When I was 15, Dave was 12,
and Joel was 8, and Jim just 4.
Our Baptist parents went to church
with us in tow four times a week:
for Sunday School and Church, of course,
but also service Sunday night,
impromptu, repetitious prayers
on Wednesdays, choir practice each week
on Thursday nights. We played with friends
from school when we walked home from class,
but church and school and play, repeat
repeat, was our whole life. We four
are almost all retired, and none
are Baptist now, but we still sing
the old-time Gospel hymns–if we
have had enough to drink…

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, March 13, 2015

The Shoemaker brothers