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Location: New Orleans, Louisiana, United States

Leonard Earl Johnson (photo credit Frank Parsley) covered Hurricanes Katrina and Rita (2005), and the 2010 British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico for ConsumerAffairs.com. He is a contributor to Gambit Weekly, New Orleans Magazine, SCAT, Baton Rouge Advocate, Advocate Magazine, The Times-Picayune, Country Roads Magazine, Palm Springs Newswire and the anthologies: FRENCH QUARTER FICTION (Light of New Orleans Publishing), LOUISIANA IN WORDS (Pelican Publishing), LIFE IN THE WAKE (NOLAfuges.com), and more. Johnson is a former Merchant Seaman, and columnist at Les Amis de Marigny, New Orleans; and African-American Village. Attended Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, and Harry Lundeberg School of Seamanship at Piney Point, Maryland. Winner of the Press Club of New Orleans Award for Excellence, 1991, and given the Key to The City and a Certificate of Appreciation from the New Orleans City Council for a Gambit Weekly story on murder in the French Quarter.

Friday, November 01, 2024

βš“FROM JFK to RASPUTIN / November 2024

  

~ Fiction ~

Roman Γ  clef, cher.

Created A. I. free

by Leonard Earl Johnson 

of Lafayette and New Orleans, Louisiana

 www.LEJ.world βœ

πŸ—£πŸ˜·

Your comments and corrections

are welcome

click here


~ * ~     ~ * ~     ~ * ~

πŸ“–
πŸ’› 

Copyright, 2024, Leonard Earl Johnson, All Rights Reserved

βš“

βš“ βš“

November 2024

πŸ’€πŸ’€

πŸ’€

πŸ’§

⭐From JFK to Rasputin⭐

by
Leonard Earl Johnson

Home Reliquary, Lafayette Parish
Photo credit: Frank Parsley

πŸ’”   πŸ’”   πŸ’”
 πŸ’§     πŸ’§
 πŸ’§

In Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, at an antique store where rummaging is encouraged, I found a dime-store memento from the shortened days of John F. Kennedy's presidency (1961 – 1963).

The item is a small glazed rocking chair that looks to be half a pair of salt-and-pepper shakers. It is not. There are no holes and there is no mate. It is a singular thing that would have been bought for very little money and taken home to display on a whatnot shelf ~ a popular home shelving unit since World War II soldiers came marching home expecting a home and
 got one, thanks to a Congressionally mandated liberal G. I. Bill.  They a
lso got an education, a career, and the middle class.

JFK's political inspiration was Franklin D. Roosevelt.  Roosevelt was the Father of the New Deal, a Great Depression weapon designed to un-constipate monetary economics.  

World War Two derailed FDR's liberal New Deal.  The G. I. Bill revived it.  Field-tested and proved it ~ and its handmaiden, John Maynard Keynesian Economics.  It is the G. I. Bill that created our World famous American post-war prosperity. 

"More than it came from guns," Hildegarde Bottlebrush, Housekeeper to the Cathedral's Rector, said to an Uber driver delivering the Rouses Market shopping bag containing a broken green refrigerated alligator brief case, with an empty melted Republican Snowball cube

She waved her hand dismissing the driver

πŸ‘†πŸ‘‹πŸ‘‡

1962 J. F. K. dime-store memento        
             Photo credit: Dave Therrien
The rocking chair is white pottery.
 Stoneware. Nearly porcelain quality. 

There are reddish brown highlights on its arms and rockers, and on the bottom it reads in black lettering: 

"c. ARROW 1962 NYC 
Made in Japan
 
In gold, on the headrest are the initials,
 "J. F. K."

We took it home, rinsed it under the kitchen faucet and placed it on a tea-towel atop the stainless steel drainboard.  

Sitting it there conjured up the President's head resting on the examination table at Parkland Memorial Hospital ~ that day in Dallas, November 22, 1963.  Back when Americans still trusted themselves, and CBS News Anchor, Walter Cronkite comforted us:  

"From Dallas, Texas, the flash, apparently official, President Kennedy died at One p.m., Central Standard Time; Two O'clock, Eastern Standard Time, some thirty-eight minutes ago."

