Who Knows Where The Time Goes?

"Who knows where the time goes?"  I urge you to step out of the shadows and offer an answer...  Surely everyone has a notion about the passage and disappearance of time.  I know I am in the present and yet, suddenly, I'm in the future.  Or is it the past where I find myself standing?

I'm having difficulty grasping that more than six months have vanished since I last sat down to listen to my thoughts and 'talk' back to them.  The evidence tells me it is so...  Wow!  The year 2013 has morphed into 2014 in the revelry of another New Year's Eve come and gone.  That's a fact!  Wait, I'm thinking, don't confuse me with facts.  Much has happened around me in this time...time gone...

Across the evening sky all the birds are leaving

But how can they know it's time for them to go?

Before the winter fire, I will still be dreaming

I have no thought of time

For who knows where the time goes?

Who knows where the time goes?

I have had many thoughts of time, but then there have been those times when I have had "no thought of time."  Life's endeavors take time.  The 'things' we do absorb time as a sponge soaks up a spill.  I know the phrase "time is money," but I have been caught up in a moment when time has had no value.  I work to live; I don't live to work... Yet, in instances, I have lost sight of that personal mantra when the day's work has captured all of my attention.  And the time slips away, quietly, into life's shadows.

Today is Groundhog Day.  In giving time some thought, I recall the movie "Groundhog Day" that starred Bill Murray as a weatherman caught up in a 'time loop.'  Murray's character relived the same day over and over again with seemingly no consequences when he altered the pursuits of his 'new' day.  The tedious experience causes the Murray character to reexamine his life and to redirect the focus of his life, which must have been the catalyst to breaking the 'time loop' and allowing time to begin a new day.  I am thinking all have had similar "Groundhog Day" experiences requiring our focusing anew on that which is most important in order to restart our life.  And that which is 'most important' is the relationships we share with loved ones, family and friends.

On this day it has been snowing on the bluff since mid morning.  The "evening sky" approaches.  I have witnessed bird's "leaving" familiar surroundings.  Where are they going?  How did they know it was time to leave?

Sad deserted shore, your fickle friends are leaving

Ah, but then you know it's time for them to go

But I will still be here, I have no thought of leaving

I do not count the time

For who knows where the time goes?

Who knows where the time goes?

The latter days of 2013 and early days of 2014 have passed by marking time and serving as a witness to friends of mine deserting this life's shore in search of a life everlasting.  While most everyone is subject to changing interests, I would not employ the word "fickle" to describe my friends as the songwriter did.  But then the relationship depicted in the song is with the "shore" and not another being.  In such context, I suppose I have been a fickle one with respect to the 'shores' on which I've trod or the communities in which I've lived.  I attempt to see things as they are intended to be seen knowing full well I am often viewing them from a far different vantage point from another.  Much like experiences in time, they can be so very different for each one living in a certain moment.

Time...seconds ticking endlessly...until it's time to leave...and then..."who knows where the time goes?"  Since I last gathered my thoughts, Joan and Tom Curtner, Betty Jo Richolson, James Spencer, Sam Boyce, Jenny Bennett, Tommie Adams, Sonny Lane, Mary Ivy, John Larson, Tiny Crabtree, Pete Guinn, Bob Patterson... all friends from my hometown of Newport, have let go the hand of loved ones still standing on life's 'shore' and pushed their skiffs into the waters drifting toward the everlasting.  Each one gifted precious memories prior to their departure.  

Memories... Time...  Kathryn and I have become fans of the 'period' television series "Downton Abbey."  On a recent episode, Mr. Carson, the butler, observed, "the business of life is an acquisition of memories.  In the end, that's all there is."  Such is friendship.  Such is love.

