By Anita Garner
I’m sharing office space right now with stacks of scrapbooks and photo albums, with boxes and bins filled with photos, searching for pictures meant to be in my new book.
My forthcoming book (“forthcoming” is such a lovely word) will contain photos and the publisher’s waiting for me to decide which ones. I’ve decided. I just can’t find them.
There’s no shortage of pictures available, but I have specific memories in mind. Later, The Glory Road website will be updated for the book’s release and there’ll be room for lots more there, but where are the ones I’d set aside for the book? They were here a few days ago.
It’s time to invoke St. Anthony (specializing in finding lost objects) and St. Jude (specialist in hopeless causes.) When we lived in Louisiana Bayou country, all my friends were Catholic. I envied them their array of saints who are apparently available all the time. We little Pentecostal preachers’ kids were advised to talk to Baby Jesus, but then we were also cautioned about when we should and shouldn’t be specific with our requests so we weren’t always sure we were doing it right. With St. Jude or St. Anthony you can say, “Will you help me find my keys?” and sometimes they will.
I don’t want to put things away until I find what I’m looking for. In old movies, Irish characters sometimes said, “Saints preserve us!” If the saints know exactly where my misplaced photos are, this would be a good time to show me. I’ll be most grateful.
******