Day 686: 5 Minute Freewrite: Friday - Prompt: a break for us all
“Thank God it is Friday!” cried Victor Morton, CEO of Morton Technologies as he all but fell into his mother's home. “I mean that with the utmost reverence – thank You, Lord, this Friday has finally come, and the alpha and beta testing for the Data Master version 5.0 is done – we are ready for launch and it is time for a break for us all!”
Oh, the shouting and jubilation among all the colors of the rainbow of Africans in America, which brought the one White in-law in the house out of his room, and from his nap, with a sleepy, sad smile on his face, because he was witnessing a dream someone he had loved was not awake to see...
Henry Fitzhugh Lee had been married to the elder of the two Mortons who were the creators of Morton Technologies … he had spent many hours on the porch of the little home in rural Virginia on which his future wife Vanessa Morton and her younger brother Victor had been sitting with their MS-DOS coding books and writing code for early PCs in the days when the Commodore 64 and 128 were still in heavy use, and a few stalwart Texas Instrument TI-88s were still running.
The Morton teens had opened the eyes of the youngest of Lofton County's Lees of the mountains (Virginia's Blue Ridge) to the widening world of computing, although most people assumed it was the other way around because he was the White boy in the picture. In reality, the Mortons had given Captain Lee his start, a start that had helped him to be master of all necessary information in Special Forces, JAG, and now as commander of the cold case division in his hometown police force of Big Loft, VA. He was a data master; they had made him so, teaching him as they learned about coding and little data and big data.
Vanessa Morton Lee had died young, and her son Henry Victor had also died, leaving Henry Fitzhugh Lee a very young widower, but brother-in-law Victor and the widower had decided not to let the little company fall... which is why Victor crossed the room to give his White brother-in-law a big hug.
“We did it again, bro,” he said. “The Lord sent you up here to be here with us, just now.”
“I believe it,” said Captain Lee. “What are you planning to do to celebrate?”
“Down the Hudson Valley for the weekend – we need you to come too.”
“I'm already there. Everything paid for?”
“Yes, but, if you see anything you think we would enjoy, you're still welcome to pitch on in.”
“Oh, you know I will … far be it from me not to invest at such a critical moment!”
So, Captain Lee owes his success to Vanessa and Victor Morton. It is sad to hear that Lee's wife died at a young age. I am soooo far behind on this story and have missed reading it. Well done! : )
Yep ... the story starts all the way back in Black, White, and RED All Over part 12, in which Captain Hamilton goes deep background on Captain Lee and Captain Bragg about a quarter of the way into the account... in high school, boyhood Bragg bullied young Miss Morton because she was too smart, too cute, and too Black to be on track to be valedictorian and graduate a year early at that. Boyhood Lee wasn't having it and took down boyhood Bragg's entire gang, 30 years before he worked with his cousin Captain Hamilton of the final takedown recorded in the longer tale ... but, read between the lines in rural Virginia, and you can understand how the stress for the Mortons increased and the move became necessary.
It will come out in a later tale how boyhood Lee pulled all that off... he owes his success in the wider world to the Mortons, but his foundation comes from his Lee grandparents who raised him in the Blue Ridge (see the "Mountain Peak" and "Eagle Feather" freewrites from a few days ago) and a large inheritance from his wealthy Slocum-Lofton mother. Minus the Mortons, Captain Lee probably would have been a well-off mountain man, living his whole life up and down the Blue Ridge and the rest of the Appalachians like his Lee grandfather ... and, he may yet retire to that fate. But, in terms of the world, the Mortons represent for Captain Lee what Black people represent in their labor and genius to the United States of America: the getting across of the gap to greatness in multiple ways.
Hooray for boyhood Lee! I don't know how you can think of these things when you write. I have no imagination at all and I just write for fun. You are an amazing writer. : )