Читать книгу No Excuses - J. Larry Simpson I - Страница 13

Story 5

Adventures 1

John Wayne to Kim Darby as Rooster Cogburn in True Grit, “Baby sister, I was born game, and I intend to go out that way!”

God put a natural explorer’s heart in me. “I was born game!”

The road gave me the occasion constantly to stimulate my adventuresome nature. Traveling gave me a big world to view and enter into. It always stirred my imagination.

To this day, when driving, I have to see what is around the bend or over the hill. Hardly anything excites me more than a long highway stretched out in front of me. Often, I’ll say to Sandy, “Look at that long highway laying in front of us.”

The highway opens a visionary treat, going out there in my mind, dreaming and seeing things clearer. Being in so many different situations calls for a wandering treat. But you must be willing to fly out there in “your” mind.

The Muscadine Highway

Buford, Georgia, is built on small ridges. Houses up, houses down.

Arriving there on a cool, clear blue spring day in 1953, Dad stopped at a truck stop on the southside of town. Leaving the truck and trailer at the big truck stop, Dad said, “Son, let’s get in the car, and we’ll find a place to stay.”

Seeing a local pickup pulling in to get fuel, Dad drove up next to him and said in his deep voice, “Sir, do you know where there is a place to park our trailer?”

“Sure do,” the old-timer said.

The good gentleman gave us directions, and away we went.

He said, “It’s next to Hughes old grocery store!”

Pulling up to this unusual treat, we beheld the oddest little parking area and spots for only two trailers. Here was an old-timey grocery store with a porch across the front, three or four chairs, a large weathered sign that read, “Hughe’s Grocery—Since 1925” and an RC Cola ice chest with every flavor in the world. Super, super cold blue, white, and red and rusty all over the corners. The porch was covered with rusty tin—some twisted upward in the Georgia air.

The wonderful old store was built out from the edge of the road. The store and porch were four feet off the street, and then six to eight feet away was a twenty-foot drop-off under the marvelous store. The rest of the store was in space, built on large poles of brown cedar…I think.

Think of it, the store was built out beyond the drop-off and set on thick poles all around the bottom of the store. Large rough rocks lined the edge of the porch to the drop-off. I stayed close to Dad.

“What do you think, son? It won’t fall,” but I stayed really close to him for a few more minutes.

Down below was an small faded old white plank house. Moss grew on the roof and two big square rock smokestacks. Both the house and the store were covered with that old brown shingle from bottom to top with green shingle roofing, worn and faded some of the roof curled up heavenward.

Walking into the historical landmark, we were greeted by the comforting smell of bubblegum, popcorn, burnt wood and coal, candy jars filled full, a red and white Coca-Cola machine full of more “coke” on melting ice. It was wonderful.

“Dad, Dad”—as I tugged at his sleeve—“this is like the old store where Uncle Melvin,” (Aunt’ Louise’s husband, Mom’s sister), “took me, and we sat around the fire and got to hear all the men talk.”

“I’m glad you remember that,” Dad softly said as he bent over close to me.

In the center of the floor was the coal stove and woodstove where friends met to tell their stories. All this was set on oily dark brown and blackish oak planks that smelled like a sawmill.

“Y’all come in and what can I get fur ya?” The voice came from behind the counter with the cash machine hiding her face. “I’m Mrs. Hughes,” a voice came forth as the dear lady emerged from behind the counter. Short, fleshed out, with gray hair under a red handkerchief do-rag, and a large smile.

Looking at her, I was amazed at the wart just below her nose with a couple of pretty long hairs and curly ones! That occupied my vision, along with the smell of it all.

“We need a place to park our trailer for a few months.”

The gracious, inviting soul said, “Let me call my husband. Homer, Homer…,” she cried from the small back porch, with twenty-five or so steps down to the ground.

I was terrified. “A store built out into the air!”

Dad just grinned at me as the wife of Homer held to the wooden rails tight enough for her short, fat fingers to turn white.

Here came Homer. I thought he was a hundred years old, yet he climbed the steps like a billy goat. Dad and I looked at each other in grinning shock. He wore faded blue overalls, with a starched, well-worn white shirt, starched stiff, cracked, with brown brogans on both feet, all with a well-used black country dress hat, all dusty and bent.

“Welcome to Buford.”

We talked, laughed and listened to Mr. Homer tell us about Buford and World War I.

