No help wanted
By Harrison Absher | 28th October 2008
It was during the last two weeks of our summer vacation. Most of us ‘younguns’ had already ran out of things to do several weeks before. Boredom was settling in.
This particular day Frankie’s folks were out in the country some forty miles from home buying apples’n’pears to be preserved for the winter. She was left alone to fend for herself the entire day. Big mistake.
About three o’clock she phoned for me to join her at her place to sample a concoction she had dreamed up all by herself. I was a little wary and I first declined. However, her persistence and threats of bodily harm caused me to reconsider. Seems she had brewed up a special “soup” and she just knew she could get a “patent” on it. Feigning a headache, I sat down hoping my mother would soon call and bail me out.
Before I could say “Nicodemus,” she shoved a large bowl of hot liquid on the table in front of me along with a container of unsalted crackers. I found myself staring into something that looked forevermore like swamp water, green and frothing, with small unidentified floating objects swirling around in it. My body quivered from head to toe. I told Frankie I really wasn’t all that hungry and couldn’t I just have an itty-bitty bowl. She didn’t answer. My imagination just kept on increasing as I sipped away at whatever it was in that bowl that looked alive and thrashing.
My churning stomach would not cooperate. I left the room in haste with Frankie still muttering plans of building a better grade of her “secret” soup. Poor kid! After sipping a small portion herself, she relinquished it in the bathroom as I had done. Years later I pondered the possibility of that concoction being the cure for canker sores.
The rest of the day we just sat around on the porch watching the grass grow and talking about the beginning of school in September. We both had already gotten our school clothes for the coming year. All we needed was that list of books’n’supplies from our respective teachers.
About that time Moose Buckhorn came out of the house next door. He had been visiting Becky Lynn, his tutor and high school sweetheart. After gawking at her for a long time, he finally planted a kiss right on her ruby red lips. It wasn’t just a little “peck” of a kiss, he held her mouth tight against his and began to root around a little. Frankie sprang to her feet and yelled: “that’s the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen!” In a low, sheepish voice, the caller next door mumbled, “Mind your own business young lady.”
Seconds later, Becky’s father asked Moose to put an egg in his shoe and *beat it. Becky thought Moose was somebody special until she saw him riding down Main street picking his nose like everyone else.
*beat it – to leave, get going, go home, get lost, etc.
Editor’s Note: Last issue, the Reminiscing column had a typo in it (my fault) that changed the whole meaning of the sixth paragraph. I apologize to the readers and to Abby. It’s a good lesson to show what a difference a word can make. The bold word “didn’t” should have been used rather than the word “did.” Here is the entire paragraph:
When Frankie and I were growing up, our downtown drugstore became a gathering place for many of us schoolkids. Just entering the place was a special challenge. Back then all the girls wore peekaboo clothes. Those clothes being just simple short-skirt dresses. No jeans, slacks or other boys apparel were ever seen on a girl. You didn’t have to note which washroom they entered in order to decide if they were girls. Only around home during ball games did a girl ever don jeans or overalls.