Lighthearted

Ok, In my last post I promised that in my next post I would take a break from the cynicism and do something lighthearted. So here goes. I once had an friend who was a genuine dust bowl Okie. Ivan was his name and I say was because he died several years ago. He was one of the happiest people I ever knew. He was quite a bit older than me but was full of life and I admired him because he treated everyone the same, with respect. He was half Cherokee Indian and said he was from the "lapland." I asked him where that was and he said, "that's where Oklahoma laps over into Arkansas."
When he came to California he picked fruit for a living. He told me this story about how one summer he ran into a friend from back home who asked him where he had been working? He replied, "over in San Jose," but he pronounced it like it read to him. His friend, who had been out west a few years before Ivan said, "no Ivan, out here the J is silent, use an H instead, otherwise the people won't know what your talking about. Ivan sincerely thanked his friend for that helpful bit of advice and wished him well. Ivan said the next time he ran into his friend it was winter. His friend was glad to see him again and said, " good to see you Ivan, it's been a while, when was that anyway?" Ivan replied, " oh that was back in the early summer, maybe hune or huly!"
Now Ivan didn't hear all that well and one of my favorite stories came up while he explained how he had lost his hearing as a child from an illness. He said it didn't bother him too much but it had been a little embarrassing at times. He said, one time back in Oklahoma when he was a kid, working in a service station, a beautiful woman drove up in a new Cadillac. He never saw her before and figured she was from a big city. She pulled up slowly and said to Ivan, "young man, do you have a rest room? The service station had just been equipped with compressed air and Ivan, hearing whisk broom instead of rest room, and wanting to impress her, grabbed the air hose and said, "no Mam, but if you pull it up a few feet I'll blow it out for ya!"