“I was with our Army in ’17 as we crushed the Germans into ‘bits’ like red Georgia gravel.”

With wide opened mouth, I pulled Dads sleeve, “Dad, I just read that story last week.”

“You did? Good.”

In spite of all that, we got the deal done, and Dad set on to get us parked and hooked up. I helped, but I couldn’t get my eyes off the front of the store. On the left was a faded “Confederate” flag, and on the right, an almost new “Old Glory.” Over the door was a saying I’ll never forget, “In God we trust. All others must pay cash.”

“Would you like to go to our Fourth of July gathering at our sons? He just built a new home, and we want to celebrate with him…,” Mrs. Hughes said.

We did go.

The Hughes’s hearts were big. We found out they didn’t live by their sign, but they also gave lots of people credit, and some never to see again. But they were happy.

Dad backed the “home on wheels” into the narrow spot by the water, sewer, and electricity. The deal was done, and the first month’s rent paid, and we set about living, but with the southside of the Liberty only five and a half feet from the ragged blacktop street.

Buford was an old town, quaint, and happy with the Hughes’s store two blocks off main street. Next to the store was a muscadine patch that grew from the street over to the two or three hickory trees. How did they grow twenty feet across? I wondered.

I asked Dad, “How strong are these grapevines?”

Not thinking about the question, he half interestedly said, “Son, Georgia muscadines are strong enough to hold a bear.”

Wow, a bear! my gleeful mind declared with the wheels turning.

I had never seen such a thing. Here was a “muscadine highway” stretched out over the high “gully” to the trees. “We had those in Walls, Mississippi, and I climbed, um, a whole bunch.”

“Thanks, Dad,” I responded. Being quite sure, I had not revealed my secret plan.

From day one, I began to study the situation, figuring out my travel route across my vine highway to those big trees. There I could climb to the sky. Not being impetuous, of course, for several weeks, I figured, calculated, and planned.

Having made several friends those last few weeks of school, I began to work on their poor little minds about the “vined highway.” On Saturday, we’d hike around, walk downtown, or just sit and tell stories. With two nickels, we could buy an RC Cola and moon pie at Hughes’s grocery. Mrs. Hughes was so kind to us, but I could not keep my eyes off those stiff long hairs, black as coal and curling up tight.

So upon one of those heavenly sun-filled days, I said, “Boys, let’s go cross the ‘muscadine highway.’”

“But nobody has ever done that before,” said my good, plump friend, whose name I unfortunately do not remember.

He had just finished the fourth grade while the rest of us the third. His argument only challenged me and pushed me on. Nobody could discourage that enflamed and tickled mind…of a little trailer boy.

One cute girl hung out with us, redheaded, freckle-faced, and pretty. Jenny was a tomboy of the highest order.

“Let’s go,” she said with flames in her words as red as her hair.

Strangely, my first real girlfriend—that is as much as a fourth grader—in conservative times could have been was a look alike to Jenny.

Walking down the street like Wyatt Earp to face the gunfighters at the O.K. Corral, we headed for the universally first-time challenge. We walked deliberately, silently seeing ourselves as world shakin’ conquerors. The competitive juices flowed.

There we were at the muscadine bridge strung out like a mountain gravel road with holes in it, daylight down below and open all the way to the earth.

I had to face up to my well laid out plan.

“I’ll go first,” I stutteringly squeezed out of my mouth. “I’ll tell y’all what it’s like.”

Slowly inching up to the sight, I saw daylight below even though the green bridge looked solid. “A long way to the bottom,” I whispered to myself.

“Hey, any of y’all want to go first? I don’t want to hurt any feelings,” I said, hoping to find a first-time victim, instead of sacrificing myself.

No one spoke. They just shook their heads side to side.

Off I went, placing my feet on the best clump of vines I could find. But the vines were swinging with me both directions as I bobbed up and down!

“Ohwee” came out of my mouth when my foot slipped off the vines with a great jar to my private area. Worst of all, I could see the ground twenty feet below, but I couldn’t let my fear be known. After all, this was my gang and my “game”!

At least there was some bushes down on the ground below me, so I took some comfort that if I fell, at least I could land on them. Swinging as I crept along, it seemed as if I were on the Empire State Building with it swinging back and forth.

I looked back to my buddies. Their eyes were swelled up as big as coffee saucers, and even though they were gripped with fear, they yelled encouraging words, “Go, Larry, go!”

