It’s in a cardboard box at the camp, waiting to be rehung after some renovations gone awry—an oval wooden sign.
My grandfather hung the whimsical phrase over the mantel, just above the Remington pump-action model 12—.22 caliber rifle he bought at a pawn shop in Norwich, Connecticut, for three bucks in the early thirties.
A phrase so catchy that I think about it often, and it woke me up this morning, an hour before my normal rise and shine time.
“Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday, and everything is fine.”
It’s not a verse from the bible, I know. But it’s definitely divinely inspired. It has to be. It’s a synopsis, maybe more of a conglomeration, of a multitude of scriptures scattered about in the good book.
When you wake up early, still worried, it’s a phrase that’s catchy enough to give you a boost while waiting for whatever life has most recently utilized to kick you square in the biscuits.
I’ve got the rifle, too. Target practice, shooting at aluminum soda cans, is darn good therapy for whatever ails you.
When I was about nine or ten, Gramp took me to the edge of the field, near the dark green woods, and we shot (and lit) the tips of wooden matchsticks stuffed into the cracks on the top of a graying cedar fence post. We then took the burned matches and placed them in a water bucket to be sure to keep Smoky Bear happy.
It’s the only time the old fire chief would allow me to play with matches. He gave no quarter when it came to fires or firearm safety. Every sentence held a lesson, kindly given, but a lesson nonetheless.
His sense of humor was that of a Salvation Army officer, turned Fire Chief, who became a Nazarene minister in his retirement years. There were no off-color jokes, nothing sacrilegious. I recall some pretty horrible puns.
I recall shortly before his death, he came to my Mama’s to have some birthday cake, maybe his birthday, I don’t recall.
There was sliced sharp cheese on the table and a few red grapes on the plate as well.
I picked up a piece of cheese, bit it, and then looked at him, saying, “What a friend we have in cheeses,” trying some wordplay based on a common hymn at church.
Without missing a beat, Gramps grabbed a grape from the plate and popped it into his mouth. He looked me in the eye and said, “All our sins and grapes to bear.”
You’d have to know the hymn to enjoy the levity in that moment.
I laughed then, and sometimes I laugh now when I think of that mischievous twinkle in his blue eyes.
So, today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday, and everything is going to be fine.
I can feel it.
From the Jagged Edge of America, I remain,
Just,
TC
Thank you to my BuyMeACoffee members, your donations to the cause of writing for a living on the Interweb keep the train a rolling. Even with the spring and summer drop-off in donations, and probably a bit to do with the economy and the price of eggs, many of you continue to be generous and kind. Thank you so much. It seems when I lose a few from the monthly-giving-tribe, someone else shows up to pick up the slack. It doesn’t go unnoticed, and I am humbled by your gracious support for the writing. Thanks for buying the books, too. It all adds up to getting more gibberish from the mope from Maine. Be well. Your friend, TC