To anyone else in the busy restaurant they were a couple of well-dressed elderly gentlemen facing each other across the table, straining to hear the back-and-forth of their conversation.
But John Ogden Campbell and Haywood King McCaleb (affectionately known as Oggie and H.K.) are anything but ordinary for a pair of 94-year-old World War II veterans who've been fast friends since first grade.
They talked about many things, including Oggie's war years in Europe as a radio operator and Haywood's harrowing time in the Philippine jungles as a soldier who earned the Bronze Star for valor in combat.
The men laughed at recalling their first meeting as children when H.K. moved to town at 6 and immediately struck up a friendship with Harrison-born Oggie that would endure to this evening over dinner at JP's Restaurant.
"I remember Haywood would get 10 cents a week allowance and I'd get a quarter," said Oggie, whose local insurance agency has become one of Harrison's success stories.
H.K. added, "We'd pool our money and go to three different grocery stores around the square and get us a Fudgsicle at each one." He'd returned from the war to help grow the family's successful M&M Block company. Both men retired years back. Each lives alone today, with grown children in town, and still driving for themselves.
Watching them recollecting and still teasing each other as the closest of men friends often will struck me as a unique phenomenon I was witnessing on this weekend evening.
"Now I want you to know tonight's all on me, and I'm not gonna argue about it," said Oggie. H.K. objected, saying he'd planned on paying.
Oggie: "No, no, I organized this little get-together. Just go ahead and order whatever you want."
H.K: "But, well, I."
Oggie: "No ifs or buts about it, I'm payin' for tonight and that's that!'"
The little debate was a far cry from that combined 35 cents they'd so willingly pooled for ice cream back about 1933.
Here sat two lifelong best friends who'd survived the war (as at least 372 of their former U.S. comrades in uniforms pass away daily) and most of their fellow friends long departed, to remarkably reach their mid-90s and still able to share 88 years of companionship this way.
With a combined 188 years of living experience between them, I asked each for one piece of advice they'd offer today's teenagers.
Oggie pondered a minute then said he'd tell them to get serious about educating themselves in whatever field they choose and enjoy from liberal arts to professional skills or trade schools. "Doing that will serve them best and go a long way toward determining the kind of life they will have as adults. They will be well served by focusing as early as they can on their future."
H.K.'s advice is for them to make friends with others their age whom they admire and respect. "Always think for yourself in college and beyond, and don't base your opinions on what others say and do, unless it agrees with Christian principles."
It was pushing 9 p.m. and departure time arrived. Each man pushed gingerly away from the table and made their way slowly toward the door. The best friends had been allowed another evening to enjoy each other's company while adding to their bank of life's precious memories. And when all is said and done in this world, what better can any of us hope for?
Interesting, but true
On a somewhat related note, I read the other day that for the first time in six decades, the consumer confidence of younger Americans has dropped beneath that of their parents.
Marketwatch reported research by the University of Michigan, Haver Analytics and Deutsche Bank Global Research found those younger than 35 have a somewhat bleaker outlook than those over 55 even though consumer sentiment is the highest it's been since 2004. High levels of student debt and the rising cost of living, including housing costs, are cited as possible reasons.
Social mobility in the United States also lags behind many other developed nations, according to a report by the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality.
Amid such pessimism, I have a problem, as do many other Americans. While these reports appear to ring true, I regret the skepticism I've come to feel in the past decade over the possible political agendas behind reports emanating from universities and agencies that rely heavily on government grants for survival.
It's a shame that so many Americans feel as I do today about credibility, or rather the lack of it, in what is being espoused and reported as purported truths. Unfortunately, that is the inevitable high price we pay as a nation for not insisting on proof of whatever information is being pushed or offered in various forms as fact.
There have just been far too many "misspeaks," grossly politicized falsehoods, outright lies and calculated spin posing as truth for intelligent, adult Americans to any longer accept words at face value. The biggest loss lies in badly diminished public trust. Once lost, trust is so very difficult, if not impossible on some levels, to restore.
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Mike Masterson is a longtime Arkansas journalist. Email him at [email protected].
Editorial on 04/10/2018