A Story Worth Telling

Remembering the Hunt County haunted house

“Bells started ringin’ and chains rattled loud,
I knew I’d moved in a haunted house.”
— ‘Haunted House’ song lyrics, recorded by Jumping Gene Simmons 1964.

– – – – – – –

The old house was charming, even in stages of ruin. A once elegant two-story dwelling in decline. Paint gone so long that it was impossible to tell what color it might have been. Probably white. Nearly all houses were painted white the last time this one enjoyed any.

Weathered gray boards hung from the eaves. Some by a nail and a miracle. Broken windows allowed remnants of curtains to wave in the wind. Birds freely flew in and out.

A front porch larger than whole homes today once spanned the front. But it had fallen in, leaving the front door chest-high to most wanting to venture inside. Still, it was easy to envision a time when it was a gathering place. Evenings in rocking chairs. Talking about the spring garden or the neighbor’s cows across the road. Listening to doves cooing. And singing “Blessed Assurance” together. Like my grandparents did. Before television.

What was left of someone’s country home sat off an oiled county road amid knee-high grass and weeds. For a quarter mile in either direction in rural Hunt County, Texas, a few miles outside of Commerce, no other house or any sign of life existed.

I was in the house twice: once for educational endeavors and once during a temporary lapse of good judgment.

The first was a class assignment. I was doing time at East Texas State University at the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s. Left there with a degree in psychology and art. Graduated short of Magna Cum Laude, closer to “Laudie How Come.”

Today, the school goes by the name of Texas A&M at Commerce.

Visiting the derelict dwelling one spring afternoon was part of learning oil painting techniques in Professor Karl Umluaf’s class.

Yes, the same Karl Umlauf, whose work today is found in more than 40 museums and public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Modern Museum of Art in New York City, and the Dallas Museum of Art.

His assignment was for young minds to find inspiration in the old house worthy of capturing on canvas.

Many set up easels around the outside and began capturing the structure’s aging essence in oils. I found my muse inside, looking through massive windows from huge rooms with 12-foot ceilings.

Applying paint to canvas, I daydreamed of what life through the long-gone glass looked like over the decades. My completed masterpiece resembled an East Texas rural setting. Trees, fences, flowers, and crumbling front porch columns. All framed by the window openings from where I stood.

Done and headed back to campus, I had no way of knowing the old house, and I was not through making memories.

I am trying to remember how that next meeting developed. It’s miraculous how the brain protects us, deleting total recall of youth’s stupidity.

What I do recall is winding up in a carload of guys one night with nothing better to do than “check out this old, haunted house.” Other cohorts from my hometown of Mount Pleasant matriculating at ETSU may or may not have been involved. I’m not saying until I’ve confirmed the statute of limitations.

When headlights hit the old house, I thought, “I’ve been here before.” It differed from daylight, looking like an old house in decline. In the dark, it looked like something straight out of a midnight movie horror flick at the Martin Theater in downtown Mount Pleasant.

Then some idiot said, “Let’s have some fun.”

An hour later, we were back, leading a carload of unsuspecting victims. All corralled at the Sonic back in town, they were dared to check out a haunted house. “Unless you’re chicken!”

Two refused to get out of the car on the spot. “Y’all go ahead, we’re good.”

After climbing to reach the front door from what used to be the porch, we stood in the two-story foyer, illuminated only by moonlight.

This is as good a time as any to define, “Let’s have some fun.” Two “plants” remained at the house while we went to town looking for suckers.

The group moved slowly toward the staircase leading to a landing at the top that overlooked the foyer. About two steps up the creaking stairs, one of the planted “haints” shuffled out of an upstairs bedroom in the darkness, a flashlight under his chin. Moaning, “Who is in my house?” On that cue, the other co-conspirator echoed similar sounds from the downstairs hallway.

Unsuspecting victims made a mad rush for the front door. The leader left the building in full stride. Completely forgetting there was no front porch. And that the ground was five feet below the door. The rest was a scramble of bodies knocking down anyone blocking the path to preservation.

We watched as taillights disappeared in a cloud of dust, dimly illuminating shadows of those still trying to climb through car windows.

Surprisingly, everyone survived. Not surprisingly, however, some never spoke to us again.

Sadly, only memories remain of my oil painting. An unfortunate victim of improper storage in later years.

The old “haunted house” is also long gone, I’m sure. But memories remain of my good, bad, and … uh, otherwise episodes at the haunted house in Hunt County.

More than 50 years ago.

—Leon Aldridge

(Note: The old house pictured above is not the infamous Hunt County dwelling. It was almost gone the last time I saw it decades ago. And the oil painting it inspired met an untimely ending some years ago. The stock photo above is not an exact representation, but it offed a vibe close enough for story telling purposes.)

– – – – – – –

© Leon Aldridge and A Story Worth Telling 2024. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided full and clear credit is given to Leon Aldridge and ‘A Story Worth Telling’ with appropriate and specific directions to the original content.

Spontaneous selective memory loss

“My memory isn’t faulty; it just goes on vacation more often than I do.”
— I would tell you who said that. But I forget. Check back with me later.

– – – – – – –

“Tell us all about it,” was a friend’s general greeting as I walked in at church Sunday morning.

Pausing momentarily, trying to come up with a crafty comeback, I replied. “Well, I was planning on doing just that, but unfortunately, I won’t be able to today. I just forgot everything I had intended to say.”

Those within earshot laughed sympathetically. At least I took it as sympathetically. “It’s something that occurs more often that I would like to admit.”

“I know what you mean,” he shot back. I’m losing my short-term memory, but my long-term memory is getting better all the time. Sometimes, I can’t remember what I want to say at the moment, but give me a minute. Or two. Or a few hours. Sometimes, until next week. It will come back to me at some point.”

