Coon Hill - Part Eleven - "Rigareee Treatment"

Coon Hill

Part Eleven

“Rigaree[1] Treatment”

            Asa, in the opening of this tale and standing at the bottom of my ladder at this opening, is spoken to by I; a ‘called out’, as a thief; a ‘he stealing antiques’... from the estate I was then ‘cleaning out’.  It is a familiar calling out on my part and Asa... responds in a familiar way to that calling out.  At the opening of this tale, this ‘Asa’; this man... knows that I know ‘this’; that he steals antiques.  He knows I know.  And:  He knows I ‘knew this before’... although we have never... ever... directly spoken of this together..., to each other or... about each other.  This is ‘even though’ we have long spoken to each other; ‘exchanged pleasantries’... within antiquarian commercial venues... for ‘over forty years and:

            Yes I can say at the ladder top that I have not ever spoken ‘about’ Asa as a thief of antiques with... well... ‘others’.

            THAT is because it was so well understood ‘in the trade’ that Asa ‘stole’ that... no one needed to ever discuss that.  Whatever... Asa... ‘had’ “was stolen” and so, therefore, all ‘regular’, ‘normal’, ‘serious’ and ‘professional’ “DEALERS” of antiques... ‘avoided’ ‘anything to do’ “with him (Asa)”.  This simple status ‘had been going on for (over forty) years’.  Asa did not know this?

            Who cares what he knows.  Thinks.  Feels:  “GET AWAY FROM ME!” was the dealer decorum and “WATCH HIM” was the ...second dealer decorum.  How does this work... for forty-five years ‘in the (local antiques) trade’?  THAT IS HOW IT WORKS:  “A thief” (of which there are many) IS ‘always around’.  They don’t go away.  No one ‘takes them away’.  In fact, speaking professionally, they ALWAYS are “THERE”; ‘show up’.  Inclusive of their ‘shiftless’ ...whatever and everything... of that perpetual ‘that moment’.  “WATCH HIM”.

            “He turned his back on me.  He got me.  He took the bowl of coins; picked it up, turned his back.  I don’t know what he got.”  That wasn’t said about Asa.  That was said about a... well how about... ‘regular’ flea market prowler ...thief.  This... reported declaration by a ‘robbed’ dealer... allows me to notice the need to discuss this; the common place of antiquarian stealing and... carry that to Asa... so I can carry him to the bottom of the ladder and then... his stealing from this estate to... his barn full of plunder and... well... what happened.

            That is ...a... point of this tale:  Asa.  He is NOT the point of this tale.  I have already made a number of points that are fully superior to ‘Asa’.  BUT I must treat Asa for his role in the ‘clean out’ in this estate is a ‘paramount’ of sorts AND:  It does allow me to ‘treat’ (Expose?  Explore?  Draft?  Dedicate?  Distill?) ...No:  I never could reach the rainbow’s end of the stealing of antiques; the ‘this’ ‘in-the-trade’ ‘of’ ‘stealing antiques’... as I must ...have to... ‘treat it’... daily... always.

            What I get from Asa; what I get from ‘having to deal with him here’... is an opportunity to profile this sort of creature murmuring in the shadow as a daily constant to antiquarian interest, study, art and... commerce.  Asa... and his ilk... is/are... always... ‘commerce’.  They come that way to ‘antiques’.  Money... to... that...; stuff... to... that is an... antique... so worth money... “I CAN GET” that; money... by commerce of antiques (“selling the stuff I steal”).

            Ok so... that’s ...like... way away from me.  I am... “It’s about the stuff”.  The whole thing; antiquarian interest and commerce... is about the stuff... and the ‘art’ applications to the stuff... in three dimensional space (‘sculpture’) OR a composition of line, shape and color on a FLAT PLANE.  Eye... see... art... is... “value” as ‘art I eye see’.  Asa ain’t there for any of that.  Shuffling... stammering... peeking... around he... in his pockets... of his deep pocketed jacket ALWAYS ready like BARF BAG in front of one on a JETLINER... to hold ‘plunder’ HE (Asa)...is... ‘never’ ‘art’.

