Oral History James Murrell

Description:

Transcript:

Interviewer: Stephen Kovash (SK)

Interviewee: James Murrell (JM)

 

SK: ...if he films you. Is that okay with you?

JM: Yeah, it’s fine with me.

SK: Okay there’s a lot of these permission thingies we have to do.

JM: Yes.

SK: Okay and we’ll start… Actually let me give you this ‘cause you can fill this out at the same

time that I’m filling mine out.

?: Okay.

JM: Matter of fact, my dear wife, she did this years and years ago and we found a copy over at the History Center of her talking, you know, but…

SK: Is there like a tape of it?

JM: Yes.

SK: Oh sweet.

JM: They have it over at the History Center.

SK: Yeah there’s lots of neat stuff over there.

JM: Yeah, yeah. I didn’t know it was there, I didn’t know she had ever done that, you know?

SK: Okay so could, this is the formal part, I need to get your name and if you could spell your first name.

JM: James.

SK: Both names - first name and last name.

JM: M-U-R-R-E-L-L, Murrell.

SK: Okay and your address?

JM: 836 NE 26th St.

SK: Okay and phone number?

JM: 427-9378

SK: And if you don’t mind, your date of birth?

JM: 1/1/37

SK: Okay cool. And if you could sign it right there. This is just a release because we’re recording.

JM: Okay.

SK: Okay thank you. I have a script. Did you have everything you needed for that?

?: Yes. Well location of birth? Were you gonna be asking that?

SK: I might.

JM: What will you be asking by the way?

SK: I’ve got this really loose script here, but mostly we’re just gonna be talking about your experience with the Northeast side of Oklahoma City.

JM: Okay.

SK: As far back as you can remember.

JM: Right right right.

SK: So were you born here in Oklahoma?

JM: No. I was born in Lenapah, Oklahoma. It’s on the Kansas line.

SK: Lenapah?

JM: Lenapah. L-E-N-A-P-A-H

SK: Okay. And we already got your birth date. What brought your family to Oklahoma?

JM: My father. My father, you know, he and my mother, they divorced years and years ago when I was a little tyke. He came here and then he had to come get us boys. There was me and two brothers. He brought us here to Oklahoma with his new wife. And so I am the product of two stepmothers so I’m still, you know, kinda shaky.

SK: Yeah yeah yeah.

JM: That’s what the case was then and that’s why we came - to be with our dad. And uh, you know, we’ve been here ever since and I think that was in, what was it, 1948? I think we came here, I believe, in 1948.

SK: So you came from Lenapah to Oklahoma City in the 40s?

JM: Mhm. Yes.

SK: Was it for work or…

JM: No, it was to… See, my mom took the girls and my dad took the boys so he had to come get us boys so we could be with him.

SK: Right.

JM: That was his part of the marriage agreement, you know.

SK: And he already lived here in Oklahoma City?

JM: Yes, he came here and he’s also from Lenapah, so you know, he came here and he’s a preacher -- a pastor, and so wherever he went, that’s where we went so… We wound up here in Oklahoma and he had 2 or 3 churches here, my dad did, because he was a builder of churches, you know, and so that just carried us where he went. We did the things that he more or less did. But when you’re a child, and you’re under step parents, it’s not quite as easy. And so we had some tough times coming up, but thank God we made it and my dad, he was more or less laid back. The things that went on in the house, he more or less permitted sometimes, but that was all in getting along with this new bride because she had children. So later we understood, but when we were there, we did not understand. As a matter of fact, I was really out for my education, I wanted to get that. I enjoyed learning at the time, but when you come up under a situation where there’s a lot of stress in the house, and as a child you don’t understand a lot of things, so I went as far as I could in school. I had some good teachers, by the way. Some were mediocre, but they tried to help me all they could. When you don’t have decent clothes to wear or food to eat, you can’t learn. So I wound up, I got in a little trouble, you know. I was supposed to graduate in 1955 but I went into the service in 1954 because I was getting in a lot of trouble. The judge told me, he said, “Son, you need to get away from here. Go into the service,” and I did in 1954, and that’s when I left Douglass.

SK: Okay so you went to Douglass.

JM: Yes.

SK: So, um, you said your father built 3 churches?

