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Memphis, TN - Sue and I enjoyed our first home football game this weekend, but it was too hot to really feel like football weather. It was fun to be enjoying football seasaon again though.Please include your class year and school (if it is not Lee) when you email me.I was channel surfing the other night, going back and forth through my favorite channels when I kept coming upon the movie from which this week's Mystery Photo was taken. Each time I got to the movie I would stop and watch a few minutes, knowing that one of my favorite parts was about to come up. I got to thinking about the movie and wondered if I could come up with a list of five of my favorite scenes from it. There were so many that I finished the list easily. I'm not going to ask you to give me five, but can you (off the top of your head) come up with the name of this movie and your one most-favorite scene in the movie? I'd be interested in knowing.Now the movie did not come out until 1969 so that is a little past most of our years at Lee, but it is such a classic that I ask your forgiveness this time.What's the movie and what was your favorite scene or dialogue?Class year and school with emails please.Last week I asked for some stories about you first kiss. Below are two which I received from classmates.I would like to hear some more stories, if any of you are brave enough (or have enough grey cells remaining to remember).
I have my own personal story about the “hawkbill” knife that came to mind when I put the picture of one as the Mystery Photo last week. While this might not be a story of interest to many of you, I think a small group might appreciate it.I was introduced to and had most of my association with knives when I was in the Boy Scouts. I had a nice “Boy Scout Pocket Knife” and I used it on all my camping trips. I never carried it in town and in my Scout troop we were not even allowed to bring them with us to our weekly meetings. The thing was for camping only and that was the only time I carried one on my person.I was comfortable and skilled with the Scout knife and could whittle and open cans and bottles and even used the leather awl on many occasions while in the woods. I was taught to respect knives and to be careful with them. I never carried a knife for a weapon or even for self-defense – except one time. Looking back it was a scary event that could have changed my life forever.The setting was the National Guard Armory on Dallas Street. It was a Thursday night; I know because I had just finished watching the wrestling matches with a “friend” of mine. I put friend in quotes because we had only been friends for a summer and the fellow was one of the hoods that did carry knives. It is a long story and you’ll have to read my book to know the background on how Benny became a friend and how he became a “non-friend” later in our relationship.Anyway, Benny had met me at the wrestling match and when it was over, probably around 10pm, we were saying goodbye before he walked to his house up by Maple Hill Cemetery and I walked to mine on McCullough. It was not a long walk home, but I had to cut down some very dark streets and through a questionable neighborhood on the way. We had stood there talking long enough for the armory to be closed and we were the only two left on the street.When I told Benny the route I planned to take home he said, “Wait a minute, I have something to loan you.” He reached in his pocket and pulled out a hawkbill knife. He had been carrying it the whole night and I did not know it. I explained that I did not need a knife but he would not take “no” for an answer and he made me take it with the promise to return it during the daylight hours the next day.The one he gave me was one that would not fold up and I think it was used for cutting carpets. It was a cool fall night, so I stuck the thing in my light jacket pocket and we both headed our own ways. I started walking down Howe Avenue, headed toward Five Points on a route that I had taken many times with no thought of a problem.I had not gone a full block that night when I saw ahead of me the silhouettes of a group of people coming toward me. The street was dark and the only light was a distant one behind them, so it gave them an eerie look, like they were coming in out of a mist.I put my hand in my pocket and grasped the knife handle in my palm when I got close enough to see that they were not people that would normally travel in my social circle – definitely not Boy Scouts! As I passed by them I saw it was two teenage males and their dates. I felt a little better when I saw they had female companions and was not just a gang of boys.That good feeling faded fast when they had no sooner passed me when the two males broke away from the girls and tuned to get in trail behind me. One of the guys hollered a rough “Hey you!” and my heart froze. My grip tightened as well.He called a second time and I turned to face the two thugs (with the confidence of the knife still in my hand inside my pocket) and answered his call with a firm “What?” I guess I did not show the fear he expected. He just smiled and in a joking matter said to me “I just wanted to see what you would do.” He and his friend turned and left me standing there and walked back to the giggling girls and they went on their way.I think I ran the rest of the way home, all the time wondering myself what I would have done had Benny not forced me to take his hawkbill knife with me and even more, what I would have done if I had really needed to protect myself. I should have felt good for obeying the Scout motto "Be Prepared" but the events of that night haunted me for years.
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