            Ranging from a peddling ‘want to buy a watch’ street corner standup style on to ‘looks like stuff dumped out of a pillow case’ on to ‘in my car’ sales promotions to ‘parking lot’ meetings to ‘I ... from my grandmother’... source descriptions.  And other...: (...Providence...)... it is a cesspool sea.  But no ‘art’.

            So ‘ever more’ they of this commerce seek to ‘find out’.  Simply find out.  What it is.  They have.  Sounds familiar?  Yes... the modest homeowner showing off her dead mother’s house contents to me so... very much just want to ‘know that’; “FIND OUT”... too.  Showing ‘me’ ‘everything’ with that being... mostly... things I don’t want to see... so... “Please... stop... doing... that...:  Your making an ass of yourself.  “The painting... (you inherited for free from you dead aunt) is... ‘no good’ (“awful”).

            “What do you mean saying THAT?”

            “I mean that the THEIVES at the flea market do a better job of stealing bad art... and do a better job of SELLING IT ...too.”

            “You’re a bastard.”

            “It’s not about me.  It’s about the art.”

            So Asa and his fellows are just managing the ‘alternative assets’[1] they have... by stealing... ‘add to their portfolio’ and... are... commercially right on top of that once they.... ah... ‘can’... ‘ah’... “FIND OUT”... what IT is that they... stole...:  AND THEN SELL IT.”

            So I get to “SEE” a lot of “STUFF”?  What do you (the reader) think?  And... for the record... for the Asa group... “THEY” do not “LIKE” to “SELL TO YOU (me)”... not that I am ever interested in acquiring their... generally very bad ‘art’.  (The reason for that ‘no sell’ is because in their... fixations... they “CAN’T TRUST” what I say... “EITHER” and that, I guess... DOES show a tad of depth on their part?).  BUT questing for a “FIND OUT” I am “SHOWN”... usually without the foreplay of solicitation... a “SEE” if they can “FIND OUT” “anything” (their word choice).  That behavior makes Asa and his fellows ‘look like they do’.

            He is there early... at whatever antiquarian venue it is... of that moment... relevant; ‘SHOW’, “SALE”, auction (hall), yard sale, tag sale, flea market, ‘group shop’ (a consortium of antiques dealers) and (single owner) ‘antique shop’.  Asa (‘they’) appear... usually very, very near... ‘first’.  They are a ‘that good’ ‘at this’.  And they are ‘shiftless’ around with whatever commercial effort they are ‘of that moment’.  A painting?  A “STERLING SILVER”.  A... toy train.  A... ‘gun’.  An “OLD POSTAGE STAMP ALBUM YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT STAMPS?”

            “Where’d you get it?”

            “THE SAL (Salvation Army thrift store)”

            (“Yeah right”)

            “WHAT DID YOU SAY?  WANT TO LOOK AT IT?  YOU KNOW STAMPS I KNOW.”

            How are you (the reader) doing?  Want to do this for a living?  You know:  Stand on a ladder up against a tree and take down an old property sign while a thief stands at the BOTTOM of that ladder and talks to you.

So Asa is always slithering around everywhere for forty-five years and doing that... always... there.  And his ilk... there... too.  That means ‘right behind Asa:  “NEXTED!”.  “OH YOU FOUND A...” “PIECE” of “ART”.

            Rarely happens.  There is no three dimensional special consideration of an object ever.  And no ‘museum visit’.  There is, at best, a sort of step-in-something-soft identification of a ‘I FIND OUT’...sort of.  No design heritage.  Design history.  No positive and negative spaces...:  Just ‘How much?”.

            “Get away from me.”

            “No really:  How much is it worth?”

            “No money”.

            “No money?”

            “It’s a piece of shit”.

            “No.  I seen ‘em.  LeRoy has one for TWENTY.”

            “So sell it to him.”

            “He only give me TEN”.

            “So take it.”

            “He’s not here yet.  He said that YESTERDAY”

            “And you didn’t take it?”

            “WELL.”

            “So now you suck shit.”

            “HE GONNA COME AT NOON”.

