Bob White

The summer morning mist rises as you rock on your front porch, coffee cup steaming, and listen to the mourning doves softly cooing. Joining with the song of the doves is the distinct whistle of “bob-white, bob-white”. It makes you feel comfortable, safe, and it makes you smile, sort of like a peanut butter fudge ice cream sundae. That’s what I love about life in the country.
Listening to the bobwhite quail makes me think of a story from Walzie’s younger days – way younger, like when he was ten years old. What do the quail, ice cream, and gravity have in common? You are about to find out.
Walzie and his brother escaped from the school bus on that last day of school in 1959. They moseyed up the dirt lane toward the tiny shanty they called home. The lane was dusty and overhung with thick berry bushes and tall pines. The call of the bobwhites and the flutter of their wings told the boys that they were home free for the summer.
Within the brush were several nests and lying in those nests were tiny eggs: eggs that the boys watched with anticipation. Walzie was a sucker for baby animals. He had already raised groundhogs, foxes, squirrels, rabbits, deer, and pigeons. Why not a cute little bobwhite quail?
As the late spring days melted into summer, the boys played under the bushes, hollowing tunnels and crawling all around those nests. The bobwhite parents seemed to accept the boys as just a part of the scenery. When the babies hatched, they had already been accustomed to the boys playing around those nests so they were not afraid.
Mama called for the boys to come in for a mid-afternoon snack; Dad had brought home ice cream. Now, this was a rare occasion and they rushed home. As Walzie reached the front porch he heard a tiny “bob-white” whistle behind him. Following him was a tiny quail. He scooped it into his hands and set the little fellow on the table. (He knew it was a boy by the white feathers around its eyes. Girls have golden feathers.) Immediately, it began to peck at the ice cream. Wow, this was too good to be true – a new pet without the hassle of training, and it liked ice cream! How cool is that? Oh yeah, and what did he name his new buddy? What do you think? Of course, Bob.
Just like birds-of-a-feather, Bob and Walzie flocked together. Everywhere that Walzie went, Bob was on his shoulder. They slept in the same bed, ate at the same table, and traveled to the same outhouse. Although, Bob’s business usually got done on Walzie’s shoulder. So what? Not every kid had a pet quail; Walzie felt special.
For the first few years of Walzie’s childhood, the family kept their food in an icebox. (I swear he lived like it was the Depression instead of the fifties.) Finally, they joined the modern age and got one of those “new-fangled” refrigerators with a built in freezer so ice cream could be kept as a staple not just an occasional treat. Now when Walzie and Bob wanted a snack they could help themselves. Walzie knew when Bob wanted ice cream; that quail would go to the refrigerator and peck at the door. Honest! Then he and Walzie would share a dish of whatever was the flavor of the week.
But then one day dad threw in a surprise. The Acme had a two gallon bucket of cherry vanilla on sale. One would think that two gallons of ice cream would be a pleasant surprise, but I’m afraid it wasn’t. You see, the freezer was not frost free. The two gallon pail sat precariously atop an ice mound. Bob chirped happily at Walzie’s feet and looked upward, wanting his daily ration of ice cream. Walzie opened the door; the ice cream pail slid from the freezer. I suppose one could not expect a tiny bobwhite quail to catch a two gallon pail on his little head and still live to see tomorrow. I wonder what Bob’s thoughts were as that ice cream torpedoed toward him, “Hallelujah, here comes the mother load!”
Had gravity not come between friends, they’d still be enjoying ice cream to this very day. Well, except for the fact that poor Bob would be about 200 years old in bird years and I would be sharing my bed with a dad gum old bird. Come to think of it, I guess I do share my bed with an old bird. He still loves ice cream, and if necessary, he can duck a falling pail faster than a speeding bullet!