I'm remembering...  In early October, my aunt, Patsy Meacham Bowie Fyles, my mother's youngest sister, departed this life at 78 years young.  She was the thirteenth child of fourteen born to Rossie Belle and Charlie Meacham, my maternal grandparents, and finished high school in Manila, Arkansas in 1954.  A little over a year later she moved to Newport.  Aunt Patty lived with my family for six years until she married Max Owen Bowie, Sr. in 1961.  She worked at the First National Bank in Newport while she lived with us.  I like to think that she was the earliest influence on my choice of a banking career.  When my sister, Lana, and I were children, we spent lots of time in the company of our Aunt Patty.  Some of my more vivid memories in her company was watching late night television, especially 'scary movies.'  It was Aunt Patty who  introduced me to Boris Karloff as Frankenstein, Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula, and Lon Cheney, Jr. as the Werewolf.  She, in essence, taught me not to be afraid of the dark.  I'm pretty sure her encouraging words didn't 'sink in' with sister Lana since she still sleeps with the light on.  My heart is with Aunt Patty's children, my cousins Max Bowie, Jr. and Ann Bowie Breckenridge, her grandchildren, and her sole surviving sister, my aunt Laura Meacham Hutton.  Sweet memories...

I'm remembering...  a week following my Aunt Patty's death, I received the heart wrenching news that my fun loving friend, John Vinson, had 'cashed in his chips' and walked away from life's game of chance at the age of 62.  John and I worked together at the Arkansas State Bank Department in the mid '70s and shared a love of music that bonded us together.  Bonding together two boys, one from Newport and the other from Batesville, takes a bit of work...and a lot of love and laughter.  And did we share a lot of laughter!  John and his beautiful bride, Cecilia, were fantastic golfers with whom it was much fun to 'play a round.'  Now many of our friends might have written that Cecilia and John were fun to play a round of golf 'with.'  But not me, for you must know that one of John's 'pet peeves' was hearing someone end a sentence with a preposition.  Newport plays a supporting role in the Cecilia and John Vinson love story...their first date was at the Silver Moon in November 1977.  I just happened to be in the crowd that evening with my friend John.  My heart is with Cecilia, their children Shannon and Josh, their grandchildren, John's brother Buddy, and his sisters, Martha and Jane, as well as John's faithful dogs.  Possibly it was John's love for dogs more than his love of music that sealed our bond.  Fun filled memories... 

I'm remembering... on December 30, just moments after Kathryn and I arrived home from a Christmas time visit with her family in Dallas, I received a phone call from my life long friend Ann Gardner Hearn.  Ann was the bearer of heartbreaking news...our forever friend, Donny "Rooster" Appleton, had suddenly left us behind...

And I am not alone while my love is near me

I know it will be so until it's time to go

So come the storms of winter and then the birds in spring again

I have no fear of time

For who knows how my love grows?

And who knows where the time goes?

Ann, Donny, and I 'grew up' together in the southern most block of Newport alongside others our age, Jenetta Ashley and David Sibley.  I moved into the neighborhood the middle of our first grade year at Walnut Street School, which was a healthy seven block walk away.  Coincidentally, all of us were in the very same first grade class taught by Mrs. Helen Shoffner.  The 'kids' in that first grade class make up the nucleus of my closest friendships and Donny Appleton was at the core. 

Donny's wonderful wife, Robin, entrusted me to speak at his memorial service on January 4 at Newport's First Presbyterian Church.  A lifetime of memories dashed across my heart and through my mind.  I so appreciate the privilege Robin granted me to share such memories possessed.

Donny is thirteen days younger than I.  In our youth, one might say we were joined at the hip.  Pretty much inseparable the first twenty years of our lives.  It is impossible to recount all our time together in any forum.

The day following the news of Donny's death, I drove down to Newport to visit his mother, Ms. Mildred.  On the drive, my mind wandered to another time...  Was it then or is it now?  Once there in Ms. Mildred's presence, I found myself firmly astraddle the present and the past.  As a boy, I am confident I spent more time in her home than I did my own.  The Ashley's back yard and a narrow alley way were the only pieces of ground separating my house from Donny's.  The path between was worn bare.  Our neighborhood was the perfect playground for kids from blocks around.  The levee formed the south boundary, Lacy's farm sat west across the street from my house on South Main Street, Remmel Park was two blocks to the northeast of Donny's house, and the pathway to Walnut Street School and downtown Newport was due north.  

Much of the time was spent playing on the levee or beyond in the woods.  Everyone in town came to slide down the levee and the kids in our neighborhood were the hosts.  Waxed boxes from Purdy's Flower Shop made the best 'sleds' on summer days and store bought sleds or metal garbage can lids were best when winter brought us snow.  The snow continues to fall on this day upon the bluff near Norfork triggering memories of youthful days in Newport on the levee with my pal, Donny, and our gang.  Time... I'm in the present, yet I'm in the past.

