{"id":40010,"date":"2017-06-06T08:00:14","date_gmt":"2017-06-06T14:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=40010"},"modified":"2017-06-06T08:16:58","modified_gmt":"2017-06-06T14:16:58","slug":"a-gathering-of-old-ghosts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/a-gathering-of-old-ghosts\/","title":{"rendered":"A View From the Balcony: A Gathering of Old Ghosts"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was Friday night and I was plum worn out from the work week and looking forward to the Memorial Day weekend. It wasn\u2019t all that surprising that after several drinks I fell asleep a few minutes before closing time on The Balcony. When the Knights of the Long Table were clearing folks out they somehow overlooked me\u2014even King Cobra, or perhaps he simply couldn\u2019t bring himself to stir me from my slumber. I woke up around two o\u2019clock and for one brief groggy moment I didn\u2019t know where I was.<\/span><\/p>\n

When things became clear to me I realized that the only semi-viable way off The Balcony was to shinny down the street light that\u2019s way too darned close to the railing of The Balcony. (If you ever sit there be prepared to be blinded by the light.) I wasn\u2019t ready for that yet, so I went back to my corner and finished the remains of a greyhound\u2014the drink, not the dog.<\/span><\/p>\n

Suddenly I heard voices coming from inside, but couldn\u2019t see anyone there. When what to my wandering\u2026er\u2026 wondering eyes should appear but an otherworldly host of foggy apparitions, floating through the eastern door! I pulled my hat down over my eyes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shiver me timbers! There was Lincoln and Hamer, Barnett and Rosa\u2014Wallace and Grant, Lee and Coretta! Oh, what a night for some ghoulish eavesdropping!<\/span><\/p>\n

Barnett:<\/strong> Karl Oliver must be the stupidest man in the Mississippi Legislature. To suggest lynchin\u2019 folks and then to put it on that innard net thing? Stupid is as stupid does!<\/span><\/p>\n

Hamer: <\/strong>I\u2019d like to nail his dumb rump to a stump! The squirrelly-eyed\u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

Coretta: <\/strong>Hold your horses, Fannie Lou. Martin always said that violence only begets violence.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lincoln: <\/strong>And he was right, Coretta. I saw it every day in that damned un-Civil War. Brother against brother\u2014I wept night and day. You did, too, General Lee. You told me yourself.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lee: <\/strong>It was the hardest thing I ever did\u2014sending boys into enemy lines\u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

Grant: <\/strong>\u2026like sheep to the slaughter, Bobby. My heart was torn out every waking moment.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rosa:<\/strong> You\u2019d think people would have learned by now.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wallace:<\/strong> Now, Ms. Parks, you know it takes some folks a little longer to see the error of their ways. It sure took me a while.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lincoln:<\/strong> But, Governor, you did change. But even with that we still have all these ignorant bigots plaguing the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Barnett:<\/strong> Knowin\u2019 what I know now, if I wuz still Guv\u2019nor I\u2019d tie ole Oliver up to a Confederate statue with nothin\u2019 on but the stars an\u2019 bars! An\u2019 I\u2019d make damn sure his face an\u2019 private parts were on full display!<\/span><\/p>\n

Grant:<\/strong> But, like Coretta said, Ross, returning evil for evil just makes more evil.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lee: <\/strong>Amen to that, Useless\u2026uh, Ulysses.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hamer:<\/strong> Even though I\u2019ve crossed over Jordan, I\u2019ve still got some of that ole sick an\u2019 tired in me. But it always turns to sadness when people look to things like statues an\u2019 flags an\u2019 such like they were handed down from Heaven.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lincoln:<\/strong> Preach on, sister!<\/span><\/p>\n

Wallace:<\/strong> I for one have a lot to make up for. As long as I can float through walls an\u2019 scare the crap outta people I\u2019m gonna get \u2018em when they\u2019re hatin\u2019. I\u2019m gonna get \u2018em when they\u2019re pontificatin\u2019. I\u2019m gonna get \u2018em every time they start actin\u2019 like they\u2019re blind.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rosa:<\/strong> Ooooh, Georgie boy! Gonna scare \u2018em straight, are you?<\/span><\/p>\n

They erupted in eerie laughter. Grant and Wallace passed out cigars and Ross produced a flask and poured the likker. It was a jolly special time!<\/span><\/p>\n

Honest Abe started singing and everybody else chimed in.<\/span><\/p>\n

Oh, that\u2019s the way, uh-huh uh-huh,<\/em>
\nI like it, uh-huh, uh-huh.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Out of nowhere Coretta shot me a glance. \u201cHey, cowboy! C\u2019mon over here and join us!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

My eyes nearly shot out of their sockets.<\/span><\/p>\n

General Lee barked, \u201cYeah, Sundown! Get your scrawny little liberal butt over here an\u2019 have some fun!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So I moseyed over. Grant handed me a cigar and Ross poured my likker. I joined the spirit circle and we all sang and danced \u2018till nearly dawn, when they floated away with the sounds of their revelry trailing behind them.<\/span><\/p>\n

I grabbed my hat and cane and slid down the lamp post, whistling and dancing over the Van Buren crosswalk like Gene Kelly in Singing in the Rain<\/em>. Yeah, I tripped, but for once I didn\u2019t care.<\/span><\/p>\n

I drove away with two thoughts. First, this was the best night of my life, dancing with the stars, so to speak. And, two, racism sucks. It really sucks.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s the view from The Balcony.\u00a0\"The<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was Friday night and I was plum worn out from the work week and looking forward to<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":262,"featured_media":39753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[307],"tags":[31,8851,10521,10522,10286,3,753,10426],"class_list":["post-40010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-people","tag-city-grocery","tag-column","tag-columnist","tag-ghosts","tag-randy-weeks","tag-the-local-voice","tag-tlv","tag-view-from-the-balcony"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/2017-5-11-View-from-the-Balcony.jpg?fit=600%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40010\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}