Lo and behold, when I got to the middle of the muscadine passage, the vines began to violently swing like a rockin’ chair. Too far to go back, couldn’t turn around, and “way” down…to certain death. Besides, once I got to the trees, I’d have to eventually come back, but my pride said, “Go on! You can’t quit…”

On I went. Swinging, slipping, and grabbing vines, suddenly, violently, I swung under the vines! Hanging on for dear life, I swung under the “highway” but got my right leg over the top of the vines, grabbed a bundle of the green strands, and wiggled back up on top as I swung side to side. I was winning over this adventure but wet with sweat!

Making it to the trees, I climbed out on a big limb, blew out air with a big, “Sheeewww,” as the four safe buddies clapped and yelled. I tried to act as if it were nothing.

I clung to the sweet, comforting big tree. I felt good while shaking from top to bottom, front to back.

“Who’s next? There’s room over here for all of us,” I breathlessly said, still excited, as if I was the victorious gladiator. I was proud I had shown the way.

The other two boys followed, leaving Jenny and “Plumpy” behind. We didn’t use that term for our heavy friend; it was just a name. He didn’t care—well, I hope. Both had learned from watching me, and they traveled with great success and better than me. Now they were on the limb with me.

What a worldwide marvelous thing. Now Jenny was to come as our plump friend wanted to be last. She almost flittered across the green highway being little, lighter than us, or so we agreed. Jenny was a good tomboy! We liked her. She was the winner so far. I was humbled…by a girl.

However, our plump friend was the real story. “Is it really my turn? Don’t some of you want to go again? My stomach hurts. Mom will call me soon….”

“No, you gotta come,” we all cried out. “Come on!”

He began to navigate the vine passage very well, but being bragged on, he let go of the vines to clap for himself, and then it happened! He flipped helplessly under the vines!

The rest of us hollered, “Hang on! Hang on!” as our eyes almost popped out of our heads. Our mouths dropped wide open as we watched him fight for his life.

His right foot caught some vines that twisted around his leg and foot, so now he hung upside down.

Plumpy boy yelled, “Help me! Help me! I’m caught…!” he hollered until he whimpered with fear, almost to tears.

“Don’t wiggle,” I cried out. “Do not move!” I said, as he turned to grab vines and throw his left thick leg over some of the dangerous highway. “Stay still. We can’t let you fall and land on your noggin!”

The poor boy was helpless, and so were we. “Get me off! Get me off…!”

And I said, “We’ll save you.”

We were in trouble. We couldn’t reach the sad victim, so the only thing to do was for me to slide down the tree and go in the store and have Mrs. Hughey call somebody.

“What…,” and I can’t tell you the rest of what she said, but in about five minutes, the fire department and policeman were there, sirens blaring.

The fire truck had a “body bucket.” Up the bucket went with a skinny small man in it, who loosened the poor boy’s foot from the vines, caught him, turned him right side up as Plumpy cried. Both were lowered to the ground as I stood by the red and yellow truck.

Up went the bucket again. The other victorious four in the big oak tree were loaded into the ride, and happily down they came!

What a turn of events. The planner and leader of this forever story was left standing, lonesome on the ground! Plumpy was the attraction.

“Who is this boy…?” the policeman asked.

Mrs. Hughes’s said, “The orchestrator of this fiasco!”

I’ll never forget as the fireman, policeman, and then others walked away. Yes, I was the motivator; they were the winners.

We never tried that mighty highway vine passage again…except in our minds. I hope at this very minute, some place, Jenny or another is telling this story.

Buford is the first place I learned I could tell stories as I set with the kids on the block and told them of my exploits in World War II, on a tank, in the jungles, or in the air, saving America. And they listened.

Sandy and I recently went to Buford. The old store was gone, but not the glad memories.

The Runaway Tractor

My soul is very grateful for my life as a trailer boy, all the places we saw, and people we met. It gave constant occasions, for me, to explore the world and loving the outdoors.

Jeanie, my sister, two years younger, was all in for almost anything I wanted to do. As the McCollum’s say, “She was set on go!” She was my good friend. We even double dated a couple of times as older teenagers. She was truly an innocent victim on the next caper.

The Rice’s—John, Wilma, and Happy, good friends since Granada, Mississipi, in 1949-’50—moved close by us, in Dundee III. With John working with Dad. Mr. Rice was a great mechanic.