Chick Munk

There are a few things in life every little boy should have, namely: a dog, a tree house, and a grandpa that catches wild critters. Needless to say, our grand-boys are lucky. I’m not so sure about the grandma, though. Let me tell you about last week’s adventure.
Our three grandsons came to spend the day with us. Rhett (12) is our computer geek, Mason (8) is the hunter and inventor, and Korry (5) is our little wild man. The two younger ones took Grampy by the heart and conned him into building a tree house. Mason picked out the trees. None of them suited. Grampy explained that one lone tree doesn’t work, there had to be at least three of them together to put the platform on; and so the two little ones combed the backyard, sizing up trees while Grampy sat in his lounge chair drinking iced tea and hoping they would forget about this tree house thing.
Finally, they came running, shouting, “We found the perfect trees!”
Grampy groaned. You see, he wasn’t exactly thrilled about this construction project.
“Okay guys, now you need to find some tools,” he ordered.
They marched into the garage and came back with a handsaw, two hammers, a can of nails, and the little one bringing up the rear was dragging a spade shovel. Lord only knows what his plan was for the spade. Possibly to bury Grampy if he didn’t soon show some interest.
“Good job, guys,” Grampy praised. “Now, you have to find us some wood.”
This time they hiked to the woodshed. The hasp was too high for either of them to reach so they shouted for Grampy’s help. I laughed as he groaned and eased himself from that cozy lawn chair. He lumbered up through the yard like a grouchy old bear just coming out of hibernation.
When the hinges on the woodshed door squeaked, it was then that I heard the screams. Suddenly, the littlest one burst through the back door shouting, “Granny, I needs gloves! Quick!”
As I rifled through the glove drawer, I could hear the dog barking madly, and shouts coming from the woodshed.
“There he goes!”
“Catch him, Grampy!”
“There’s six of ‘em!”
“Ouch, the little sucker bit me!”
“Are you bleedin’, Grampy?”
“Susan, send my gloves with Korry!”
Oh boy, I knew from past experience that this was going to be a riot. I also knew what supplies to take to the woodshed: leather work gloves, a flashlight, and a cage. Korry worked his fingers into knit snow gloves. Two fingers drooped where he missed the holes.
“I’m gonna catch me a baby ‘quirrel,” Korry informed me. “I gonna name him Chick Munk.”
When we reached the woodshed, we found Grampy and Mason on all fours diving under shelves and buckets and parts from an old furnace, you know, all sorts of good junk stored in a woodshed that hadn’t been used for twenty years. Walnut shells and chewed up rags littered the floor. Mason was covered in cobwebs and walnut stain.
Suddenly, I heard loud squealing and then silence. The dog had pounced on a baby red squirrel. It quickly went to squirrel heaven. Then there was another loud squeal, a second baby squirrel got put on the doggie train to heaven.
“Cubby! Drop my Chick Munk,” Korry shouted.
It was too late, the squirrel was dead. Korry picked it up and shook it. “Wake up Chick Munk.”
“Not like that, Korry,” Mason had to get his two cents in. “Gimme it! I know how to do CPR.”
As Mason administered CPR to the squirrel, Korry paced like the anxious mother squirrel, but to no avail. We tried to explain to the boys, that once a squirrel goes to heaven, there’s no coming back. But Korry wasn’t ready to give his Chick Munk up just yet. He got a piece of twine and made a leash (actually, it looked like a noose) for his squirrel. He carried it around all afternoon slung over his shoulder like a hobo’s pack.
Finally, he brought it inside and threw it onto the kitchen counter. “Cut its tail off, Granny,” he ordered. “I want to take it to school to show my friend, Chloe. Hey, can you make me a squirrel pie?”
Luckily, I convinced him that Chick Munk should be buried out behind the woodshed where the mother squirrel could visit his grave. So we had a use for that spade shovel after all. After the funeral, Korry went home with Chick Munk’s tail in a baggie and Grampy went to the garage to make a cross for on the grave.
And what happened to the other four babies? Well, if I were them, I’d high-tail it out of that woodshed and find a new domain before those kids come back next weekend. Besides, Granny’s not in the mood for making squirrel pot pie!

