{"id":1069,"date":"2012-05-20T03:31:53","date_gmt":"2012-05-20T03:31:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/2009\/05\/20\/the-tree\/"},"modified":"2017-03-30T21:36:27","modified_gmt":"2017-03-30T21:36:27","slug":"the-tree","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/2012\/05\/20\/the-tree\/","title":{"rendered":"the tree"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><center><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-content\/grandpa3.jpg\" alt=\"Grandpa in the Bowler Hat\" \/ border=0\/><\/center><\/p>\n<p>Last night I had a dream about a man.   <\/p>\n<p>He told me about his life. How he was born in his momma\u2019s bed, and raised in the cornfields.  His daddy was a farmer.  From way back.   <\/p>\n<p>\u201cOne day daddy\u2019s gonna die in that corn.\u201d  He looked at me and winked.  \u201cBut not until I die first.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p>He talked about his brothers.  How he watched them being pulled under by the river.  How he wondered what it would be like.  To be gone.  Just like that.   In a flash and in a flood. Boys.  Buried in a watermelon patch.  <\/p>\n<p>He carried a camera.  Wanted to teach.  To write.  He took my hand.  In long, slim lines we drew his name in the dirt.   I asked if he knew my name.  He said one day, part of him would.  But not yet.  <\/p>\n<p>He liked fancy suits.  Vests and jackets and bowler hats.  Red ties.  <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019ll show up better.  After I\u2019m dead.\u201d  <\/p>\n<p><em><center>He hands me the camera.  I take his picture.  He looks like <a href='http:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/05\/bj4.jpg' title='BJ4'target=_blank><strong>my brother<\/strong>.<\/a> <\/center><\/em><\/p>\n<p>He said he had a wife.   She liked to laugh.  She worried.  He knew why.  <\/p>\n<p>He sang about how hard things were.   Constant sorrow.  Hell on Earth.  Whiskey in a bottle. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cSometimes people need to believe.  That it cant get any worse.  Even if somewhere, somehow, it gets better.\u201d   He just wanted to run.  \u201cI didn\u2019t know.\u201d  He looked at me and cried.  \u201cNo one ever told me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I said it didn\u2019t matter.  Because someone knew.  Even if he didn\u2019t.  Everything would be okay.  <\/p>\n<p>He said he liked blue.  The color of his baby\u2019s eyes.  <\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019ll show up good in pictures.  Even after he\u2019s gone.\u201d  <\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last night I had a dream about a man. He told me about his life. How he was born in his momma\u2019s bed, and raised in the cornfields. His daddy was a farmer. From way back. \u201cOne day daddy\u2019s gonna die in that corn.\u201d He looked at me and winked. \u201cBut not until I die<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dreams","category-fiction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1069"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1069\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6158,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1069\/revisions\/6158"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.buffyholt.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}