Monthly Archives: November 2023

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Little Johnny IV

(These are a few more of the Little Johnny stories as I tell them to Anna June. Most of this is true…)

Little Johnny Rides His Bike

Once upon a time, when Little Johnny was about six or seven, he got a new bicycle without training wheels, and he was trying to learn to ride it. It was a little scary, but his Daddy was helping him.

One day they were riding up the dirt road from their house at 400 W. Alden St. in Valdosta, with Daddy holding on and keeping the bike balanced. Johnny was doing pretty good on the way up, and so, on the way back down the road, Daddy turned loose and Johnny was riding along on his own. But then… he got a little nervous and looked back to see if Daddy was still holding the bike, and when he did, he accidentally turned the handlebars a little too much and the bike flipped up and threw him right over the handlebars!

He hit the road right on his forehead, and a nice rock cut his head. Daddy pushed the bike on back to the house as Johnny walked along crying. He was okay; it wasn’t a terrible wound, but he did have a little scar right at his hairline for a long time.

The next day, though, Little Johnny went out and got on that bike and rode it right up the road all by himself! He was so proud and happy, and he rode that bike every day after that.

Little Johnny and the Train Trestle

(This is June’s favorite Little Johnny story.)

One night when Little Johnny was a teenager, he was driving his daddy’s station wagon around the mountain roads near Junaluska, North Carolina, where Johnny and his family were visiting their friends who had a cabin at the lake. He and several of his brothers and his sister Linda and their friend Bunny Anna were all just riding around ‘cuz there wasn’t a lot to do at the lake at night.

They were coming down County Road and everybody was having a nice time, and then Bunny Anna said, “Oh look, here comes the trestle, speed up Johnny!”

So Little Johnny, always hoping to make little Bunny Anna happy, stepped on the gas and the car started speeding along toward the trestle.

“No! No! Slow down! I was just kidding!” Bunny Anna said.

She thought that Johnny knew about the trestle and the curve that was on the other side of it, but he hadn’t done much driving on County Road, so he didn’t remember that curve.

When Anna said to slow down, he tried, but it was too late, he was going too fast!

The little Ford station wagon zipped underneath the old railroad trestle and there was the curve, twisting around to the right. Johnny was trying to slow down and putting on the brakes and turning hard to the right, but the curve was too sharp and he was going too fast! The station wagon crossed the left lane—luckily, there were no other cars coming from the other direction!—and was riding on the left shoulder of the road. Down below was a valley with a river and lots of rocks and Johnny was very afraid, but he kept holding the wheels on the road and finally the car slowed down and was able to get back to his side of the road.

Just a little ways further and there was a place to pull over on the right, so Johnny pulled over and stopped.

Suddenly, everybody started laughing and saying silly things because they were so happy they didn’t fall off the mountain into the valley.

But suddenly Johnny’s sister Linda, who was a very sweet and good little girl, yelled out at them all, “Stop your damn laughing!”

Everybody stopped laughing right away and gasped! They were so surprised, because Linda never, ever had said a bad word before! Everybody started saying sorry and feeling really bad for laughing after they almost died, and Little Johnny especially felt terrible about being so foolish and driving too fast. He promised Linda and all the others that he would NEVER do that again!

J

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Little Johnny III

“Little Johnny and the sad Christmas”

Once upon a time when Little Johnny was about six or seven, he had a very sad Christmas.

Johnny and his family had their last Christmas in their house at 400 West Alden Street in Valdosta, because they were moving to Adel so Daddy could buy the newspaper there. They had a really nice Christmas day and Johnny and his brothers and his sister got some nice toys and had a fun day with the family.

Johnny was really happy, because he got the beautiful Golden Trumpet that he had been wanting for a long time from Santa that morning. It was not a real trumpet, it was just a plastic toy, but it looked like a real trumpet and he could play it like a trumpet.

But just a few days after Christmas, the family packed up all their things and started moving to Adel. They moved all the furniture, including the beds, but they left their clothes and most of their toys all packed up in boxes in the house. Since they didn’t have beds, they spent the night with their friends, the Hamils, and they were going to come back to the house the next day and get all the boxes and finish moving to Adel.

But during the night, they got a phone call from the fire department. The house had caught on fire during the night. The fire department came and put out the fire before everything was burned up, but it got really hot and smokey in the house and a lot of their things were ruined.

One of the things that got ruined was Johnny’s new Golden Trumpet. He was walking around in the smokey-smelling blackened house when he found it, in the box all melted and not even golden any more. He was so sad that even though he was a big boy now, he started crying.

He saw that Mommy was crying too, because her favorite two paintings, Pinky and Blue Boy, were all blackened and wrecked by the smoke and the fire.

Most of their clothes were burned or so smokey they couldn’t keep them, so they had move to Adel with no change of clothes. But all the people in the church in Adel were very kind to them and brought clothes so that everyone had more clothes for the next week.

But nothing replaced that sweet little Golden Trumpet for Johnny, and he always remembered how sad it looked, all melted and wrecked that morning after the fire.

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Little Johnny II

Little Johnny Stories — As told to June by her dad (that’s me!)

“Little Johnny and his Magic Daddy”

Once upon a time when Little Johnny was about 5, he had a painful thing happen, but his Daddy helped him get through it.

Johnny was trying to build a little house in the back yard of their new house in Valdosta, so he was finding things around the yard to stack up. He found an old concrete block in some bushes at the back of the yard, so he decided to add that to his stack. It was heavy, but he managed to get his arm through it and pick it up. He was struggling along headed for his little house, but he got tired and it slipped out of his arms and landed, smash!, right on his toe!

Aiiee! He cried out and headed for the back door. By the time he got inside, he was crying, and his Mommy came out of the kitchen asking him what happened.

He told her about the block, and showed her his toe, which was bleeding a little and looking pretty banged up.

“Oh! Poor little boy! I’m so sorry!” Mommy said. “Let’s get that fixed up!”

So Mommy put some medicine on his toe and a nice big bandaid, and gave him some water. He was still crying a little and his toe was really hurting when his Daddy came home from work a few minutes later.

“Oh no!” Daddy said when he heard the story. “I bet I can make that toe stop hurting!”

So Daddy showed Johnny his “magic jewel” — a pretty red piece of glass that he got down from a shelf. He gave the glass to Johnny to hold, and told Johnny to squeeze it and then give it back to him. Then he told Johnny he was going to make the jewel disappear.

Daddy put the jewel is his hands and moved them around really fast, put them behind his back and then held his hands out in front of Johnny — and there was no jewel! Johnny was amazed. Then Daddy asked him where he thought the jewel was. When Johnny said he didn’t know, Daddy said, “I bet it’s in your ear!”

We’ll, Johnny didn’t believe that, and he laughed, “No!”

But then Daddy held his hand out and reached up to first one ear and then the other, and then he flashed his hand open in front of Johnny and there it was! The jewel was sitting in Daddy’s hand!

“Hey! How’d you do that!” he asked.

“Magic!” Daddy said!

By then, of course, Johnny had forgotten all about his injured toe, and though it still hurt, he felt so much better about the whole situation that he stopped crying, and he and Daddy had a fun time together talking about magic tricks and all kinda of interesting things!