And just like that, what started as humorous banter became a serious discussion. About something so commonplace, most of us regard it as funny. Until it happens to us.

The late John Walker, a long-time friend and Center attorney, was the first to share the “long-term memory theory” with me some years ago. As John told it, he and some other Center adventure seekers who went to Colorado every summer to ride ATVs in the mountains, discovered it.

“It became a joke,” John said. “During the two days of traveling, we talked about a lot of things. But not one of us could complete a story before forgetting a name, a place, or a date. Where that good place to eat was located. Or the name of it.

“All of our stories were about ‘what’s his name’ or a ‘you know where I’m talking about.’

Then, later on down the road, an elusive piece of information would magically appear in someone’s mind whereupon they would throw it out, without hesitation. Before it disappeared again.

“The game became measuring the trip by the length of time it took to recall a lost memory,” John said. “We’d say, ‘That was a 60-minute memory,’ or a ‘two-hour memory.’”

“That’s funny,” I laughed.

And it was. Until that day. The day I was sharing a story about a long-gone Greenville restaurant that had good coffee. The one where Elvis ate.

“It was on the interstate at Greenville,” I said. “Back when I-30 came out of Dallas and ended at Sulphur Springs. My grandparents stopped there every time they made the trip from Pittsburg to Seymour, where we lived in West Texas. I was young, and the thing I remembered most about it was the plate that hung on the wall. It looked like one of those colorful Fiesta Ware plates. Someone had printed on the it, ‘Elvis ate here,’ and the date, ‘3-14-58.’

“Oh, what was the name of that place,” I hesitated, trying to wrap up my recollection of … that place I couldn’t remember the name of. “It was just like home cooking and the best pies of any cafe anywhere. We ate there every time we passed through Greenville.

“I was a young music fan about the time Elvis ate there,” I offered. Hoping the name would come to me in a vision. “And we always stopped because my grandfather liked the coffee. Plus, I got to see the “Elvis plate” in the cafe where Elvis ate.

The name of it was … oh, what was the name of that place?

“Even in the 60s when I was a student at nearby East Texas State University in Commerce, I drove over to Greenville,” I continued. Not just for a good cup of coffee but also for fried chicken steak. Or a piece of pie. And to see the plate where Elvis ate.

“Then, sometime after graduating, I passed through Greenville,” I tried to wrap up, certain the name was going to come back. But it was gone. The café and it the plate Elvis autographed.”

“What was the name of that place?” I conceded, “I’ll just have to look it up and let you know.”

About two weeks after forgetting to follow through on the research I vowed to do, it came to me. Out of the blue. Without any provocation whatsoever, it just appeared in my mind. Floyd’s.

I grabbed my phone and called my friend. “Floyd’s. It’s Floyds,” I said.

“What’s Floyd’s,” he said. “Who is Floyd and what is his?”

That cafe I was telling you about—in Greenville, where Elvis ate—was Floyd’s.”

“OK,” he said like he understood the meaning of my outburst.

“That was about a two-week memory,” I laughed.

“A what kind of memory,” he asked. “You feelin’ all right?”

“I’m fine,” I said. “And I’m not forgetful, I’m just spontaneously experiencing selective memory loss. But I remembered, It was Floyd’s. And I thought I better tell you about it.

“Before, this two-week recollection becomes an ancient memory.”

—Leon Aldridge

– – – – – – –

Deciding on which direction to go

On the road again,
goin’ places that I’ve never been,
Seein’ things that I may never see again,
And I can’t wait to get on the road again

—Song lyrics written and recorded by Willie Nelson

– – – – – –

I’m thinking about going in the opposite direction.

Geographically speaking, that is. This trip I’m thinking about could be made going two different directions. Center is only 17 miles from the Louisiana border, so going north for 127 miles would take me to Texarkana. And 134 miles of windshield time south would find me looking at the city limits of Beaumont.

Whichever way I venture from home, the initial leg of this proposed journey would be only 1/24, or roughly four percent, of the entire journey.

Traveling the perimeter of Texas.

An episode of Texas Country Reporter featuring three ladies who did that three years ago started me thinking. They spent nine days on the road, covering something like 3,100 miles of Texas roads less traveled. Avoiding all interstate highways.

Learning of their adventure sent me searching, looking under the seat in my car for that 1999 edition of the Cracker Barrell Road Atlas, Nationwide Store Listing, and R.V. Guide. And trying to decide whether I would follow their route traveling clockwise or take the opposite direction and circumvent the state on a counterclockwise heading.

Regardless of any direction, such an endeavor didn’t cross my mind until last week when, ironically, friends in two different parts of Texas sent me a link to the Texas Country Reporter blurb. One of them adding, “This sounds like something you and Oscar would have done.”

Oscar Elliott and I met at Mount Pleasant’s South Ward Elementary School in 1959. At the bicycle rack during lunch. It was my first week as a fifth-grade student in N.A. Mattingly’s home room class, recently transplanted there from way out west at Seymour.

“Haven’t seen you before,” Oscar said. “You new here?”

“Yes,” I replied. “I live on Redbud Street.” We mounted bikes and headed home for lunch in the same direction. When I dropped off at my house, he waved and continued to his house on Stella Street.

That two-minute two-wheeler trip began a 57-year friendship that would include many two-wheel rides. Before Oscar’s earthly journey ended a few years ago, we logged motorcycle miles on summer trips to sunny Florida. When Panama City Beach was known as the Red Neck Riviera. When budget bike riders stayed at high-class joints like the Barney Gray Motel.