            As anyone can see... Asa and his ilk... are... precious... jewels... scattered on the ground... before me.

            SO FOR FORTY-FIVE years Asa has been “ALWAYS” ‘coming around’ with a ‘something’ to, ah... show and tell.  MOST of the time... in fact a very, very most of the time, I am ‘not included’; that is... ‘not asked’ due to my... established and understood by Asa (and et al) ‘poor attitude’ to their current ‘quest’.  NOT TOO HARD TO FIGURE OUT IS IT.  And that means that when I am finally a ‘deal with him’ (Asa) I am ‘well backgrounded of him’ (Asa) ‘before I start’ (to clean out this estate).

            “THIS ESTATE” is... and this long known to me... RIGHT UP THE STREET from Asa who... lives in a rather run down 1840’s “OLD FARM” he, “SOMEHOW” inherited... .  It is well known that the “BARN” on that property is “FULL” of “THE STUFF” Asa “HAS”.

            Yeah:  That word:  “HAS”.  That’s a blurry word?

            Well... you want to know something funny about Asa?  Ok?

            Asa... ‘doesn’t sell’.  That’s right.  The ‘stuff’ he ‘steals’ he doesn’t sell.  For real.  Asa... is a hoarder.  For real.  He really is one.  He won’t (will not and never has) ‘sell’ ‘anything’ ‘ever’.

            I know this.  Everyone knows this; Asa steals and never sells.  “IT’S ALL IN HIS BARN”.  Asa, I know, has plenty of money.  A silver spoon in his mouth.  A never needed to work a day in his life.  That ‘s known too.  Sort of.  I mean... some know it.  I reported it earlier; ‘cut from the same cloth’ (Part Nine toward the end) (as the ‘Her’ of the estate I’m ‘cleaning out’ that Asa ‘stole from’ for decades).

            “So what’s that about?”

            “Oh don’t worry.  He (Asa) can be a real pain in the ass.”

            Why can that be true.  Because Asa isn’t just any ordinary antiquarian thief.  His circumstance... and his hoarding ‘set him apart’.  I ah... have to consider him, in the context of this particular estate... to be a... some sort of... ‘alternative asset (?)” OF this estate that I have to ‘manage’?

---

[2]:  That is what the financial community qualifies ‘antiques’ as; ‘alternative assets’ as in a ‘funds allocation’;  one has an ‘alternative assets portfolio with allocated funds and ‘investment’ ‘managements’ (note plural).

[1] :  “Ornamentation on (antique) glass of narrow applied bands forming ribs”.

Coon Hill - Part Ten - "Stop! Thief!"

Coon Hill

Part Ten

"Stop!  Thief!"

            The puzzle on table number three.  Instead of offering to art-wise and commercially explain a... 19^th century cast steel and painted ‘sculpture’ of a young girl ‘at quoits’ (ring toss) on her, she slipper footed, lawn, (probably French but possibly Austrian...):  Instead of that I will also not ...art-wise and commercially explain... the old English Victorian cottage figurine of the fox hunter, the fox, his dogs and his horse... with their vibrant polychrome color and ‘characteristic’ worn gilt gold highlights... once ‘tied by a ribbon’ and ‘hung on a wall”?  “OH that’s just old (fireplace) mantel TRASH”... here found in a rural Maine farm THREE THOUSAND MILES from where it was ‘made’.

            Why not be fair to all of the antiquarian imports to the ‘this estate clean out’ that have been found by I and pitched on ‘table three’.  I like the possibilities of the little painting best for it is... ‘of that ilk’ yet “AMERICAN” (New England).  Too.

            It; the little old painting in its ...original gilt gold frame ‘as framed by the artist’ and ...sold so... at the... local... gallery ‘downtown’.  Gallery downtown?

            Why of course for this little bitch (sight size four by six inches) of an ‘oil painting’, ‘artist signed’, has a ‘gallery label’ ‘intact’ and a... ‘still there’ too... on the original gallery framed dust paper on its back... too.  “SEE?”:  it says “Walter Heywood... Providence, Rhode Island”.  That is just where the artist ‘lived’, ‘painted’ and, well, TRIED to ‘sell these’ (paintings he painted that ...look just like this one).