Rice had told Dad that “since there are so many Johns, just call me Rice,” so Rice it was.

Happy, two years older, and I had become fast friends.

We lived in several towns and six states together, and here they were in a park close to us in Dundee. Illinois.

On this particular July day, it was a Saturday, the Rice’s had come to visit. The sun and blue sky were brilliant. Arriving at about 9:00 a.m., Happy, Jeanie, and I got outside as quick as possible. We headed down the gravel road to visit the mink ranch (as told in “Jobs”).

In about thirty seconds, we turned our heads from talking, and behold, a remarkable, frightening sight. A big round object moving with a goal in mind.

“A snapping turtle,” Happy said, and Jeanie lightly screamed. He was crossing the road headed toward us and the trailers.

“What’s he thinking?” I asked, and both shrugged their shoulders.

Huge, but we easily ran up to him as he slightly turned toward us, raised his body up about three inches, let out a loud hissing sound, as if blowing his nose. It was a fearsome sight, his eyes glared at us, all brown and wet-looking.

“Be careful,” Happy said as if we needed that information.

Covered with moss, very green, with a head the size of Dad’s fists, he kept up his journey. Jeanie screamed, and we chattered with excitement. Neighbors began looking out their doors and swiftly emerging from their homes on wheels. The “oohs” and “aahhhss” filled the air.

Robin—another trailer boy, but not an outdoor type—ran up, almost stumbling down on the beast.

“Get back, Robin,” Dad said to the “light in the loafer” kid, “or he’ll bite your foot off. He screeched like a little girl. Stink? The big boy on four legs stunk!

By the time, the owner of the park, who had lived in that country all his life, told us that this happened every once in a while. There was a large “swampy” area across the road that always looked very frightful. He said, “The swamp is full of them and other creatures!”

Jeanie, Happy, and I looked at each other with stretched out eyes.

The owner said to Rice and Dad, “Walker”—as he glanced over at Mr. Rice—“this is the best meat in the world. We’ll kill him and have a cookout later.”

So Dad and Rice went to Dad’s green Ford and got a “pic” handle and held it down to the monsters pointed mouth that inevitably attacked the handle with severe violence. He then clamped his mighty jaws down on it. The two mechanics, with sleeves rolled up, picked up the turtle and carried him to the owner’s home. The crowd still stood and chatted, all in a furious excitement.

Later, the men said, “He weighed at least 105 pounds and was two feet wide and long. Once he clamped on to the handle or if to a human, he wouldn’t let go until the skies light up with lightning.” But he let go quicker than that as an ax took care of him. No doubt those things were true.

We talked breathlessly about seeing him killed, meeting his abrupt end, being dressed (prepared), cooked, and tasted. I loved his taste. It was the only time I’ve ever eaten a swamp creature. This excitement set our blood to flowing and set us up to do some exploring in the woods close by. Jeanie was ready to go, so we looked at each other, blinked our eyes in slight hesitation but said in strict determination, like Warren Oaks in The Wild Bunch, “Let’s go,” as if we were going into battle or some world-shaking adventure.

Heading northward, Happy led us through the woods, looking for anything we could find. The deep green moss and clear water seeping up through the moist Lake Michigan earth was fascinating. We turned in about twenty minutes eastward and came up on a beautiful large pasture and a fencerow. Cows and a donkey were fenced in. The farmer had told me a few days before, “There are a lot of coyotes, and the ‘jackass’ kept them away.”

“Jackass!”

“Yes,” he said.

And I felt awfully worldly to hear such a word.

The floor of the woods was covered with red, yellow, and all colored flowers.

Jeanie said, “I love this.” The woods were very low lying, only twenty-eight miles from Lake Michigan.

Looking and walking down the rusty fencerow way out in front of us was a dark, vine-ribboned object. It was huge, brown, and covered with moss and old crinkling leaves and limbs.

“A tractor,” Happy burst with glee, strangely smiling from ear to ear.

“Come on. Let’s get on it and see if we can start it and drive it,” Happy said as our pace quickened.

I thought we could silently, then said boldly, as if in charge, “Go on up. Help Jeanie up.” Walking up to it, it was, all rust-covered, square-shaped, and huge. A homemade metal roof set over the two seats with two steps up to the seats. All three of us climbed upon the ole-timey machine.

“I figure it has a key start,” start less crank. “Let’s crank it and take off.”

