The Family Jewels

The Family Jewels

Every fall, me and Pappy would cut an' stack the dried corn stalks, called fodder. We'd stack 'em in little tepees in rows down the garden spot so they'd be easier to pick up later. They make good hog feed durin' the winter. Hogs will eat just about anything if they get hungry enough.

Anyway, it's about ten in the mornin', an' Pappy has to take his mornin' constitutional. Bein' too far from the outhouse, Pappy just heads down-wind to some fodder-shocks we'd cut the day before. He'd been gone about 20 minutes, when I heard a scream that sounded like a cat with his tail in a winder fan. Pappy come runnin' through the garden like a scalded dog with his drawers down around his ankles, still hollerin' and a cussin'. I grabbed hold of his undershirt and set him down right there on the ground. He said he thought he'd been snake bit or bee stung. I did see a goat stung once on the butt, and it jumped a 6 foot flood-wall.

I ran down to where Pappy had went to do his business, an' sure 'nough, there laid a four foot copper-head with a great big smirk on his face. I guess he'd waited his whole life for a shot like that. See, Pappy had squatted right down in front of that snake's head, an' I suppose the snake took offense or was just being a smart-aleck. I killed it and run back to Pappy, to see if he was okay.

When I got back to him, I found out that snake had more of a sense of humor than I gave him credit for. Poor ol' Pappy's jewels was swelled up like two ripe grapefruits. He told me run up to house, an' git help or lots of ice. Preferably both. Since nobody had come back from storin' yet, (that's gone to get groceries for you city folk), I called a neighbor to find out what I should do. He told me to make a small cut where the bite was and suck out the poison. Then get him to a hospital as soon as I could. I thanked him an hurried back to Pappy. I told him he was gonna die if I didn't get him to a doctor.

I helped him to the truck and drove him the 30 some miles to the local hospital. When I ran into the emergency room and told them my gran'father was outside an couldn't walk, they assumed he'd had a heart attack. He damn near did have one, too, when those four big guys grabbed 'im to put him on that skinny bed with wheels. Inside, he looked like a kid curled up in pain from a green apple belly ache (again, for city folk, that's when you get real bad cramps from eatin' too many apples at one time before they're ripe).

They finally got 'im to let go, an stretch out his legs. I swear, when they pulled his pants off, Pappy looked liked a two-fisted bowler with his thumbs caught in the holes. He'd swelled up real bad by now and was turnin' all different colors. Kinda looked like Walt Disney threw up. They gave Pappy some shots, an' he was up an around in a couple of days with no parts missin'. All-in-all, I think the swellin' goin' down was the most disappointin' part for Pappy.

Anyway, Pappy never did use the great outdoors for his mornin' visits again. Course, the week he come home from the hospital, he had indoor plumbin' put in. See, the mornin' after he come home, he went to the outhouse where he thought it was safe and sit down on a sleepin' groundhog. But that's another story.

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