We went to wintery Colorado, waking up in legendary burgs like Leadville to find bikes covered in overnight snow. And crossing 11,000-foot mountain passes. In the snow. We made short scenic trips through Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. Saturday trips that were often well underway 15 minutes after a “What ‘cha doin’ today” phone call about coffee time a.m.

All on motorcycles.

But traveling the circumference of Texas never crossed our minds.

Which might seem odd because road trips, most with little notice, are always on my mind. My mother’s family gene pool has a basic unit of heredity that just can’t sit still. With five minutes’ notice, anyone of us is good for a trip across Texas.

Like a few weekends ago when Abilene cousin Derf called. “What are you doing this weekend?” he asked. Everyone calls him Derf; that’s Fred spelled backward, but that’s another story. Said his wife was planning a girl’s weekend with the daughters, and he needed to get away.

“Nothing,” I replied. “Come on.”

So, he drove five and a half hours—one way—to spend the weekend in Center helping me with my kitchen remodel. Then drove five and a half hours back home. That’s our family. We’re like that, and I love every one of us.

Will I make a trip around Texas? First, I’ve got to decide in which direction to start.

Border-to-border, the longest distance across the Lone Star State is 801 miles from north to south. Going east to west, it’s 773 miles. While we’re elaborating on geographical data, real estate contained within the 4,137-mile perimeter of the state totals 267,339 square miles. That’s 7.4 percent of the nation’s total area.

Less important is deciding how long it will take. After mapping it with the tattered but trusty road atlas, I’m somewhat certain my trip could take longer than the ladies on Texas Country Reporter. Depending on which way I turn at El Indio near the border or whether I try to include the Big Bend area by hanging a left at Marfa for a couple days’ diversion.

Maybe I will do it. Just because there are some things people should do when they reach my age. The trip likely won’t happen on a motorcycle, however. Just because there are some things a person should not do when they reach my age.

One thing for sure, the trip will be dedicated to Oscar’s memory.

Because it’s one direction we never thought about going.

—Leon Aldridge

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Aldridge columns are published in these newspapers and magazines: The Center Light and Champion, the Mount Pleasant Tribune, the Rosenberg Fort Bend Herald, the Taylor Press, the Alpine Avalanche, The Fort Stockton Pioneer, The Monitor in Naples, and Motor Sports Magazine.

Don’t step on my blue suede shoes

“Well, it’s one for the money, two for the show,
Three to get ready now go, cat, go
But don’t you, step on my blue suede shoes.”
— Rock and roll standard written and recorded by Carl Perkins in 1955. It was a hit song for Perkins in 1955 and for Elvis Presley in 1956.

– – – – – – –

I never noticed how many songs have been written about them until I wrote last week’s column. Shoes, that is.

“Old ladies’ shoes,” someone remarked on my column last week. “What’s that?”

“You’ve seen ’em,” I said. “Shoes that, let’s call them mature, women wore when I was a kid. Black. Lace up. Stocky heels. Back when, to a youngster, an older woman was one that had graduated from high school.

It was a memory on the fly. Popped into my mind as I was writing about two “mature” women visiting, one of them my grandmother. Back when shoes were real.

I like nice looking shoes. Leather shoes that are comfortable and last longer than temporary government programs.

Shoes like I wore to school. When tennis shoes were all high-top black-and-white lace up Keds or P.F. Flyers. Because other than cowboy boots, that’s all there was. High-top tennis shoes and real leather shoes.

Shoes that Mom made sure I polished every Saturday night, for Sunday morning church service. Shoes that were sold in shoe stores where clerks measured the customer’s foot to ensure the correct size. Then double checked by gently pressing the shoe to see where the toes were. Shoes that could be purchased in all sizes and all widths.

Shoes worn until the heels were run down and the soles were more holy than righteous. Well-worn shoes that weren’t thrown away but taken to the local shoe repair shop. Where the smell of leather lingered. Where the proprietor wore a canvas apron and used industrial strength sewing machines to bring shoes back to life. Repaired, polished, and returned to the customer shined to a gloss that dazzled in the sunlight.

I remember buying my first pair of leather loafers at Beall’s Department Store in downtown Mount Pleasant. Working after school during my sophomore year. Virgil Tolbert was the manager, Gerald Birdwell the assistant manager, and classmate Janice White’s mother was a salesclerk. Where Saturdays, I wore a sport coat and tie, and sold men’s clothing and shoes. Wearing frehly polished cordovan Bass Weejun loafers for which I had paid $4.95 out of my average $20 weekly earnings.

Then, in the early 1980s, the tennis shoe craze catapulted sportswear smack dab in the mainstream of “acceptable anywhere” dress. Overnight, everyone was wearing tennis shoes—with everything. In all colors and styles. For all occasions. Everywhere.

That’s when a friend noted that she thought it might be an excellent time to buy stock in one of the trendy tennis shoe brands. I sure hope she did. It was probably a good idea. She’s probably rich today. And probably owns lots of shoes.

– – – – – – –

Well, she walked in the shoe store, picked out a shoe,
She tried on a twelve, but that wouldn’t do.
Betty Lou got a new pair of shoes,
Betty Lou bought a new pair of shoes.
— Song lyrics by Bobby Freeman.

– – – – – – –

I watched shoe styles change again with my children in the 1990s. Daughter Robin was a teenager. “I like those,” she proclaimed, pointing to a store window in the San Antonio mall.

“Those combat boots,” I asked? Still wearing cordovan Bass Weejun loafers. For which I paid a lot more than $4.95.

“They’re Doc Martin’s, Dad,” she said. With an “Ugh.”

Those shoes would be the first of several pairs of combat boots … I mean shoes … that Robin would own and wear with jeans, shorts, dresses, formal wear—everything. Everywhere.

I always wondered if my tennis show friend invested in combat boots.

