About The Forest-blade. (Swainsboro, Ga.) 1996-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 25, 2021)
The Forest-Blade • www.EmannelCoimtyLive.com • Swainsboro, Georgia • August 25, 2021 5B Editorials Columns A Star is Born Most of her fans said she sang just like Dolly Parton but others thought she was anoth er Loretta Lynn. She sang from the heart. Every song seemed to come from her own life experience. Songs like Don't Come Home A 'Drinking with Loving on Your Mind spoke of her own daddy who was an alcoholic, or Dolly Parton's Coat of Many Colors told of her own impoverished childhood. In other words, she had lived her life through the lyrics of her songs and her audience loved it and felt it came from her heart. In grammar school, she was always the star of the show at the annual talent explosion. She lived for the applause from the audience and the roar of approval that followed. The blinding bright lights and the swish of the plush, velvet curtain at the end of her electrifying per formance always brought happy tears to her eyes. At home, she never heard any words of acceptance or felt any approval from her parents like she did after a satis fied and appreciative audience gave her an extended curtain call with their applause. She was not interest ed in having a boy friend or getting mar ried like her sisters had done. She wanted to be a star and noth ing could stop her. Every time a young gentleman would show interest in her, she would brush him off and delve deep er into song writing and her career. She became well-known as a country singer. Many fans flocked to see her at The Bamboo Ranch on the traffic circle in Savannah. It was always a sold out show, and they kept coming back for more. She never trusted anyone with the direc tion her career was going or the money she made along the way. She was never sure if anyone had ever loved her. So, it was very important that the applause would never end or be silenced because in that brief moment, she always felt loved. The years rolled by and she ventured up and down the East Coast. Sometimes, she went as far as Chicago singing in small clubs in tire dead of winter. She had to be care ful not to let her emo tions get in tire way of entertaining her audi ence. When the icy wind swept through the late night streets of Chicago, she longed to be in the warm con fines of her own home, with Cuddles, her soft, fluffy cat, at her side. "Get ahold of your self," she said as she pushed those thoughts Ronnie Johnson from her mind. "You are a star who has everything money can buy - clothes, cars, jewelry and especially fame." At the end of the sold-out performance, she stepped out of the small club into the cold night air with the applause still ringing in her ears. Her hotel room would be warm and cozy when she got there. She would take a couple of sleeping pills to come down from her high; this was a rou tine ritual. Sometimes, f she thought of her sis ters who had families of their own with the proverbial white fence and all, but they were living from paycheck to paycheck while she seemed to have it all; but, they seemed to be very happy just the same. She drifted off to sleep because she no longer heard the love and acceptance of the applause in her ears. After all, tomorrow is another day. The applause would come back again. Remembering a time when negative was positive I had a COVID-19 test the other day even though I have been fully-vaccinated and wear my mask regu larly in public. I am sure to some of you that proves I am a lib eral weenie commie who loves Nancy Pe- losi, watches CNN and glows in the dark. But I digress. My doctor thought it would be a good idea for me to take the test. The not-so-good idea was ramming a cotton swab up my nose that stopped just shy of my cerebellum. I am happy to report that both my nose and cer ebellum survived the ordeal as did I. The results were negative. Unlike flashlight bat teries, where negative is negative and posi tive is positive, in this case negative meant positive. And so it has been with my life. What some would consider a negative way to have grown up was, in fact, very positive. We just didn't know any better because there was no one around to tell us differently. They, too, Editorial Cartoons ' 1 The Spats by Jeff PickeringJ 60OP YEARS, HAVEN'T WE? t i s i/VEVE AU/0 HAD SOME FIRESTONES. 'fcr * were enjoying the pos itives of their negative lives. To those who can't imagine life without a daily dose of dot. com in it, what could be more negative than to live life without the benefit of the Internet. I deem that a positive. If I needed to look something up, I was taught to go to tire dictionary or the encyclopedia or to tire library - all information sources that could be trusted - where I would find the answer. Teachers tell me that today's students can write a six-page es say on any subject as signed to them and turn tire paper in dou ble-spaced and with no errors. The only problem is they have no idea what they were talking about. They just pulled it off the Internet. No thinking required. I may not be the brightest bulb in the lamp, but I learned the hard way tire dan gers of faking it in my school assignments, in cluding the time I tried convincing my English professor Dr. Raymond Cook of the soaring poetic brilliance of Joyce Kilmer's "Trees," which I had not read. Big mistake. Dr. Cook didn't like "Trees." Not at all. I still have the scars to prove it. No Internet meant no email which meant we wrote letters and cards to each other. This column generates Dick Yarbrough a lot of email response, which I greatly appre ciate even when I am getting my knuckles rapped. But there is no warmer feeling than to pull out of my Post Of fice box a handwritten note or card, knowing someone took the time and effort to compose their thoughts and then went to the trou ble to mail it to me. I answer all my emails. I am also trying to an swer all tire cards and letters, as well. You de serve it. Try convincing to day's generation that there was anything positive about having one black rotary-dial telephone in the house with no speed dial, voice mail or Caller ID. If someone called and they got a busy signal or there was no one at home, they just called back. No big deal. Also, we did not have to endure robocalls try ing to get us to renew the warranty on a car we no longer own or restructure tire debt on a credit card we don't have. Today, everyone seems to have a cell phone at their ear, even folks walking their dog. What is so important? Can't it wait? Recently, I ob served a well-dressed couple with three teen age sons come into tire restaurant where I was dining, all absorbed in tap-tapping on their individual cellphones and not acknowledg ing each other's pres ence. They paused long enough to order their food and then went back to their screens. Maybe they were talking to each other. There is proba bly an app for that. I grew up in a world without tire benefit of a hundred zillion chan nels of television tripe, featuring zombies and the F-word and biased talking heads yelling at each other. I grew up when spam didn't clog your inbox. Instead, you fried it and served it with eggs and grits. I grew up without the presence of social me dia where gutless peo ple go to spew their venom anonymously. I grew up when we knelt for prayer and not the National An them. I grew up going to church because I be lieved in God. I still do. Looking back on those days maybe they weren't as perfect as I make them out to be, there wasn't a whole lot negative about them, either. Of that, I anr positive. You can reach Dick Yarbrough at dick@ dickyarbrouglr.com; at P.O. Box 725373, Atlan ta, Georgia 31139 or on Facebook at www.face- book.com/ dicky arb. The Forest-Blade ©2021 All rights reserved. Gail Williamson, Editor / Publisher Whitley Clifton, Newsroom Editor Emanuel County Newspaper, Inc. 416 W. Moring St., P.O. Box 938 • Swainsboro, GA, 30401 Telephone: 478-237-9971 • Facsimile: 478-237-9451 Internet: www.EmanuelCountyLive.com news@emanuelcountylive.com • advertising@emanuelcountylive.com © 2021 Emanuel County Newspapers, Inc. The entire contents of this newspaper are copyrighted. Any reproduction or dissemination without the express written consent of the publisher is strictly prohibited. We welcome Letters to the Editor from our readers. However, due to increas ing production costs, we must request that letters be kept to approximately 350 words. All letters must be signed by at least one person. Address and telephone number of the writer should also be giv en. The Blade reserves the right to edit let ters and limit the number of letters on any one subject from any one person. CYAN-AOOO MAGENTA-OAOO BLACK 012908
