Nilla Banana Pudding, The Sweetest Sin

First published in the July 25, 1990 issue of The Camden Chronicle

Mark Twain told a story of a maiden lady who became ill. The doctor was called and after an examination declared that tobacco was the culprit.

"If you give up snuff dipping," he said, "I can almost guarantee a complete recovery."

The lady protested, "I am a clean, fastidious woman. I have never used tobacco in my life."

"Is drinking your problem?" the doctor asked. "Perhaps if you gave up the bottle, your health would improve."

Again, the patient took issue. "I am," she said, "the daughter of a long line of teetotalers. If I put a glass of the Devil's brew to my lips, Heaven would split open and Satan would cackle from his hellish throne. Never, under any circumstances, would I partake of spirits."

"Well, then," the doctor opined, "it must be your social life. If you will give up some of your gentlemen friends and live a more sedate life, your health will improve dramatically."

The lady became agitated, "Doctor! I am a lifelong spinster! The only man I have been alone with in my adult life is Deacon Waverly, and even then there is always three feet of space and a pair of overalls between us. You are barking up the wrong tree. My life is as pure as the driven snow."

"Too bad, then," said the doctor. "You have no bad habits or shortcomings to give up in order to get well. It looks like you're a goner. Good day, madam."

I posed this question to the woman I consort with: If you were suddenly taken ill and had to give up some lifelong or beloved habit to improve your health, what would it be?

"That's easy," she said. "I would give up cornbread. That's the only way I would give up cornbread -- if my life was threatened. And, if that did not work to improve my health, I would made the supreme sacrifice: I would give up porch swinging. Life without cornbread and porch swinging would hardly be worth living, anyway. A just God would not overlook such a sacrifice on my part. I feel confident that the Almighty will honor those offerings laid at his feet."

While I pondered her answer, I wondered what I would do in like circumstances. I gave up smoking long ago. I never was much of a drinker. At my age, an overactive social life would probably be more dangerous to my health than anything nature could contrive.

The only over indulgence that plagues my life is vanilla wafers. That will attest to the dullest of existences. If Mark Twain were here, I wonder how he would feel about my plight.

Back of the Box Recipes, click here

Editor's note:

The Mark Twain story that Jim cites appears to be in "Following the Equator: A Journey Around The World" and is often referred to as the "Moral Pauper." Twain's version isn't quite like Jim's, but you know how storytellers embellish. One of Jim's favorite quotes from his mother was "I know that story's the truth 'cause I made it up myself." 

It's true about those dang bland cookies. There was always a box of Nabisco Vanilla Wafers in the house and there was nothing Jim loved more than the Banana Pudding recipe on the box.

The Art of the Deal - Southern Style

First published in the August 9, 1990 issue of The Camden Chronicle

I can remember exactly when and where it happened, when I acquired an affluent feeling, when I felt like I had left the common herd and had taken my place among the CEOs of this life. Until then, the only claim I had on the upper echelon-ship of everyday comings and goings was as a trustee in the church.

Being a church trustee requires no great amount of talent or training. All you have to do is show up at most meetings, say a short prayer if you are asked, keep your pledge more or less current, and speak well of the pastor in public. I could say something about what it takes to be a deacon or song leader, but I have digressed too much already.

There was this man who owed me a small sum of money. He came by my house while the workmen were building a new garage to replace the old one that was nearly rotted to the ground.  As he stood beside me watching the workmen perform, he explained that ready cash was still in short supply around his house and it would be a while before he could return the loan in the currency of the land.

"By Golly!" he exploded, his eyes lighting up. "I've just come into possession of a new garage door opener!" He gave the brand name and motor horsepower.

"It would sure be the thing to open the door on your new garage! I'll give you the opener and help you install it in lieu of the debt!"

Since I held no collateral on the loan and the amount was not a great lot, the idea appealed to me, but the clincher was his offer to help with the installation. I knew my debtor was skilled in things mechanical and the installation of the door opener would be a snap for him, while the removal and replacement of a light bulb sometimes taxes my engineering abilities.

