through a hole in the wall

502 court street is an alley with a door on it now. But back then it was an alley with a back wall and a door and a ceiling and a floor. It was alley-wide, sandwiched between a theater and a pool room. It was a sort of coffee shop where they served hotdogs and donuts and that kind of thing. When someone in the bar wanted food, the bartender put the order into the place next door through a hole in the wall.

My first memory of the place was when I was about ten or so and Mom had to go into town on business. When she was finished at the courthouse, she said, "I know what let's do," and took me across to the Hole in the Wall (which was not actually called that on the sign), and she got coffee and I got milk and a donut or three. I remember the waitress saying, "You want a do not? I think we can come up with one of those." and she messed up my hair. She heated the donut and it was the best thing. A grainy grey kind of day and we sat in the alley-wide coffeeshop (might have been called The Coffee Pot?).

We only came to Summersville on business. There was only main street, then, which had anything. A lone dairy bar on the right of Broad street completed all that Summersville offered.In those days, Richwood was THE town and Summersville folks came there to shop. Then the dam went in and things reversed. Then Wal-Mart came and both towns died.

But long about 1988, we rented 502 court street. Not just us, but a whole group of us. We built shelves for books and we built a bar and put in a few chairs and tables. A Bible verse kept ringing through our heads but we ignored it, mostly. It said, "Ye shall escape through a hole in the wall".  But we weren't trying to escape anything -- we were representing our church in an outreach -- "Set Free Ministry" which I thought of as "sit free" since we gave the coffee away there. It did help set somebody free though -- us.

The church was not happy that a bunch of theirs had taken the initiative to go out and feed the hungry and clothe the naked and visit prisons and whatnot. We started another coffee house in Richwood, and for a time -- a short time, it was as much fun as church folks can expect.

But soon, we were out of church, because they were not thrilled. So we took to meeting in houses. We had an abundance of preachers. A couple of them were prophets, to boot -- what I'd now call intuitive readers.

One of these fellows told Honey he would someday be "going through dead people's houses and taking what they left behind". Had no way of knowing that would play out the way it has -- we buy houses that once belonged to someone and now belong to the state. The one we live in, for instance, which we got the year the old owner died -- she was 101 years old that year.

That fellow told me that "I see all the things you let go coming back. They're like birds you set free and now I see them coming back and bringing their young with them." We didn't have diddly-squat at that time, not even enough to eat. All the money that came in donations went to feed the hungry (other than us) and pay utility bills for everyone else. We were living here and there and wherever. Church folks said we were worse than infidels for not providing for ourselves. But the Lord must have had mixed opinions. Cause we were reading in the Bible,  "Take no thought for tomorrow." and there was talk about the lillies of the field and birds of the air being taken care of -- which may be why the dead bird someone left on the windowsill was a bit off-putting.

The prophet/intuitive reader also told me that I was a teacher. Little quiet church-mouse that I was, I begged to differ with him. He hastened to add, "Don't worry. It's like you're not ready for the trip yet, but the Lord is packing your bags." I just didn't know the Lord was packing my bags with tarot, runes, astrology and numerology.

The "teacher" thing was not wholly news to me. I had heard (and negated) the thought once before. When we were at the Baptist church before we went to the Assemblies of God church, I quite liked the Preacher and his wife, Tish. Tish was a good egg -- not wholly suited to be a preacher's wife, with her red hair and attitude. One evening, as I was heading in to prayer room (we always got to church hours before anyone else), I thought, "Tish is a good leader, a really good teacher." and the thought came (not the same kind of thought) "so are you". Which startled me and to which I replied, "no way".

Well, there we were with two coffee houses, doing the Lord's work, and with the kids in Christian school and those dues were high. I sold my dulcimer and my sewing machine and anything else of value to pay the tuition. That church had us all leery of public school. Plus they thought they were hot sh.t when it came to achemdics. The Pastor took us around and showed us that school. He took down a book and handed it to Heather. He had this irritating smirk (which he did so well) until H started reading. Then he took the book and put it back on the shelf -- since he didn't get to prove his point.

It was not a good time.

But fortunately it didn't last long.

The coffee houses failed, one of our good buddies stole the chairs (there is a Tarot card -- 7 of air -- that I shortcut by calling it the "Sonny" card). We were left holding the bag on those taxes. Fortunately, Uncle Sam will divide up those payments for you if you really need it. It was really not that big a price to pay for getting to "escape". And just as the Tarot de Bible said, the escape began "through a hole in the wall".