I can't really remember when I first heard his name and noted the repugnant undertones associated with the mention of it. Like most young people, my conclusions about a lot of things were based on other's opinions. I had no real personal foundation for my own beliefs. If fingers were pointed, if whispered, unkind comments were made, there must
have been some good reason--I mean, after all, so many people couldn't all be wrong, could they? You'd have to admit that from a distance he looked awfully shabby. Besides, everyone said he was a little "crazy."

One lazy afternoon in 1961 my girlfriends and I had just enjoyed a movie at the Rex Theatre and were leisurely strolling to Ikie's Drug Store for a dip-n-squirt. Heads together, talking excitedly about the upcoming Platter Club dance, and not watching where we were going-- we stumbled into him. My heart stopped. I was toe to toe with the subject of so many conversations--Hammond Combest, the old scary man who walks the streets of Jal. The rest of the girls scattered like a covey of quail. My first reaction was to bolt and follow them, but his eyes caught me off guard. "Scuse me", he apologized. "Excuse me, sir", I muttered. In what must have been mere seconds my eyes took in the sight of him: the floppy, sweat-soiled felt hat pulled down over his forehead and ears; the multicolored, scruffy beard with permanent tobacco stains at each corner of his mouth; the tattered collar of his old chambray shirt; splatters of food on the dingy, blue denim overalls that were six inches too short; and the shoes that had walked many hundreds of miles in search of a friend.

Was this him? Was this the scary old man everyone was so afraid of? (I had only seen him from a distance.) Funny, I didn't feel afraid. Startled maybe, but not afraid. Something about his demeanor told me he was not to be feared. So why was my heart pounding? Maybe I was expecting him to raise his arms, make a face, and say "Boo." Instead, he looked down at the ground, moved to the side, and shuffled away.

"Did he touch you?" "Didn't he give you the creeps?" "Isn't he spooky?"....came one question after another. "Oh, Lord, yes. He scared me to death." I quickly changed the subject, prattling about the Platter Club dance. For some reason, I didn't want to talk about it.

A few weeks passed, the yearbooks had been handed out, and our covey sat three-abreast, stuffed into a booth at Ikie's. We were looking for pictures of ourselves in the freshly-printed books. There we sat, a giggling gaggle of girls immersed in our own self-centered world, subconsciously enjoying the fact that we had nothing better to do than what we were doing at that moment.

Suddenly, there he was...standing directly beside our booth with a copy of the Jal Panther Yearbook in his hand. The inhaled breaths of six teenage girls in unison all but sucked the yearbook pages from their bindings. Then we heard the thundering, hollow, nasal voice, "Regina, could I please have your autograph in my annual?" "I've heard you and your sister sing and I think you sing so pretty." I wanted to crawl into a hole. I wanted to run. I wanted to laugh. I wanted to cry. Instead, I took the book, opened the crackley new cover and wrote, "Good Luck, Mr. Combest--Your friend, Regina Montgomery." I slammed it shut, thrust it back at him and secretly prayed he would turn and leave. He did. There was silence for a moment, and I expected unmerciful teasing. Instead, one of the girls just said, "let's eat."

By no means am I implying that as a young, insensitive teenage girl I was above reproach in my treatment of Hammond Combest. I avoided him when possible and I'm sorry to admit that I joined in many heartless conversations about the man I hardly knew. I think guilt has probably prompted this story. In later years I heard anecdotes that fascinated me about this misunderstood man. They say he had total recall about most things. He could recite poetry, historical dates and events, and would tell delightful stories about people he had known and things he had seen . He had money, but money wasn't important to him. I guess you could say he was simple--some would say simple-minded.

But maybe he could be better described as a man who had an air of simplicity. He valued the more intangible things in life and was content. He walked around the streets greeting the townspeople, storing information in his mind as he went, rooting for the home team at athletic events, following the marching parades, joining in our pep rallies, observing the snake dances as they writhed through town, stopping to chat with the local barber, sitting on the stoop in front of the Milky Way Drive-In, wistfully watching the magnificent desert sunset--enjoying life in its simplest form.

If only we had taken the time to invite him into a conversation or, more importantly, into our hearts. Maybe we would have learned how to savor the modest things in life. If nothing else, perhaps we could have learned to appreciate the serenity of an uncluttered life and to nurture that appreciation in our own hearts. Instead, we put too much value on money, set goals that are unreachable, live half our lives in automobiles, plant roses but never stop to smell them, and at the end of the day, fall asleep in our easy chairs in front of our T.V.s, having missed one of God's most beautiful paintings--the desert sunset.

I salute you, Mr. Combest--our hearts would have been bigger had we taken the time to really know you.