True to our agreement, the next day my friend brought over the electric door opener and installed it in short order. Debt paid. We shook hands, agreed that both had made a great bargain and parted friends. He promised to keep me in mind if he needed to borrow money again. I thanked him and said I would certainly mention his name if anyone inquired about a garage door installer.

That night, after things had settled down and the woman I consort with was watching television in another part of the house, I stood at the kitchen window with the garage door remote. I pressed the button and watched the door quietly slide up and down. What a feeling of power!

"I am no longer a small time country boy," I told myself. "I have arrived." An automatic garage door opener is the difference between feeling influentially stable and just hanging on with crowd.

The editor (Connie Parker Harrison) beneath the Influentially Stable Garage Door Opener,
August 1986, with Kevin Cornett and friends.

Father's Day, 1990

First published in The Camden Chronicle June 13, 1990

Parker Family 1953
From left, back row: John Moses, Walter, Polly, Jim (author of the blog), JoAnn, Larry
Seated: John Wyly ("Dad") and Bertha Sterling

To the anti-tobacco crowd he would be an ogre and to a clean air freak, he would be a Mount St. Helen's disaster, but my father was one of the few totally honest men I ever met. He didn't rule his home like a dictator or an emperor. His rule was more benevolent, like the Speaker of the House. When possible, all family members had a say in any decisions made. He was a kind, soft-spoken man, seldom raising his voice even when angry. He could usually find some humor in all but the rankest disregard of household rules.

In the daytime during working hours, he either chewed tobacco or dipped snuff. In the evening, he enjoyed filling his pipe with tobacco strong enough to tote a mule across Harmon's Creek. He would lean back in his chair and fill the room with a smoke cloud as thick as fog in the Smoky Mountains.

I saw him cry twice. Once, when he gave my eldest sister to be a wife. In those days, expensive church weddings were out of the question. The loving couple usually went to a nearby marriage parlor in Mississippi, quietly married and that was the extent of the ceremony. After my sister and her betrothed drove away from our house, I saw dad wiping tears. The other time he cried was when my youngest sister was bitten by a rabid dog and he feared for the life of one he loved.

The Director of Life miscast dad for the role he played. Dad was a farmer, but he had no talent or desire for the role. The only natural trait he ever showed around the farm was an affinity with animals. All of his animals loved him. Horses and mules obeyed him like children. Cows would relax and produce more milk when he was around. A certain cow we owned that never missed a chance to impale me on her spike-like horns would snuggle those same horns under my father's arms and croon like a lovesick partridge when he stroked her neck.

Dad died broke. When he realized the end was near, true to form, he called a friend who was a retired funeral director to make arrangements for his last service. It was his way of relieving his wife and children of that unpleasant task. His death was a shock to me. It just seems some people should never die.

For The Love Of Books And Libraries

First published in The Camden Chronicle February 21, 1990. Picked up by The Dearborn Press and Guide and The Dearborn Times -Herald. 

Terry and the Pirates Vol. 2: 1937-1938

by Milton Caniff

Fifty years ago at Liberty School, Herman Presson taught me how to read. Then he taught me why I should read. Finally, through his Friday afternoon storytelling sessions, he showed me how to enjoy reading. Mr. Presson could get more action, excitement and pure romance from a book than anyone I've met since I left his care. If books were as compelling and stories were as amazing as Mr. Herman convinced me they were, I couldn't wait 'til I could read and understand books for myself.

Alex Raymond's Jungle Jim (November 26, 1939)

I have not been disappointed. Books have long been my main source of relaxation and learning. My early reading was made up mostly of comic books. Some the the lads read Captain Marvel and Superman, but my taste ran more towards Jungle Jim and Terry and the Pirates. Somehow the supernatural antics of the Superman type stories never appealed to me.