JM: Well no, several churches. You know, well he was a man that built churches and established churches in the organization that he was in, that was his job more or less. As an evangelist, but he was an evangelist that established churches. And they moved him from wherever he needed to be, or where they needed him. Of course he preached a lot, you know, but that was part of his responsibility and so when he went, we went. We spent most of our time right here in Oklahoma City.

SK: Are any of his churches still here?

JM: Yes. Well, the ones that he’s established, they’re still here, yes. They are. And I think, let’s see, there’s 2 or 3 I know that are still active, yes.

SK: That’s good. As far as the Northeast side of town, do you have any place - or what were the places that were most memorable to you?

JM: You know, I guess my neighborhood. My neighborhood was called the Fairgrounds, as you might recall, I don’t know. But the Fairgrounds was where the new Douglass is. That’s where we had the Fairgrounds. And I lived about 2 blocks from there so we would walk to the fair, you know. It had been a very nice neighborhood of people that, we loved each other and we knew each other. We longed to get out of the house and go where our buddies went and go play ball. We had sandlot ball, basketball, as a matter of fact I remember we loved basketball so much that we had a little basket that we’d put up on a pole. We finally got us a basketball and we’d bounce that ball. Finally we wore the basketball out we played so much. So finally, we said,

“well we don’t have to bounce the ball. Let’s just play like we’re dribbling.” And we got a bunch of rags bundled up, you know, put them in our hands. That's the kind of neighborhood I grew up in, where the guys are real tight, you know, and we always looked out for each other. My neighborhood was the East Side, but there was Sandtown, Southtown and all that. But they said those guys on the East Side, don’t mess with them ‘cause they’re tough, you know. And my wife said, “I heard about you guys over there and I never wanted to come over there.” We weren’t tough, we just didn’t take nothing from anybody. We just cared for each other and we sometimes went to a neighbors house to eat because they had more food than we did. And they knew that we weren’t eating well so they invited us, you know. And that’s how we got to know our neighbors and all the guys and the young ladies. We got to know everybody and gosh, I hated to leave when I did, but I had to get out and go in the service. But I enjoyed the neighborhood though. As a matter of fact, when I’d get home from school, because there was so much friction in the house, I would look forward to getting out of the house just to go to school, just to get away, just to get out and be free because in the house you were bound, you know, and overruled because she had two children and they were older than we. So they had preference over anything in the house, you know, and if we went in the refrigerator, somebody had to know what you’re going for and stuff like that. But my neighborhood was so great that I just, I felt freedom when I got out of the house and I could run and play. I still see, not many people from my neighborhood, but I still see 2 or 3 that are still around.

SK: Did you move back to the same neighborhood when you moved back?

JM: No, no, as a matter of fact, my dad married again. That marriage didn’t work out so he married again and we moved to another neighborhood - got out of the fairgrounds, more or less, and moved to another neighborhood. It was somewhat better, but I still miss my old neighborhood so we’d go over there anyhow just to be around some of the ‘fellas’. When I left in ‘54 and went into the service, I was gone for 10 years so I had to, uh, find whoever I could find in the neighborhood, you know, in the old neighborhood.

SK: When you came back?

JM: Yeah, uh huh. And then, of course, I was going with a young lady and I think we spent more time together then, so I didn’t get to see a lot of the guys. She was the one - she was in another part of the city - and she’s the one that told me “we didn’t like to come over to your neighborhood because you guys were crazy,” you know, but we got married in 1958. Golly, we were married for 58 years then the Lord took her home. She died August 22nd, 2016, you know, and, oh, I love that lady. I love that lady. That was, I think, some of the best of my life with her. We had 3 children. Oh, I’m James Murrell Sr., too, speaking of children, I’ve got a Jr.

SK: Cool.

JM: Yeah, yeah. Douglass High School -

SK: Old Douglass?

JM: Yep. This building here, it was tops because, like I said, I wanted to learn but I wasn’t equipped financially, you know clothes or food, but when I could be here, because a lot of time I would spend my time out on the golf course. I was caddying, trying to make some money to eat on, you know.

SK: Lincoln Park?

