13. UNCLE JOHNNY'S GLASS EYE

UNCLE JOHNNY’S GLASS EYE

This story was told to me by Verdon R. Adams. It took place in Hydro, Oklahoma--well, on a farm outside of Hydro. says,

One of Papa’s brothers came from Kentucky to visit us for Christmas. Mama said Uncle Johnny had a glass eye. She said it was a bit unusual, but we should be very careful about looking at it; we shouldn’t stare at it, or mention it to him or say anything about it when he was in the room.
Mama & Papa picked up Uncle Johnny at the Rock Island depot while us kids were still in school. Mama was right, his eyes were funny. One of them would move and look around, and the other one always looked straight ahead.
Uncle Johnny slept kind of late, ‘cause he’d had a long ride in the day coach, then stayed up talking to Mama & Papa about their relatives back in Kentucky. But I had to get up early, ‘cause I had to go feed the calves, and I thought Uncle Johnny ought to come with me ‘cause they were really pretty, and they’d be going down to the shade at the other end of the pasture as soon as the sun came up. So I went into the front room where he was bedded down. He was awake, but he just had one eye open.
“Is breakfast ready, Verdon?” I told him it wasn’t, but I thought he ought to come down and take a look at those calves. He hesitated for a moment then he said, “Why don’t you take my eye down and show the calves to it.”
He picked up a glass that was sitting on the table by the bed and handed it to me. It was half full of water and his eye was in it. Now I don’t mind telling you that it was a little scary, but I took the glass with the eye in it and walked carefully down the stairs. I went out to the calf pen and jiggled and swiveled the glass so the eye could meet all the calves; all the way to my favorite, a little white calf with red shoulders. Then I went back into the house, and back into the front room and I gave the glass to Uncle Johnny. He turned away from me and put the eye back in his head.
He said, “I sure want to thank you little nephew, those calves are just great! And that white one with the red shoulders is just about the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen!”
Now, I couldn’t be convinced his eye hadn’t seen those calves~~~not until some years later when Mama told me Papa had shown him all the livestock before us kids got home from school.