Happy, more thoughtful and cautious, said, “No, we can’t.”

I retorted, “Sure, we can!” while I wrinkled my eyes like “I think” with a very uncertain face on Jeanie and rightfully so.

We could find no key or way to start the monster, so climbing down, I began to look around the front to see what was what. Both Jeannie and Happy were perched up in the cab with Happy in the driver seat. They now felt more at ease.

“Here it is,” I yelled, “an old crank!” with breathless words. That’s where the saying “Crank your car” came from. Then I remembered seeing Dad start an old Euk dirt Grader by cranking it.

“No, no,” Happy exclaimed, seeing what was about to happen while Jeanie silently, wild-eyed, waited for the event with the green and hazel flashing like a flashlight.

Grabbing the handle, I tried to twist it clockwise around in circles, but it was too tight and stuck. Breathlessly, turning it clockwise slowly then faster as it loosened up. Determined, with sweat now running down my face to my chest and middle of my back, I worked with all I had. Stopping to slap a mean bloodsucking giant mosquito, it came to me.

“Counterclockwise,” I said out loud and twisting the “crank” one time, two times, three times, and out of breath, I gave it one last heave with all I had left in me.

“Now!”

“Listen, Jeanie, it’s starting,” Happy said as he hit her on her left shoulder. The engine sputtered, turned over, and finally set into a rough, missing run, then a steady stuttering purr.

But! But the big old square Allis Chalmers started to move forward!

“Oh no,” Jeanie pleaded, as Happy said, “We got to stop this Simpson!”

“Yeah I know!”

“Larry!” Jeanie, chocking, cried, as I madly, with every muscle, scrambled from the front of the tractor and jumped straight up, poking my left foot into the square step.

“Move over!” I pantingly shouted as I tried to pull myself up. But like Happy, I was stupefied and rendered, almost malfunctional.

As the 1930s fifteen-thousand-pound tractor started rambling forward with increasing speed, Jeanie hollered “Larry!” again.

I shouted, “Move over! I’m coming up!”

My next step on my right foot with my dirty white tennis shoe slipped off the step! I was holding on frantically to the step handles now hanging out in the middle of the air. I knew if I fell, I’d be run over. I refused to let that happen.

“Come on, buddy,” my great Granada pal encouraged.

The giant man killer was moving faster, and I thought, What if it goes through the fence and all the cows get out? What if I never see Happy and Jeanie again? What if…? What if…? As I fought gravity, hanging out in midair, and the shaking ole machine seemed to be trying to eat me up. As it jerked forward and shook me like a freezing man, my hands were wet from sweat and slipping dangerously.

A huge faded, cracked half-flat black tire was reaching for my right leg as it hung, swinging way too close to it. I saw the black, rubber monster with my right eye, looking over my shoulder, and pulled with all I had.

By God’s dear mercy, with all I had left, I pulled myself up, my feet dangling under the monster, and I climbed the next two steps and set in the driver’s seat! By now, we were mowing down saplings and bushes. If we tore open the fence, I just knew we’d have to work for the old farmer for the rest of our lives…after we got out of prison!

Looking fearsomely for a switch or key, I finally discovered it but looked up, and we were headed for the fence! “Oh no!”

As I twisted the crude key, the motor whimpered down with a loud as a cannonball of backfire and smoke.

Shaking with tears of relief and words of thanksgiving, the three of us hugged one another, and Happy prayed a very short prayer to God for delivering us. We set silently, breathlessly a few moments as Jeanie squeezed my right hand with tears. The path of the tractor was about twenty-five to thirty yards!

We humbly walked back through the woods breathing deeply as a conquering and relieved, maturing spirit of success came over us. We were both humbled and proud.

“We better learn from this,” Jeanie softly said, and we agreed…as I was looking sideways with a “sure.”

The tractor path had only taken a minute or so, but we had lived through a war!

Soon no words were spoken, and we “crossed our hearts and hoped to die” if we ever told anyone. I didn’t for years, and I only revisit that scene every few years and then with reverence and wonderment. We told Mom and Dad just before I went to Memphis State in a moment of family reflection.

Dad just said, “Son, son,” slowly shaking his head.

The years passed and the secret miracle was just ours.

In 1986, I went to Mr. Rice’s funeral. Happy and I briefly mentioned the day of the secret tractor run-away.