Regardless of the show style, I’m told my focus on footwear formulated at an early age. Mom delighted in talking about it. Told it far and wide. How the first thing I inspected was someone’s shoes. And it was a “no go” if I didn’t like them.

“We hired a babysitter one time when we lived in Ballinger,” Mom told every year at family reuninons. About a hundred times, “You looked at her shoes and started crying. Only after the poor woman removed her shoes and hid them in a closet would you consent to being in the same room with her.”

Even after Mom started losing her memory, she still managed to remember that story. Bless her heart.

– – – – – – –

“And someone else will fill the shoes that I once wore,
Cause them shoes, don’t fit me anymore.
— Written by Hank Cochran and Velma Smith, recorded by Patsy Cline.

– – – – – – –

When I closed the door on the “every year, whether needed or not,” spring closet cleaning ritual recently, 35 pair of shoes remained. Yeah, it scared me, too. Mostly dress and casual shoes, most of them leather. Seven pairs of cowboy boots, all leather. One pair of Bass Weejuns that cost more than I paid for my first car. One pair of tennis shoes, just for the gym.

And … from Lansky Brothers Men’s Shop in Memphis. Where Elvis shopped. The store that still markets themselves as “Clothier to the King.”

One pair of genuine blue suede shoes.

—Leon Aldridge

(Photo taken by the author in May of 2021 during the renovation of a downtown Center, Texas building that was for many years an attorney’s office. Obviously at some point before “legal” was the office buzzword, “leather” was. Removing the facade revealed signage advertising “Shoes 2 pair $5. Even thought they were real leather, it’s a safe bet they weren’t Bass Weejuns.)

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Aldridge columns are published in these newspapers and magazines: The Center Light and Champion, the Mount Pleasant Tribune, the Rosenberg Fort Bend Herald, the Taylor Press, the Alpine Avalanche, The Fort Stockton Pioneer, The Monitor in Naples, and Motor Sports Magazine. © Leon Aldridge and A Story Worth Telling 2024. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided full and clear credit is given to Leon Aldridge and ‘A Story Worth Telling’ with appropriate and specific directions to the original content.

I still don’t like needles

“But the mere sight of a needle makes me pass out, I can’t even knit!”
— Mrs. Betty Slocombe’s character in the 1977 film “Have You Been Served.”

– – – – – –

“On a scale of one to ten …,” the nurse began.

“Pain? About a one or two,” I responded. “On the stupid scale, about an 87.”

“Accidents happen,” she said politely.

I nodded. Maintaining a death grip on the kitchen towel hastily wrapped around my finger as I headed for the ER. After my unfortunate Saturday afternoon encounter with a power saw.

“Pressure on the wound.” Distant voices from Boy Scout first aid training. Sometime during Dwight Eisenhower’s second term.

The exam room was silent, save some medical sounds like those heard on TV doctor shows. A blood pressure cuff tightening and releasing. Beep, beep, beep beside the bed. Assurance that I still had a heartbeat. The nurse methodically placing various medical apparatus on the tray beside me. Enough tools for a major organ transplant.

“I don’t think it’s that bad,” I offered. “I’m just here as a precaution, you know.”

“The doctor will see you in just a few minutes,” she said. Politely.

I nodded again. Alone for a few minutes with silence to savor, questions crossed my mind. Things like “when was the last time I had stitches in an emergency room?”

My racing mind was quick to respond. “It was that warm summer afternoon at your grandparent’s home in Pittsburg,” it whispered. “Before you entered first grade.”

Summer days spent with my father’s parents in Northeast Texas as a child were good times. Great memories.

Granny lived in Pittsburg in the same house from 1930 until she died in 1993. That likely had something to do with why she had lots of friends.

Mrs. Martin was one of those friends. She lived on a street somewhere south of the old downtown depot. Over toward what I remember everyone calling the box factory.

Granny and Mrs. Martin enjoyed coffee together. On that afternoon that came to mind, Mrs. Martin’s grandson was visiting. Lucky for me. I was rescued from listening to their coffee chatter. Not having to sit quietly in a house adorned with ornate little knickknacks on every table. Each one arranged on crocheted white doilies. And not having to look at Mrs. Martin’s shoes. Black lace-up shoes with thick high heels. What I called “old ladies” shoes.

“You two be careful,” the grandmothers harmonized. And we dashed out the door.

As I recall the rest of the day, my newfound friend was the good guy for a game of cops and robbers. I was the bad guy. Fair enough. We were on his turf.

Roles established; play time was on. In the 1950s, kid-type make-believe. Shooting at each other with trusty pistols that were always with us. Three fingers rolled into the palm, the thumb stuck up for the hammer, and the index finger pointed to resemble the gun barrel. Shots mimicked with lots of loud “pows” and “p-pings.”

I hid beside a car in the driveway, confident I had found temporary cover from make believe flying bullets. That’s about the time law and order got the drop on me. Literally.

From out of nowhere, something landed on the back of my head. I was hit. The renegade outlaw was down. Crying his eyes out. Blood everywhere.

Grandmas to the rescue. Granny took me to Pittsburg’s M&S Hospital on Quitman Street. The old white 1940s structure with hospital rooms on one side and doctors’ offices on the other.

“Let’s have a look at that,” said Dr. Reitz.

Percy Reitz was a World War II veteran physician who often saw me during summers spent in Camp County. Our relationship began in 1948 when he delivered me into the world on a cold January night. That same M&S Hospital. Snow was falling, so I was told.

He had a deep, husky voice. Primarily professional. Not much chit-chat. Medical treatment often delivered while smoking a cigarette. An ashtray sitting among the medical paraphernalia. It was the early 50s. Everybody smoked. Everywhere.

