“Hold that steady, partner. Don’t want me to lop a finger off do ya? I need you to concentrate. Pay attention to what you’re doin’, son.”

Charlie knitted his brow and stared at the board as though he was scolding it with his glare. He leaned on it hard to anchor it down.

He wanted Uncle Bob to understand just how seriously he was taking his instructions. There was no one in the world that he admired as much as Uncle Bob, and he so wanted to please him.

The power saw screeched on with a twang and then a roar. Uncle Bob carefully guided the board through the blade to make a perfect cut along a faint line he had sketched across it earlier with his pencil. The saw clunked to an instant stop when Uncle Bob cut the power. It’s blade rang out a final, soulful tone that lingered in the air for several moments.

Charlie savored every sound and smell, and every minute that rolled by when he was with his Uncle Bob.

“Yep! That’ll do. Good job, Charlie. You held ‘er real steady for me, bud.”

He knew that Uncle Bob didn’t really need his help. Uncle Bob cut wood for his carpentry projects all the time without anyone to hold the other end of anything for him. But Charlie was so glad to be a part, it didn’t matter.

‘Uncle’ Bob was not really his uncle. He was just an old friend of the family, so cherished by all that he was affectionately promoted to ‘Uncle’ by tribal consensus.

As they were clearing up the mess from their work, Charlie blurted out something that had been pushing on his heart for some time.

“Uncle Bob, I wish you were my dad.”

Uncle Bob’s busy hands stopped suddenly, and he turned to Charlie, almost as if startled.

After a pause, Uncle Bob walked over to him, and put his big hand behind his head and neck and pulled him into his side. Then he slid down to sit on one of his work stools so his face was closer to Charlie’s.

It was one of those flat, square wooden step stools that doubled as a tool box of sorts. So it was fairly close to ground. Still, he remained a head taller than Charlie.

“Well, I love you too, buddy, but why would you say that? You have a great daddy.”

Charlie swallowed hard, and looked at the dirt floor of Uncle Bob’s wood workin’ shed.

“He doesn’t have any time for me. He’s always too busy, and he get’s mad at me whenever I go in his office.” Charlie started to choke on his own words. “He never wants me around.”

Charlie’s eyes were suddenly red hot, and his own tears took him by surprise. He had convinced himself that he didn’t care, but now the hurt was about to bust out of him. He was embarrassed for a moment, then crumpled into Uncle Bob’s arms and sobbed.

For several minutes, Uncle Bob didn’t say a word. He just held him snug. When the energy of Charlie’s sobs diminished into stuttering whimpers, Uncle Bob began to console him in a low gentle tone.

“You know, Charlie. Your daddy loves you a ton, and …”

Charlie shot back, “No, he doesn’t!”

Uncle Bob waited for a moment.

Uncle Bob lifted him up so they were looking eye to eye. Charlie’s eyes were still so wet that he had to wipe each one with the heals of his wrists to be able to keep looking Uncle Bob in the eye.

“Say, buddy. Do you remember that terrible accident that happened near your school last month, when that sand truck hit that bus?”

He sniffled out a “Yes.”

“They had all them counselors and all talk with ya about how you kids felt about it. ‘Member that?”

“Yes.”

“Awful thing. Awful, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I hate to bring it up again, but I want you to understand the difference between how your dad loves you and how I love you, and I want to use that bad event to make my point.”

“You feel your dad has no time for ya, and I know he’s very busy. He works hard to make sure you and your mama have food, and electricity, and clothes, and a bunch of stuff, maybe even a present or two at Christmas. He has to work hard when other people may want to get his job if he doesn’t work hard enough to keep it for himself.”

“Now, I imagine when someone feels a whole lot of pressure like that, it can make ‘em a little grouchy sometimes, don’t you figure?”

This time the answer came slower, as he thought about Uncle Bob’s words.

“Yeah. I guess so.”

“Well, it sure can make a person cross. Now, here I am, retired. I don’t have to fight to just keep a job and feed my family. We don’t have a lot of money, but we have enough to get by on, and I’d guess that my stress is pretty low compared to your papa’s.”

“Well, he doesn’t EVER want me to be around.” The tears started to well up again.

“Now. Now. I’m sure that isn’t true, but I’m am also sure that it really does feel that way to you. So, I understand.”

He thought for a minute and asked, “Uncle Bob, what about the bus that got hit? Why did you say somethin’ about that?”