JM: No, it was Twin Hills, yes. I know we would come to school and some of the guys would say “let’s go to Twin Hills.” And we would. There was some railroad tracks that went from here all the way to Twin Hills. On the other side of Interstate-35, 36th Street out there. We would go out there and make us a little money and get back. When I got to school, I had some teachers. As a matter of fact, I had one teacher - one teacher - who told me that “you will never amount to anything” and it hurt me so bad because I was trying so hard to get there, you know, and to learn. And I realized I was a poor guy and I didn’t have much. I was a below-average student, but I felt like I could have done a lot better had I had the help. And I didn’t, you know, so I did my best. I had some teachers that really encouraged me because they saw the situation, you know,

so that’s how I was able to survive, to a point. I had a decent life in that way, I mean, like I said, when I would get out of the house, it was good. It was mellow.

SK: Totally understand that. Were there places you liked to go, especially when you and your wife were going out for an evening?

JM: Well, me and my wife, when we got married, I was in the service so we didn’t go a whole lot. We just enjoyed being around each other, you know, and of course, her family, we’d go over to their house because that was home for her.

SK: Is that here in your neighborhood? When I say neighborhood, I mean this part of the city.

JM: Well, no. See her parents, they were over on 17th Street. I guess you could call it this part of the city, yeah, but it was not considered the Fairgrounds, where they lived. So we would spend time over there, you know, and that was about the jest of the whole thing, her and I just being around each other. We had some friends - I was stationed at Altus, Oklahoma and I would come home on the weekends. So we had some buddies that we would get together with on weekends and take them to a movie or we’d go to a club, something like that. We went out a lot with other people and then finally, we met some people that liked to picnic so we’d go out and set up a tent and just be together, as friends.

SK: Did you go to any of the parks? Did you like any of those?

JM: Well, it didn’t have to be any particular park, as long as we were together. I guess that’s all that really mattered to me, if I could be around her and she around me. We used to go to movies and stuff like that. You know, back before I got married, on the east side of town, the Fairgrounds, we had 3 theaters. They were all black theaters, see, because we weren’t allowed to go to the white theaters. As a matter of fact, I might add this too, the zoo, Oklahoma City Zoo, Thursday was our day. That was the only day we were allowed to go. We said, “well, if we’ve just got one day to go, we won’t go at all.” Makes sense. But anyhow, we had the Eastside, the Aldridge, and the Jewel Theater. And the Jewel is still standing on 4th Street. That’s not far from here. Jewel Theater, right up on 4th and…

SK: It’s all by itself, I think it’s about 5 blocks from here.

JM: Yeah. They’re trying to refurbish that.

SK: That’s what I heard.

JM: Yeah. Then that was, that was before we got married, of course, there was a drugstore in our neighborhood. People had built a brand new drugstore. So we said, “now guys-” they told us, too. They said “you can come in here and you can watch our TV,” because they had a new, nice TV, real nice store, clean. “You can go in and watch TV and if you want something to eat, you have to order a malt or something for being here, you know, and you have to behave.” So we all agreed that anybody cutting up in here, we’re gonna put you out so we took care of that and took care of their store. I forget now what their name was, seemed like it was Randolph’s or something like that.

SK: The drugstore? The people that owned the drugstore?

JM: Yes I believe it was Randolph’s. Golly, it was such a privilege and pleasure to have some place like that to go, where you can sit and, like I said the nice TV, you can watch TV as long as you want to until they close.

SK: Yep.

JM: That was just one other highlight of the neighborhood that I really enjoyed, you know. It’s just hard to recall a lot of things, and some things I won’t talk about, you know, because they weren’t exactly kosher. There was a time when about 8 or 9 of us, one night, got into some boxcars that had ice cream and stuff in them. We broke in and the nigh watchmen came and we heard them hollering and shooting up in the air and we flew, a line of us. 2 or 3 days later one of them told. And they came to our classroom, the police, said “you, you, you, you, you,” they gathered us all up and handcuffed uf and took us to jail. I said “son of a gun, what have I done.” And I called my dad. I said “Daddy, I’m in jail.” He didn’t ask what I did. He said “well, I didn’t put you there, you have to stay until you get out.”

SK: That’s love, huh?

JM: So that was right before I went into the service. The judge told me “get out of here, you’re headed for trouble.” I’ll never forget that. I always told my siblings, my brothers, I said “you know, a lot of times, I did not understand our father and I didn’t think he loved us.” But that’s one good thing he did for me, I don’t know how much he knows, that helped me, it turned me around when he didn’t come pick me up. Like today, I don’t think a kid will stay in there too long because Mama or Daddy will come. It’s a lesson you have to learn and I did. I’ll always be appreciative of that. I never will forget those days, or those times. Then Douglass High School had, I thought, the best football team and basketball team in the state. And we were rivals with Tulsa and Stringtown because they were real good too. I remember one of the coaches, I think, was Coach Miller or Diggs one, they made the statement or the word got out. They approached, oh what was it, Bud Wilinkson, I think, was the coach for OU.

