Part One of a Trilogy
The dominoes circled on the black slate table like so many milling Angus cows. They clacked and rattled beneath the dry hard hands of the old men that knew everything. The room was stark and undecorated with a high ceiling, concrete floor, numerous tables, a beer cooler, and pool tables in the front. It was one of the churches of my youth. Here I listened, watched, and gained morsels of gold about horses, cattle, crops, the weather, and how to be a man. Here I heard the gospels and philosophies of the WWII generation and the last men to savor free air before the industrial revolution.
Also, a filter was acquired to dis cern the lessons of the disciples from the grunting proclamations of the beer hogs. A wise child kept his mouth shut and absorbed knowledge and perspectives otherwise lost. Less studious children were not invited and counted as absent from this upper- level education. Mostly, they were ushered to the play yard or left to peer from under their mama’s aprons – sentenced to mediocrity. They would later suffer the Blue Sky (BS) salesman prevalent in modern settings.
