The Traveling Man

                                                                                                    The Traveling Man                                                                                July 1, 2024

                                                                               This is only Page 1 Chapter 1 (not the entire Chapter)
                                                                                                              Chapter One

         Back then, it was the three of us: my mother, Janet; my brother, Tommy; and myself, Bobby Harlow. We lived in a modest row home on Main Street up on Mt. Charles. Sadly, in October of '51, my daddy was killed in the Korean War. After Eight months, momma still cried quite regularly; but, so did I!
          That summer my greatest worry was that I’d forget what my daddy looked like; so, every day I looked at his photograph and visited his grave weekly. That was the one thing that kept me on the mountain all these years. I still miss him ! But years later, momma still referred to those early months of the war as the honeymoon period.
         ‘See this necklace!’ While holding the necklace in front of myself, ‘It’s St. Patrick, the patron saint, and my daddy gave this to me before he left for the war – I never took it off ! Each night while I prayed, I held it between my hands. Also, I covered it with my right-hand whenever I made a promise. While I wore this necklace, I felt safe and secure because my daddy was watching over me.‘
          Up on the mountain in those days, we only had two shops: Marty’s General Store, and Zack’s Garage; everything else we had to do was down in Millersburg. All of us grew-up dirt-poor; in fact, most families didn’t even own a car. Our fathers worked in the Kepner’s coal mine, while pointing toward the end of Main street, ‘ down yonder. Everything we owned was in our homes. For most of us, we owned the homes; however, the coal mine owned the land.
          But a year later, the summer of ‘52, once the bodies started coming home the entire topic was taboo. Heck! Even the kids that still had their fathers felt guilty speaking of them around us. We became known as the suffering seven: the misfits !