“Ah yes! Thanks. About that …

So, imagine for a minute that you, your dad, and I were all standing on the side walk right where that bus was. You followin’ me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“OK. Now, do you remember how the sand truck came blazin’ through the intersection and T-Boned that bus, knockin’ it over on that unfortunate young man?”

“Yes.”

“Awful sad. Awful sad. That young fella lost his life at too young of an age, but I know he’s with God now, and in a better place. Let’s imagine an even more horrible thought for a second, that the bus fell over, and, God forbid, it fell on top of you. OK? I don’t want to scare ya, but I need you to just imagine if that happened for just a minute, OK?”

“OK.”

“Now, if your dad and I were both there, do you know what we’d do?”

“Nuh uh.”

“You wanna know?”

He nodded, and wiped his eyes again. He was listening with great interest now.

“Well, let’s start with me, and what I’d do.

I’d run, ruuuuunnnn over to where you were. I’d start rubbin’ your hair and kissin’ ya on the forehead, and tellin’ ya that you were going to be OK, and tellin’ ya to hang in there, and to not give up. I’d tell you all that even though secretly I was terrified that I was about to lose you, even though I knew you were about to go be with Jesus, even though I knew there was nothing I could really do to save you. I’d still frantically show you all the love I could while you were still alive to give you at least some small amount of comfort, to help you to not be afraid.”

He sat quietly and thought about Uncle Bob’s story.

Then he said, “What would my daddy do?”

“Ah, that’s the difference, right there, Charlie. That’s the difference.

You see, your daddy wouldn’t do the exact same thing I would. Do you know what he’d do?”

“What?” He sat up and looked up at Uncle Bob with intense interest. “What would daddy do?”

“Charlie.” Uncle Bob paused for a long time, then said, “Little buddy, your daddy would try to lift the bus.”

They sat silently for a moment.

“Not everyone shows love the same way. Some folks are all hugs and fun, it seems, but that doesn’t really mean they love you more than someone who’s quieter. Your daddy shows you how much he loves you as he works hard, day in and day out.”

“I get to be the ‘fun’ Uncle, but even though I might have kissed you on the head as the rest of you lay pinned under that bus, your daddy would have tried with all of his strength to lift that bus – a bus that weighed several tons, and even after all was lost and you had already gone to be with Jesus, people would have to pull him away because he’d never stop trying to lift it, because his Charlie was under that bus, and he loves that Charlie with all of his heart.

That’s the difference in how I show my love and how your daddy would and does show his love for you. It’s just different. Mine might feel better sometimes, but his is even more intense inside than mine could ever be, because you are his sweet boy. Understand me?”

He thought about Uncle Bob’s words for quite awhile. Finally, he stood up, and said, “I better get home, Uncle Bob.”

“OK, buddy. Thanks, for helping me with that board. I could’ve lopped my finger off if you hadn’t held it so straight for me.”

“See ya!” He bolted towards the old wooden door to Uncle Bob’s wood workin’ shed.

“See ya later, Charlie!”

He ran all the way home, blew in the front door, and went straight to his dad’s office.

He stood in the door way out of breath, staring at his dad who was lost in thought at his computer. He only half noticed his son huffing and puffing at his door. Finally, as Charlie’s presence became inescapable, he turned with a half grin and said, “Why are you so out of breath rooster?”

He ran over to his daddy threw his arms around him, and tucked his head down tightly against his dad’s shoulder. “I love you, daddy.”

His dad was a little taken aback by the sudden, mysterious display, but he pulled his arm out of Charlie’s hold and put it around Charlie. Pulling him into his chest, he gave him a squeeze, and said, “I love you, too, rooster. Now, git so I can get this report done. Your mom has supper ready for ya. Go wash up.”

Charlie let go. “Yes, sir.” He, turned and headed out as he had many times when dismissed from his dad’s office, but this time, it felt different. It felt very, very different.

Dogs baying throughout the night in the dark East Texas woods meant that some poor critter was running for its life. When a small red fox zigged and zagged through the thicket at top speed, its heart pounding, its small chest about to explode, the onslaught seemed a tad unbalanced, a bit unfair. At least, Samuel thought so. Sam consoled himself with the fact that the fox’s cleverness and agility would serve it well.

Though its prospects were bleak, it at least had a slim chance of outsmarting Papa Jim’s pack of hunting dogs. Raccoons were rarely as lucky, but this night’s hunt was for neither foxes nor raccoons. It was for wolves.

Papa Jim trained his dogs well. He kept pelts of different critters. He’d let the dogs see or smell a pelt, and sent them bolting off on a hunt for that specific type of animal. They were truly remarkable, and the boys often wondered which he loved more, his dogs or his children.