SK: For OU, yeah.

JM: The coach said “Coach, maybe we can set up a scrimmage, you know, with Douglass -”

SK: High school?

JM: And OU, that’s how good we were.

SK: Wow.

JM: OU is a college, we’re a high school. Douglass was so good and tough that the OU coach said “no, no, no, we don’t want to go there,” because it would be embarrassing to be out scrimmaged by a high school team. That’s who wer were, you know. I was always proud to say “I’m from Douglass. I’m from Douglass.”

SK: It’s a big deal.

JM: It really was. So that’s why I love my school. Like I said, even though I didn’t prosper as I thought I should have, I wanted to. But I still learned a lot, there was a lot of love here. Oh my gosh, I sometimes think of those days and say if I could have graduated and all that, but I still got a good education. I still got a good education.

SK: And you served.

JM: In life, I really did. I learned. Sometimes I look back and say, well, it was so hard, but not really. It was hard to me and it looked real tough and all that but not really, because the benefits, when you look back and count the things that you learned through hardship, man. You realize and you learn that I can do this. There’s nothing impossible. I don’t know.

SK: Do you have anything you miss a lot? What do you miss the most from those days?

JM: Oh, just the comradery, you know, because when you get older, you go a different route. Like when I got married, all those kind of things we didn’t do anymore. Being around certain people, you learn certain things, but when you get married, you still learn but in a different way because you’re learning then how to be in love and that takes on a whole lot; that’s a whole new book. I don’t have anything I’d wish back, I’m just glad that I went through it. And I didn’t quit. You know, I quit in the sense that I left high school and went to the service, but that was beneficial because I was headed in a bad place.

SK: So you went in the right direction.

JM: Yeah, I did. I did. And although, when I went in in 1954, there was a lot of racism.

SK: Army?

JM: No, I was in the air force, you know what, the air force was 7 years old when I went in. So it wasn’t much different than the army, it had the same routine. Even through all of that, I learned a lot. I learned a lot. And my grandfather, when my dad sent us to live with him in Lenapah because he was a farmer, he told us that “you boys”, he used to butcher. He was town butcher, and uh, there was a store name Cab Moseley, he owned a store there in Lenapah and my granddad was his butcher, he was the butcher for everyone in town. We would go to the store and get some bologna and sandwiches and stuff and sit there and laugh and joke with [Cab Moseley?]. But back then, my grandfather, and I’ll never forget this, he told me that “you boys, you see how Cab Moseley and I sit around and we laugh and joke?” He said, “don’t trust him.”

He said “if he could, he’d lynch me today. So always remember that.” And I’ve never forgotten that. And so I’ve always been aware. I take nothing for granted. You know, it’s learn learn learn in this life. I just, I cherish that. I cherish the things I’ve gained, yes. And I don’t know, now that I’m single and it’s still hard to adjust to being without my wife. I miss her so, but God has given me a grace that I can maintain. When she left, he stepped in and he said “I’ll be your companion now.”

SK: It’s a comfort.

JM: It is, it is. And my children now, they tell me “Dad, it’s alright if you wanna date. You can get married if you want to.” I said “well yeah, I guess so, I was married for 58 years, I know about marriage.” You know, I said “no, no, no, no, children.” I’m adjusting now. There’s a couple of ladies, you know, that they would like to get married I know, but I don’t wanna go back there. That’s too much work for me now. I’m 82 years old, what do I look like? [laughter] I don’t wanna have to learn anybody or I don’t want them trying to learn me or remake me, I should say, me make somebody, that’s not who I am today.

SK: No need to do that.

JM: But I’m just, I’m adjusting to everything and I’m liking it. I don’t cook too much, [laughter] but my daughter in Tulsa made me some food the other day that she cooked, a whole box of food came out of her fridge and she said “Dad, take this home.” But those guys, they keep me going - my dear children.

SK: So are any of them here in town?

JM: Huh?

SK: She’s in Tulsa, are any of them here in town?