The World learned Kennedy had been assassinated while I was "with my stockbroker," in Springfield, Illinois. I was young and feeling myself firmly on Capitalism's prosperous path ~ had just purchased twenty shares of Saint Louis based Ozark Airlines.

That brisk November day, I walked the few blocks from my broker's office to the Illinois State Capitol.  Where a bronze bigger than life Abraham Lincoln stands yet today, on a pedestal inscribed with his prophetic words, Departing Springfield for Washington, February 11, 1861:

🎩

"I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may return..." 

πŸ’«

The following text message was sent from Amtrak's Sunset Limited, somewhere in Texas.  It was sent
 
Amtrak's Sunset Limited, Westbound  
by the Red-Warrior-Woman who boarded the train in Lafayette, sporting a big red hat and two doting acolytes. 

She sent her text to Hildegarde Bottlebrush,
Housekeeper to The Rector of The Cathedral of Saint John the Evangelist, Lafayette.

"know a good joke about JFK," she texted.
 
"This Conspiracy Theorist dies and goes to heaven, see!

"Saint Peter says to those waiting at The Gate, 'I will now answer any questions you have about Earthly matters.' 

"The Conspiracy Theorist slaps his forehead and yells, 'Who shot John F. Kennedy!?' 

"Peter smiles and says, 
'Why, Lee Harvey Oswald.'

"The Theorist cries, 'My God, this goes higher than I thought!' " 

Hildegarde looked at her phone for a moment then texted back: "Have you heard the one about Arnold Palmer in the locker room shower with The Donald and Rasputin!?"

Β© 2024, Leonard Earl Johnson, All Rights Reserved

πŸ’›

πŸ’œ πŸ’š

πŸ’›

πŸ’§


πŸ—£πŸ˜·

Your comments and corrections

are welcome

click here

~ * ~     ~ * ~     ~ * ~


πŸ“–
  πŸ’› 
~ to be continued ~
~ www.LEJ.world βœ 

~    ~    ~

Lagniappe du Jour


πŸ’œ  πŸ’š  πŸ’›

πŸ’§

Photo credit:
 Leonard Earl Johnson

~    ~    ~

πŸ’œ  πŸ’š  πŸ’›

πŸ’§

The Ladies Wore Red,

July 2021

Origin Story

 

If you wish to read any month's column go to www.LEJ.world anytime. 
They are posted on the first of each month and polished for the next few years.
~   ~   ~
 LEJ's Louisiana, Yours Truly in a Swamp
is a monthly e-column @ www.LEJ.world,
Hosted by GOOGLE BLOGGER,
and historically at
Les Amis de Marigny, New Orleans
publication of the

It is written by Leonard Earl Johnson
of Lafayette and New Orleans, Louisiana

Tuesday, October 01, 2024

✍ WHAT GOES UP / October 2024


~ Fiction ~

Roman Γ  clef, cher.

Created A. I. free

by Leonard Earl Johnson 

of Lafayette and New Orleans, Louisiana

 www.LEJ.world βœ

Β© 2024, Leonard Earl Johnson, All Rights Reserved 

βš“

βš“ βš“

October 2024

πŸ’€πŸ’€

πŸ’€

πŸ’§

⭐ WHAT GOES UP β­

Continuation of the Red Women Warriors Series

BY  Leonard Earl Johnson

πŸ“–
πŸ’›

πŸ’œ πŸ’š

πŸ’›

πŸ’§

πŸ—£πŸ˜·

Β© 2024, Leonard Earl Johnson, All Rights Reserved

Your comments and corrections

are welcome

click here

~ * ~     ~ * ~     ~ * ~

Photo credit: Leonard Earl Johnson

Amtrak  πŸš….....
 πŸ‘’

The train bearing our little klatch of 
Red-Hatted 
Women-for-The-Donald
wobbles off down the tracks leading from Lafayette, Louisiana to the Texas border.  

