BIG MOUTH: POST #36

There always has to be a big mouth it seems and in Herman Junction I guess I was it. But, I am not talking about gossiping, carrying tales, etc. although I could have been guilty of that too I suppose. I am talking about a literal BIG MOUTH.



One time I had been to basketball practice and I was hot and tired so I stopped in at the Yellowjacket Cafe to have a Pepsi. That Pepsi tasted like heaven to me. There were two of three guys standing around and I said, "Man, I could drink 10 of these things!" One of those men told Harold Freeman, the owner of the Yellowjacket to bring us 10 Pepsi's. I suppose they were either six or eight ounce drinks. Regardless, 10 of them makes a lot of Pepsi! Ten six ouncers would make almost a two liter bottle full. They set them up there and said, "We want to see you drink TEN Pepsi's. It took me a few minutes to do it, but I did it. Then, I had to walk three miles to Herman Junction. I tell you, I was as sick as I had ever been in my life. I would walk a little bit and stop and throw up, walk some more and throw up again. When I walked I just sloshed around like a tub full of water. I'm sure that if people had been close enough to me as I made that awful journey they would have wondered what in the world was going on.



But, that wasn't enough for an ignoramus from Herman Junction. Sometime later I was in the Yellowjacket again and some other guys were standing around talking about who could put the most chewing gum in their mouth. Guess who spoke up and said, "I can put TEN packages in my mouth? You got it right, it was BIG MOUTH again. Junior Denton was home on furlough from service and he went in and bought ten packages of Wrigley's Spearment gum and brought them out and said, "Let's see you do it." Junior was a very handsome, tough, guy and I didn't want to cross him and I didn't have any money to pay him back for the gum. So I started chewing and they watched and laughed like a bunch of idiots. I put 51 cakes of that gum in my mouth and then quit. I chewed around on it for a few minutes then took it out of my mouth and threw it across the street and hit the railroad depot. It looked like that thing just rocked back and forth for a little while before settling down. I have often wondered what the person that found that huge wad of gum thought when they found it lying there. They may have thought that BIG FOOT had been there but it had only been BIG MOUTH.



I was working with a farmer one time and had never planted a row of cotton in my life driving a tractor. But, I had always wanted to! He asked me, "Can you plant a straight row of cotton?" I said, "Yes, Sir, I can do it!" I thought that he was going to drive his own tractor but he said, "Get on there and let's see what you can do." Why in the world don't I shut my mouth??



I got on that tractor and planted the straightest row of cotton that you have ever seen and planted several acres before I stopped. I know now that the Lord must have had charge of that steering wheel seeing to it that BIG MOUTH didn't get embarrassed again.



I have tried to do better in my adult years and have tried to be 'slow to speak.' But, I don't chew gum at all and haven't drunk a Pepsi in years. I have not been on another tractor either. Oh well, that's not to bad for a boy from Herman Junction where all is well today.