            He was a busy man though; this artist; Walter Whitaker, a ‘the dean of Providence painters’.  How does one get to be that?  Well Walter did by becoming ‘the first instructor of oil painting at the Rhode Island School of Design’.  What a bad boy he was.

            And he painted ‘these’; this little tiny signed framed-in-gilt-gold... Victorian re-do of seventh century type Dutch ...still life... to be... including the frame and the gallery label... ‘hung’ (displayed for sale)... so a ‘walk in the door’ “women mostly” of ‘obvious fine taste’ “MAY I BUY THAT ONE.  TODAY.  PLEASE”.  And she did.

            She took Walter’s work home and... leaving it in the brown paper it was carefully wrapped in at the gallery... took it with her

            On the train

            To Maine.

            “I just thought that Estonia should SEE a pretty picture when she

            Wakes up in the morning”.

            That’s how it ‘got there’; into the little room in the attic chamber of an old, old, very old... old farm... in

            Maine.

            I am the one taking it ‘out of there’.  NOT YOU or anyone else.  EVER.  Just me... stealing it.  And I know exactly what it is too.  It is an American ...Victorian... painting.  Is it American art?  I know that too; the answer.  Why don’t you try... to answer.  Too.

            “Typical of his work” isn’t it.

            Does that mean that ...to me... the BEST thing about this painting is that it was ‘in there (the old Maine farm) and ‘up there’ (in the chamber room) and that it was I who ‘found it’ and

            Put it

            On ‘puzzle table three’.

            There is nothing wrong with the painting... and its package (frame, dust paper, gallery label, et al).  In fact it is in PERFECT CONDITION... because... no one, including Estonia, ever cared about it ‘being there’ at all.  I am, I am confident, the ‘first person’ to ‘do that’; ‘care’.  Your number two.  IF you do care.

            That means the ‘other stuff’ ‘like that’ I found ‘in there’ too?  Yes.  That’s where that stuff came from:  on a train... to Maine.  “Cultural enrichment” endeavors by well meaning and well healed “FAMILY”.  It worked too:  All of the boys went to Bowdoin.  Then were killed in a war.  No one... in the old, old Maine farm... ‘collected’ “ART”.  They just ...had some around.

            For me.

            To find.

            And steal.

The puzzle on table number two.  Is too... about art.  But here, by my divination upon discerning the ‘old stuff’ ‘in there’... it is about ‘American (New England) Art’.  I:

            Eye

            And was pleased and relieved... to ‘find’ ‘that’ ‘in there’.  I put that stuff on table two and

            Stole it

            Too.

            Now I know the glance-of-eye that separates that on table two from that on table three.  I know that it is NOT I and my EYE that has divided the discernment so I and my eye ‘don’t have to worry about that’ for finer eye than I have, have very long, ‘done that’.  And I will speak to that ...with the thief; I will specifically discourse with him ‘about art’ when I return us (Part Two at the end) to I speaking with the thief when we are alone together in the old house... and together with that (the able two and table three stuff)... too. 

            BUT:  I touch for support... now...  of that-coming-later, a notice of the helpful NEED to ‘work with’ ‘design’ ...as I go along... doing this (clean out old Maine estates).  SO I just mentioned above ‘The Rhodes Island School of Design’.  What does that mean?  It means ‘art school’.

            And ‘school’ means ‘studying design’?

            Do I care

            If you care?

            No.

            I... at table two brushed off (the attic dust off) two... old... paint... brushes.  “YES; PRETTY”.  Actually not.  Visually they are a bit of a ponder for they are ...design forms... not encountered (‘old paint brushes’) so the first view may perplex.  The two I found; a ‘household set’ of a ‘big one and a little bit smaller one’ ‘identically made’ ‘hand made’ by a ‘once’ a ‘brush maker’.  A crafts person who made paint brushes and...:  Could one make a living in 19^th century rural Maine making ‘paint’ ‘brushes’?  Or were they made in England and... ‘brought over’?  It was cost effective to do ‘that’ (import paint brushes)?

