Skunky and I Build a Monorail

One of the most dangerous things in the world is a teenage boy with too much time on his hands. About the only thing more dangerous is two teenage boys with nothing to do. That’s exactly the circumstances Skunky Wilson, my childhood buddy and partner in mischief, found ourselves in one warm August day of my 15th year.

Around midmorning of that memorable day, Skunky Wilson called me on the phone and invited me over to his place, where we’d think of something to do to ease our pangs of boredom.

“Hey, I know what we can do,” Skunky announced as he welcomed me into his house. “Let’s make a monorail.”

“Sounds good, but how we gonna do that?” I asked.

Skunky said all we needed was a long rope (his dad’s 200ft industrial rope would do), a thick tree branch that forked out like a V, a jar of hog lard, and the Wilson’s small Ford tractor. It already was sounded pretty good to me.

Once we found the materials, we went to work building our monorail. We tied one end of the rope to a power pole that stood behind the back fence of the pigpen, took the other end to the barn (the Wilson’s milking barn stood directly across the pigpen, maybe 100 ft, opposite the power pole), and slung it over the roof, tying it to the back of the tractor, which we’d parked behind the barn.

Skunky then drove the tractor away from the barn until the rope was taught. Next, we found the perfect tree branch and peeled the bark off the inside of it, precisely at the point where the branch forked, forming a V. Carrying the jar of lard with us, we climbed a ladder to the barn roof, and once we reached the top Skunky scooped a gob of lard out of the jar with his fingers and greased the freshly peeled joint of the branch. With the joint now thoroughly lubricated on the inside, our contraption was ready for a test run.

Holding the branch over the rope like an upside down wishbone, Skunky was about to take off when I strongly protested.
“Hey, you always getta go first,” I said. “This time I wanna be the test pilot.”

“Oh yeah?” replied Skunky, “who gotta go first when we jumped off this very same roof using my mamma’s umbrella for a parachute?”

“Uh, me,” I answered.

“And who was first to roll down dead-man’s drop inside the tractor tire?”

“OK, OK, you go first,” I said.

With that, Skunky took off toward the edge of the roof at a dead run. Down the rope he slid, away from the barn and toward the pigpen. But Skunky forgot one little, but very important, detail before he took off—He forgot to wipe the lard off his fingers. Luckily, he lost his grip on the branch right over the water trough of Melba their cow.

“Yaaaaw hooooo!” He yelled after his splash down. “That was great!”

“Hey, toss that thing up here,” I hollered, referring to the forked branch lying on the ground not far from the trough. “It’s my turn!”

Skunky tossed the branch up to me, and after wiping off the greasy ends of it, I placed it over the rope. With the rope resting snuggly in the crotch of the branch I backed up to the top of the pitched roof and ran as hard as I could down to its edge.

Away I flew, over Skunky, Melba’s trough, and the corral fence. I zoomed over the open space between the barn and the pigsty, cleared the gate to the pigpen, and sailed right toward the end of the rope and the pole it was tied to, and that’s when it dawned on me.

In all of our planning and scheming, Skunky and I had forgotten to factor in our body weight when figuring how low to tie the rope to the power pole. As I cleared the gate to the pig pen, it became obvious my body weight was creating so much pull on the rope that I wasn’t going to make it to the pole. No, infact, I landed with a soft thud right in the middle of the pigsty.

Now, for those of you who have never had the privilege of stepping inside a pigpen, suffice it to say, crashing down in the middle of one, especially on a scorching hot August afternoon, the day after what we called in Booger Holler a “toad strangler” (a storm that rains so much and so hard it drowns the toads trying to cross the road), is not something that is highly desired unless, of course, you happen to be a 15-year-old boy.

“Yee haw! I gotta do that again,” I hollered.

Well, a couple of hours and several rides later, Skunky’s mom rang the dinner bell on their back porch, and Skunky headed in for dinner, and I left for home.

Evidently, Mrs. Wilson called my momma to prepare her for what she was about to encounter. Upon my arrival home Momma was waiting for me at the front door, and she wasn’t too pleased when she saw me covered in pig excrement, resembling something akin to a big ole pig dropping.

I just couldn’t understand her anger. I mean, I know I was wearing my new school clothe, but heck, they had to be broken in, didn’t they? A guy couldn’t show up the first day of school looking like he’d just come off the clothes rack of the local J.C. Penny’s store. Geez, he’d never live it down.

8 comments:

Rachel said...
With all your inventions it's a miracle you and Skunky both survived your childhood days. Now that Monorail does sound like fun, and you had all that pig gook to land in!! LOL I can just picture you now as your poor Mom saw you!! Another great story!!
Sunday, September 17, 2006 9:47:00 PM EDT

cmk said...
And no one thought to take pictures?!?!?! For shame! :) (Great story, as always.)
Sunday, September 17, 2006 11:53:00 PM EDT

Melanie said...
Sounds like a lot of fun even the pig pen part.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006 1:12:00 AM EDT

Jules said...
YOu boys and your poor mothers! Another big smile on my face from another great Doug story...thanks.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006 7:34:00 AM EDT

JunieRose2005 said...
Oh, my!I'm glad I wasn't your mama- or Skunky's! :)Come to think of it though, MY son did some pretty daring things too! (He's about your age,too!!...maybe it was the times...!!)Junie
Thursday, September 21, 2006 12:27:00 PM EDT

SonSon said...
A smile lit my face before I even finished reading the post title. If it's you and skunky, it's gotta be good.
Monday, September 25, 2006 2:34:00 AM EDT

Mountain Mama said...
Oh my gosh! Wasn't childhood fun?My sisters and I had a swing made of a single rope with a big knot tied at the bottom. It was attached to a huge old maple tree on the hillside. We could take a run down the hill and swing out over the barn and the old barb wire fence. We had a great time until little sister let go to get a better grip, landed on the fence and broke her arm. Dad cut the tree down.Shucks, he ruined our fun!
Thursday, September 28, 2006 2:23:00 AM EDT

Peter said...
Hi Doug, I see we share a few readers and I'm here to tell you I'll be back for some more of your adventures.
Thursday, September 28, 2006 8:00:00 PM EDT