“Hold him tight, Mizz Aldridge,” he said. “I need to stitch him up, and he doesn’t like needles.”

Dr. Reitz knew me. This was not our first rodeo.

Granny got my attention with promises of an ice cream cone from Lockett’s Drug Store and a trip to the toy store down by the post office. Just as I let my guard down, she embraced me in a bear hug that would have rendered even Walker Texas Ranger immobile.

I was snapped back to the ER at Center, Texas and to 2024, when The ER doctor came in. Whisked away from memories of the last time and the only other time I’ve required emergency room stitches.

“That’s gonna need a few stitches,” he said, assessing the self-inflicted wound. “But your finger is otherwise OK. No major damage. Luckily.”

“Just some stitches on my left gun barrel, huh,” I chuckled.

“What’s that,” the doctor asked?

“Aw, just on old memory,” I said, rubbing the scar on the back of my head. With my good hand.

“Just don’t hurt me, Doc. Granny’s not here to hold me. And I still don’t like needles.”

—Leon Aldridge

– – – – – – –

The passing of neighborhood stores

“The more things change, the more they stay the same.”

— Well-used term, credited to French critic Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr (1808 – 1890)

– – – – – – – –

Taking stock of what has silently disappeared over time, I thought about neighborhood grocery stores last week. How they’ve all but disappeared from the American way of life.

“Run over to Raney’s,” Mom often directed me with a list of two or three things. “I need this to have supper ready when your Daddy gets home at five.”

And in a flash, I was peddling my bicycle through the neighborhoods. From our house on Redbud Lane to Raney’s Grocery Store. A few blocks away on South Jefferson.

“Hello, Leon,” Mr. Raney said from his stool, where he often sat at the cash register just inside the door. “Your mother needing some things for supper?”

“Yes sir,” I said, placing the items on the counter.

“Charge ‘it today,” he asked, reaching for the account book with Aldridge hand-written on the cover.

“Yes sir … please.”

Everything placed carefully in my bicycle basket, I was soon headed home. And I aimed to make it back without a torn bread wrapper or a leaking milk carton.

Mom never had eggs on her list for me, with good reason.

The white frame building bearing the “Raney’s Grocery sign sat at the top of the hill on South Jefferson, at Holland Street. Today, a modern convenience store sits in the exact location. A far cry from the once commonplace neighborhood grocery store.

Raney’s had gas pumps, unlike many neighborhood groceries of the day. In fact, it resembled a gas station where a grocery store was added after the fact. Even had a door separating the two.

Following the years of bicycle trips to Raney’s, I left and went off to college. Followed with a headfirst dive into the working world. During a visit home, I noticed Raney’s was gone one day. Replaced by a new business in a new building.

I don’t recall if he was the first to follow Raney’s, but the newer proprietor I remember the most was Robert Dunavant. Because he followed the same “greet the customer by name” business model practiced by his predecessors.

Fast forward a few more years into the age of computers. The day a message from long-time friend and one-time business partner Albert Thompson hit my inbox. “An old associate and friend from Mount Pleasant passed away this week in Ripley, Mississippi,” it read. “Robert Dunavant.”

Albert related how Robert came to Ripley from Mount Pleasant in the 80s to purchase his, and the community’s, first McDonalds restaurant. “Robert was one good person, as hard of a worker as I ever shook hands with,” He concluded in his native Alabama, country boy terms.

“We ran a picture of him mowing the grass at McDonalds as he was wearing his necktie. In reading his obit,” Albert added, “I see he is going back to Pittsburg, Texas, for a graveside on Saturday.

“We always talked about Mt. Pleasant, as I knew you were from there,” Albert said. “Robert owned and sold a convenience store there, if I remember right. He always wanted a McDonalds. He had the opportunity to purchase other franchises but chose to be hands-on with the one. He worked until three weeks ago.

“Something tells me ya’ll likely passed ways one way or the other,” the message concluded. “A great guy.”

Robert Dunavant and I, in fact, did “pass ways” to borrow Albert’s axiom. Where our family and many others on the south side of Mount Pleasant frequented Raney’s neighborhood grocery store, they continued to stop at Dunavant’s.

Mount Pleasant had more than one neighborhood grocery, but growing up on the south side of town, Raney’s is the one I remember. Neighborhood groceries were just a few blocks away, and always had that quick loaf of bread or gallon of milk needed right at suppertime.

Also, the go-to place for a kid looking for a candy bar or cold drink on a summer afternoon. Or needing air in a bicycle tire.

For my grandparents in Pittsburg, it was Unger’s Grocery Store on Mount Pleasant Street. In Center, I’ve been told, it was places like Pete and Mattie Dellinger’s neighborhood grocery on Shelbyville Street.

Every community had them.

As South Jefferson grew from a sleepy two-lane street into a busy four-lane thoroughfare, I remember Robert as the friendly and outgoing guy Albert described as “hands-on” at the McDonald’s in Ripley. Always there and always the one behind the counter.

My father probably knew him better than I did. When coming home to visit, a trip to Dunavant’s for something with my father was a given.

“I need to run over to Dunavant’s,” Dad would say. “Want to go with me?”

“Sure,” I always said. Figured it was most likely for something Mom needed to get supper on the table.

Because, despite change as a constant in the world, even then, some things just never changed.

—Leon Aldridge

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© Leon Aldridge and A Story Worth Telling 2023. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided full and clear credit is given to Leon Aldridge and ‘A Story Worth Telling’ with appropriate and specific directions to the original content.

The good times we shared

“Only memories remain,
For a time, there by the sea.
There was only you and me.”
— Song lyrics by ‘My Morning Jacket’

– – – – – – –

Stumbling onto tidbits of history about an old friend last week was heartwarming.

