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                                                     Down Memory Lane 8-31-02  by Peggy Shepherd
I come from a small town where the only excitement during the summer months  was a traveling skating rink. It only stayed a week, with it's bright lights and popular music blaring, we skated around and around the hard wood floor. Back then no one got into trouble after the rink closed.Most were too tired to do anything except walk back home,Mom and dad were waiting on the front porch swing counting the minutes until curfew time. We shared the fun we had with our parents and went on to bed,happy and satisfied. The weekly excitements were those hot, hazy  days of late summer when it was time for  the Saturday Matinee double feature. The matinee started at one o'clock sharp. Waiting for Saturday to roll around was a true fight for our independence, we children liked to get there early. So we could be first in line and get a seat on the front row. We had a need to get close to the real action. If one happens to look down at the front row from above, it might look like a row of  dodo birds with a whip lash.
Our journey to the big picture show started long before the curtains opened on stage. The hours until the big curtains on stage parted and the MGM lion roared was almost unbearably exciting. The fun started when  Mother  handed  us young people a quarter. These quarters, of course,  had certain conditions attached to them, along with the usual threats and promises of what we would get if we dared stray. The cautions never seemed to end. Do not play with fire, do not be climbing trees, avoid the river, do not be fighting, stay together, but  the
dreaded gypsies kidnap scams worked best of all. She presumed, as all loving Mother's do,  that some member of the human race  would relish  holding for ransom, three ornery mudlarks. These little waifs were always hungry, and  meaner than a striped snake. Number one,  " I dare you to do rules," consisted mainly of the finger
stuck in one's face threat. "I will cut the blood, wear you out, when I get home, never talk to strangers, --- rule!" This never worked with us.  We promptly banished this threat from our minds when our feet hit the trail.
Thus, in a town of two hundred people, where  one's pedigree  was established back to King Henry the Eighth,  hiding one's genealogical tree was not easy! The first questions they asked a stranger, "Who was your grandad, son?" It should be someone of upright standing in the community if one wanted to have overnight lodgings.
It was never a fun day to be a stranger in our small town. Unwelcome glances ever so slight, in the wrong direction, could bring out  every knobstick, sling shot, and squirrel rifle with a dead bead on a vital part of the anatomy. Most foreigners stayed only long enough to fill  the gas tanks. Very few were brave enough to wander off the beaten path.
Therefore, with this quarter burning a hole in our pockets, and throwing every  caution to the wind, we would head for the big city. Running and walking, we would set off. The most tiring part of the trip was comparable to climbing the first slope on Mt. Everest. Do you suppose that we took the easy road? Of course not! We young mountain people were always forging ahead and conquering new territory. If it were good enough for old Rebecca Boone, it was even better for us. On spindly legs that never tired out, we ran most of the three miles to
town! After conquering the first scarp, the last mile and a half was like shooting fish in a barrel. It was downhill all the way    . . .
Arriving at the theater long before the movie began felt like  an old home week, All the local farm kids met there, here we discussed, and imitated the movie stars. Some were good at it.  Many John Wayne imitators were very good. The colorful and exciting billboards advertising the best action scenes, absorbed our rapt attention, that
is,  until the velvet curtains parted in the ticket sales booth. As the curtains slowly glided open, we knew  Miss Hedy Lamarr would soon appear.
In those days, a quarter bought  anything a child needed for entertainment. So we thought! It was so exciting, marching right up to the pretty lady in the little booth. She sat so sophisticated and cosmopolitan in that cramped, hot booth, while an itsy-bitsy fan, connected to the wall, shilly-shallied hot air in her face? A beautiful smile adorned her face as she licked her sultry red lipstick, it made her teeth sparkle and gleaming like expensive pearls. She always managed to have ever hair in place. I wanted to be just like her. In our town, she was very popular and as lovely as Hedy Lemarr.
Gripping the ticket, and slowly ascending the carpeted arcade, we entered another time and dimension, every sense becoming acute.  The olfactories accelerated into hybersmell and the saliva glands flowed like the Nile River. Pausing only long enough to buy a bag of popcorn and a Dixie cup of Orange Crush, we opened the double doors and descended into a mysterious world.
These were the days when all heroes wore white, and all bad people wore black. Whip Wilson, and Lash Larue tamed the west with whips of black snakes' hide's. Whip could unbuckle a gun belt in one flick of the wrist. Lash LaRue could kill a fly sitting on the nose of his horse at fifty paces, and never draw blood. Old silvered headed Hopalong Cassidy with his horse Topper rode the ranges in rain, sleet, or a hail of bullets. Hopalong  wore a big white hat, it was large enough for ten mexicans to perform the hat dance. A rumor most prized among the boys,
held that Hopalong had bed springs attached to his legs under the chaps. Who knows? We children had few material things, but we were extremely rich in imagination. I hope that this little story down a memory lane brings a smile to some of you. That was my intention. It was in this theater, which was dark as a wolf's mouth, that we had a weekly encounter with Sheba  Crasie. But that will be a story for later. Have a good week, And God Bless!

                                 A song for fools. by Peggy Shepherd 9-1-02
It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise, than for a man to hear the song of fools (ECC.7:5) I have thought much on this statement made by the wisest man in the world, King Solomon. How do we respond when we are given a rebuke? Perhaps we can accept it quite graciously when it comes from our pastor, because he preaches the word of God with sincerity,  But what do we do when someone else tells us face to face, or in a round about way, that we are wrong in our walk with God?  With some people that is like lightening the fuse on a stick
of dynamite, especially when they feel, they have done no wrong.  Solomon goes on to make a strong comparison against the song of fools. He says, "the laughter of the fool" is like the crackling of thorns in a fire. Ancient Jewish peoples burned dried thorn bushes when they wanted a small amount of quick heat, but they knew they could not use this fuel to cook everything that required a high temperature over a long time. Some foods are best when simmered, or cooked slowly, much like our pinto beans. So, are we to learn from this criticism or are we to follow the song of the Pied Piper? Ecc . 7:8-9 tells us to be patient, but under the pressure of the moment we often lose track of our long range objectives. Our determination to be kind and loving and patient disappears the first time something goes wrong. Later, after we calm down we are sorry and remorseful.
Next Solomon tells us in ECC. 7:10 , not to complain. Some Christians are bright and happy as long as things are going well, but let something go wrong, in their unhappiness they think back to times when things were going much better. Yearning for the old days is not being realistic. God never changes, we  forget to put our trust in God and His wisdom. Solomon goes on to say that we are to choose Godliness, avoid self righteousness. He warns against two wrong roads taken when people observe events in the lives of others, both good and bad." All things have I seen in my days of vanity: there is a just man that perisheth in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man that prolongeth his life in his wickedness. Be not righteous overmuch, neither make thyself overwise. Why shouldest thou destroy thyself? Why shouldest thou die before thy time?" ECC. 7:15-17.
Solomon is not telling us that we are a little wicked, no, he is merely telling us the perils of being self righteous. He also tells us to have self restraint, by adopting the right attitude toward public opinion. It is natural for people to want to know what is being said about them, and to be upset, when the comments are negative. Solomon, warns us in Ecc .. 7:21. "take no heed unto all words that are spoken, lest thou hear thy servant curse thee."
God is always honored when we do "what is right" not what "the people will say." When we find out that people are slandering us we must resist the impulse to retaliate. We are to remember that we have been guilty of
doing to others, what they do to us.  For Solomon said is ECC . 7:22. " For often also thine own heart knoweth that thou thyself likewise hast cursed others."  To sum up , we must turn to God in prayer, confess our weaknesses and ask Him for the Grace to live above the natural inclinations of man.