I served a church in Hialeah, Florida as minister of music and youth from 1979-1982. Starting in 1978 another fellow and I had an auto parts store in Hollywood, Florida. For me it was kind of a day job. The store in the day and the church in the evening. My partner in this was a man named Barry Lyles. I have never enjoyed working with anyone on a daily basis as much as I enjoyed working with Barry. Sometimes a business can ruin a friendship, but not with us. We worked on cars in the back of the store. I rebuilt carburetors and mounted them and Barry loved working with the electronics on a car.

         He bought a Honda 600 and brought it up to the store. He wanted me to take a look at the exhaust. I went back and was genuinely surprised. The 600 was never sold in the United States. You could have one here, but you had to import it in yourself. He had bought this thing from an owner in Brazil, sight unseen. It is one of the smallest cars ever built in Japan. Eight inch wheels. A two cylinder engine. It would have made a fair sized shoebox.

         I walked back into the store and said, “Did you get a deal from a Matchbox Car dealer?” He had bought it because he liked the unusual. (He wasn’t married, so he could afford things like that.) Barry was about six foot tall, so he had to hunker down in it, but he drove it everywhere. He got over 80 miles a gallon. He wanted me to drive it, but I wouldn’t even get in just to sit. It needed an exhaust system, so I rolled it onto its side and worked on it like that. It was so light it didn’t even dent its own door. He had a black lab named Velvet and the two of them could barely fit.

         He didn’t care for Marsha much, so he rarely came by the house. (He once said to me, “Seriously, dude, what were you thinking?” We were good enough friends that I didn’t let it bother me.) But the ten hours we spent each day at work were always ten good hours. I opened, he closed, and it was great.

         One day we were both looking things up for customers who had called in. This was before computers, so we each had a long row of catalogs to work through. While we were doing that, and working on the third pot of coffee, another customer, a regular, walked in. We told him we would be with him in a minute and, as it happened, we finished our searches at the same moment. We both looked up at the customer.

         “Before I tell you what I need, I have a question. How is it you two get along so well?” I looked at Barry with a quizzical look and he looked back with the same look. Barry said, “I don’t understand. What do you mean?” Remember, this was about forty years ago. The deep south was a different place. “Well,” the customer said, “One of you is white and one of you is black.”

         We turned to each other and it was like it had been rehearsed. We pointed our fingers at each other. “Barry, you ARE BLACK!” “Larry, you’re a white dude! Have you always been white?” “Well, yeah, but you are black!” “Always have been!” “Awe, Barry, does it hurt?” “No, I don’t think so. Don’t you burn in the sun?” “Well, yeah, but Barry, You are BLACK!”

         Then we turned back to the customer and Barry said, “We are friends. Color has never mattered in this store. If it matters to you, you can leave.” The customer looked at me. I pointed to the door. He left in a big hurry.

         I have been thinking about Barry a lot lately. I saw a clip on the internet the other day. A black man, a business owner, about Barry’s age now, standing outside his store as other black men broke out the windows and looted the place and someone else set his truck on fire. Insanity. Tears stained his cheeks. I thought about Barry. It could be him. It wasn't, but it could have been him somewhere else. I think for these 'protesters,' it isn't about color, either. It is greed. 
        The police officer who killed George Floyd, and the others who did nothing to stop him, should be brought to trial in Minneapolis where the crime occurred. But there is no reason for Indianapolis and Atlanta and Columbus and New York City or any of the dozens of other cities that are being burned, should have to suffer.

         Barry and Nick and Dennis. Such good friends. I wish I could spend time with any of them right now! Dennis especially. I would like to be at his place. He’s in heaven now and I am thinking he has a really nice place. But Barry and Nick and Dennis were all black. That shouldn’t be according to the liberal news media. Why, I am a conservative white man. I should hate black people! The thing is, though, Jesus made me color blind. And He also made Barry and Nick and Dennis color blind.

         Society has gone to great lengths to take God out of America. Entertainment, movies and TV, make fun of God and Christians. In sports, you can kneel to mock the flag, but you cannot kneel to pray to the Most High. God is not in the schools or in the government. God has been put on a shelf somewhere because man is getting better and better. God is a myth. The only myth there, really, is that man is getting better. The truth is, man is getting worse. Man is failing. Man cannot handle anything more difficult than figuring what socks to wear. Meanwhile, God is waiting for His creation to come to their senses.

         Barry lives in Jacksonville, Florida now. Married. A couple of little girls. Well, sheesh, they would be in their 30s now. I hope they are all OK.

         2020 has been a crazy year. I worry about my friends, but I also place them in God’s hands.