My Budda

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Effrim Williams Morgan was brought to my house in a box. He had a bunch of names in his lifetime but Effrim Williams was his formal one. He didn’t like people smoking around him. It made his lip rise up and his nose wrinkle so he looked vicious. A smoker would say "Whoa, is that dog going to bite me?" "No" I would say confidently, "What I know about kindness I learned from him."

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Eff had a plastic dolphin collection. He started collecting them when he worked with me painting a house in Rehoboth. I looked down from the ladder and thought “what’s he got in his mouth?” It was a plastic dolphin. Later he brought an identical one to me as if he had found a bush nearby that grew them. He loved the dolphin twins. He especially loved when I told him they were nice. I bought him another plastic dolphin that had teeth.

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There were times we called him Old Ned which was funny cause he was a nothing of a devil. He was, however, an Officer, checking out any and all altercations as an expert witness and a disciple of fair and square.

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When his name was Ned Grass he wore a baggy baseball uniform and pitched in sepia stadiums.

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When he was my Budda I was never alone.

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He was one in twenty five thousand.

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I sure do love my Budda.

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