My recruit from Clarksdale High School Nathan Omar Kern graduated with his bachelors degree from Jackson State University Friday, december 12, 2014. I was giddy with excitement. This is no ordinary young man. No way. Omar is the grandson of Mr. Adolp Kern who is the central character in a book I am releasing during Black History Month. Most of the characters have names changed to protect the guilty but the Kern family knows, approves, respects and understands that Adolph Carnes in the book is their patriarch Adolph Kern. I recruited Omar at the request of his father who was working at the Governors Mansion in Jackson six years ago during the spring of 2008. His father and grandparents once lived next-door to my family during my early teenage years. They had to be in my books for the following reasons. His grandfather was the hoe filer for plantation cotton choppers while I was water boy. His dad drove one of the Mule Train Wagons from Marks, Mississippi to Washington, DC in 1968. Here is an exciting excerpt from Storm Splitter featuring Omars grandfather. Adolph Carnes squared his squat overall covered body at a right angle in the path of the oncoming dark billowing clouds sparkling periodically with lightning flashes. Temperatures were falling fast. Old man Ezra Turner limping on his elevated left shoe broke the stony silence with a line from a Doctor Watts hymn: “If we ever needed the Lord, we need him now.” On cue, Adolph Carnes lifted the double-bladed axe with the polished hickory handle and held it high above his head. Until this day, no two eyewitnesses among the 32 hoe hands have given creditable yet along identical accounts of what happened next. Some say lightning struck the shining, stainless steel blade on its downward plunge. Others say the axe flashed in reflecting the glow from the lightning. Still others say the axe flew through the air in a shining glide, splitting the top soil, miring itself handle deep in Mississippi gumbo. They all agreed on the rest. The loudest clap of thunder ever heard ensued, rolling and crackling through the afternoon sky like tons of dynamite. Mama Rose fell to the ground like cut spruce. In according fashion, everybody reacted to the astoundingly loud thunder and either fell flat or knelt on the ground. The noise was deafening. Big black rainclouds parted like the Red Sea with heavy rains falling to the north and to the south as the storm came from the west and headed east leaving the cotton choppers as dry as Johnson Baby Powder. Dust devils whirled eerily but only a few drops of rain fell among the awestruck hoe hands. Something out of the ordinary had just happened: Adolph Carnes had just split a storm! Gosh Almighty! Adolph Carnes stood his ground. His eyes covered by dark glasses. He reached in his right back pocket for his red and white Polka-dotted handkerchief. With the finality of a fait accomplis; he wiped his brow, pointed to Water Boy, pointed to the axe, and pointed to the house on the ridge. He then turned and began sauntering nonchalantly to the truck where his soft drink carton and hoe file were stashed. -------------------- Now, you know why I am so attached to Omar Kern. His grandfather by any other name is one of my heroes. As is his father who drove one of 28 mule-drawn wagons from Marks to Washington in 1968. Isnt life exciting?
Posted on: Sun, 14 Dec 2014 11:42:14 +0000
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