Chapter 44

Just flattened that puppy. Then he drove over trees ... kinda scrub trees ... third growth ... some of the stumps were first growth. Huge!

Daddy was having a great time ... half the fence was still attached to one of the tracks and the fence naturally got balled up ... posts and all.

I can tell you that was one OLD fence.

I’m in college ... graduate student ... Doctoral Candidate ... and I have to come up with a thesis that is ‘original.’ I even thought about barbed wire ... not the wire per se ... but the socio-economic factors that had to evolve for ‘sharp’ wire to become necessary.

Texas is huge ... there used to be huge spreads ... ranch terminology ... big ranches with lots of cattle. In the east ... a couple of acres will keep a head of cattle growing. Out here ... a hundred or more acres per head is the norm. In order to think about the why ... there has to be a how right along with it.

Someone had to think about how to keep his cows at home. They won’t go where sharp pointy things scratch.

Once upon a time there were cattle in this place ... livestock. They were gone. The wire was no longer needed. I don’t need to beat a dead horse.

Bobwire has its aficionadi ... collectors ... even groupies ... and, in my quest for the socio-economic factors, I looked at several collections. Texas A&M has a good one. So, I know barbed wire and this fence was from 1877. Joseph Glidden developed this wire in response to his wife’s complaint that HIS cow was in HER garden ... again.

While I was ruminating daddy was driving around the big stumps and knocking down the small understory on his way to 969 and the bridge.

I tapped him on the shoulder.

“Stop.”

Wonder of wonders ... he did.

“Go back to the airfield,” I said.

That damn tank could turn one hundred eighty degrees in it’s own length.

“You want to drive?”

“I want to think.”

Back at the spring pond Daddy stopped and tested the water. My turn. I thought I might freeze my hand off. The water is colder than the river in the dead of winter. I think I may have orgasmed thinking about the pond after a sauna ... just a little.

“I think the pad will go there,” I pointed to the north and pictured it in my mind. “Yes ... north side, deck facing south.” Now I’m in a hurry to move.

I can see a van pull away from the Dirt and Loam and head our way. It’s an old Dodge Powerwagon. I love those antiques.

“What are you doing ... this is private property.” The driver is close to my age.

“I’m pleased you know that. I bought the whole thing this morning.” I said. “Including your lease.”

“The widow sold?”

I nodded.

“Damn! Daddy wanted to buy it.”

“Dirt and loam is profitable?”

“Yes,” she said.

“This is going to be a landing field for my aircraft because ... well ... just because.”

I wasn’t ready to acknowledge that my cat was responsible for ‘the move.’ Not publicly anyway.

She was quickly on her cell.

Soon ... too soon, her daddy was thundering up in a dumptruck. Her daddy and my daddy had a ‘discussion’ that started out with frowns and balled fists and ended up in grins and palm spit.

They were moving the scattered dirt piles and I was deeding them their place. Angela Marcos and I were destined to be great friends.

She loved my sauna ... I loved her scrap pile ... there was a 1963 Dodge Townwagon in it.