Though she’s been gone for several years, learning things about her I never knew made me smile. Remembering the many good times we shared.

We first met sailing out of Miami. Late one October afternoon. About 1986. Or was it 1987? As we set a course for the Caribbean, the setting sun was disappearing into the ocean.

I had no clue of her storied history. And she had no premonition of what the future held for her in the years after we parted.

She was elegant and hospitable, something for which she is still remembered by those who knew her and have written about her. And I was savoring the moment, intoxicated by her luxurious charm. Attracted to her elegance and formality. Both attributes of society already fading faster than the setting sun.

I quickly fell in love. We would sail together more than once in the years that followed.

She was born in 1960, commissioned SS France at Saint-Nazaire, France. She sailed into service in early 1962 as the longest passenger ship ever built at 1,037 feet. A record she held until 2004 when RMS Queen Mary 2 set sail at 1,132 feet.

At about the same time, air travel entered the jet age eclipsing times for Atlantic crossings from New York to London. While Atlantic cruising was losing favor to increasingly popular Caribbean party excursions.

She was sold to Norwegian Cruise Lines in 1979 having logged 377 crossings, 93 cruises, and two around-the-world trips. She had carried 588,024 passengers on trans-Atlantic crossings, 113,862 passengers on cruises, and sailed 1,860,000 nautical miles.

NCL spent $18 million reconfiguring her for island cruising, changed her name to SS Norway, and made her the world’s largest and most luxurious cruise ship. The only Caribbean passage offering sophistication.

And that’s where our affair flourished.

Holdovers from her luxury liner days, lacking on other island cruises, were amenities like spacious rooms, a large library, artwork in public areas, a grand piano in the lounge, and reserved seating for dinner. Proper attire required, of course.

I still have my tux. Miraculously, it still fits.

In time, casual culture took over. Mundane mega ships dominated more stylish formal island cruising. The “Grande Dame” of the Caribbean was renamed SS Blue Lady and demoted to join run-of-the-mill bargain cruising.

When time began to catch up to her mechanically, she was slated for retirement. Norway sailed out of Manhattan for the last time in September 2001 on a transatlantic crossing to Scotland before going to her home port of Le Havre, France. Passengers heard about the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington while still at sea.

She was sold for scrap in 2005. By the end of 2008, only memories remained.

**The Norway’s salvaged bow on display in France.**

Her bow was cut and preserved; a ceremonial move done to most ships that end up in the Alang, India ship breaking yard. The same bow where I stood many nights at sea. Feeling the breeze. Listening to the churning water below. Where one night, I leaned over the railing, and my glasses slipped from my pocket, disappearing into the ocean depths below.

Her bow was exhibited in Paris but returned to her home port, part of an auction deal made before scrapping.

So many things I never knew about her when we had our flings. Nights spent in spacious upper deck rooms, unaware I was occupying quarters celebrities, film stars, and aristocratic cruisers enjoyed on her maiden voyage. Preparing for island snorkeling using her lower deck swimming pool. Oblivious that it was the first-class pool during her Trans-Atlantic days when tourist class cruisers gathered at the upper-level deck pool. Visiting with the ship’s entertainers in the first-class library, untouched from her early days.

Listening to lounge music played on a piano Elton John used while crossing the Atlantic aboard the France in 1974. When he wrote the music for the Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy album.

And never knowing she once carried the Mona Lisa from Le Havre to New York for an American tour.

She even amassed film credits in her day. The conclusion of 1973’s Serpico when the main character is sitting on the dock with the France behind him. Opening shots of Dog Day Afternoon while docked in New York. Kolchak: The Night Stalker episode “The Werewolf” as the cruise ship on which the story takes place. When Anne Murray, Richard Simmons, Eddie Rabbitt, and Luis Rodriguez performed while aboard the Norway In 1983 for a TV show called Caribbean Cruise. And in 1986 when the morning show ‘Today’ spent a week-long cruise on her.

Plus, a 2014 episode of The Simpsons with the Couch Gag featuring an animation with a picture of her plus the 2015 animated feature Minions as they left New York City.

True, there were other times I spent cruising after we drifted apart. But they pale in comparison to my first love.

And to memories of her, “… for a time, there by the sea.”

—Leon Aldridge

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(Historical data and photos: Wikipedia)

Aldridge columns are published in these newspapers and magazines: The Center Light and Champion, the Mount Pleasant Tribune, the Rosenberg Fort Bend Herald, the Taylor Press, the Alpine Avalanche, The Fort Stockton Pioneer, The Monitor in Naples, and Motor Sports Magazine.

I remember wanting him to make it stop

“Long as I remember,
The rain been comin’ down.”

— ‘Who’ll Stop the Rain’ song lyrics by John Fogerty.

– – – – – – –

The idea was to thread some thoughts together for this week’s column early last Sunday morning. Sunrise through the breakfast room window was cloudy. A welcome improvement from Saturday’s most-of-the-day deluge.

Dashing out the door for church a couple hours later, it was apparent things had changed. Dark skies were serving monsoon-sized showers blended with notes of hail.

“Looks like I’ll be late this morning,” I murmured. Dashing back inside to escape the weather.

Honestly, waiting for a reprieve in the weather just seemed like another chapter in the recent week’s string of plagues.

“No electricity one week, no gas the next,” said someone at the coffee confab one day last week. “Then an arctic freeze followed by early Spring weather and floods. What next!”

I broke the silence. “Locust.”

Blank stares.

“I reckon the only plague left is a hoard of locust.”

More blank stares.

“You know,” I struggled. “In the Bible. Never mind. I’ll simply settle for no tornadoes.”

