Lester White

Lester White died last week.

I read his obituary and thought about the big man and his full white beard. No, not Santa Claus but a real man who was kind and generous with a smile and a laugh.

Our first meeting that I remember was when I was six years old. He was Morg or Org or something like that and telling the older kids at a Methodist youth camp what it was like on his planet. Dressed up in a Halloween costume in the middle of August had to be brutally hot but there he was with rubber gloves, an overcoat, rubber mask, and a wig. To my six year old mind, Morg was a fraud. I knew he wasn't from another planet and I was determined to prove it. I followed him closely through the camp to his room and surprised him when he took off the mask. "I knew it!" I yelled. 
He laughed and roughed up my hair. "Do you think the older kids know?" he asked conspiratorially?

I shook my head no and we agreed to keep the secret. 

Through my grade school years and into my high school days, we'd see each other often. I'd see him at Church, youth group and I'd see him as I dated his daughters. His smile, his laugh, that beard, those quick quips were ever-present with me in some very formative years.

I struggled as a teen. I just didn't know how to behave. Was I a boy? Was I a man? I was trying to be an adult, always competing with the older kids and always trying to be mature ... pretending to be wiser than I actually was. He talked to me as I pulled his refrigerator away from the wall, "Hey, Big Wally!" He laughed giving me a new nickname, "Don't grow up so fast. This isn't a race where you are trying to be the first to the finish line. Enjoy your youth!"

He'd give gems like that often. 

Mom and Dad's friends from Church would go camping as a group. There were several times that we joined them and Les and Barbara White were there. His beard was somehow whiter and hair somehow thinner but in his heart and through his smile he was still the same youthful guy. He pretended to chase my kids around the campground and they pretended to be afraid. They laughed and they giggled, fell in the tall grass and rolled over and laughed some more. 

Les White inspired me to lighten-up and live life fully.

Thank you for your inspiration.