After another thirty-four years, I’ve not seen my good old friend. I’d like to talk about this adventure with him and other great times, but I don’t know where he is.

No excuses. Live life as an adventure.

Arkansas and Ready

“The earth would move beneath my feet,” said in a good old western.

—J. L. S.

“Boy, you’re ready,” Granddaddy Mac said one day to me as I was hanging around his rocking chair, the one with a hole or two in the seat.

I looked up at him and said, “Yes, sir. I’m ready.”

He grinned, just puffin’ on his pipe and patted my head.

Ready Teddy was another of those sorts of sayings in the fifties, and I was “ready.”

Prince Albert was Granddaddy’s favorite pipe tobacco, which filled the air with its august aroma.

“Why do you smoke a pipe?” I asked one morning as I filled in my time before tearin’ up the countryside.

“Your great-granddaddy McCollum smoked one, so I do too.”

I just looked at him and said, “Okay,” and went outside in the cooler morning air.

Jeanie and I were in Arkansas with Mom’s mother and father. I do not remember the nearest town, but we were there because we were about to have a baby brother born in a few days. Dad brought Jeanie and I to stay with Grandma and Granddaddy Mac for safekeeping.

“Joy” and “fun” best describe our stay with them as we waited for what was to be born. Back in those times, we couldn’t know what sort of human was to be born, nor did we need to.

Nevertheless, Troy David was born into this world, August 6, 1949.

Dad called the neighbors phone, one mile down the dirt road northward, so they could get the happy news to us. Since Granddaddy Mac and Grandma Mac didn’t have a telephone, they needed good neighbors. They knocked on the door.

“You’ve got a boy, Troy David,” the lady said in excitement.

I stared at her because she had an Indian-lookin’ face, all brown with some long-twisted hairs hanging from her head.

“She’s just got ’em. That’s the way she likes it,” Grandma Mac said softly as I looked bug-eyed at her and said, “Yes, ma’am,” and ran out the door.

“I’ve got a baby brother. Jeanie, we’ve got a baby brother. Barbara, Alice we’ve got a baby brother!”

And around to the rest of the family, I announced this amazing news. Everybody clapped and said words of excitement.

This three-week stay in Arkansas was a time to be told even at this late date. James, my uncle, was thirteen years old; Alice and Barbara, four and two years older than me; and Carolyn was younger than me; all were there along with two skinny short-haired hound dogs. Their ears hung way down, and they “panted” a lot in the Arkansas furnace. I learned that word panted’ from Uncle James.

Now as we whooped and hollered on the front panel porch, the hound dogs stood on the bottom step and joined our celebration howling, barking, and whining with their tails justa fly’n.

James and I became close friends forty years later when we could travel to see each other. He was a lanky, strapping, muscular, tough kid with whom I rode horses in the west many times before his passing in 2006. He treated me like a brother.

My sweet aunts Alice and Barbara thought of me as a baby brother, wagging me around on their hips. They spoiled me until I was seven or eight with my feet scratching the ground. I guess, eventually, I got too heavy, but they, thankfully, tell those stories today as delightful almost eighty-year-old women.

Carolyn and Jeanie were close to each other, and she still has the sweetest, brightest smile and soft voice this side of heaven.

This combination of little humans with me born “ready” was a catalyst for excitement.

“Are you ready?” Alice would say after breakfast, and away we’d go to the wonderland beyond the steps of this old plank sharecroppers’ house.

Arkansas was hot in that summer of ’49. Humidity was sweltering in the delta, hilly countryside, on top of the red dirt. Cotton was standing big and tall with the “white” beginning to fluff up.

The house was small and, of course, with only fans to circulate the ninety- to ninety-five-degree wet air. Four or five rotating fans with one big window fan, provided by the farm owner made the hot air fly. Flies, green, brown, and black ones flew through the house with Grandma Mac being the fly killer.

“How’d you get so good at killin’ flies?” I asked as a little sweat ran down my left chin.

“Practice, son, practice” was all she said, but I remembered those words, “Practice, son, practice.” And it stays with me to this cold day in March.

Rockin’ chairs were necessary in those days, not just a pleasure.

Granddaddy said one hot day, “Who can stand to just sit in this weather if you don’t have a rockin’ chair and a hand fan?”

And there were on the old church bench and chairs, fans for the hand, mostly form funeral homes or banks. They got worn out pretty fast, but that didn’t matter. They still got used.

