Maybe I am experiencing something more than just a pair of shoes as I become immersed in their polished reflection. It’s as though I am looking into the point of his walk. I place my hands one over the other on my left knee, and as I lean forward to look down at his feet, I have a sense of privilege. There is a righteous imprecision in both the purpose and the meaning of this moment, a sacrament and revelation in the movement before me. Remembrances overtake my mind with a sort of “sixth sense.” He gently grasps the back of my shoe in one hand while simultaneously picking up a clean cloth with the other, never breaking the lilt of the soulful tempo he established when I sat down. The new cloth is white and it looks like the sleeve of a robe—his pressure increases on my feet…
For the first time I begin remembering…I have been here before! Way down deep I have a story about this man. I recall being a child, and I can still hear my dad telling me about a gentle soul he knew when he was growing up. Pieces of myself are coming back to me, flooding my awareness. My dad’s name was Floyd. He was a carpenter, a simple man. He shared his name with me the morning I was born. I think I can even remember him coming into the room to look at me. Maybe the most interesting thing about him was that he had these unique inflections when he talked that were a lot like the way Sam Henry talked.
The story he told was about a black man called Old Blue Pete.
He told me this story so many times that I feel it’s my story too.
Floyd lived in the same house most of his life.
OLD BLUE PETE
[FLOYD]
OLD BLUE PETE WAS LIKE a free baby sitter. When my folks went shopping in our little downtown they would leave my brothers and me near Pete’s shoeshine stand for a little while and tell us not to leave that area. Pete didn’t know they were doing this because of him, but they knew he had a protective instinct for the young fellows who hung around him while he worked. Though not by plan, many of the other parents did the same thing, so it was fun for us kids. We would play in the nearby alleys, climb the trees along the street, and bother old Pete when he wasn’t busy. Times were different then and we were safe in the arms of our town’s common decency and had the comfort of knowing we were okay as long as we were not far from “Old Blue Pete.”
He had an old bell from a tricycle handlebar mounted on the side of his shoeshine stand beneath the rail that supported the worn seats where he spent his days bent over people’s feet. He would tell us kids that touching him would bring a blessing, then he would stick that massive black finger toward us and we would all shrink back and giggle. Whoever was the bravest would gingerly venture forward and reach out to touch the end of his finger. Because we were so focused on the touching point of this event, we never noticed that he had shifted himself up against the shoeshine stand so he could reach behind him with his other hand and ding that bell the exact moment our fingers touched. No matter how many times we had been down this road with him, we would jump back and shriek with laughter. He would then bend down and square off with the kid that had touched him and tell him in his warm soft voice: “Listen to me, my sweet child, and always remember what I am telling you today. Every time you reach out and touch someone, especially someone different than you, there will be hundreds of bells in Heaven ringing for joy at that very moment.” Then he would dance, head tossed back, eyes closed, hands stretched to the sky, smiling as if he were in some kind of dream.
He loved putting us on, and I believe in his gentle heart he delighted in doing stereotypical “Negro” things for us—the kinds of things he knew we had seen in the movies in those days. This was the 1940s and he was the only black man in our little town. He was “Old Blue Pete” because his skin was so dark that it almost looked midnight blue. A perfect, half-golf-ball-sized mound protruded dead center from this enormous man’s forehead. Maybe he was not as big as we thought; but, when we were small, the whole world looked different.
Things were not so complicated back then and we were free to enjoy and embrace the differences in each other. We were fascinated with him; and, in our innocence, would ask him what the difference was between being black and white. He said there was no difference except that he looked a lot better all dressed up in white than us white folk did when we got all dressed up in black. He delighted in teasing us by telling us that God was black, and we would howl with disbelief at the absurdity of that idea. We’d reply, “Uh uh, no way! God is white!” And his dramatic reply was, “No suh! No suh! De God is a black man!” We would go on and on about this until a customer came along. At that point, Old Blue Pete would take some pennies he kept in a tip saucer under the seats and throw them down the sidewalk. He always got the final laugh as our whole gang would scramble after them and then go on our way, the lucky ones in possession of unearned bounty.
My hometown was 99.9 percent white European stock. Because I had never seen another black man before, I was convinced they all had that big, round, half-golf-ball-sized lump on their foreheads like Old Blue Pete’s. When I was twelve, my family went on a vacation to San Francisco. It was late at night when we got there and I was half-asleep by the time we checked into a hotel. When I woke up in the morning I was excited about this new adventure and immediately ran downstairs to see what a real city looked like. Out on the sidewalk I saw some black people and not one of them had bumps on their foreheads.
We eventually told our Sunday school teacher about what Pete had said and asked her whether God was black or white. She got very quiet when we asked this, and it was obvious she was aware that her answer was very important—especially at that stage in our lives. “You are both right.” She let her answer settle in for a while as she observed our confusion and then said, “You are both wrong.” Now she had us going. “It isn’t about color,” she explained, “it’s about love—and love is colorless.” She stood up and continued, “God is both black and white, and He is also neither one. He is all things and every shade in between. He is around, inside and outside, before and after, above and below everything that ever has been or ever will be—all at once. Besides, the color of a person’s skin is no different than the color of the paint on a car—you really can’t tell how it runs until you get inside and start it up.” She paused, knelt down, and looked each one of us in the eye before she said very slowly and evenly, “The main thing you need to know is that it’s more than how we see God, it is how God sees us.”
