Mark O. J. Esping--Max Performs for the Last Time

^{Max Performs for
the Last Time,}
^{and
the Last Time, and Finally the Last Time}

Mark O. J. Esping

© Copyright 2020 by Mark O. J. Esping

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

Max studied to be an opera singer. He actually preformed as the crocodile in the stage presentation of Peter Pan. Health interrupted his singing career. He started a summer theatre called Broadway RFD, which presented musicals during the summer in Lindsborg Kansas. He played Santa Claus at Macys in New York City.

^{After
the Santa Claus fiasco, Max said he would never again perform for
anyone.}^{Well,
that was not exactly true. He sang at his Uncle Klee’s church
in western Kansas. He said he should have known something was going
to go wrong, when he drove into town. He was to meet the church
Pastor at the Pheasant Inn, which Max’s Uncle Klee owned. As
usual Marie was driving and Max was looking for the sign to this
restaurant that was susposed to be a real good eating place.}^{Klee
said he named it the Pheasant Inn for two reasons. The restaurant was
located in a county where pheasants were more plentiful than any
other county in Kansas and they actually had pheasant on the menu.
Well the portend of coming disaster was the fact that Max and Marie
couldn’t find any Pheasant Inn. There wasn’t any Pheasant
Inn, there was a Peasant Inn set back off of the highway, which had a
painting on the sign of a Pheasant flying above the words Peasant
Inn. Max said that he should have known right there what he was
dealing with. Max always believed in omens. His Uncle Klee’s
Peasant Inn was a pleasant place. It was just that no one had noticed
that Pheasant was mispelled Peasant. Maybe no one in this town knew
how to spell. Maybe the sign painter wasn’t literate. Max said
it crossed his mind that he should just have Marie turn around. They
should have just turned around and gone back home. But he had
promised his Uncle Klee and he liked the old guy so he didn’t
want to hurt Klee’s feelings. They met with the preacher and
went over the church bulletin at the Peasant Inn.
Atthe church Max and Marie were seated in a pew at the front of the
church. The church had everything, it was well organized, so Max
started thinking that his feeling of impending doom was probably just
a little bit of paronia. The church service started. The pastor had a
pretty good message and the organist started the into to Max’s
song which was to be “How Great Though Art” Max got up,
marched to the front and the middle of the sanctury and started into
the solo. He said it went fabulous. He felt good, his voice was
vibrant and he moved his great tenor voice to full volume. He said
the words echoed slightly off the stained glass windows. He could
feel the entire congregation was barely able to breath, he had them
in the palm of his hand. He finished. Hesitated for a minute to let
the reverbration of his singing slowly receded to quiet. He walked
triumphantly back to his seat in the first pew. Seated in the front
row was his Uncle Klee and Uncle Klee’s wife, both with ear to
ear smiles on their faces. Marie gave Max a little thumbs up sign.
Max said as he bent his knees to sit down next to Marie, he felt
satisfied and vindicated from all of the bad things that had been
happening to him lately.

At this point in the story first, Max would always stop and then repeat
that when he saw the Peasant Inn sign he should have followed his
intuition and gone straight home. Next, he would raise his voice to a
bellow, shouting about how when his three hundred and twenty pounds
joined the nine hundred fifty pounds that was already seated in the
first pew, the pew gave way and all four people went flying backward
partially onto the floor and partially into the laps of the people in
the second pew. There were four pairs of chubby legs flayling in the
air and Max’s heroic rendition of How Great Thou Art was lost
forever in the screams and moans of Uncle Klee and his wife followed
by a crack as the second pew gave way and the quick addition to the
pandemonium of a falseto whailing interspersed with a bass bellowing
of obsenities from the third row. He said that God told him and then
showed him that he should never sing again.}
^{He
would finish the story by stating that it was his final preformance.}
^{It
turned out that was not quite true. Max sang at Don Valentine Ely’s
funeral a few months later. Don had Down’s Syndrome. He was one
of the regulars for coffee at the Bakery. Don’s home was at the
“care” home which was a house where several persons with
less than normal mental functioning lived. Don who was referred to as
Donnie until Max brought up the fact that that was a kids name, and
so it was demeaning to call some one who was fifty years old by a
kids name. Don was 61 when he died which is suppossedly pretty old
for people with Down’s Syndome. Don lived with the “Mumbler”,
a man who was beaten by Police so viciously that he never was
mentally cognizant. He also lived with Wally who had been kicked in
the head by a horse when he was a child. Wally and Don were almost
inseparable. They did lawn work around town. Leaves in the fall, cut
grass in the summer and shovel snow in the winter.}^{On
Don’s funeral bulletin it states that Max Muller sang “What
a friend we have in Jesus” But after the bulletin was printed,
Max switched it and sang “Jesus Loves Me” which when
worked by an Operatic Baritone is fantastic.}^{Don
believed in angels. Every time some one he knew died, Don would refer
to their death by saying that the angels got em. It doesn’t say
so in the bulletin but I was asked to read the obituary. I concluded
the obituary and the service by saying Goodby Don Valentine Ely,
born on Valentines Day.” “A gift and message of love for
everyone” “Goodby Don, I guess the angels got you.”}
^{Max
sang, Jesus Loves Me, again as people got up to leave.}^{That
really was the last preformance for Max . He died a year later.}

Mark O. J. Esping lives in the Kansas City area. His wife and he share their home with three cats. Twin deer occasionally graze in their backyard. Mark grew up in Los Angeles. Graduated from a Swedish Lutheran College. Reprinted the feminist science fiction novel titled NEQUA.

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Max Performs for the Last Time, and the Last Time, and Finally the Last Time

^{Max Performs for
the Last Time,}
^{and
the Last Time, and Finally the Last Time}