“How come there’s so many swatters in here?” I asked Grandma Mac.

“Well, son, they are for killin’ flies!”

I got it. Direct, simple, and funny. Why else? Of course, to kill flies! Those were good, hot, fly-killin’ days.

This setting was perfect for outside adventures as Alice said, “Let’s go,” and away, I, Alice, and Barbara would fly. Hogs in the shaded hogpen with lots of hard dry mud until it rained, a barn to climb up in, two hounds, and a small dirt road beyond the fence laying to the west called us.

The barn had a loft that I loved to sneak over to, to climb the ladder and look out, for which I got in trouble.

“Boy, get away from that loft,” I heard many times, and “Do you want to break your neck?”

Well, of course, I didn’t, but I did want to see the world below and out “yonder.”

For the first day or two, I would stand and look down that long dirt road and wonder. The earth would move beneath my feet.

In adventure, questions, mystery, new things, my world…the earth moved beneath my feet. I did, and it does.

“Larry, you ready to go.”

“Yep.”

I’d gleefully go back to Alice. Always, she, Barbara, and I would say anything to be with one another.

“Let’s travel the old dirt road,” the sisters said.

“Ready, let’s go.”

It’s been my motto for these years: “Ready, set, go.” Did it come from those days? Yes, and more like ’em.

It seemed to this five-year-old that we walked a long way, especially as the time flew by, looking, climbing, and talking.

We came to our first barbed wire fence and carefully went through it. We then crossed another and another.

“How far have we come?” I asked.

“Oh, about a half mile.”

“Will we be in Texas soon?”

“Texas?” Alice replied. “No, not yet.”

I had a cowboy book about the Texas Rangers, so I thought, It’d make me sound “big” to ask such a question.

“Let’s climb this tree,” one of them said.

So up we went, as high as possible. We looked all around. Up high! Three kids. Warm breeze blowing at 9:00 a.m.

Coming to a place, as the sun got high in the sky, where some blackberry bushes were growing, we went over to see if any were ripe.

“No, they’re still too green,” Alice said, when suddenly, Barbara yelled out, “A snake! A snake!”

We swirled around, started to run, and what do you think?

“A blue racer! A blue racer!” Alice shouted. “Run! Run!”

Turning back down the little road that split the huge farm, we lit out.

“What’s a ‘blue racer’?” I yelled.

“A snake that chases you.”

I pumped my arms all the harder, but they kept up with me.

The blue “killer” followed. As I looked over my shoulder to see the varmint, it seemed to be closer and closer, making a continuous “S” figure in sailed along. It wasn’t afraid of us! Surely, it would swallow us up!

“Faster, or we’re sure ‘goners’!” Barbara barked at the top of her voice.

The prospect of a snake with huge teeth biting my rear end was scary indeed!

“Up this tree!” Alice cried out, and we scrambled up like monkeys. Now I don’t want to belittle monkeys, but from the bottom, looking up it looked like that to me as we ascended to our safe spot.

Gasping for the Arkansas morning warm air, we swallowed in gulps. “Look, look at that! The thing is climbing the tree!” Barbara barked out.

It did raise up a little and looked up at us as if to say, “Now there, this is my country.”

Then he swerved slowly back toward the blackberry patch as if he had another accomplished mission.

Alice, sweating profusely, said, “Let’s get down and get on to the house.”

We were happy to get home.

Granddaddy Mac was sitting on the front porch, reading his big worn black Bible. I blurted out what happened as I jumped upon the front porch, and he never lifted his eyes and said, “Yeah, son. They’ll do it.”

I went inside.

“That was close,” Alice said, who had already gone inside while Barbara, usually second to speak, said, “I’m just glad to still be here.”

“Listen,” Alice said, “let’s just keep this to ourselves,” to which I nodded in agreement and never telling them I had already told my Bible-reading Granddaddy.

Grabbing some iced tea with the ice chipped off the big block of ice, we whispered a repeat of the story as Jeanie listened quietly. She didn’t ask a question but tried to understand.

“Larry, you will keep this secret, won’t you?” Barbara asked.

“Yes, I can. I will,” I said, having learned that phrase from Dad.

Jeanie just looked wide-eyed with a slight frown. She was only three years old.

I only saw one other blue racer in all my journeys.

A Granddaddy Lesson

“Lessons come hard but make life easier,” I read somewhere. It seems to be true.

