The house for cancer children, in
Minneapolis, Minnesota Chick Evens in 1987 was invited to visit, on behalf of a
board member, wishing he’d do a chapbook for the children, to give them
hope. He volunteered his time, and
rights to the book. But as the project began, before it even got started you
might say, it somewhat dimmed. Let me explain:
In 1981,
Evens had published his first book, “The Other Door,” it would in thirty-years become a sought after book, a
book that sold for $5.00, would be selling, for $125.000, First Edition, a
collectable. Then he created six
chapbooks of children’s tales, one called “The Tale of Willie the Humpback Whale” gave 500-free books to “Toys for Tots”, to this day 8, 000-books have
been published, or printed.
These books were created between 1982 and
1984. In 1985, he wrote a book on Child
Safety that got a response from President Reagan, and the newspapers in the
Twin Cities, Minnesota. He had worked
during these years at Midway National Bank, and was devoted to the word.
Now dear
reader, we must backtrack to 1987, where the board member, a woman in her
mid-40’s had asked Mr. Evens to visit the cancer home for children, to which he
did, and talked too many of the children. Thereafter, upon agreeing to do the
work, and working out a draft of a short tale with drawings and all, Evens
being a fairly good artist, he was invited by that same board member to attend
a showing and lecture on the Children’s Home that was sponsored by an international
fast food chain (one
we all know of course). During this visit, sitting and watching the
movie, with perhaps twenty-five other guests, two young employees by the firm
sat behind him, asking many questions, boisterously, meaningless jargon and
nearly giggling, telling him how they felt the chapbook should go after
learning Evens was the invitee or the person whom was to work with them in this
project: whom was tasked to do the job, saying it needed to be this way, and
that way, and not Evens’ way, and
endlessly cutting his ideas to shreds, but having no creative ideas of their
own. Then Mr. Evens simply said, “Why
are you people asking me to do something when you already know what you want, and
evidently, it isn’t anything I’m producing, thus, you don’t need me!”
Of course, that was the point. Evens had told them he had created a book of
hope, by creating an image of a turtle, having seen the children and their
interest in cartoons, and to drive the message of hope, not giving up, feeling
this had richness to its surface. But these young men took insult to everything
he said. Consequently, Evens told them to get out of his way, and he got up and
walked out. Presupposing he’d not want
to work with such berry pickers—
The
following week, he had met the board member, and she asked what took place,
hearing he had left. And he explained to
her the story, and she said she’d bring it up to the board. But, Evens simply said, “They’ll look for a weakness in
everything he does, to get control, and he didn’t want, nor had the time to
accommodate that.” He knew those two did not have the
ability to heal with words, or art, they were political machines— ambitious at the expense of the children:
those who never have hurt, live without out that knowledge of how to heal.
#1171/ 10-6-2016
