The Poppies Blow

Neptune Park, St. Simons Island, Georgia.

In this place for many years multitudes of a cross-section of diverse Americans celebrate Taps at Twilight in remembrance of Memorial Day. We come to pay tribute to those who have died in service to our country, as well as honor those living who have served in our preservation of liberty. It’s a humble and solemn occasion.

“In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our places, and in the sky,
The larks, still bravely singing, fly,
Scarce heard amid the guns below.”

The annual event is organized by the St. Simons Island Rotary Club. The Golden Isles Community Band resurrects John Phillip Sousa for a short concert of his militaristic music. We can imagine him directing the band. The enthusiastic music is rousing. We march along with them, waving our tiny American flags in time with the music.

Picnics are everywhere. Smoke from barbeque wafts across the lawn. Our own ravenous crowd usually numbers about twenty-five. We gather around several tables covered with red checkered tablecloths and feast on fried chicken, sandwiches of cucumber, pimento cheese and pineapple, all on white bread (the edges removed in true Southern tradition). There’s more: deviled eggs, guacamole dip, fruit and unlimited desserts.

Throngs of patriotic Americans pack the entire lawn of Neptune Park. We face the rotunda where engraved bricks with the names of the beloved fallen remind us of our heritage. Standing alone in the center is a flagpole. Our flag, the enduring symbol of national unity, is alive. It waves freely in the breeze. It’s the central focus of all eyes.

As the day drifts down towards dusk, a Spirit floats on the coastal breeze and moves among the crowd. It swells, then hushes, then blows again. A profound stillness descends upon the multitude. Laughing voices of children ring in the distance. They add new life to the solemnity of the gathering.

“We are the dead; short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.”

This same Spirit blows amid the graves of patriots everywhere. It’s we, the living, who are restless. The honored dead lie peacefully in the earth now. Their names, dates and events mark their final resting places. What survive are their names, our memories and the ideal of Freedom. The Freedom that beats in every living heart was purchased by the blood of our countrymen. This same Freedom, we pray, will continue to survive long after we, the living, are gone. We have our names; we have only borrowed the dust.

Like our warriors, we live for a purpose…a common devotion for freedom and brotherhood. We hear this theme from every speaker who ever came to memorialize the occasion.

At twilight we witness the Retirement of the Colors. The crowd is breathlessly silent. The flag is lowered, gently folded, itself soon to be laid to rest in the darkness of the night.

A mournful trumpet then sounds the three simple notes of ‘Taps,’ or Lights Out or Gone the Sun. In the distance its fading echo descends gently upon the declining day.

Three simple notes close this day, but another three notes will renew the morrow. Like death and resurrection, tomorrow’s bugle call is Reveille, accompanied by a cannon’s retort. It’s a rousing ‘get-em-up’ tune as the flag is again raised atop the naked flagpole. It will again personify our nation’s glorious past, its hopeful future and our enduring commitment to freedom.

So we will say goodnight to the Spirit here. The day is finished. Picnic baskets, tables and chairs are packed, and the crowd disperses, somber in the memory of the occasion. Yet it departs unsettled, knowing that our nation’s struggle for freedom continues.

“Take up our quarrel with the foe!
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high!
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep…”

The spirits of our departed comrades are watching. Will our generation join them in the preservation of our ideals?

“In Flanders fields the poppies blow…”

And in Neptune Park on Memorial Day, the voices of our children’s spirits sing the sweet song of Liberty.


Bud Hearn
May 25, 2017


(Thanks to John McCrae for the use of his poem, “In Flanders Fields”)

The Leaf Blower

Behold, the Leaf Blower cometh, sowing the wind, and reaping the whirlwind.

**********

In your silent reverie it comes. The distant roar encroaches, closer, closer. You hear it before you see it. You smell the fumes of its foul breath before you feel its vibration. No explanation necessary: the Leaf Blower is here.

The ear-splitting whine of the two-cycle engine shatters the day’s quiet enjoyment. You can’t think, and your tongue utters expletives that would curl grandma’s blue hair.

You close all doors, windows, retreat to your prayer closet, take the matter up with a higher authority. You’re displeased with the former silent answers, like, “Patience is a virtue,” or, “Do it yourself.” You hope for better results today.

Reactions vary. Some curse, some rent their garments, some wish for the return of rakes and others flee the scene. Whichever, but look closer: There’s some good in just about everything.

I’m on the porch, reading. My yard team arrives. One mows, another blows. Both grass and leaves cower in fear of the impending destruction. The grass gets shorn, the leaves scatter in advance of the 250 mph, hurricane-force winds of the blower. Birds, insects and small creatures flee the wrath caused by the tornadic centrifugal force bearing down upon them. I escape inside.

Eric is the Leaf Blower. He wears a cap pulled tight on his head. Large, blue noise-reduction cups cover his ears. The blower is strapped to his back. If he’s not careful it can whirl him around like a ballerina doing a clumsy pirouette. Once he pointed it over the pool. The waters parted like the Red Sea.

The Leaf Blower reminds me of the 1950’s television and movie serials, ‘Rocket Man.’ They were before Technicolor, when good against evil always showed up in black and white. Like Rocket Man, the Leaf Blower always shows up and cleans up our messes.

Rocket Man was an average-looking guy dreaming about a career in space exploration. Alas, he was mostly earth-bound. When evil emerged, he hopped behind a rock and strapped on a jet pack. With a running start and a jump, he zoomed airborne to the squeals of us sitting in the front row during Saturday matinees.

Now I’m thinking, what would entice someone to build a career of blowing leaves into piles every day? Poverty? Insanity? What goes through the mind of someone in such a seemingly mindless occupation? Curiosity demands answers. So I go out and ask Eric.