Sam wasn’t really one of Papa Jim’s boys. Papa Jim’s boy, Ray, was Sam’s best friend above all others. Sam felt like he was tenuously part of the Jones family, and he treasured that honor highly.

Yet, hunting wolves with dog packs always secretly bothered Samuel. So, Sam tried to reason it away. It was more fair, certainly more just, Sam figured, since wolves were larger and more dangerous. They killed chickens and small livestock of all kinds. They were a pest that had to be thinned out. He learned all of that from people he loved and loved to be around. So, he tried hard to understand it and believe it.

Still, the wolf didn’t stand a chance. Outnumbered like the fox, the wolf lacked the fox’s ability to evade and outsmart Papa Jim’s dog pack. The wolf would eventually succumb to exhaustion, be cornered and held at bay by a snarling circle of hounds.

The hunters knew. The dogs’ anthem changed from the long baying of the running chase to the guttural growling and woofs that announced a capture. The predators and prey would remain in this intense standoff, possibly for an hour or two until the hunting party finally decided it was time to go see what the dogs had “tree’d.”

Sam could never let on that varmint executions pricked his heart just a little. That would surely bring down a shit storm of mocking upon him. He just knew he’d be called a wussy by the hunting party, and that only by those who would still even speak to him. He could be banned from ever going on any future all night hunts.

The late evening prior and earlier hours of the morning were spent in two ways. The elders had their traditions, and the boys had theirs. The older men would sit around a camp fire drinking beer, chewing tobacco, spitting, telling stories, and listening to the hollow bays of the distant hounds at work. The boys would head out on long adventures throughout the country side, but not in the direction of the hunt. No, sir. The boys would get in a ton of trouble for heading towards the hunt, because they might get themselves shot in the brush, or disrupt the chase. It wasn’t clear which was worse.

The killing normally occurred late into the hunt, around 3 or 4 in the morning, when the boys were out on their trek. This spared Sam from having to witness most of the actual executions. The older men would finally go find the dogs and dispatch whatever creature the hounds had cornered.

The hunting party leaders often tried to have their all night wolf hunts during a full moon. Once your eyes adjusted to it, you could see just about as well at midnight as at you could at high noon. Things seemed to glow more by moonlight, as if the light came from the things themselves, the soil, the grass, the brush, and the trees. Everything shimmered, yet remained visibly detailed.

Sam and Ray headed down the tire-rutted dirt road, away from the hunt and from the convocation of elders in the hunting party. Each boy had his shotgun draped over his right arm, barrels pointed down to the ground, bouncing slightly as they walked.

Sam and Ray walked for about a mile and a half, talking about anything and nothing. They did not need to have an intelligent conversation. All that mattered to Sam was getting be there with his best friend, Ray, going on one of their entirely improvised, grand, middle-of-the-night adventures.

The boys came upon a pasture with a large barn and several randomly spaced, motionless cows. This was raw material for a good time. Cows that did not move could be easily tipped over or simply mounted and ridden for short distances. Barns were a sure source of nocturnal rats that deserved to meet their end. The former did no lasting harm to the cow. The latter would be doing a favor for the rancher.

The only prerequisite was that it had to be far from any farm house. Even though the boys meant no harm, they didn’t want to have to persuade any owners at 2 in the morning of their semi-good intentions. Of course, it never occurred to the boys that breaking into a barn in East Texas in the early 1960′s could have gotten them shot. Fortunately, there were no armed young lovers spending the night in the barn to be awoken by two shadowy figures holding shotguns. The boys did, however, hit the sought-after jackpot of rats.

The boys had enough sense to not get too excited and start blasting away at the fastest ones. They didn’t want to blow a hole in the wall of the man’s barn. Whoever owned this barn would almost certainly know Ray’s dad, and any residual evidence of such mischief would come back to roost on their heads later as the grown ups put 2 and 2 together. No, the boys had plenty of brazen, arrogant old rats that were in no particular hurry. The boys blew two or three of those rats away quickly and easily without doing any appreciable damage to the barn proper. At worst, there might be a mysterious tale tell dip in the dirt, dug by the payload of bird shot.

After the loud explosions of their shotguns, the boys decided they’d best move on, and leave the cow riding (or tipping) to another night. Though no farmer’s sleep was disturbed, it added to the fun to skedaddle as though the whole Russian Army was in hot pursuit of them. Sam and Ray never wanted to really hurt anyone or their property, but running from such shenanigans made them feel as though they had been more mischievous than they had been. Just pretending to be bad always gave them an adrenaline rush, but left them with few regrets.

