Small, Small Town USA

Some of what is best about this country is found in small towns. Seems a sense of community is lost as population density increases. Of course, privacy increases with population; hard to have a totally private life in a small town.

The internet now gives these small town a bigger voice. Economics have killed off many a small town newspaper. In place, we have blogs. I would direct your attention to a small town blog HERE.

http://www.maybellwomensclub.com

Nothing unique, just a sample of small town life. (Someday I will learn how to do hyperlinks.)

This little town looms large in my paternal family history. Various forefathers have roamed that part of the country since just after the Civil War (excuse me, The War of Northern Aggression) as both solid citizens and down and dirty outlaws. Maybe both at the same time.

The Ladies Club is today, and has always been, a potent force in the town and surrounding areas. It takes a fool hardy man to tell a Moffat County woman what she is going to do. Personally, I would rather play chicken with a coal train.

Hunting Dogs and Buicks

After years of roaming, my parents settled down in a then small mountain town. In this town was a proud Buick owner who got a new car every two or three years and took great pleasure in showing off his relative, to his neighbors, better financial status. He was also thoroughly unpleasant and haughty. One winter night, two high school students jacked up the rear of his car and put blocks under the axle near each wheel so that the tires were barely off the ground. He gets off work, starts the Buick and tries to back up. When it didn't move, he floored the accelerator. Either the spinning tires made ground contact or the Buick fell off the blocks. In any case, the Buick ended up across the street buried in a snowbank.

New to the town was a Southerner with hunting dogs. To train them, he had a crippled bobcat. He would take the bobcat outside of town, let it loose, and recapture the cat after his dogs treed it. Great fun for everyone but the bobcat. One day the bobcat got treed in the rafters of Buick owner's garage. Buick owner, investigating the commotion, finds a half dozen dogs jumping on his Buick trying to get the bobcat in the rafters. While he wasn't amused, the rest of the town was. The combinations of dog bites, fist fights, police, Game and Fish, lawyers, city fathers, and insurance adjusters involvement's took the town through the winter doldrums all the way to spring.

Recently, a bear was found wandering the town streets. Ah, the potential of a bear, dogs, and the trust funders who now populate the town makes my imagination go wild.

Fall Far From the Tree?

Work took me to a Wyoming resort town where I spent a day making sales calls with the customer's outside saleswoman, Mrs A. We started swapping small town stories and I shared one about my father.

My parents had the only White Volvo 122 in their county. One day my father noticed a White Volvo pull up so he jumped in the passenger side saying, "Where are you going, honey"? Not his honey, not his car.

About two hours later we were leaving a business when I took a cell phone call. We were riding in Mrs. A's White pickup. Finishing my call, I opened the door, got in, and asked, "Where's our next stop"? "What do you have in mind"? replied the well dressed, very attractive driver of the Audi station wagon I was sitting in. Outside, I could see Mrs A holding on to her pickup and laughing.

One benefit of being a lifelong fool is having lots of practice dealing with embarrassing situations. Order was soon restored, apologies made, and on to the next stop.

I do regret not being able to ditch Mrs A.