(2 of 3)
Chester Hickle came back in and offered a stranger a stick and a knife, saying whittling keeps you calm and keeps you out of trouble. The stranger had been reading the newspaper, the Marshall Mountain Wave. Correspondent Sybel Smiley, writing the news from Nubbin Hill, had noted that "we have some very muddy roads again. There isn't any bottom to anywhere now. The sun is trying to shine some, which looks good." Correspondent Rosie Ragland from over at Red Oak reported that "Pearl Davis and I purchased 15 hens from Mary Redman Saturday night." For the record, Ragland also wrote: "Norma Patterson has the shingles." Mrs. Hartley Williams' word from Archey Valley was "I am feeling some better after being in bed most of last week. I can be up now and do light housework."
In the Morning Star community, "Theresa and Larry Jackson just returned from a Bahamian cruise they won playing Chevrolet bingo. The cruise lasted five days." In Pindall, "Edith Vaughn has a new roof and two porches over her trailer house. It looks good." In Oxley, "Mr. and Mrs. Junior Harness took two loads of pigs to Thayer, Mo., last week. They were nice pigs." In the classifieds: "If your cows could talk, they would say buy a registered
Angus bull, the long, tall kind, from Jim Hawkins' farms." The stranger put down the newspaper, took Chester Hickle's knife and whittled like a fool.
Sharon Caughron came in and said, "I'm so sick of cows." She said she had been kicked while milking one and that she had gone and bought a "screw-down kicker." This contraption, when tightened, puts pressure on the cow's flanks, making it impossible for the cow to kick. "So now I screw it down till her eyes pop out, and she don't kick me any more."
A blue-haired woman with a new skillet came in, insulted the whittlers, told them to sweep up their mess, took a seat and looked for all the world like she was waiting on the end of time.
Sharon Caughron got up and left in the company of Bernice Drewry, calling back over her shoulder that they were "going to paint the town." "Red?" asked Jan Blackwell. "We haven't picked the color yet," said Sharon.
Chester Hickle, on his feet again on account of his arthritis, looked out of the window and said, "There goes Howard Tree. That fellow's got a brilliant memory. He can tell you everything that happened from the time he was ten years old."
A businessman came in saying he had been to Kansas City. "They got Coke machines there that talk to you. They say, Thank you' and 'Have a nice day' and 'Sorry, that nickel is bent,' that sort of thing. There were country boys there buying Coke they didn't want, just to get the machines talking."
Another man poked his head in the door, then walked away. Don Blackwell, immediately realizing that the potential customer thought he had a long wait since the shop was full of people, ran after the fellow, explaining that the shop was full of people, not customers, and that he would be next. The man came back for a $4 cut.