Dad was never ordained, but he preached at
a circuit of three churches in rural
We lived in the parsonage at Culloden.
He preached every other Sunday at Culloden or
Yatesville and one Sunday a month he doubled at
They put cornmeal, bacon, smoked sausage, and fresh vegetables
in the back of his car. Lard, flour. There was a well and a pump
a man in the congregation worked on. Bill and I caught fish
in the stocked ponds at the dairies. The ponds were-nutrient rich
from having cow shit hosed in them. Mom didn’t like to
fry fish but Bill and I caught them and cleaned them
and she cooked them. We had a place to sleep
and food to eat and Dad had a car to drive
back and forth to
finishing his classes. During the week
he visited the sick and counseled
the aggrieved and the disturbed.
I don’t remember him marrying
anyone or preaching at anyone’s funeral.
He did baptize a couple of babies.
This year was like something out of a Bergman movie,
for Mom and Dad, but for me and Bill it was like
The Adventures of Huckeberry Finn. Or Andy Griffith.