I don’t like tornadoes. Not that anyone does. But I don’t even like “conditions favorable for tornados,” as the weather prophets often foretell.

Maybe it’s related to my childhood. I remember standing behind my father in a doorway of darkness framed by bursts of near-constant lightning flashes, popping power lines, and piercing sideways torrents of rain.

He and I braved the elements together at the top of the concrete steps, leaving the safety of the dank storm cellar below. Watching as the black funnel danced across the other side of the small West Texas town of Seymour. But ready to retreat if needed.

Just blocks away, utility poles were snapping like matchsticks. Debris bigger than refrigerators was swirling in the air. The twister was threatening a steel suspension bridge across the Salt Fork of the Brazos River.

Memories of watching the twister gyrate through the night, leaving what daylight would reveal as a path of destruction, have endured since the mid-1950s. I remember wanting my father to make it stop.

In my third-grade mind, my father was invincible. With him one step ahead of me, I was fearless. However, the image of the weather’s wild side illuminated by the storm that spawned it plays vividly in my mind every time one of nature’s most violent forms of wrath comes to life.

That was not the only night my parents spent racing through the rain and darkness. Kids in tow. Seeking shelter in the storm cellar.

The underground shelters were a way of life in West Texas.

They were also excellent places for storing canned vegetables or garden-fresh onions and potatoes in the summer. And cool places for kids to play. Literally.

Playing changed to praying during nights spent waiting out the weather. Trying to sleep on an army surplus cot. In an underground space the size of a closet. Illuminated by a kerosene lantern.

Scary at any age.

Storm-watching was not limited to my childhood. I observed a tornado that rumbled across the west side of Oklahoma City some 30 or more years ago. The good news is I was on the east side of the city. Ready at the drop of a tornado-tossed hat to hastily retreat, if needed.

News of twisters close to home always gets my attention. And you can define close as 100 miles. Give or take the power of the storm.

Without a West Texas-style storm cellar, I have no place to hide. But in my forty-plus years living in Center, the only tornado I recall blew through sometime in the mid-1980s. I didn’t see that one, but the weather bureau reported it as a tornado.

What I did witness was its fury.

Lacking was today’s on-the-spot reporting that “a tornado has been sighted in Podunk County, 2.375 miles away southeast of Toadhop, traveling north-northeast at 25.782 miles per hour, expected to be at the intersection of 78 and 281 in 14.34 minutes.” It was still obvious that something terrible was looming when the skies were dark at midday.

“You have a phone call,” Lois Cooper summoned me.

“We’re scared,” housekeeper and babysitter Mae said. “The plaster is coming off the wall in Robin’s room. When I got there, insulation and wall studs were punching through sheetrock. Braving wind and rain to investigate outside, I saw it. Tallest pine tree in my yard. One to have caused even mythical lumberjack Paul Bunyon to run and hide. Trunk measuring more than five feet in diameter, and the top fading into the clouds. It was working its way out of the ground with the wind whipping it against the house.

“Go,” I commanded, grabbing Mae and the children as I ran out the door.

The alleged tornado took out seven trees, damaged my house, and cleaned off my patio. Took metal tables and chairs, plus a plethora of potted plants, and deposited pieces down the street.

Other damage reports included the Rio Theatre sign, the elementary school roof two blocks away, and several houses.

“So, what was thing about those locusts,” my friend interrupted. Jerking me out of my recollections of storms past. Back to 2024.

“Oh, you know,” I said. The Biblical account of the plagues in the book of Exodus. Disasters inflicted on Egypt by God to convince the Pharaoh of his wrongdoings. The wind brought the locusts; they invaded Egypt … in great numbers. And they followed the hail and lightning storms. Worst in Egypt’s history.”

Blank stares.

“Never mind,” I said.

“Did I ever tell y’all that I still don’t like tornadoes? Especially since I don’t have my father to stand behind.

“I always thought he could make the rain and storms stop.”

—Leon Aldridge

– – – – – – –

There’s always that one who remembers

“Anything worth saying is worth repeating. It’s rare that we come across something worthwhile in life, and a single encounter is enough for it to stay with us.”
― Humble the Poet (Kanwer Singh), Canadian-born YouTube personality, poet, bestselling author, and former elementary school teacher.

– – – – – – – –

During my first decade or so of column writing, it was my profound opinion that one column, fanfare or failure, was a stand-alone work of art. Published, one and done. Filed for posterity.

But I’ve mellowed somewhat on that philosophy. Regular readers will have noticed that especially if you caught last week’s offering. What was a worthy piece based on reconnecting with an old friend a few years ago deserved another time around with an added chapter on his recent passing. And that’s what I did last week.

That wasn’t the first time. Over the years, I’ve dusted off other old columns, updated them, and ran them one more time when it was deserved. I came to appreciate with time that an old column is not necessarily finished just because it’s been written and read. Many can find new life and acquire new meaning for any one of several reasons.

It could be a new twist on an old thought because time changes everything. Or it might be new information that adds a new chapter where the original work left off. I’ve even learned it’s also all right to repeat one verbatim. Because what was once good is often still good after time has faded memories.

That works incredibly well for writers finding themselves in unexpected circumstances, high and dry, and on deadline. Serious situations like Illness. Family emergencies. Equipment malfunctions. Lack of coffee.

Crisis situations that are cause for fleecing the files in hopes of re-airing an oldie but goodie. With proper explanation and reference to its original appearance date, I’ve rerun old works word for word that were more popular the second time around.

In complete transparency, a portion of this piece was once published in the pages of the Boerne (Texas) Star newspaper. The early to mid-90s, as best as I can recall. In that first publishing, I compared longtime column writing to preachers who move from one congregation to another proclaiming the gospel. And how each new flock is an opportunity to introduce previously preached sermon texts to a whole new audience.

