Simpler Times?

Simpler Times: The Way Back to Mayberry, Or maybe Singers Glen, Va.

We live near a small town (unincorporated) called Singers Glen. It has one store, a post office, an old building where a semitruck holds your old magazines and newspapers (and takes them for recycling, I think). The aging building offers free books and cans of food in a small cupboard, and also a free library of books you can borrow and return.

There are two small churches, a beautiful old but restored B&B place one can stay in for a night or a week, and a lovely cemetery overlooking the area. It’s place in history is that at one point a local named Joseph Funk published hymnals there—a shaped note hymnbook compiled and printed in the 19^th century which became known as the Harmonia Sacra. Songsters love to have what they call a “Harmonia Sacra Sing” event. It is beautiful sacred music with books that some still use to this day.

Annual Harmonia Sacra Sings – The Harmonia Sacra Society

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I’ve been reading a devotional book called “The Way Back to Mayberry: Lessons from a Simpler Time,” compiled by Joe Fann (published in 2001 by Broadman & Holman Publishers). Since “Andy of Mayberry” still plays on channels with old time TV shows and if you still enjoy them, the stories and “lessons” in this book have been fun, spiritual, and worthwhile: ultimately encouraging all of us to do better with the lives we have been given.

(While as a child I enjoyed the show, Andy had three wives over the years and later he had an ongoing affair for several years on the Andy Griffith show, with the teacher named “Helen Crump.”  The affair was a pretty open secret among cast and crew, according to Wikipedia. She was never married.)

So neither Andy nor Mayberry was far from heavenly or perfect, but we can still learn from the show, and Fann’s (2001) “Lessons.” For instance, remember the time Opie met a new kid in town whose Dad apparently has lots of money, while Opie is lucky to get a 25 cent allowance each week. (I remember those meager days as a young girl, when a quarter actually bought a hamburger and soda at a McDonald’s. Right?) The new kid in town makes Opie jealous, but you can guess the eventual outcome—when the father realizes how spoiled his young son has become after the kid throws a mega-tantrum. And there is a turn around.

Thus I was not too surprised when I went into the grocery and beer store in our little “Mayberry-like” community and found a bright yellow sheet of paper reminding local citizens that people were driving too fast through the little burg, which could result in a child, pet, or elderly person getting hit when crossing the road to get mail or get out of their driveways. In fact, I had been driving on that road that very day and suddenly noticed a red blinking sign reminding ME to slow down to 25 mph. The title of the yellow sheet reminder says “Does the speed of the traffic through Singers Glen concern you?” The paper encouraged local citizens to help pay for two blinking “slow down” reminders (the state doesn’t supply them), and small towns must provide such. A blinking light, one for each end of town, would cost $7500 altogether. A local Ruritan Club is working to raise the money.

Then I went into the store to get what I had driven there for. On the top yellow sheet, someone else had scribbled, “No!” That citizen apparently didn’t find too fast of traffic a problem. I cringed, and we promptly sent off a check the next day, to help with the problem.

Like the yellow sheet reminds us: “You could make a life-changing difference for someone.”

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Joey Fann has an older website that may be of interest to some: http://www.BarneyFife.com

His inspirational book was published by Broadman & Holman Publishers