We never knew where Pete went at night. We had asked him a hundred times where he lived, where he went after he put away his polishes and brushes and chained the creaky sidewalk concession to iron pinions in the brick wall for the night. We were curious because it seemed very strange that no one had ever seen him anywhere except at the stand. He would always look off into the distance when he would answer. “It ain’t important ‘cause I am only passing through and this isn’t my real home. Actually,” as he pointed off into that same distance, “I have a mansion somewhere else, and if you kids pay attention to the things I tell you, then you will get to visit me there some day.” We never believed that story either because we were all dirt poor and knew he wasn’t any better off than we were. He still insisted that if we minded our parents, paid attention in church, and studied hard at school we would someday get to visit this wonderful place. Then he would start teasing us again.
One of his favorite pranks was when he would puff up his chest and show a full mouth of pearly white teeth as he told us he had a second job working with Santa Claus. He would warn us, “You kids had better be good because I am keeping track of whether you are being naughty or nice.” The vision of a black man working with a puffy white-skinned, pink-nosed Santa brought even more howls of protest than his claim that God was black. He told us that Santa only worked during the day because it was a long drive to the North Pole, and if he came home late, Mrs. Claus would give his dinner to the elves. Old Blue Pete said the reason Santa was so fat was because he always took over right on time, just as it started getting
dark, so Santa hadn’t missed dinner once since Pete came aboard. He said he watched us at night to see if we were being good, and that we couldn’t see him in the dark because he was black. He said he and Santa tried it the other way around once, but all the kids could tell they were being watched because it was hard for Santa to hide in the evening shadows, especially with his hair being bright white and him being so big and fat. Besides, Mrs. Claus made better dinners than breakfasts, so Santa liked the day shift better.
Sometimes I stood alone watching him from across the street while my folks were shopping at one of the stores located in that part of town. By “that part of town,” I don’t mean it was a slum or anything. It was a small area in our downtown where families like us went to shop—the part of town where things were not so expensive. Old Blue Pete had his shoeshine stand strategically set up on the edge of that area because the next section was where our only “upscale” hotel was located. His spot was also ideally situated close to the bus station and the downtown business offices. He would stand at attention by his little stand and repeat his signature slogan as potential patrons passed: “If you’ll give me the time, I’ll show you the shine…If you’ll give me the time, I’ll show you the shine…If you’ll give me the time….” He always finished his rap with a little dance and infectious smile.
No matter how many times we begged, he never told us the rest of his name. He promised someday, if we were good, we would find out. He said it was very cool and we were going to be very surprised. He promised it would be worth the wait. He would laugh at our confusion, and then somehow, in the midst of this activity, repeated his mantra on the importance of being good. When it was time for him to get back to work, he would once again throw pennies down the sidewalk to send us sprawling in pursuit. Sometimes we’d hide behind things to spy on him. Just when we thought he didn’t know we were there, he would stop in the middle of shining someone’s shoes, turn around and do a little dance step while singing a few lines of “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah” that was straight out of the movie, Song of the South. The men on the stand probably thought he was daft, but he didn’t care. Pete was letting us know he knew we were around.
We liked spending time with Old Blue Pete because he was funny and kind. Looking back many years later, I think we were drawn to his godly spirit and the truths he gently passed on to us. He would toy with us and tease us; but he always ended up imparting some wisdom that had to do with goodness. Take the thing he did with the pennies for instance—he said they were pennies from Heaven and that is where all good things come from. He’d tell us “As soon as you have collected ten pennies, inspect them closely because one of them belongs to God.” He said it was our duty to give God one of the ten pennies before we did anything with the other nine. He told us when we gave that penny to God we were to be very careful to pick out the best and shiniest one. He said that’s because God wants the best for us so we should always give the best to Him.
Pete also told us it didn’t matter where he went at night because what really mattered was where we were all going when this life was over. He would talk to us about things that we didn’t understand; but, because he made us feel good, we’d stick around to listen anyway. As I grew older, each new stage of maturity strangely seemed to kick off with a revelation about some nugget of wisdom Old Blue Pete had told me many years earlier. Even though these were things that didn’t make sense at the time, he knew how to draw me in. He knew I would listen to the important things he had to say just so I could be present for the fun things he had to offer. He also had the wisdom to know that packaging these lessons with happiness would make them easier to recall from my childhood associations in my aging reflections. Now I understand he was just planting seeds that would bear fruit in later years. He wrapped these teachings in his uniqueness, his humility, his patient love, and his joy. Sometimes I wonder if he were even real. He was Old Blue Pete—an enigmatic, curious, old black man who shined shoes on Main Street. He was always there, always the same, and always looking straight at me when he talked. The truth is, it doesn’t really matter if he was real or not. I like that he was there and the feeling I got when he would rearrange my insides.