JM: Two of my daughters are in Tulsa, I’ve got 2 girls and a boy, and he’s in Dallas. He lives down there and my eldest daughter told me that she has pretty much signed a contract. She is gonna be in a play, probably be national, you know next year, and she’s going into modeling, most likely. And then my baby girl, Nicole, she’s in Tulsa. She has 3 sons. She went back to school and got her masters degree. I said “oh baby, good, that’s what I like to see.” Then our eldest son, he’s going to veterinarian school up at OSU. I said “that’s what I like seeing, my family, is growth.” I love them so we are all are real tight, you know, my family - my children and I and my siblings. Yeah. I’m a “happy pappy”.

SK: Your siblings, are they close by?

JM: No they’re in Kansas City. I’ve got 2 sisters here, but I say half-sisters and such, here as a photographer I guess, but we’re all real tight. My two siblings - I just came from Kansas City, as a matter of a fact, to see my brother who has cancer. I went up to see him and he’s fighting a good fight, you know, he said “no, brother I’m gonna beat this.” So he’s doing good, he’s doing good. We decided that all we can do is pray, you know, that’s what we do. That’s what we do, that’s how we sustain ourselves, you know, are sustained, by the grace of God.

SK: That’s always helped me.

JM: I don’t know what I would - I couldn’t make it without him. Could not make it without him, you know, because it seems like every time I have a need he steps in. He steps in and it doesn’t always have to be a physical thing, but emotional, you know, oh gosh. Has he got a gun? [laughter]

?: Is it okay to record a little video of you?

JM: Certainly.

?: Terrific.

SK: I don’t know if we introduced you. Did we introduce you Ebony?

Ebony: When he came in.

JM: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SK: Do you have anything you wanna ask?

E: Um, we could mention the Jewel Theater and some of the black theaters they had around. Did you used to go to any of those?

JM: Sure. That’s the only place we could go. You know, those theaters. See like we had our own funeral homes, which we still do, but they were in existence then and we had our own EMSA more or less, ambulance care, you know, where we could call. That was Slaughter’s, the name of it, and we would call them whenever we had an emergency and they’d come and get us, you know, and take us where we could be served because back then, they weren’t - you know we had Edwards Hospital out here, that was the African American hospital. It’s still there, isn’t it? It’s a nursing home now, but it used to be a hospital. Yeah. And like I said, we had our own funeral homes here, Temple, McKay Davis, and Rolfe. They’re still in existence today, and that’s what we used, you know. But yeah, what was the question you asked me though?

E: Um, about Jewel Theater.

JM: Oh the places we could go, yeah.

E: About that, like did you have any, is there any, memorable places or times you had growing -

JM: I know the Jewel Theater, like I said, the building is still there. I pass by there a lot of times and I remember that after the movies was over, my dad would show up. Then we would clean the theater at night after everything was done. We’d clean the theater and, you know, the Jewel Theater. I think tickets were something like 25 cents to go in and you’d see 2 movies. 2 movies, you know, and you’d say “wow!” We loved to go to the movies. They had the - even the previews was special, you know. [laughter] Just to see it all for a quarter, you know.

SK: And the cartoons? Like cartoons?

JM: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’d see the cartoons, yeah. But it was quite a life, I’ll take nothing for you, nothing nothing nothing. But back then, see, my dad, we’d clean the theater up of course, but he had a girlfriend named Jo because he tried to marry but they just didn’t work, so he had a girlfriend. She was our buddy. She was our buddy because she didn’t give us any hassle and she was always there for us, you know, us boys. And my dad of course. And I’ll never forget her because she was so friendly. The ladies he had before were not, you know. She was quite a change. And not to be a wife, she was just a girlfriend and she used to go to the theater with us and help clean up, you know. Wow that was part of the good thing I had. And we had the policeman, we had an African American policeman that would come to the east side and he stayed on the east side. I’ll never forget them because there are certain of them that are kinda rough, they didn’t mind putting a club on you head, you know “ratatata” and all that. But there were some that, one of the guy’s dads was a cop, you know, and so we got along pretty good with him. But a certain two, they stayed in the fairgrounds. One of them passed away and we rejoiced, we were down in front of the house just jumping up and down and clapping, you know, and jeez, I think about that now and boy, we must’ve really hated back then to do someone like that, but that’s just who they were. It seemed like they were there just to beat on you, you know, and to mistreat you as an African American, you say you’re treating people like that?

