that same summer

so that same summer that we endlessly baited the dimick boys into touching the electric fence, i remember another striking incident.

the shelter belt around our house didn't amount to much in those days and you could easily see out to the junk pile in the middle of the 40 acres. we probably had a good dozen or more horses at that time and so, generally, i just spent more time out there in the field, going out to catch a horse or some other such thing. we used to go out and climb around on the husk of an old car that was rusting away into oblivion out in the junk pile.

anyway, for whatever reason, i was out there at the junk pile and to my surprise, i came across a dead pig. now that was a strange thing to find out there. we didn't have any pigs and there weren't any anywhere nearby. this one had been strangely cut up. it was, for a child, such a violent image--a half-grown pristine pink pig, cut up his middle. could it be some crazed cult of pig-assaulting satan worshippers on the loose in platte?!?!

i ran to the house to tell mom. uncle red was there and laughed and laughed. turns out he had done a post on the pig earlier that day and had been hauling it around in the back of his little bitty datsun pickup. for some reason, they needed to load something else in the pickup and so the pig got tossed into the junk pile. he had forgotten to go back and get it.

but i will never forget the shock of the sight of that dead pig in the junk pile.