Beauty is in the eye of the beholder

There in among the weeds was a flower, a big White Flower. It was so white that to me it looked like it was sparkling. I dropped my books and went scrambling though the weeds and briars to the big White Flower. I pulled it and I know that my face lit up. I remember that my mother had said things work out for the best and it had, I now had the prettiest flower in the group of kids. I grabbed my books and started to run. The others were already inside. They were lined up giving their flowers to the teacher. She would take a flower cut it and place in a vase. I went running in to where all the kids could see my flower. I was standing holding my flower with a smile on my face. The girl that was called a snob by the other, came running back to me.

She got in my face and yelled to where everyone in the line could hear her: “It’s a weed that you have, a dirty old weed. This is a flower.” And she stuck the red rose in my face. A snicker could be heard from the crowd. She ran back to the front of the line saying “it’s a weed, a dirty old weed.”

The bottom fell out of my world for I thought what I had was the most Beautiful Flower in the world. To find out that it was a weed broke my heart. I remembered I stood there fighting back the tears in my eyes. The rest of the kids had gone in the classroom and sat down. I couldn’t take another step toward the teacher. I had a weed not a flower. How could I give a weed to the teacher?

Then I heard: “Lonie is that beautiful flower for me?”

I looked up and she stood there with a big smile on her face. “Yes, ma’am,” I said extending my hand out to her with the flower in it.

She took it and said “This is the most beautiful flower that I have ever seen. Lonie don’t ever look at the floor again for I want you to remember that you are as good as anyone. Keep your head up and look people in the eyes.”

I watched as she cut the stem off and placed the white flower in the middle of the others. It seemed to glow in among all the different colors. I sat down at my desk and looked at an angel, my fifth-grade school teacher Miss Susie Davis.

Time has a way of healing a hurt when you are young. You keep growing and the hurt will disappear. It may go away but deep in your mind it stays with you. As years pass you push it to back of your mind. My memory of the white flower lay hidden for many a year.

I had been on the police department for a few years when I was in Avery Drug Store which was on the corner of Turner McCall and North Fifth Avenue. I was having a cup of coffee with the owner, who was a good friend of mine. I was sitting behind the counter talking with Leon when two women came over to the counter. They started to talk and I looked at the one who stood silent. I couldn’t believe my eyes for there stood the woman who treated me so mean when I lived in West Rome as a kid. She looked at me and smiled. I knew she didn’t know who I was.

“Leon, who is your friend?” she asked.

“This,” Leon said, “is my best buddy.” “Do I know you?” she asked. I gave her one of my best smiles and said, “I am that Adcock boy you chased out of your yard when I lived on Armstrong Street in West Rome.”

Her face fell and she said “That boy who wore overalls and had a funny hair cut?” “Yes,” I said, “that little skinny boy who wore overalls and had what was called a bowl hair cut back then.”

I watched her face and saw the disbelief in it. I again gave her one of my biggest smiles just to see what would happen. She didn’t say a word, turned and went over to the counter picking up a bar of candy as she went. The other woman went over to her and she said something I couldn’t hear. They then went out the door never looking back. I must have had a smile from ear to ear seeing the look on her face.

You would have thought that the white flower incident was over and forgotten. There is another thing that I must write about the white flower.

I was headed out Shorter Avenue and had stopped the patrol car at Shorter and Horseleg Creek Road at the red light.

Back then, we had numbers on the department that we were called by. My number was 011.

I was called to an accident on the lot of the Alto Shopping Center.

I walked over to the car noticing that it was a new Cadillac and someone had done one heck of a job tearing the fender and the trunk off of it. I didn’t have a chance to speak before she said.

“Did you have to stop off for coffee and doughnuts before you got here?” she asked.

I looked down at my worksheet. From the time I received the call and checked out it had been three minutes. I remember that it hit a sore spot and I turned to answer but stopped dead in my tracks. I looked at the woman and a memory came back to me and it said, “It’s a weed a dirty old weed.”

I asked for her license and began the report. The name on the license matched the little snob that we had in school. She was so much a snob even being married she had kept her last name. I finished the report not saying much. I told her when she could pick up a copy of the report and started to get back in the car. “Hey you can’t leave,” she said. “I have the information for my report. There is nothing else for me to do,” I said.

“What about my car? You can’t leave me here like this. Look at the shape it is in. I cannot drive it looking like that,” she said.

I had never got close enough for her to see my name plate. I went over to where she stood at the back of the car. I made sure she could see my name. A funny look came on her face. She looked as if she was about to cry. LONIE ADCOCK Jim Powell of Young Harris