Vrgabond Editorials

Bv Jack Dionne

Some philosopher of the present school is credited with the remark that "you can't be true to all your friends." He was speaking politically. He might well have said the same for editorial writers who really try to be helpful. Looks like you're always on someone's toes. The only way to escape it is to climb up high on top of the fence, and stay there, making noises like a resounding vacuum-every utterance predicated on policy.

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Somehow I have always entertained the deepest disrespect for that guy who "bends the suppliant knee where favor follows fawning." I'm afraid I'll never get mine that way. I don't subscribe in full to the old editorial adage of "Hew to the line, let the chips fall where they will;" nor to the philosophy of Emerson who said, "Speak what you think today in words as hard as cannon balls, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again though it contradicts what you said today." But I pity the man who, with an arsenal of ideas before him, and a conviction of good to be accomplished by placing truth on parade-fears to speak freely. If you don't like frank utterance on the lumber industry, DON'T read Vagabond Editorials. They try to speak true, and they try to speak fair-but they WILL speak.

The famous Southern *"t""*a Sam Jones liked to tell about the fellow who kept a bushel over his light until his light went out. Along came Sam and kicked over the bushel, and the man discovered his light out, and blamed Sam for putting itout. The light had been out all the time but the fellow didn't know it until Sam kicked the buShel over. ***

A friend of mine has a colored employe. He also has a sense of humor. The other day the colored brother was talking to his boss and he mentioned "the depression." My friend looked puzzled. "What depression?" he asked. The colored one stared at him in amazement. "Why boss," he said "h'it's heah now." {< :t t<

A lot of lumbermen have asked if this depression hasn't dammed up a huge volume of prospective building that must come later. No doubt on earth about it. But the way the depression has dammed building is nothing compared with the way the lumbermen have damned the depression. I've seen some that take all their exercise that way.

More and more frequently, as this cloud through which we have been fighting our way extends itself, I utter that prayer that I have voiced in this space before-"Oh Lord, give rne a sense of humor." Every day I need it morehave tried to use it more.* * *

Not long since I wrote an editorial that I egotistically thought was really a delicious piece of humor. So many people told me it was. And then I got a letter from a man I have never met but whose delightful correspondence I have long enjoyed, and he jurnped all over me with hobnailed boots, for that editorial. So now I'm wondering, has he an undeveloped sense of humor, or must I start branding rny intendea nlmo;ou; remarks?

Oh Lord ! Give us all a sense of humor for this trying period. Help us to meet our daily problems smilingly. For truly a sense of humor is the front and rear bumpers, the balloon tires, and the shock absorbers on the motor car of life. Without it we would shake to pieces in times like these' * * *

Old Father Time, whiskers and cycle and all, is the blX I am betting my money on at present. For Time is the great healer. He heals human woes, human troubles, human ills of all sorts-including panics and depressions. If we can stick to our jobs, do the best we can to keql our little end of the world moving, keep grinning, and keep believing, Father Time will do the rest. Every day he is bringing us nearer to the end of this business cloud., We don't any of us know when it will come, but we DO know that it WILL come-and we believe that it won't be long. ***

The eloquent advice of the late Robert J. Burdette fits well into these days. He advised all men to "think and do and journey but one day at a time-TODAY. Any trnan," he says, "can fight the battles of today. Any woman can carry the burdens of just one day. O friend, it is only when to the burdens and cares of today carefully measured out to us by the Infinite Wisdom and l{iSht that gives with them the promise,'As thy day so shall thy strength be,'we wilfully add the burdens of those two awful eternitiesyesterday and tomorrow-such burdens as only the Mighty God can sustain-that we break down. It isn't the experience of today that drives men mad. It is the remorse for something that happened yesterday, the dread of what tomorrow may disclose. These are God's days. Leave them to Him."

(Continued on Page 8) thehome owner points with justifiable pride to his new oak floors he sees only their finished beauty. But behind the home-building scene must be both good workmanship in laying the dealer, the builder and the owner, for it sells and stays sold.

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