At a table under the club car's upper deck observation 
dome sits the large woman who boarded in Lafayette with a small following and the biggest red hat she could find in Dallas. She opens a green alligator briefcase exactly like the one Sylvia and Balthazar took to New Orleans, and extracts a clear cube inside of which sits a solidly frozen Republican Snowball.

"A manifest example of non- Global Warming." 

She continues, 

"To paraphrase our leader,

'Global Warming is a Wacky 
Wokey Liberal Hoaxy'."


She smiles at one of her acolytes and instructs her to pass pamphlets to three glum faced women watching from the table across the aisle. 

The three women are bound for Lake Charles. They hold red paper coffee cups liberally laced with Bourbon, and wear faces that are liberally skeptical. 

Now they live in Lafayette. They previously lived in Lake Charles and 
Capital One Bank's Bank One Tower
Lake Charles, Louisiana 
proudly worked at Capital One Bank's Bank One Tower   
~  ~  at twenty-two stories the tallest building between Lafayette and Houston. They are taking the train back home to witness The Tower being brought down in a highly publicized implosion, following years of FEMA inertia, and private investor reluctance to reopening the building after Hurricanes Laura and Delta blew out its windows and closed it down but left it standing. The implosion will not be so sparing.

"Makes you think FEMA and investors might know more 'bout  Global Warming than Republicans do." one of the former Lake Charles residents says to the acolyte handing her a pamphlet.

 πŸ₯€ πŸ₯€ πŸ₯€

Meanwhile in Lafayette, at the Rosa Parks Amtrak stop, Sylvia and Balthazar cross Jefferson Street for RΓͺve Coffee Roasters. There they are greeted by their friend, The Mulato, who asks if
 they brought Stormy Daniels back with them for Halloween.

Photo credit:
Leonard Earl Johnson
"No," Sylvia says. 

"But Balthazar did buy a Trump Voodoo Doll for twenty-dollars, from a street picker at a gas station under the Broad Street overpass."

Balthazar holds up the little orange headed doll with a long hat pin through its bloated chest.  The Mulato sits their coffee on the counter and laughs.

Balthazar picks up the cups and they move out to the curbside tables. Sylvia unlocks their broken green alligator brief case and transfers it and its empty snowball cube to a Rouses Supermarket bag. 

Shortly an Uber driver pulls up, takes the bag and drives off down Jefferson Street. The Street is under an early Fall canopy of browning 

Spring budding, Bald Cypress Trees
Jefferson Street, Lafayette, Louisiana
Photo credit: Leonard Earl Johnson 

Bald Cypress Trees gathering deciduous needles round their knees, and around storm drains up and down The Hub City's Great Art Way
~ www.LEJ.world βœ 

πŸ“–
πŸ’› 
Copyright, 2024, Leonard Earl Johnson, All Rights Reserved
~ to be continued ~

πŸ—£πŸ˜·

Your comments and corrections

are welcome

click here

~    ~    ~

Lagniappe du Jour

πŸ’œ  πŸ’š  πŸ’›

πŸ’§

 
πŸ’œ πŸ’š

πŸ’›


Implosion Day, Bank One Tower
Lake Charles, Louisiana

Jefferson Street Cypress Knees
 The Great Art Way, Lafayette, Louisiana
Photo credit: Leonard Earl Johnson
πŸ’œ  πŸ’š  πŸ’›

πŸ’§


Photo credit: Leonard Earl Johnson

~    ~    ~

πŸ’œ  πŸ’š  πŸ’›

πŸ’§

The Ladies Wore Red,

July 2021

Origin Story

 

If you wish to read any month's column go to www.LEJ.world anytime. 
They are posted on the first of each month and polished for the next few years.
~   ~   ~
 LEJ's Louisiana, Yours Truly in a Swamp
is a monthly e-column @ www.LEJ.world,
Hosted by GOOGLE BLOGGER,
and historically at
Les Amis de Marigny, New Orleans
publication of the

It is written by Leonard Earl Johnson
of Lafayette and New Orleans, Louisiana