Running around with Alice and Barbara, who were seven and nine, I was feeling pretty big. Besides, “cool” James, at his grown-up age, being born in 1936, taught me some “slick” behavior as I followed him around.

On the second Saturday of being in Arkansas, I came in from outdoors all full of myself, and Granddaddy Mac said, “Son, go over there and get me my pipe.” He loved his pipe.

I replied quickly, precisely, and definitively, “In a minute,” and I never looked up. I had lost my mind.

“Boy, what did you say?”

And I could hear some aggravation in his gruff voice. “In a minute,” I confessed, and I knew I had transgressed the law! Like a sheep killing dog, I tried to handle it, saying, “But, I’ll do it now.”

Too late.

“No, you won’t. Come here. Bend over this old knee!”

“Yes, sir,” and he then and there taught me a lifelong lesson. “Don’t cross the one with the power, especially Granddaddy!”

He bent me over his knee and spanked the hurting behind for what seemed like an hour. I was shedding some wet tears from shame and pain when he ceased. “Do you understand me now, son? Like Randolph Scott to his young companion in “Ride the High Country”.”

“Yes, sir,” as I fell into his arms, knowing I was wrong, and he was right while the tears rolled down my red cheeks. I could not stand to know I had disappointed Granddaddy and aggravated him. I was hugging him. He was hugging me. Correction with love.

“I’m sorry, Granddaddy!” “I’m sorry… I’m sorry.”

To which he replied, “We’ll be okay. I’m not mad.”

I was comforted and corrected. With his hands on my shoulders, he explained respect, honor, and duty. He did right, and I learned a life lesson even now sixty-nine years and a million miles later. He’s gone, and I thought I couldn’t live anymore when he died too young in 1961. The earth moved beneath my feet.

The Bull

“Larry, Jeanie, hurry, you’ve got a baby brother!”

The reason we were there had happened. Not having a clue as to where the new brother came from, Grandma Mac said, “His name is Troy David, named after your Granddaddy Mac.”

Jumping up and down, we celebrated, and then I asked, “When will we see him and Mom and Dad?”

Secretly, I had gotten very homesick.

“Four days. They’ll be here.”

Jeanie and I jumped up and down together, making a lot of celebration noise. Then we settled back in for the last few days of our Arkansas trip.

The next day was cloudy, and we’d had a little sprinkle. That ole dirt and clay was slick with the rain.

“Hey, let’s go see the cows in the back pastures,” Barbara suggested.

So away we went with a picnic lunch of bologna sandwiches and a jug of water in case we got too hungry.

So through the fences, past the blackberries, over stone by stone in the creek and through the fence to the red with some white cattle.

There were a few cows and calves that we could get close too. We rubbed a nice cow, massaged her ears, and scratched her back.

But we had to get back for lunch pretty quick. Through the fence, cross the creek and into the next parure, we went. We walked slowly, enjoying being together for one of the last times on this trip.

Suddenly we heard a thundering sound, limbs breaking, rocks flying, and as we turned back and here, he came. What! We thought he was put up. What? A huge rumbling and rolling bull! His horns had been cut but were still six to eight inches long. Weighing in at two thousand pounds, he looked like a mountain rolling at us. The dust was flying, and his snorting created a dust storm!

“Run! Run!”

We ran as hard as we could. The fence was getting closer, but so was the bull.

“Run!” Alice hollered.

I did keep up with my aunts, but the old bull wanted us. We had invaded his domain. Alice grabbed my hand and pulled me through the air, my feet hitting just every once in a while.

He was saying, “Leave my girls alone! Don’t come back!”

We made the fence with the bull ready to spear us. Alice went through, held the next wire open as fast as she could, and I flew through, and then came Barbara, screaming, “Bloody murder!”

The bull stopped, snorted, pawed the ground with his right then left foot, and shook his head as if to say, “No, don’t ever do it again” as “slobber” flew out of his flopping jaws.

We were safe. But when we went to the sharecroppers’ house, Grandma Mac asked, “What is it? You’re wet, dirty, and you look wild-eyed.”

Alice told her, and all my wonderful grandmother said was “You knew better. Get cleaned up, and no one will ever know.”

Thank goodness. Granddaddy didn’t know until they moved back to Memphis. He was okay that a lesson was learned, and that’s enough. That’s the way my wonderful grandparents were—“always have a good time.”

We did.

No excuses. Live life to its fullest.