I Thought I Heard the Angels Cry

It was one of those days in late August. It was hot and it had not rained in a month. The crops in the fields were withered and dying. School would be starting soon and I was glad. Living on a farm two miles from the nearest neighbor meant I had no one to play with during summer vacation. That meant I could only play with my younger sister. A boy can’t have a lot of fun playing with his sister. Yes, I would be happy when school started. I liked school, not just recess. We learned interesting things about foreign countries and did science experiments. And once a month the bookmobile came. I liked books about famous men, presidents, inventors, and others. You could check out magazines too. Popular Mechanics was one of my favorites.

On this particular day I was riding my bike in the front of the house when I saw someone coming toward the house on that red dirt road. There were two figures on bicycles. As they got closer I could tell it was two boys from school. I quickly hid my bicycle behind the house. You see, my bicycle was a 26 inch girl’s model. Daddy had gotten it from Uncle Jake when his daughters no longer wanted it. Daddy really did not have the money to buy me a new one but he painted up the old one to look like a new one. But it was a girl’s bike. When you are a ten-year-old boy, you don’t want to be seen riding a girl’s bike. The boys coming up the road would never know I had a girl’s bike.

As they got closer I recognized the bike riders. Two boys from school, one was a year older and one a year younger than me. I did not care for them that much, but anyone to play with was better than my sister. They were the rich boys at school. Their father, Mr. Beaufort MacDonald, owned a lumber company.  His company turned trees into lumber from which people built houses, barns, and stores. They wore Wrangler western jeans. The other boys like me wore Red Camel jeans. That’s what the sons of farmers and factory workers wore.They were closer now. I could tell they were riding their new English touring bicycles they had received for Christmas. They had skinny tires and three speed gears. And hand brakes too. They were beautiful machines. They lay the beautiful machines under the front yard. The bikes had no kickstands. 

Frank spoke, “Hey, Tony, I told Joe we should ride over to see you.”

“It was quite a ride. The new bikes are great, fast and easy to pedal. You should get your Dad to get you one,” Joe said. It was a joke that was not funny. He knew boys whose fathers farmed or worked in factories couldn’t buy their sons expensive bicycles. 

“Maybe,” I said, trying to put up a big front. 

Frank, the older and bigger of the two, spoke next, “Tony, why don’t you show us that guitar of yours. You’ve told us all about it at school but we’ve never seen it. Come on! Let’s see it!”

“ Allright,” I said. At least they wouldn’t be bragging about the bicycles.

I ducked into the house and grabbed my guitar. 

“Got company, huh!” Momma said as I was walking through the semi-darkness of the living room. We didn’t turn on any lights during the day.  It saved on the electric bill and with the windows and the doors open there was enough light inside. 

“Yes, Ma’am, boys from school,” I answered without breaking my stride.  

I went down the front steps two at the time to rejoin Frank and Joe under the big oak tree. I was beaming. 

It had taken a lot of work to earn that guitar. About six months ago I was visiting my cousins in a nearby town when I saw this ad on the back of a Blackhawk comic book. The ad read: “Kids make money or earn great prizes selling seeds from the Great American Seed Company”. One of the prizes pictured was a guitar. I had always wanted a guitar. I had seen Gene Autry and Roy Rogers play guitars in the movies. It took me about three months to sell enough seed to earn a guitar. It wasn’t easy selling seeds to farmers. But I did it! I loved that guitar. It had pictures of cowboys and Indians on it and came with a song book  and instructions. Soon I was 

“Let me hold it, “ Frank said. 

He turned to his brother and showed it to him. And then they burst into laughter as they looked at me!

I was in shock. I was speechless. Why were they laughing, I thought.

“This is not a real guitar,” Joe said, “ This thing is made of cardboard, real guitars are made of wood!”

I had never seen a real guitar. I had only seen them in the movies I attended with my grandmother. I wrenched the guitar from Joe’s hands and ran toward the house. I felt my face turn red and I could feel tears forming in my eyes. But I stopped in my tracks when I heard a deep baritone voice behind me. 

“What’s wrong, Master Tony? Is dem boys bothin you?”

It was Old Theo. I had been so busy with Frank and Joe and had not heard Old Theo approach. He stopped his horse and cart on the red dirt road in front of the house. Old Theo was only fifty feet from our front porch. He was a big man, topped by the passage of time, but his shoulders were broad and the sleeves of his faded chambray almost burst when he flexed his arms. I turned and walked toward the man stepping down from the horse drawn cart. 

 “Yessir, Nossir! These boys are making fun of my guitar,” I said.

I heard Joe say to Frank, “ Did you hear him say ‘sir’ to a colored man?”

My folks always told me to respect my elders. They never told me what color they had to be. Old Theo walked toward me. His beard and tufts of hair peeking out from under a battered felt fedora was white as cotton.His skin was ebony and glistened in the sun. A big grin emerged from the shade provided by the brim of a battered felt hat. There was something about him seemed to have descended from royalty in that far off dark continent we had studied about in geography class at school.  

“Lemme see dat git-tar, Master Tony,” Old Theo said. 

He took the guitar from me and walked over and sat down on the stump of a big oak tree that Momma had cut down. The hard packed clay around the stump was swept clean. He adjusted the tuning keys on the guitar a bit and reached into his pocket and brought a piece of a bottleneck and slipped it over the middle finger of his left hand. My guitar was dwarfed in his  huge hands. His eyes were closed as he began to play. 

And then he started to play. I had never heard any music like he played. I looked back toward the house and saw my mother behind the screen door with my new baby brother in her arms. She was wearing a the new feed sack dress she had just finished making. I had helped Daddy pick out that particular bag of hog feed down at the hardware store. I could see old Aunt Cindy in the shadows beside her. She was helping out Momma with the new baby. Couldn’t see much of her in the dark, except the whites of her eyes. I heard her tell Momma. 

“Dat music is da blues…it makes me wanna cry!”

She was right. It was the saddest music I had ever heard. I’m sure the angels in heaven were crying. 

That was long ago. Old Theo has been dead and buried for many years. My brother has grandchildren and lives in Michigan. And I never learned to play the guitar. But, I will always remember the day… I thought I heard the angels cry.