Works for newspaper column writers, too. Because it’s true that anything worth saying once is always worth repeating.

That topic came up not long ago in a discussion with preacher friend Tim Perkins. Well, it wasn’t columns or sermons, but my song leading. And how I fear repeating songs too frequently. So much so that I’ve built a searchable database of song services for the years I’ve served as song leader at Center Church of Christ.

“I can tell you what songs we sang on any given date,” I bragged. “Or I can give you a list of each song with all the dates that hymn was included in the order of worship.”

Tim, however, pondered whether people remembered precisely what songs they had sung on any given Sunday, more than a week or two removed. Excepting perhaps, one of their personal favorites.

“Well, I admit there are times I don’t even remember myself,” I said with a quick shoulder shrug. “So many songs in the hymnal, I guess any song we sing could quickly be forgotten after a week or two.”

“Yes,” Tim smiled, “but there is always that one.”

Tim began preaching as a teenager, often referring today to a time “… way back when I was just a boy preacher.” He comes from a long line of preachers, with his grandfather, father, sons, and other relatives serving in full and part-time ministry roles over the years.

Finishing his “always that one” story, Tim said. “Dad was the preacher at this small church over by Nacogdoches. After he left, I also preached there on an interim basis when they were looking for someone to fill the pulpit full-time. Then, when my son Matt was attending school at SFA, he preached there a few Sunday mornings to help out.

“As people were filing out after the service concluded one Sunday when Matt had preached,” Tim continued, “this little lady placed her hand on his shoulder and said, ‘I really did enjoy your sermon this morning.”

“Matt thanked her.

“Then she added, ‘I also enjoyed it when your grandfather preached it, and I enjoyed it when your father preached it.'”

Because it’s really true that anything worth saying once is always worth repeating. Even if just for that one person who remembers.

—Leon Aldridge

– – – – – – –

Moments live forever in memories

“We do not remember days, we remember moments.”
—Cesare Pavese, Italian novelist, poet, short story writer, and essayist.

– – – – – – –

Friendships endure, I’m convinced, because of memorable moments. Life often puts time and distance between us, but unforgettable experiences live forever in memories that surpass physical boundaries.

Another friend with whom I shared many memories reached the end of his journey on Earth last week. It’s part of this age in life, so I am told. But it sure seems like it happens way too often these days. For any age.

Weldon Campbell and I forged a friendship 50 years ago in Mount Pleasant, Texas. Life lured me in different directions out of Titus County, but Weldon remained to live out his life there.

Memories were many for the seemingly short time before I left. Things like our friendship that started as teaching colleagues at Frances Corprew School. Impromptu “just for fun” basketball games with a bunch of guys after work at the P.E. Wallace gym. A camping trip or two with our wives. Weldon’s business partnership with friend of the family, Monroe Wright. A marine business located near the intersection of Ferguson Road and the “Monticello highway,” as we called it then.

In fact, it was one recollection that started with a boat about which we laughed the most a couple or three years ago. During an email conversation with Weldon’s wife, Huella. She contacted me about something else in one of my columns; I don’t remember now. But I will never forget the incident recalled.

She had not heard the story, but Weldon confirmed it as told. “Yep,” he chuckled. “That’s a true story.”

I referred to it as the infamous day Weldon and I witnessed a bonified East Texas miracle. The dog that came back from the dead. Given up as a goner after falling victim to a car chasing caper.

The column I crafted then from memories of the incident related as how stopping at the boat business after school was common occurrence. Just to see what was going on. In hopes maybe a boat might need a checkout. At the lake.

As the last school bell rang that day, we were headed to one of the then-new lakes, Lake Cypress Springs, to test run an antique wooden hull inboard speedboat. The prospect of working in some skiing time on this spring afternoon was, I am sure, purely a coincidental afterthought.

As we passed the small black-and-white dog on the two-lane country road near the lake, I saw him. Poised and ready in a driveway. And I recognized the universal canine surprise attack stance for chasing cars.

Sure enough, “bullet dog” launched into the road, barking in hot pursuit of a tire.

The same question about dogs chasing cars came to mind. Why do they do that?

The sport of the chase ended quickly. The pooch dropped back and slowed down. But it overlooked one small detail—the boat trailer following closely behind Weldon’s blue and white Chevy Blazer.

I still remember the sad sight. The trailer wheel caught the unsuspecting pup, rolled it around a time or two, and then launched it into the air and off into the ditch. Where it landed in a lifeless lump.

We turned around and went back. The dog’s owner, an old farmer type, was standing over the dog’s body, surveying the situation. As we gathered around in silence, it was unanimous. We were all in agreement. That dog was dead.

Weldon apologized profusely and offered to pay the man for his poor animal. The fellow laughed and said, “Don’t worry about it, you did me a favor. I didn’t like the dog anyway.”

Amid one last apology, the miracle began to unfold as we were about to leave. The dog moved. We watched in disbelief as it shook its head, slowly got up, and wobbled back toward the driveway to lick its wounds.

Awkward silence was broken when the farmer said with genuine disappointment, “And here, I thought I was finally shed of that darn dog.” We all shared laughter of nervous relief that the pup was apparently OK. Then, Weldon and I continued our journey to the lake, having witnessed “the dog that came back to life.”

Passing the scene later that evening while headed home, I looked around. “You think that dog will remember today’s trailer encounter the next time he feels the urge to chase a car,” I asked aloud?

“I doubt it,” Weldon said. “What I’ve always wondered is what a dog would do if it actually caught a car.”

Thank you, Weldon, for memories that make friendships last a lifetime. After all, who else could say they witnessed something like the day that dog came back?

—Leon Aldridge

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