Great Wolf Lodge Vacation

Rising high above the trees are massive log dormers that resemble those of Yellowstone’s Old Faithful Inn. As you drive up the winding roadway and round the last curve, the Great Wolf Lodge looms before you like a giant grizzly. Its beauty is breathtaking. Modeled after the wilderness lodges of the great northwest, the stone façade and the wolves carved into the totem poles will transport you to the majestic forests of the American west. Where are we: Wyoming, Oregon, Montana, or Washington? No. We are only a few hours from home in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania.
Every year when the kids get out of school for the summer, Granny and Grampy take them on a vacation. Several years ago, I decided to take them to Niagara Falls, Canada. That’s where we first stumbled upon the Great Wolf Lodge. Grampy liked it just because it reminded him of the great outdoors. Entering the lobby is just like walking into an enchanted forest, but the best part was yet to come. Our grandkids were thrilled to learn that the Great Wolf Lodge has an indoor waterpark – and a fabulous one at that. In fact, they were so bored with Niagara Falls itself that the oldest one said, “I’m sick of standing here getting wet by this stupid falls. Let’s go to the waterpark.” And so for the past four years, vacations have been at a Great Wolf Lodge – there are about a dozen of them throughout the US, so we have plenty more of them to visit. But our favorite one is just a short jaunt across Interstate 80 to the Poconos.
Grampy Walzie is not a big fan of water. Every time he sees a body of water he has flashbacks of trudging through neck-deep mucky rivers, holding his M-16 high above his head, and being weighted down by an eighty pound backpack. But for the sake of the grandkids, he reluctantly put Vietnam aside and wriggled into a pair of flowered swimming trunks. He nervously put his toes into the toddlers’ pool and I saw a grin spread across his face. Holy cow … he actually liked it! Well, who wouldn’t? It’s a balmy 84 degrees inside and the water is soothingly tepid. So Grampy happily played with the two little guys, while Rhett and old Granny here hit the tunnels and the waterslides and the water coaster.
“Hey, Grampy,” Rhett shouted from the top of Big Bear Landing. “Come ride the “toilet bowl” with me!”
“No, I’ll stay here in the toddler’s pool,” Walzie told him.
“I double-dog dare you!”
Well, nobody can resist a double-dog dare. We switched places; I rested in the shallow pool while poor Grampy slowly climbed the four flights of stairs to the top landing of the huge waterslides. I know his heart was pounding and his knees were barking. Maybe it was the climb or maybe the fact that he’d never in his whole life ever done anything like this. I’m willing to bet it was both. He was probably wishing to be back in ‘Nam!
The tiny blonde attendant in the red t-shirt and striped bikini bottom blew her whistle and motioned for Grampy and Rhett to sit on the double tube. Walzie awkwardly squeezed his big behind into the back hole of the tube; the front lifted a foot off the platform. Rhett giggled as he straddled the front hole. Now picture this: a 250 pound grandpa doing a wheelie on an inner tube with a sixty pound twelve-year-old perched on the front. The attendant gave them a shove and they snaked through the tubes at full tilt. When they hit the “toilet bowl” at the end, Rhett was howling from his perch and Grampy squeezed his eyes shut tight as his behind dragged around and around the bowl, and then they got flushed out into the lazy river. I saw Walzie breathe a sigh of relief. The meandering current floated them easily around the three foot deep river; suddenly, Grampy found himself caught under the dumping buckets and gallons of water drenched him. As he tried to exit the lazy river, his behind stuck in the tube, it flipped and Grampy sunk like a stone. He surfaced sputtering like a cat that fell into the crapper. Enough! Grampy stumbled back to the toddlers’ pool.
After four days of splishing and splashing, we were water logged – all except five-year-old Korry.
“I needs to take a bath,” he whined.
“Kiddo,” I said. “You’ve been in water for four whole days. The car is packed. We’re going home today.”
“No, no, no! I’m going to live here forever,” he shouted as he ran for the bathroom and slammed the door. I heard the bath water running.
“Let’s go, Korry,” we coaxed in unison. “Get your little behind out of that bathtub. It’s time to go.”
For twenty minutes we coaxed and Korry adamantly insisted that he was going to live there forever. I guess he figured that as long as he was naked and in the bath, nobody could force him to go home.
Finally, the light bulb above Grampy’s head snapped on. “I’ll get him out of there. Watch this.”
“Uh oh! I have to do number two. I’m coming in, Korry,” Grampy urgently shouted. He dropped his drawers as he entered the bathroom and backed up to the bathtub instead of the throne.
Korry was giggling and shouting, “No, no, don’t poop on me!”
Suddenly, Grampy’s foot slipped, he lost his balance, and he tumbled backwards into the bathtub. Korry shot out of there like a missile. With his pants around his ankles, Walzie was stuck sideways in the tub and laughing so hard that he couldn’t budge himself free.
“Granny,” shouted the other two boys. “Get the camera!”
But I was laughing so hard that I forgot how to master the camera phone. I probably should have handed it to eight-year-old, Mason. Kids know about such technology. I need to study “Cell Phones for Dummies”.
“Camera?” shouted Grampy. “%@$$, just get me out of here!”
Well, it took all four of us (including the little guy) to wiggle him free and get him to his feet. His behind was already turning black and blue.
And so, after unpacking and re-packing the van to get Grampy some dry clothes, we finally were on our way home. For three hours we listened to the kids teasing and giggling about Grampy’s little mishap, and I listened to Grampy moan about his aches and pains.
As for Grampy, he can hardly wait ‘til next year’s venture to the Great Wolf Lodge. Only this time I’ll betcha’ my right arm that he goes armed with a bottle of pain meds!