The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1938-07-21

learned something. Robin Hood
became my favorite book. Read
and re-read, it became for me +
symbol of the good man, and emu
lated him in my play fashioning
wooden swords and slaves for bat
tie against unseen and imaginary
foes.
l remember now how great and
difficult things seemed In those ear
ly years, and how easily the same
obstacle was overcome In the latter
ones. And it's always been a
source of wonderment. At ten, the
high school student with his geom-
etry, and algebraic equations, his
profound history of the world SEEM
ed staggeringly cognizant of all that
went on around him. But some
how I mastered those things too,
and they seemed much easier than
anything the smaller mind had
imagined. And so It gees, at %
there are those Things that stagger
the imagination, but once dug into
the job seems to roll along easily
as If some unseen inertia was push
ing it. For me perhaps the great
est disappointment ever suffered
thanks, I'm over it now was the
realization that was not, nor never
would be, any kind of an athlete. =.
Now that was bitter pill to swal-
low when the heroes of the school
were all athletically inclined. And
it bothered me no little. I had ex-
pected that athletics would come
to me just as had many other
things in school and in play. {.
But there was a cog missing some
place. I couldn't even get to be
average in basketball, football, or
the others. Perhaps it was be-
cause I SHE'D from the competitive
angle. Though this is highly COM
petitive world we live In, am fore
ed to completely shut out the rapid
strides of others, quit comparing,
and go blithely along my own path
hoping somehow the job will be ac-
ceptable. But athletics wasn't
for me.
I was 10 when / hit the business
street as a reporter for this paper.
It was a new adventure, and frank.
ly was scared Of the impending
reception imagined. Since then
I've found that the street has been
a thrilling and a pleasant place to
be, and I've found too that kids
don't have all the fun. That
these businessmen on the street are
a lot of boys with the pants longer.
and bigger around the waist-and
they have lot Of fun. I soon
found that all one needed for ac-
ceptance into this crowd of bust
nessmen was work. You took
your place on the street and they
accepted you-much as the gang
did in the younger days. You had
to tell stories with them, hunt, or
fish, or drink coffee, to get into
their circles, but that was all. :.
And there is a romance to be lived
in each one of these businesses and
in the lives their operators lead. :.
That these fellows aren't the stearn
and serious-minded "fogies" we
once pictured them to be. They're
all looking for lot of good times
and they're finding it up here on
the street. To them wars and
rumors of wars and political par
ties and kings and nations aren't
the important thing. But in
quire about little Johnny or how
business is and the man will talk
for hours and with interest about
those things that catch his atten-
ton. . No, these men, one finds
at % when you're trying to make
your way some sort of manhood,
aren't concerned with profound
problems. They like the neighbor-
illness of hanging over the back
fence, or puttering In the garden,
or moving the lawn. -.