Just a few weeks back in late November, another member of 'our gang,' Margaret Ann Gillihan Snow, posed a question on Facebook asking her friends where they were when they heard about President John F. Kennedy's assassination.  Margaret Ann reported she was in Mrs. Dely Breckenridge's sixth grade class at Gibbs Albright School in Newport playing jacks indoors at recess due to inclement weather.  I promptly replied that I was in that same sixth grade class, but did not think I was playing jacks.  And then Donny jumped into the 'conversation' through Robin (Margaret Ann's and my Facebook friend) reminding me of the 'rest of the story.'  Shortly after learning of the Kennedy assassination, classes in the Newport schools were dismissed.  Donny and I began our walk home just like any other day except earlier.  There was an 'attractive nuisance' in the form of a trampoline in the Ridley's yard on Erwin Street on our route home.  We took advantage of our 'early' day and started our play on the trampoline as any young boys would do.  Quickly, Mrs. Ridley came to her door and shouted at us to "get on home" and proceeded to tell us how disrespectful we were in light of the day's event.  We were a bit miffed, but we 'respectfully' left the scene and made our way on home.  We were most always respectful even in those instances when we disobeyed an adult command.  Just boys looking for fun...  

We didn't look for 'trouble,' it just had its way in finding us.  Mischief was our friend!  The stories of trouble found and messes made will remain sealed for another fifty years to protect the not so innocent and the reputations of our mothers.

In recent conversations with Gene "Bean" Bennett and Carl Cross about days gone by, we reminded ourselves of the good fortune of tightly holding on to our 'army' of childhood friends.  "Bean" and I were joined at Donny's memorial service by my wife Kathryn, and many in that 'army' of friends including Ann Gardner Hearn and husband Frank, Gail Thaxton Fogleman and husband Frank, Ruth Johnston, Margaret Ann Gillihan Snow, Billie and Kenny Thaxton, Margie and Danny Cordell, Melody and Mike Fortune, Bobby Joe Forrester, Janice and Rick Wiggins, Mike Brand, John Sink, John Brownd, Bud Conner, Phil Madison, Debbie and Terry Dillon, Vickie Cordell, Thelma Ruddell Welch, Lee Scoggins (Terry Scoggins' widow), Jeannine Pender and Candy Crawford Wilkerson (Eddie Crawford's widow and sister, respectively).  The parents of several in 'our gang' were also present among a crowd of friends of the Appleton family.
 
It was a good day in Newport...  My heart remains there with Donny's wife Robin, his daughter Mille Alderman and her husband Kyle, Donny's mother Mildred, sister Jane Bratton, sister Rosemary McGinnis and her husband Paul, brother Jimmy Appleton and his wife Donna, and his nieces.   A lifetime of memories...

The snow is falling more gently now.  Not only is it Groundhog Day it is Super Bowl Sunday.  Super Bowl XXXXVIII!  Has it really been 47 years since the Packers beat the Chiefs on January 15, 1967 in Super Bowl I?  Has it been more than 50 years since President Kennedy was assassinated on a November day in 1963?  And 50 years since the Beatles arrived in the USA to jumpstart the British Invasion on the Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964?  I'm fairly confident that I was in the company of my forever friend Donny Appleton at the time of each of those historic happenings.  Seems like only "Yesterday," when "all my troubles seemed so far away..."  

For who knows how my love grows?

And who knows where the time goes?

In 1967, the year in which Super Bowl I was played, Sandy Denny penned the song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"  Judy Collins covered the song and released it in 1968.  Sandy Denny joined the group Fairport Convention that year as lead singer and made "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" a signature song.  She is the only person to have sung with Led Zeppelin in the studio as a guest vocalist when she joined Robert Plant to sing "The Battle of Evermore" on Led Zeppelin IV in 1971.  Sandy Denny died in 1978 at age 31 and was laid to rest on my friend Donny Appleton's birthday that year.

"Who knows where the time goes?"  When I awake tomorrow morning could it possibly be today again as in the movie "Groundhog Day?"

I think I will get back to the "business of life..."  Acquiring memories is an exciting and fun pursuit.  After all, "in the end that's all there is."

I'm Miles from Nowhere......guess I'll take my time...  "And who knows where the time goes?"

joe