SK: And this is the one who would hit you on the head with the club and stuff?

JM: Yeah, there was two of them like that. But they finally had to leave, they passed away. Yeah, so it was all good. It was all good. I just enjoyed it.

SK: Is there anything you’d like to say that we haven’t asked you about?

JM: You know, I wish, because I talked about the neighbors and how it takes a village, and it does. It really does. But I wish that people, at a child’s early age, would take more control. Give the children more time so they can train them and teach them how to grow up, you know, because right now I think people have lost control of their children. And you know, there was a time in my neighborhood where, that was even before I came to Oklahoma City in Chanute, Kansas, where we were little tykes, but the neighbors. I never will forget Mrs. Cole, our next door neighbor. She would catch us wrong and she would give us whipping herself. They had trees out there and they’d take some switches off, you know, “ratatatat” and they’d burn you with those switches, you know. She’d say “now, when your mother gets home, I’m gonna tell her.” That was another whipping. And my mother, she did a magic with switches where she could [helicopter sound] double them up, triple them up, and boy, she’d say “Mrs. Cole told me what

you did” and it wasn’t much, but that was correction, see, because Mama, then she had all 5 of us by ourselves, before my dad came to pick us boys up. She would whip us in such a way that you never forgot it. And we’d go out and do the same thing again but she came back. And I had a brother, the one next ot me passed away a while back, but he was a runner. My mother would get after him and he’d take of running. She said “boy, don’t you ever run from me again.” I’m surprised he’s not a preacher today, he passed away like I said, but my mother would wait, see because we slept upstairs in my grandparents’ house, I don’t know why they put up with us like they did, but all of us slept in the same bed, all 5 of us. But my mother would wait, and we had to strip down when we got in the bed, you know, because we didn’t have anything to sleep in. Sleep in your school clothes? No. But anyhow, my mother would come in there and say “Clarence, come here,” and he knew what it was about, it was a dual whipping. My mother would whip him with that switch, boy I felt sorry for him because he was praying, I said that boy’s gonna preach one of these days. But she made believers out of us and we learned how to behave and so that’s what is missing today. I’ve been in positions today where I’ve tried to help other peoples’ children, now this was not very many years ago, and my being a deacon in the church, I said maybe I can get his attention because his parents were both preachers, but he didn’t care. He just did not care about them. And I think this kid might have been 15, 14 or 15 years old. And he was sassing his parents and I said “hey, come here let me talk to you.” And I took him back in the restroom and said “don’t you have any better sense than to sass your parents like that?” He said “man, you can’t tell me nothing.” And I felt like grabbing him up and slamming him against the wall but I said no, this is not my kid. But something is lacking, something is missing because both of his parents were such devout Christians but their son had gone astray. I wish there was something that, a pill you could give these kids today where they could get the message that you’re not to do that, that’s not too cool. But I think it’s beyond - I don’t there’s any helping anymore these kids are, I just don’t, because some of them are lost and they don’t care about nothing or nobody. That’s what I would long for, to see that, because now my children, i was hard on them because somebody was hard on me and I benefited from that. And sometimes, my wife was a little petite woman, and they would give her a hard time, you know, and she would whip them and say “I’ll tell your daddy.” So I’d come home, I’m tired, I was a mailman so those hot days, I’d come in, she’d say, “he did what,” and I said, “okay,” and so, I’d say “come here” and boy, I spared not the rod. I used a belt and they named my belt, my kids did, “Black Beauty.” [laughter] And they took it to Tulsa with them, but they used the same one on their children, they did. That’s why we’re so cohesive now, me and my kids, because me and my wife, we took time with them. But I don’t know, I don’t know what we’re gonna do. I don’t know, but nevertheless.

SK: Well I think we’ve got some other people we’ve gotta talk to.

JM: Okay good.

SK: It was wonderful to hear from you.

JM: Same here.

SK: And I appreciate it.

JM: Thanks for letting me open my mouth. [laughter] I can’t talk to nobody at home.

E: Thank you so much, I enjoyed it.

SK: It was wonderful to meet you.

JM: Yes sir. Yes sir. Yes sir. Young lady, give me a hug. God bless you.

E: God bless you.

JM: Where you go to church?