Can't Wait to Get to Heaven

Where’s Elner?

8:30 AM

Back in Elmwood Springs, the phone lines had been buzzing all morning with the news and latest reports about Elner. Out on the farm Elner’s good friend Louise Franks had been up all night worried and wondering how she was going to tell Polly, her retarded daughter, about Elner. Polly didn’t understand about death. How could she explain that Polly would never see Elner again? Louise burst into tears when Irene Goodnight called her and told her that Elner was alive. Tot and Ruby had been so busy answering questions and calling people that they totally forgot about feeding the cat, feeding the birds, or filling the birdbath, and Sonny the cat was not happy. He had just walked over to his dish and discovered that it was empty. This was a shock to him. His breakfast was always there at this time. He hunched down and stared at the dish for a while, then got up and wandered around the house. Then he came back to his dish and sat there thinking cat thoughts, wondering whether or not to take a nap or try to catch one of those birds that were flying all over the yard, also upset and wondering where their birdseed was. One old blue jay was squawking his head off, and three smaller birds sat in the birdbath looking for water to splash around in. Two squirrels sat in a tree nattering at each other. The old lady had always thrown a couple of biscuits out the back door for them by now. Something was not right. After a few minutes of debating the issue, Sonny opted to take a nap and went to his spot on the back of the sofa.

Meanwhile a red-eyed Luther Griggs was just pulling into a Flying J truck stop outside of Yuma, Arizona, and he had never felt so alone in his entire life. As he climbed into the back of the truck to get some shut-eye, he thought about what Elner had told him over and over. “Honey, you need to get married. I’m not going to live forever, and I want to think that you won’t be left all by yourself. As much as you don’t think it, you need to be with somebody. Women can handle it, but men don’t do well alone.” He had not wanted to get married, and as much as she’d said it, he never thought she would really die. But now that she had, he saw that she was right. He was so lonesome, and if Elner had liked Bobbie Jo Newberry, he figured she was the one. Miss Elner had always known what was right for him, so why fool around? And so before he drifted off, he made up his mind; when he got home, he’d go on over to the Dairy Queen where she worked and pop the question.