy’s whistle just out of screen shot. I am suddenly alert and turn to see a scaffold-high hard hatted workman signaling for the attention of his down-below assistant on a construction site.
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I start whistling under my breath in fond memory. As I enter the market, I whistle to accompany another man of a certain age who is whistling to himself in a nearby aisle.
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He and I and many other old-timers whistle so much we don’t even know it, much to the bemusement of shoppers and family.
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I remember my mother telling us kids that she heard my father long before she ever saw him. She would hear him whistling to himself in the neighborhood and wonder what he looked like. Apparently he passed muster and helped produce five children and a lifetime marriage with her.
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I became because of a whistle. Imagine that!
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When you hear an under-the-breath whistler whiling away the day, think kindly of me and my heroes: the workers, the shoppers, Roy Rogers, Tommy Reed, and all the other dudes who roam their imaginations while awaiting their golden stallions
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© 2022 A.D. by Jim Reed
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