This post was submitted by Mike Strong.

Southern Fried Chicken

I never told Bayno when Mama was going to make fried chicken. If I didn’t say anything, then all the cracklings in the pan would be mine. When the chicken was brown and crisp, I would take the spatula and press it against the bottom of the skillet and scrape the cracklings out of the grease, and when they were cool enough, I’d pour them into my mouth.

That summer was different from other summers even though the garden was the same. All its blooming and growing meant a good harvest along with back breaking work. Sometimes I’d stand in the middle of a row with both hands pressed into my back, my hands making a V and I would bend backwards and listen to all the bones popping and feel the muscles stretch so much they hurt. But with the sun beating down, I’d set my jaw and finish the row no matter if I was weeding, hoeing, or picking.

One day I thought about how many times I’d gone over those rows. Probably I’d been at each row at least 7 or 8 times. I multiplied that in my head, and then doubled it for the extra rows outside the fence and added some for when I’d be picking off bugs, and figured I’d been up and down those rows near to a thousand times already that summer.

But that was the first summer I’d spent without father coming home after work. It was easy to remember how it started. We had got up for school, and a man in a tractor came and plowed back the snow as Mama peered out the window, and when the driveway was clear we put on our coats and went to wait for the bus. When we came home father was already there, waiting for us outside the house. He told us to get in the backseat of the car while he got in front, gripping tight to the wheel as though he had somewhere to go, and I watched his face in the mirror as he told us he loved us, but he couldn’t stay where we lived, in the new house he’d built. And then he told us to get out of the backseat and go in the house by our mother, and we did.

The way we’d lived life had been thrown off schedule what with nothing to mark time the way scheduled work did. Father had always come home from the factory at 4:30 and we’d eat supper at 5 o’clock. I liked how every Tuesday we’d had tuna fish casserole, and every Wednesday, Mama had served pizza along with a shot of Black Label beer for everyone. I longed for a family that sat down to eat meals at 5 o’clock, eat them off Mama’s pretty Melmac plates, when Mama was happy and father was happy and brother smiled all the time and there was enough good food to eat. Mama would scold Bayno for eating her mashed potatoes with her fingers. I had realized that summer it was only just pretend and if anything was real at all, it was the pretty Melmac plates.

But that was all done now because father had taken all the money. We ate whatever was in season, what we could grow in the garden, along with eggs from the chickens. Lots of eggs. Lord knows how many times Mama gave thanks for those chickens. Only the old ones went into the fry pan, the oldest in the stew pot. And we had popcorn. It had been awhile since we’d had any bread, but we had popcorn, which last fall we had shelled by hand until our fingers bled.

Sometimes Mr. Kirby would bring a snapping turtle. He would nail it to the light pole by the thick part of its tail and brother would wave a stick in front of it until the turtle tried to grab it with that pointy hook tooth at the top of its mouth. And then Mama would lop off its head with an old machete she had just for that purpose. The turtle would dangle headless with its legs all jerking and moving while the blood drained out and pooled on the ground, sometimes still jerking at the end of the day even if Mama had cut its head off in the morning. Once I looked in the pan after Mama had cut it all up into cook-size pieces and some of the pieces were still moving.

Snapping Turtle (Picture from SESC)

Summer was near to end when Mr. Kirby came with another turtle, unusual for the time of year, as most of them came in the Spring. I stood next to Mama, standing with her back to the pole. I could never watch Mama swing. I stared at the grass waiting for the sound that would let me know it was over, and

“Aren’t you going to…”

“That turtle’s a she, and she’s crying. A tear just rolled down her cheek.”

I looked at Mama shaking, and then I looked at the turtle, and those sad eyes connected with mine. Sure enough, there rolled another tear, plopping in the sand below. I felt like something had reached all the way in from some deep dark far-away place and took hold of my heart and squeezed it dry. Mama took a breath. She pulled the nail out of the pole and hanging on to the tail of the turtle she walked across the road with it swinging upside down, swinging far out from her body so it couldn’t snap at her. With her strong arms she set the turtle down, pointed it toward the water and walked away without looking back. Mama came past me. “Go on and get your pole.”

I knew what that meant. If a fish decided to bite your hook and take your bait, well that was a whole lot different than lopping something’s head off when it didn’t want its head lopped off. Sometimes there was only so much a good woman could do.

This post was submitted by Julie Eger.