Once we asked him why he shined shoes for a living. He answered, “I always knew that was what I wanted to do. When I was a child my favorite Bible story was about the time Jesus took a towel and washed the feet of his disciples.” He told us to this day he still pretends his shoeshine rag is that towel and the shoes he shines are the feet of saints. He said the shine that he put on their soles was really the light from God on their souls and that as he worked on their feet he would pray for each customer’s good walk. He purposed each time to engage as many of them as he possibly could in some form of godly conversation. He said one day he was so intent on looking for an opening to talk to this one man about God that he shined one shoe for almost an hour!
Ah, yes—“If you’ll give me the time, I will show you the shine!”
One night, many years later, I had a very vivid dream. At the time, I was as old as, maybe older, than Old Blue Pete was when he dazzled me as a kid. In my dream, I died, went to Heaven, and when I got to the Pearly Gates, guess who was there? Instead of the typical glowing podium at the entrance manned by an imposing silver-haired white man standing over a large open book, there was Old Blue Pete standing at attention in front of his shoeshine stand. Above the stand where he used to have a sign that read “Pete’s Shine” it now read “Saint Pete’s.” I finally found out why he didn’t have a last name. He was all dressed up in white and sure did look good. When I looked beyond the gate, I could see streets of pure gold, beautifully bordered with bright shiny copper. Looking closer, I could see that the copper lining was actually bright, shiny pennies. Pete said those pennies were the ones I gave back to God all those years with my tithes. I looked back at his stand, and on the ledge where he kept his brushes and rags still sat that saucer of pennies. (Old Blue) St. Pete said he had kept an eye on me during many dark times. Even though I couldn’t see him, he was always there watching over me from the shadows. He wanted me to know how much my pals and I had meant to him. It wasn’t easy for him being different, and the fact that we kids always treated him with respect softened the loneliness. He said he and all the less fortunate people in our lives who had received our kindness were the ones who really stood at our gate to Heaven.
He told me he loved it when we got older because every one of us would stop by for a shine when we visited our old hometown. Even though I adamantly denied it, he was convinced we had all planned together that after our shines, we would dump hundreds of pennies in his saucer until it overflowed and they rolled out on to the sidewalk all around his stand.
Then, in my dream, Pete held out his hand and motioned toward the gate. As soon as I put my hand in his, the bells started ringing so loudly I thought they were going to rupture my eardrums. Letting go of my hand, this wonderful man gave me a gentle shove to the other side. With a gigantic smile he started dancing, clapping his hands, and singing:
“You gave of your time, now you get to see the Shine!”
I awoke from this way-too-real reverie and, for the first time in years, had a sincere desire to go back home. The incredible thing was that I never felt much like returning after my mom and dad died. When I left home those many years ago, it was on a grimy bus on a dreary day. I returned via the same mode of transportation. It was that strange time of year between fall and winter when it is neither season. I went down town to see if Pete was still there and was saddened to find a coffee cart where his old shoeshine stand used to be. I asked around and no one had even heard of Old Blue Pete.
As I turned to leave, I was overcome by something that was not of my mind but was grabbing me from a much deeper place. Everything around me dissolved into a soft diffused gray, like when mist rises up from a hot pavement after a light summer rain. I turned away from the coffee cart in slow motion. I had the strangest sense that Pete was
watching me from across the street from the exact place I used to watch him as a child. I stopped and stared at that spot. I swear I could almost see someone standing in the shadows on the inner edge of the alley that was once my hiding place. Just in case it was him, I decided to let him know I knew he was there. I had never done anything like this before, but the minute I started dancing, I knew I had been missing out. I gave it my best shot and imitated Pete’s dance when he caught us kids spying on him. I was oblivious to everything around me and became completely lost in reliving glorious memories of innocent times. I was also quite moved by the sound of my voice as I did my imitation of that old black man when he would sing “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, Zip-a-dee-ay.” In my way of seeing things, the only thing more beautiful than my singing was my version of his dancing. The coffee crowd was staring at me like I was nuts and didn’t know whether to throw money or run. I finished my dance with the Old Blue Pete bow—a full forward bend, left arm across my waist and right hand behind and up in the air.
That’s when I saw it—a shiny penny on the ground at my feet. I dropped to my knees as in prayer, picked it up, and started crying.
I will give it to Saint Pete when I see him.
DELI CUT BALANCE
[PHILCO]
I HAD BEEN LULLED INTO a trance by the undulating rhythm of someone rubbing my feet in the act of shining my shoes. I emerge rested, look around, and can see that I am once again alone. There is no shoeshine stand or old black man. I am back in Hurricane Hills, and I am sitting on a low railing outside an establishment I can only describe as a “cowboy delicatessen.” The amateur drawings of food on the dirt-streaked windows facing the street make me realize I am incredibly hungry. I’ve had nothing to eat since my supper last night at the hotel. Actually, until this moment, it never entered my mind that I need to take in nourishment on a regular basis. In fact, I am actually not sure if it was last night or last month that I sat alone in the Palace Hotel dining room. I stand up to walk into the store and awareness moves down my legs. I become conscious of how good my feet feel, and when I look down, I am surprised to find my shoes glistening with a shine they didn’t have before.
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