Sunday, May 29, 2005

simon the slopman <--link

When my brother was about ten years old he worked with a man called Simon .Simons job was to collect discarded food from behind schools and restaurants in large barrels to feed to the pigs out in the country that were owned by some white man. this was in the late sixties my brother only did it after school to earn a little money simon was also an alcoholic and one day he began to tell my brother a story. He say, yeah the Germans said they were beating us so bad that we were turning black as it turned out Simon served with a tank battalion in www2 the man that everyone scorned for being a drunk, the man that the kids teased my brother about working for "I hear you work for Simon the slopman" was a veteran my brother said he wondered how a person that did so much ended up with so little its probaly because no one stopped to really talk to him.a few years ago my oldest son sat down to talk with my cousin a vietnam vet they talked for long time my son said. after their conversation my cousin thanked him because he want to talk about his experience for a long time and he was the first person to really listen. We may not agree with wars or their reasons but we must agree that our sons and daughters are our own and we should give them our ears when they need them