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CHAPTER FOUR
The Little Orphan Granny and The Real Granville begin their education
The Little Orphan Granny seems to have been born an orphan.
Near to the humble farm close to the Hamlet of Walnut that contained the lair of The Orphan and The Muddy and The Forbidding Giant, there lived, in the Counties of Tippah and Benton in the State of Mississippi, a plethora of Aunts, Uncles, Grandmothers, Grandfathers, Cousins and Others.
The Orphan always saw all of these as through a mist - even the beloved Cousin Neil called “Bitty” (so named because at his birth an unfeeling person said “…This is a little bitty baby…”).
From the beginning, there existed inside The Orphan an alone place where The Real “Granville” lived. In this place was the freedom to be any right thing chosen by The Orphan. In this place only logic, goodness, rationality and clarity of thinking existed.
When the external persona of The Real Granville was exhibited, it was always as The Little Orphan Granny. This Orphan guise was used as a barrier between the world and The Real Granville and could be used to filter the externally imposed “information” and “data” that flowed from the wise mentors as well
as the flawed and limited thoughts from the other “learned” ones (“learned” was most often confused with either the time the “learned” one had been alive or with an accidental phenomenon called “age”).
The Orphan learned quickly to keep The Orphan barrier as a closely guarded secret because, whenever The Orphan expressed the inner thoughts of The Real Granville, those who heard them reacted with “startlements.“
Initially these inner thoughts would escape as a “blurt” from The Real Granville through the barrier and out of The Orphan following some “expert” thought that was so stupid that it screamed its ignorance to all the universe. The Orphan was taught early that many “experts” cherished their “beliefs” and would rise to smite any question (and sometimes the questioner, however
innocent) with the all-consuming fury of the intolerance of any different thought process.
The Orphan had an internal meeting with The Real Granville and made a pact that, for the time being (while The Orphan weighed less than fifty pounds), some filtering of data from The Real Granville and through The Orphan to the outside world was not dishonest. It was important that The Orphan be allowed
to grow up in relative safety.
Later, when The Orphan massed 150 pounds and was well muscled, the final pact was to never filter data at all but always lay it out as the data showed, and to use real data only for good. The mass of The Orphan would later protect him – somewhat.
Neither The Orphan nor The Real Granville had any notion of the weight of the “cross” that the duo had vowed to drag through life - but drag it they did.
It was at this instant in time that The Orphan ceased stuttering forever.
Now, The Orphan, as the protector of The Real Granville, could go forth safely to all of the world that he could reach and learn. It was acceptable to learn the real, the unreal, the false, the wrong, the old, the new, the not-yet-learned and the needs-to-be-learned. The Orphan met internally at least
once each day with The Real Granville and they organized all of the additionally gained data in a manner such that it was in place in the internal files in the correct category and organized such that the data could be retrieved instantly in its entirety.
The Orphan was now ready to learn and went bravely from the loving arms of The Muddy, in a covered wagon, to the first grade of a School, while clutching his lunch in both hands, (but frightened nearly out of his wits so horribly that shallow breathing was all that could be accomplished).
Quickly, a thing called a Recess occurred, which The Orphan confused with Lunch and therefore ate all of his food. Later, when Lunch was called, The Orphan realized what had happened and was hungry. The Orphan decided quickly (as he would through all life) that he had learned enough from school already
and that he did not like being away from The Muddy or from his toys or from readily available cold biscuits and ham.
The Orphan then walked alone the mile back to the lair and went to his favorite places with a biscuit (The Muddy being off doing things like the “washing” and the hoeing and watering of the garden).
Later, when The Muddy discovered The Orphan out happily playing in his comfortable places, The Muddy reacted with a strange form of consternation. When The Muddy heard the story from The Orphan, The Muddy acted stern but hugged The Orphan and cried and laughed and said mysterious things like,
“…but along that busy highway…what will the teacher think…what if you got lost…” (a strange thought - The Orphan knew exactly where he was).
Then The Forbidding Giant came home with the mules from the fields and, after listening to “The Muddy,” gave The Orphan some new thoughts that included an opinion that half of one day in the first grade of school wasn’t enough learning. There were also lurid mental pictures of the rear of The Orphan
changing from a pale white to a seriously red color, and mentions of striped calves from an instrument of torture called a “peach tree switch.”
The Orphan was now firmly dedicated to school and stayed each day until the mule-drawn school wagon (sometimes driven by The Forbidding Giant) returned him home to a grilling of,
“…Well, what did you learn today…?”
And threats like:
“…A whipping at school will get you two whippings at home…”; and
“…I don’t care if the Luna boy did it too – you are a Frazier and you will behave like one…”
Thus began The Orphan’s education.
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