By Tom Dodge, KERA 90.1 Commentator
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kera/local-kera-495349.mp3
Dallas, TX –
I grew up in Cleburne and have a lot of pleasant memories of my childhood there. If I'm not careful these keep me from being clear-sighted about it. I know Cleburne is probably better in some ways now than it was in my day. Booker T. Washington school is no more, for example, and the descendants of the boys and girls who went there because of segregation now attend the better schools along with kids of other races.
I love small towns. Did, I should say, until Wal-Mart started savaging them of all their character. The town I live in now is a former small town but is currently in a state of frenzied flux. Soon it will be unrecognizable from Hurst, Bedford, Euless, and all the other former small towns that have become generic suburban confluxes of runaway sprawl. Soon, I am told, there will be a Super Wal-Mart within virtual walking distance of my house.
As anyone knows who drives the Interstates, all the cities have all the same franchises and all look the same. You get the feeling that you might as well have stayed at home. On the back roads, the small towns have antique stores and law offices and boarded-up windows where small businesses of many varieties and theaters and car dealerships used to be. Wal-Mart is criticized nowadays for killing small town businesses and other infractions but franchises of all kinds have diminished us a culture. We emphasize diversity among people but our surroundings are all the same.
I fight this sameness when I can. I buy from small merchants though they're few and far between. I failed to do this though when I broke my glasses the other day. I took them to one of those big optical places and tried to get them repaired. Not possible I was told and furthermore we can't bother with trying to fit your old lenses in new frames. Besides, after five years, I was told, you need new lenses anyway. But I can see fine with these. Sorry, I was told.
So after an assembly-line routine of a hurried eye exam, choosing new frames and various add-ons for the lenses, including a feature that turns them dark in the sun and forking over five hundred bucks, I was all set.
Except that I couldn't see as well as before to read or work on the computer. The assembly-line process fouled up somewhere.
So this where is where my sentiment for the old days came in handy. I remembered that Doctor Bill Jones, an optometrist from the old days, still has his business on the square in Cleburne. He's the only business left though he has moved from the north side of the square to the south side. I remember him from the 1950s, driving his black 1950 Ford convertible and parking it in front on Henderson Street.
As I suspected, I was his only customer. I got the feeling that he still puts on his white coat and goes to work simply out of stubbornness, refusing to let the chains drive him out. "Doc," I said, "can you put my old lenses in some new frames? I can't see worth a flip out of these new five-hundred dollar glasses." He went to the back and returned with some nice-looking frames. "I'll have to make them fit but I can do it," he said. I picked them up three days later and now, for 65 dollars, I can see again.
"You still have that 1950 Ford, Doc?" I said.
"I sure do. I just put five gallons of gas in it this morning. You have to keep fresh gas in the old cars to keep them running right."
I was happy to hear that he still has it. And I'm happy to report that after a visit to Doc Jones I can see a lot clearer now with my old lenses in my new frames.
Tom Dodge is a writer from Midlothian.
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