Old dogs ‘n children ‘n watermelon wine...

“ain’t but three things in the world that’s worth a solitary dime but old dogs ‘n children ‘n watermelon wine”

Tom T. Hall

Just finished cutting up a 23 lb watermelon...ain’t nuthin’ a whole lot better on a warm August evening...

Ackshully, it wuz just a little bit more than 23 lbs...I know ‘cuz I paid .38 cents a lb for the durn thing...back in the day.....well, back in those golden daze, my once’t upon a time daze, we didn’t pay for watermelons....we sort’a just liberated them from the people that put all the work into growing them, the people that actually deserved to profit from the hard work that ended with a field full of melons...’n I apologize to those kind folk who, for the most part, just shook their heads ‘n complained about ‘boys being boys’...

‘course, all of ‘em didn’t just complain..

more’n one of them (‘n even at this late date, I ain’t gonna name names) protected their ‘melons with shotguns..

there’s many a boy who ran with his heart in his throat after he heard the boom of a shotgun ‘n heard or felt the pellets fly around him...’n some there are who’re bound to recall having those pellets removed with tweezers ‘n then being doused with mercurochrome (I hadda look that up in order to spell it ‘n I’m willing to bet there ain’t that many people that’ll know what it wuz without looking it up too)...

Anyways, I wuz a grown man ‘n ‘way old enuff to know better the last time I went to ‘liberate’ one of them ‘melons...the seller had moved them to the porch of their home for the nite ‘n I had the audacity (luv’ly word, ain’t it) to walk across the front lawn, bend over to pick up one when I heard the cocking of a shotgun ‘n a womans voice promising to make me a believer in the wages of sin...I raised my hands to the Lord in the skies ‘n begged her not to shoot as I walked backward across her front lawn ‘n across the road to jump into the front seat of the waiting car ‘n yell “SHOTGUN!” at my waiting friends....

“Those were the days, my friend, we tho’t they’d never end.....”