honeysuckle

My first story of recollection goes way back, before I was knee-high to a grasshopper. It was the day I pulled a leaf offa Gran'ma's hunnysuckle bush and lived to regret it. It was, and I say "was" for a reason, a real nice and quiet evening on the porch with the entire family. Quiet, that is, except for my sister, Lou. Actually her name is Tami, but she hates it when I call her "Lou", so that's why I do it.

We were making fun of the elders, as usual. Pappy pickin' his nose, listenin' to the Cincinnati Reds ball game, Gran'ma in the swing with her dress rode up in the back, Mom and Dad fightin' over the best seat cushion on the glider, and aunt Betty and uncle Roy tryin' not to watch Pappy.
Now keep in mind, nobody's watchin' me and Lou.
Lou gets a great idea, we're gonna do dares. Now if you got a kid sister, you know as well as I do, you're always the one who gets caught or blamed. Well, bein' as young as I was, I sure as hell didn't see what was comin' next.

She had first dare, as always, and started lookin' around the yard.
Then she sees it! Gran'ma's hunnysuckle bush in full bloom.
Now everybody around home knows that Pappy planted that bush 20 years ago for Gran'ma's birthday, and it's also his pride and joy. Nobody touches that bush, without written permission from the good Lord himself, or Pappy's say-so, and both are impossible to get. Lou's dare was for me to run out to that bush, grab a bloom, then run back and let her touch it. Since everybody seemed busy with all the excitement up on the porch, I figured it was safe enough. WRONG!

Ol' Pappy hadn't seen or heard us in a while, and I guess he figured we were up to meanness again. Well, I run out there to get it and, let me tell you, I got it good. Pappy seen me run out from the corner of the house and was waitin' for me, when I turned around to run back. I did the only thing a boy could do in this kind of a predicament. I run to the other side of that bush, outta reach of that belt he was swingin'. Here's where it gets real interesting.
Runnin' around that bush made Pappy miss a few licks, and the spring grass, bein' slick an all, made him bust his butt worse than he was gonna bust mine. Now he's real mad, 'cause Dad just rolled off the porch laughin'.
Pappy hollers, "Stay right where you are!"
And I holler back, "You gotta be kiddin'!"
He says, "you're gonna git it worse, if ya run from me."
I looked him straight into the pack of Lucky Strikes in his shirt and said, "no, I won't, if you don't catch me."
Boy, I tell you what, I ain't never seen nobody's face turn so many pretty colors, unless you wanna count Gran'ma's, when she sat on that groundhog in the outhouse.
Anyway, Pappy's throwin' cuss words at everybody and his brother for laughin', and I'm still tryin' to figure out a way to get to Lou and give her a few licks. When Pappy turned around to tell Dad to shut up, I seen my chance. I took off for the gate like a scalded dog, as fast as my legs would go. Pappy was in hot pursuit an madder'n a wet hen. Behind me, I heard him holler, "I'll tack your hide on the outhouse door for this!"

Bein' about five years old, and Pappy bein' about sixty, with black lung from workin' in the coal mines, I outrun him easy. Least ways I thought I did. I cut up the holler (that's hollow, for you city folk), and was gonna take the creek path home, so no one would see me. I made it back to the house okay and thought I was safe for the night. So much for thinkin'!
I walked into my room, and Pappy jumps out from behind the door. He'd been waitin' for me to come home for over an hour. That's one of the few times I remember Pappy havin' any patience. He drug me all the way back down to the house by the ear, with me puttin' up a pretty fair fight. I lost!

When we got back, Gran'ma was waitin' on the porch. I gave her the biggest sad-eyed coon hound look, I could muster up. For a minute, Gran'ma's pleadin' for mercy on my behalf started to work. Only for a minute, though. When Pappy came back to himself, all hell broke loose in the yard, or at least it did on my butt. Gettin' a whuppin' I deserved never bothered me that much, except Pappy dropped his teeth again, I stepped on 'em, got blamed for causin' that, too, and got more. All this, 'cause my sister wanted one of those blooms to see, how it looked in her hair.

Well I never hold a grudge or get mad over spilled milk. After all, it was me who picked that bloom. It was me who got caught red-handed like an egg-suckin' dog in a hen house. And it was me who ran from Pappy, and caused him to fall down and make a fool of himself in front of God an' everybody. There's no way, I could blame my loving sister for any of the stuff that happened. Now that I mention it, I wonder how they did get all that tar out of her hair?

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