            Ok so these brushes... once the “I OLD STUFF” puts the breaks on and... LOOKS AT THEM ‘design form’ denoting the horse hair, the strips of iron wrap, supporting stammer of rivets holding the hair, the handmade carved wood (oak) handles the... it took more than thirty minutes to make ‘one’ didn’t it... one’s eye searching ‘design’ quickly denotes.  Making a... making that... that will be used in the... making of a ‘something else’... (“HOW DID THEY PAINT the pumpkin pine farm house walls OLD RED?”) is here noted by eye to have been ‘white paint’, that is, WHITE WASH, ‘brushes for’.  These are old handmade whitewash paint brushes.  “Oh... huh... cleaned ‘em good too.”  Yes; the two brushes are remarkably well preserved too... after being ‘well cared for’ by ‘the user’.  I ...love this kind of design... “IT’S ALMOST LIKE IT’S ART”.  Could it possibly be that old New England handmade paint brushes for painting whitewash on old New England homes... fences... butteries could be... of a true... art... SHOULD one ever... inspect ‘their design’.

            That’s what puzzle table two is all about; what’s ‘going on there’; the American (New England) Art.

            I’m stealing it.

            Puzzle table number one?  I covered that in Part Nine

            With the leeks

            Carrots

            And beets:

            She didn’t care... Her puzzle table tells me... about the ‘old stuff’ in the estate.  She lived ‘otherwise’ and was ‘well settled of things’.

            It (the ‘stuff’) was there

            She didn’t care.

            Nor did she ‘do anything about it (the stuff) ever.  Never, ever “did”.

            I am the one who “did”.

            Steal it

            I was the first person to do that?

            She knew that?

            I, then, went down and retrieved the Coon Hill sign... Her spirit ‘told me to’.

            I knew the thief would be there; at the bottom of the ladder... looking up at me?

            Of course.  He couldn’t stand it; to be out done by a better thief than he.

            One last for puzzle table one?  An antidote (cure)?  Or a ‘piece of the stuff’?

            Beth... sold her honey... and her herbal teas... at the local (“farmer’s”) market.  In a field.  In the ‘summer’.  Across from her Terry (Terence) Halifax sold... his small tree stump ‘wood carvings’ of little bears and other animals (mostly bears) he ‘carved’ with his small chainsaw.  Big, beefy, flapping shirt tails and, aside for his size, otherwise not much to look at... he did “always” show up, show up on time, show up clean and... was very patient with the tourist who... did actually buy many of his little chainsaw carved ...little bear carvings.  Beth sold her honey and teas ‘across’ from him and

            ONE DAY said to Her when she had purchased a small jar of honey that she (Beth) wondered ...out loud... ‘what she could do to EVER catch his eye’.  ‘She’ (of this tale), holding her little jar of honey, looked ‘across’ too and, peacefully pausing in her view for a minute, then turned back to Beth and said “Perhaps... if you put some honey mustard and strips of bacon in you hair that will do it”.  They both laughed.

            BUT the NEXT WEEKEND Beth came DOWN the booths of the ‘across the field from her’ carrying a tin tray with two pounds of  ‘still hot’ cooked bacon and, as she came upon Terry’s booth and started to veer across the field to her booth from Terry’s booth she... flaunting her... baited trap... DID ‘catch his eye’ and HE (Terry) said “Whoa girly where you going with THAT?”.

            She, a little flustered at the prompt success of her trap, says “I have a jar of my honey, some of ROGER’S mustard, a loaf of ***** Bakery’s BREAD and WITH THIS BACON FROM Bob’s he just cooked for me I MAKING SANDWICHES would you LIKE ONE?”

            “Well I do think I WOULD.” said Terry.

            And now... over fifteen years later, married with two growing children, Beth and Terry still are always... happily together... set up at the (farmer’s) market.  Beth has been ‘long been told’ by ‘Her’ that she (Beth) ‘still owed her’ for ‘the witchcraft’.  This stood to the day of ‘Her death’ and... continues to this day.  “I still owe Her” she says.

