My past.

About 10 years ago, I selected this photo and used a graphics software program to digitally remove everything but Lawrence Morton standing there in his white farmer’s hat and suspenders.  I then took the image and made it transparent around him.  I then printed his photo on several envelopes, large and small and used one of them to send my resume to a potential employer.

As I recall, I was proud of all of this and to know that this “work of art” on the envelope was something very personal.  To my surprise, as I was showing one of these envelopes to a waitress where I was having breakfast, she said something to the effect, “Oh, look at that poor old farmer.”  Of the many responses that I expected, this was not one of them.  The response caught me off guard, but I sat back, as she walked away, and I took another look at him.

“Yes.  I guess he was a poor old farmer,” but being one of the grandfathers I never knew.  And, that his children, “mom” included spoke so lovingly of him, it would have been difficult to see him as a “poor old farmer.”

He probably worked so hard to support his wife and seven children, of which Mickey, my mother, was the youngest.