Feeling pretty stuck up, I gathered myself together and made it back to the chair on the porch. I plucked out most of the thorns and finally fell asleep there, out in the night air away from that awful ,ghastly screaming that caused my undoing just moments ago.

When I heard DeWayne’s truck next morning I was wide awake and could smell the biscuits and sausage before he made it to the porch. He just stood there holding that grease stained, brown paper sack, containing heavenly manna and said ” what the hell happened to your face?” I just reached out took the bag got out a biscuit and sausage and stuck it in my mouth started chewing and went on to tell him about the awful late night encounter with a ghastly beast in the house. He listened and then laughed ” Hell you got you some coons in there and when they is a mating you’d think they was a killing some woman the way they carry on. Hell scared me near bout to death first time I happened upon some. Them coons will be gone as soon as they smell humans around.

We were out to the truck and I got the door open and saw there was no seats just some buckets to sit on. The inside of the cab was filled with stuff saws oil cans, gas cans, chains, tools and I don’t know what all. I climbed up and got me a seat and Dewayne climbed in and hit the starter and there was this god awful noise of gears grinding screeching it make your teeth hurt. Then again on the third try she fired up and I mean fired up, shot flames through the floorboards and instantly the cab was filled with smoke so thick you could taste it and nothing else, I couldn’t even swallow the biscuit I was chewin’ DeWayne Hollered over the horrendous noise roll yer winder down. Then we set off down the road and air precious air started to circulate and I could breath. I tried washing the biscuit down with some of Dewayne’s coffee but it was stuck and tasted just like burnt oil. About the time we were going good He started stopping we gotta put some oil in her the light came on. We added four cans and was off again. looked as if the truck was on fire all the time. Dewayne said it needed some new rings whatever them was. So this is how the free folks live seems there was going to be a lot of stuff to remember.

Soon we turned off on a dirt trail and followed it for a spell and killed the truck and it was dead…silence at last, you could hear a squirrel’s heartbeat at a hundred yards. We got out most of the stuff in the cab and DeWayne started cutting trees down and I was cutting the limbs off and he had gave me a stick to measure and cut them into lengths as wide as the truck.
Once we got what DeWayne thought was enough for a load we loaded all we could by hand then he fired up the truck again and worked on the gin pole thing in the middle of the back of the truck got a cable running through it and we put some tongs on it and hooked them to the big pieces and he pulled a leaver and the were pulled and hauled up in the air and I turned them crossways and he pushed another lever and they would fall pretty much where we wanted them.

By about two o’clock we were loaded and ready to head for the yard and collect the money and Eat I hoped. When we got to the yard they had a stick and measured length, width and height then put them figures in a calculator and converted in into cords. So The check was for 176.27 not bad for a days work if you had all the fine machinery like DeWayne. When he cashed the check at the store he gave me 40 dollars and I didn’t even have a saw. I ask Dewayne if he thought they might have some coon repellant. He laughed… So we got some groceries and oil a case of the cheap oil and I hauled it out to the truck and came back and got my food. I put in three cans of oil just for good measure and we were off for home after a gas stop for the truck and fill the cans for the saws. We was eating some cheese and crackers on the way home i was just thinking how quickly we become accustomed to things like the smoke and exhaust in the cab. When we pulled out De Wayne said” on to America and then The Moon.”

When Dewayne dropped me off He said he would be back and bring me a light and he wanted me to meet his wife and little girl. So in the daylight I went to investigate the house and found it eerie as it looked like someone had just went to the store and would be right back. The kitchen was a mess all the stuff was pulled out of the cabinets and in the floor there were a lot of cans and most was probably still good so I set to work picking up and putting the old homestead in order America, You just gotta love it.

                                                    To Be Continued