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Arts and Entertainment > Old Josh: Goes Fishing [Ozark, Alabama, 1864/Chapter Episode Five]
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Article rating : 0.00, 0 votes. Author : Dennis Siluk
Old Josh lived on the Hightower Plantation where chores were unlimited and entertainment had to be manufactured by it self, or by those who wanted it. He: Josh was a sharecropper when he was young, back in his 80s; he also fed the pigs, milked cows, churning milk into butter; his son now went about husking corn. I suppose in a if you wanted fun, you had to find it, especially in those far off days in Alabama.
His sister was raised like him, on the land Hightower owned; his wife died there and his two sons were raised there.
Today his job was to wring necks, chicken necks. He didn’t mind doing it, not a bad job, this was during the days of the civil war, 1863-64, when freedom for the salves were being churned just like the butter. Most of what old Josh lived on was bacon, cornbread and lots of cabbage, and a slice of chicken now and then.
His sons Silas and Toby were both men now, and tried for the most part to keep old Josh in some kind of peaceful mood, he was or could be quite disruptive.
Old granny fixed the food for the Hightower boys, she’d ring the bell and the hot biscuits and honeycombed chicken would be ready; old Josh would go down to the creek then and fish, catch those catfish, and a squirrel, and cook them up, and make funny sounds like: ding ring, ding-a-ring, pretending he was calling the Hightower boys for their meals. Oh he didn’t hate the boys, or even the Hightower’s, he was just a ting resentful, and so when it was working time, he’d go fishing often to spite them in his silent way.
—He was today, at the creek fishing, talking to himself, and doing his little bell play. The backwoods was his getaway. Today Silas was looking for him, and found him fishing, a string on his big toe, and two fish cooking, laying back on a rock with his jacket under his neck.
“I ain’ known …Look like he wants to git out er draggin’ dis here string all the ways down the Mississ-ippy. Woops-he gon, he guh see him kin like me I suppose. Who wid him? (he looked deep into the waters)”
(Yes the fish escaped, and Silas was looking down on him, and old Josh knew, that’s why he was talking the was he was of course; he had looked for him back at the barn, saying, “Ain’ nobody wid him he left here by his self.” And he got worried about his papa, and went looking.)
(Silas) “I sho’ ain’t loves to wander ‘round des here woods by my lonesome, You aint token nothing’ to eat wid ya!”
(Josh) “I recken dte old fish must er had some kind er trouble”
(Silas approaches his father closer, helps him up, takes him on back to his shack)
(Silas) “Yous sho’ looks like you loves to fish deese here creek by you self.”
(It soon would be twilight)
Note: Episode Five 8/2005/Revised 11/2005
See Dennis' web site: http://dennissiluk.tripod.com You can see Dennis' books at http://www.Alibris.com or http://www.abe.com
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