He idles the blower to a dull roar when I approach. The leaves relax with the sudden reduction in the decibel level. Birds start chirping again. Nature exhales a sigh of relief.

“Eric, I’ve been meaning to ask you, what’s it like to spend your days with that leaf blower?”

He gives me a quizzical look and switches the blower off. Suddenly, the air’s ambient silence is stunning.

“Never thought much about it, I guess,” he says.

The question must have touched a nerve. He tilts his head while his eyes scan the skies for an answer. We both stand there in silence.

“I guess it’s not much of a long-term job, doesn’t pay all that much, either. But for some weird reason I like to see things clean and pretty. Strange, maybe, but I get a joy from seeing all these messy leaves cleaned up and yards looking pristine. Kinda like how I imagine the Garden of Eden. It’s like having a lot of my own beautiful gardens without the expense.”

“Well, Eric, that’s a good way to see a job. You do make our yard a showcase every week.” I smile.

He grins. “Funny you ask me this today,” he says. “It was always my dream to be a landscape architect, to draw beautiful gardens and enjoy making people smile. I guess this is as close as I’ve gotten so far. But maybe one day…” He trails off in thought, his eyes again searching the skies.

“There’s still time,” I say.

“I guess,” he says, and fires up his blower.

**********

Life is like a leaf blower. It’s a wind that’s always blowing. It sneaks up on us, blows for a while, then moves on. It usually makes a clean sweep of things.

I guess if we look close enough, we might see something good in everything. There’s still time for dreams to come true, even for Leaf Blowers. Thank you, Eric.


Bud Hearn
May 22, 2017

Cinnamon Toast

“Stood alone on a mountain top, starin’ out at the Great Divide. I could go east, I could go west, it was all up to me to decide…” Bob Seger

I left home at 18. Not willingly. Poverty evicted me. My parents couldn’t afford my enormous food intake. They had to choose…a new car or feeding their omnivorous son. The car won. So I left.

I didn’t really mind, except I hated to leave behind mama’s cinnamon toast. But life moves on. Anyway, the future winked at me when I graduated from high school. I winked back.

The future is a Siren. It seduces with promises of magic kingdoms, just waiting for us. Its allure packed more punch than my last fortune cookie, “See Rock City.”

I said my goodbyes. Mama sat grinning on the fender of her new 1964 gold, slantback Plymouth Savoy, delirious with joy over the car. Or my departure? She never said. I never asked.
I stood in our front yard, one foot on the driveway; the other on US Highway 27. It ran north and south. Across the street lay a dead-end dirt road to our farm. Three choices. I went north.

The Stone Age was slow to leave Southwest Georgia. It slipped out unseen in the dead of night the week before I left. We both knew it was time. It couldn’t compete with Elvis or hippies.

Food was responsible for my expulsion. Children consume vast quantities of it. My father was a righteous man but tight with his cash. He saved money by goading me into mowing the lawn and encouraged me to eat the grass for snacks. Promised it’d build muscles and attract girls. Skinny boys are dumb. They’ll believe anything that promises muscles or female attention.

But I hated anything green, except money, of course. Later I learned that’s what attracts female attention. If I got hungry, I had to find it or kill it. My parents were tyrants. “Feed yourself or starve,” they said. Claimed it builds character. Hogwash.

They were devout disciples of Dr. Spock. He warned them in a dream not to hug or kiss children. Said they’d never leave the nest, and like leeches, they would make old age a living hell. No, give ‘em sugar instead, said Spock.

I preferred sugar to kisses anyway. Familial affection abused me horribly as a child. I was mentally damaged, suffering from the dual stigma of being both seen with relatives and hugged by them. Aunt Doris once hugged me. Mothballs popped out of her pockets. Like a dog, I ate whatever fell to the floor. I now refrain. That day’s consequence remains vivid in memory.

As for kisses, OMG, their breath. It was a ghastly cross between snuff and coffee, as stale and stagnant as swamp water. But then again, who with any brain would touch a teenager who secreted musk more rank than that of a bull moose in rut?

Sugar is the quintessential staple in the diet of children. My mama had plenty of it. She dumped it on everything. Kool-Aid and ice tea were as thick as molasses. And always on cinnamon toast for breakfast. I mourn for it even now.

I used to watch her prep that delicacy. She’d slather slices of Wonder Bread (white, of course) with a tsunami of Oleo margarine. She’d shake fistfuls of freshly ground cinnamon on top and layer it with a pound of Dixie Crystal sugar. Just looking at it red-lined my glucose level and sent my stomach into orgiastic spasms.

Mama’s cinnamon toast was magic. In the oven the concoction boiled and bubbled. It emitted a heavenly aroma, the pure essence of Paradise. My mouth would drool profusely in anticipation of gnawing out the sweet bubbly middle of the toast.

I was a voracious snacker. Cheese toast, for example. Soda crackers toasted with cheese, topped with marshmallows. Bananas, peanut butter and honey. No apples…too mealy and mushy. Apple sauce? No problem.

There were mayonnaise sandwiches stuffed with pineapple, and light bread smeared with butter and sugar. I ate raw cookie dough, drank Ovaltine, devoured popsicles and occasionally squirrels. But nothing compared with cinnamon toast.

The crusts were the cast-offs of cinnamon toast. No kid ever ate them. Why remains an unsolved mystery. My mother tried, reminding me about starving Chinese children. Since I didn’t know any, my conscience was clear.

Some years later I discovered the Magic Kingdom promised by the Future is often more like a chimerical dream. It’s a mirage that shimmers in the distance, twinkling just out of reach. Unlike mama’s cinnamon toast, the center core of reality is not always sweet. Life has its own share of crusts.

So, here’s to mama’s cinnamon toast…thanks for the memories, and goodbye to the crusts.


Bud Hearn
May 12, 2017