DAMN WATERMELONS

DAMN WATERMELONS. A TRUE STORY

 THE MUSIC. SOME OF THAT 70S FUNK...

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLC7641484D627650D





I get out of the car and the heat of the day seems to ripple in front of my eyes. My mother and father and my sisters climb out as well and we watch as my aunt and uncle and their children come down the stairs into the yard. I see my cousin Mike and we are the only boys so far. He has three sisters that are older than us and my sister is older than me. We all start to talk and forget about the adults as they make their way to the porch,into the coolness of the house.

My cousins live in the country part of Moultrie, Georgia out near Norman Park and my uncle Robert raises hogs. He also has fields planted with corn and all kinds of things, yet there is only one thing that we are concerned with right now and that is watermelons. I look past the barbed wire and I see the striped watermelons and I can already taste the sweetness of them...the coolness.

We look back and the adults have forgotten about us as more family members pull up. Aunts and uncles and plenty of cousins.

My mother has twenty brothers and sisters and when we cousins get together we make an impressive mob. We already have realised that there is power in numbers and we roll as a group almost everywhere we go. Nobody bothers us. There are simply to many of us.

Today we turn our attention to the field which lies in front of us as we make plans to go in and get us some watermelons. We start to pick up sticks and rocks and we talk to each other as we collect these things. We are getting these things because there is something in this field that is worse than all the snakes and the rats, yet we are ready to challenge even this presence today.

There is nothing better than a cold watermelon on a hot day.

We climb through the barbed wire into the field and start to make our way to where we know the largest watermelons are. There are about ten of us in this group, We are the oldest and the boldest. We may not see each other all  the time but we spend enough time together that we trust each other and each of us knows the other strengths and weaknesses. There are only three boys in this group, the rest are girls but they are tough just like us and we do not question their abilities.

We start to walk into the field and the stalks of the corn seem like a forest as we go deeper and deeper into the field where my cousin says the really big watermelons are. As we walk we talk and play around.

The main thing that we talk about is what we are going to do if we see our enemy. I have a rather large stick in my hand and I show how I am going to hit him if he bothers me,..if I see him. My cousins all agree that we are going to kick his butt.

We pass by watermelons but they are all to small for us, We want the big ones that are left after the adults have picked all the ones that they are going to sell.

The corn shades us and we see mice and birds as we make our way deeper and deeper into the jungle of corn and watermelons. The sounds of summer surround us and it seems as if music plays as the insects and the birds sing to us...to each other.

We reach the place where my older female cousins say the the big watermelons are and we start to look around but we stay together.

Strength in numbers remember?

We hear a sound in the corn ahead and we freeze as the rustling and huffing grow louder. I look at my older cousin and she places her finger to her lips in the hush position and we all crouch down. We all raise our sticks and get our rocks in the ready position.

All of a sudden the corn parts and a very large boar hog comes into view. He is much larger that I thought a hog could get and I realize at this moment that we all have the same idea as he paws the ground and snorts. It seems as if smoke comes from his nostrils as the dust from his face blows into the summer air. I see my cousin Mike throw his rock right before all hell breaks loose and the hog charges us. I turn to run and I realize that there are already three or 4 other kids in front of me. I imagine that the hog is breathing on my ass and that makes me run faster and we are all hollering and dragging sticks and running like hell. Something about a hog that a lot of people don't know is that if he gets after you he does not give up until he wants to.

We run across the field and jump through the barbed wire into the back yard and I keep running until I am in the car with the windows rolled up.I do not notice that my cousin Mike is with me until I calm down a little. I look out of the window and I see that my other cousins made it out as well. I look at the porch and I see my dad and one of my uncles, Horace I think... laughing their asses off and I get out of the car and puff my chest out as I walk up to them. My dad tries to contain his laughter as he asks Mike and I what happened and we make up a story about 20 hogs chasing us. As we turn to walk away my dad says to me. " Boy you might want to change them pants since half your ass is hanging out." I look back and see that  my pants are ripped and half my ass is indeed hanging out.

My dad and uncle told that story again and again about the cloud of dust that they saw coming at them across the field that day.

Needless to say when the story was told again and again that summer I was the butt of all the jokes.

JERALD HAMZAHFARUQ MURPHY