Then came the "Big Little" books. Anyone old enough to remember when the Dixie Theatre sat smack in the middle of the block on the east side of the Court House in Camden will recall these marvels of literature. On one page were printed words and on the next page was a picture pertaining to the story. They were just the right size to fit in your hip pocket and were always handy to fend off loneliness. They were also nice to have in your pocket in case your old man or teacher decided to correct your attitude.

As I grew, I read almost all of Zane Grey's books, then I moved on to Jack London's "White Fang" and "Martin Eden." After reading Grey and London, comic books and the Big Little Books were too light for me.

The people in Camden and Benton County are lucky. You have a well stocked library to borrow from. I know because two years ago I spent the best part of an afternoon there just browsing through the books on the shelves and visiting with the volunteer librarian on duty.

These winter months are the perfect time for anyone to read, but especially so for retirees and people on Disability. Go down to the library. Get yourself a library card, if you don't already have one, then check out some good books. Don't look for books that are easy to read. Get the ones with words that will send you mumbling and cursing to the dictionary to figure out what the author is saying. Find some books on subjects that will have you groping through the encyclopedia. Reading might as well be fun and fun might as well be learning. I believe books are man's greatest invention. If nothing else, they will give your TV set a rest.

Editor's Note:
Jim's love of literature has been a major influence in my life. I wrote about it in a post, "Marketing Books To Boys" at The Bookshop Blog. 

When The Brain Shifts Into Neutral

First published in The Camden Chronicle December 27, 1989

Why is it that when the human body is placed in a state of enforced idleness, the human brain belonging to that body insists on going into neutral also? In the eight weeks since a heart attack and a subsequent bypass operation rendered me more slothful than an inchworm crawling on a mulberry leaf, my mind seems to think it has every right to a period of recuperation, too.

I mentioned this to my sister. She says the answer is simple: when the body is idle, the brain has no reason to do anything other than idle along with the rest of the crowd. She may be right. When I was working, it seemed like every day two or three ideas would bang inside my head without any effort on my part. Not all were good ideas, certainly not all were original, but they kept bumping around against each other inside my mind, sorting themselves out, until finally, at the end of the day, they would settle down into one pretty good thought to ponder and write about.

A few days ago, after the woman I consort with made her way to work, I sat alone at the kitchen table gazing out the window watching a small flock of birds gather around the chimney stack on the roof of a neighbor's house to keep warm. They reminded me of  how the kids in my family used to flock around the wood stove in our living room on a cold morning, first warming one side, then the other. Moving in and out, occasionally squabbling about who had the better position.

At the table, on my second cup of decaf, it seemed like the perfect place and time to grope for new ideas, so I gave myself an assignment: sit at the table for 30 minutes or until an idea I'd never thought of came to mind.

"Don't read, don't ponder, don't even answer the phone if it rings. Come up with one thought that is original."

In 30 minutes I could not. Oh!! It occurred to me to research the reason Chinese people like rice and Irishmen prefer potatoes, why our fingernails grow as long as we live but our teeth do not, why God made some birds that can fly and some that cannot -- is it because He has a sense of humor after all? You might want to take this up with your doctor or your preacher or even your hair-dresser.

Maybe I'm just in a slump, but it seems to me that the body's action begets brain action. That's why I'm looking forward to the time I can do more than walk five or six blocks a day. I want to go among the people to, as the big time writers say, interact and inter-relate. My body is healing, but my mind is atrophying. I'll sure be glad when I can get them working on the same level.

In the Liberty Column of the next issue was a comment from Andrea Madden, whose husband, Walt, was Jim's cousin.

"A message to Jim Parker in Michigan. We really did enjoy your article in last week's paper, about the 'brain' going on a leave of absence during the months after surgery. Don't worry not fret, just let Norma do your 'thinking' and everything will be OK. My better half says he went through the same feelings of 'limbo' in 1984 and here it is 1990 and not much improvement, so don't worry about such minor details!!! Just knowing that friends and family are there to guide you along will help."