My great-grandfather would go on to marry Opal, the ex-wife of the jealous brake-cutter. It’s a long story, but my grandfather (pictured in front of the bread truck) knew how to tell it.
Warren G. Smith was a master storyteller.
He could hold you spellbound for hours as he spun his yarns. Like the time a jealous man cut the brakes of his father’s bread truck, sending them spilling into a ravine halfway across their mountainous route. Or when he dressed as Santa to greet people traveling home for the holidays through the Amtrak station where he volunteered. Or how he rescued a boy from drowning because he was the only one at that lake who knew CPR. His stories were burnished over time like beloved war medals, ready to be brought out at a moment’s notice.
Warren, my grandfather, recently passed away. But his stories live on.
