In old Belmont County there's a little ferry town…
..
It's 2-30 p.m. The oppressive heat and humidity of the last few days has given way to a ferocious summer storm, raging over the Ohio Valley, just a little west of Wheeling, West Virginia. The rain lashes the tree clad hills surrounding the little Ferry town that nestles, quietly, on the west bank of the great Ohio River, on the Ohio side of the Ohio State and West Virginia border. Lightning strikes somewhere out in the grey, green unknown, and the sound of thunder, rumbling, grumbling, reverberates round the surrounding hills……. At last, the rain subsides, the howling wind sends the dark grey clouds scudding eastwards, and the Sun appears, brightly, in the height of the clear blue mid afternoon sky…..
The roofs of houses, windows, fences, the roads and sidewalks of FerryTown are wet, and as they gleam in the new found sun shine, the trees drip liquid crystals of pure, fresh water, the droplets glinting and shining like little tiny jewels, running from the fresh, light green leaves. A half rainbow appears, briefly, feathering out to the east…
..the rumbling thunder slowly fades away, and FerryTown begins to regain it's composure. People are in the streets, once more, laughing, smiling, joking, in and out of the little shops, scurrying about their business, as if spared, to begin life anew….
9-30 a.m. West Sussex, England. A middle aged man sits in a bright red Ford, parked in a lay by, by the side of a minor country road. He stares, absently, through cigarette smoke, at a few scattered Elm trees in the middle distance. Beyond the trees, and the summer green fields and hedgerows, the dark grey western sky is turning ominous and black. The car radio, ignored, crackles briefly. A flash of lightning rends the distant sky. Heavy drops of rain strike the car windscreen, the wind rises from the west, and the thunder storm is upon him.. The man's eyes are weary, tired and depressed. The weeks of speculation and dread are over. Now, he knows that hard work, service and loyalty count for nothing, his future taken from him, in a sentence or two, an hour before. Once full of energy and promise, his life now seems over, empty and barren. Suddenly, he is living in a country he does not recognise…...
Afraid of the future, his thoughts turn to the past, and the heady days of roaming the American Midwest, a carefree young man. He recalls the thrill, the thrill of of unknown country, and he remembers...he remembers.... he idly stares at a rainbow, fading now, feathering out toward the west….Woodie Guthrie is on the radio, and he suddenly knows what he has to do.....
I'm going back, back to Belmont County, in the morning…