            Now how am I going to steal that: “Put honey mustard and strips of bacon in your hair that will do it”?

            I put it on puzzle table one.

            And then stole it.  I just showed it to you.  Want to buy it?  Could be one of the best things I found in this ‘estate clean out’.

Coon Hill - Part Nine - "Door Bar"

Coon Hill

Part Nine

"Door Bar"

            If... a man stealing is a second issue... for me... in an old New England estate clean-out...:  AND IF I set up the first issue of the clean out of the estate to be my mental fabrication of three card tables of puzzle pieces of  ‘stuff I found’ that... I qualified at my beginning of amplification upon those ‘puzzle pieces set up’ with...:

“In this estate I had two issues.  The first seems trivial to the pilfering approach of an estate while the second was the stealing raised at the opening of this tale.” (Part Eight).

            One could, by oversight, just read by that utterance.  Probably shouldn’t.  I didn’t.

            The first issue; the puzzle pieces tables... have something to say about pilfering (stealing) from this estate?  They raise the quandary of pilfering (stealing)... and expand the traditional notion of estate pilfering (estate stealing).

            The... three puzzle tables, in reverse order were (1) a discernable group of better quality true antiques that were brought into the estate by... well-to-do family... ‘from away’  (Were these antiques, themselves, pilfered?).  (2) A handful of splendid Northern New England made antiques that are classic... old Maine farm... ‘attic treasure’... antiques.  (3) the curious need to set up a first table to put puzzle piece about the old dead woman herself.  A... portrait... of... her... self; the ‘her’ whole ‘lived there’ self... portrait that she, herself, painted (so to speak) with her actually very scanty ‘stuff’ (puzzle pieces)...; she painted... for me?  No:  For ‘us’.  That includes pilfering, stealing and the... those who did/do that.

            It is this first table I look at to fit puzzle pieces to, well... superficially... ‘explain’ the other two tables... but discover quickly that I, in doing the puzzle on this table... recalibrate... the other tables... the contents of the estate, the ‘stuff’ of that contents and... the pilfering of all... that... stuff.

            SHE... being dead... left me with my flashlight and the spaces to shine it in so I noticed before that there was ‘cellar’ (not ‘basement’) (Part Eight) and... I’d locked ‘the buildings’ so that, closed and dark, they too required ‘my flashlight’.

            At the top of the cellar stairs there was, on the fireplace / chimney shelf... squash, empty clean canning jars and a pair of brass candlesticks with ‘new’ candles in them (‘in case the power goes out’... as if she cared).  Below on that side of the ...cellar stairs... was a harness of brussel sprouts set upon a brown paper shopping bag of ‘potatoes’.  Both were her last (?) farmer’s market purchases?  On the opposite side was a single sweet potato and a ‘store bought’ bag of ‘Vandalia’ onions.  Warning shots across my bow... these were and I... DID NOTICE THAT ... in addition to... TAKING THEM.  “Pilfer?” you say.

            I bought the estate.  “Brown Clean” titles the end product of the ‘estate clean out’.  I took.  “THEY” “ARE MINE”.  If I had not put them as ...puzzle pieces... on my ‘Her’ table... I ...would have felt that I DID steal them; pilfer.

            Down the cellar stairs to its bottom and there I find:

            TWO washtubs of leeks

            A single tub of carrots

            TWO bushel baskets one third full of beets

            FIVE cabbages in a row.

            TWO bushel baskets one third full of onions.

            The cellar (exterior bulkhead) door.

            “OVER THERE”

            With it barred with a

            “Door Bar” (inclusive of those words written on it... in old black paint)

            We took that ‘stuff’ too.

            “Didn’t she eat an AWFUL LOT of BEETS!”

            There were, actually, still ‘some leeks’ in the garden.  “THE DEER HAVE EATEN ALL THE CHARD.”  WE:  The ‘row’ of brussel sprouts... was harvested... leaving the sprouts ‘on the harness’.  “LOOKS LIKE WE ARE GOING TO A FARMER’S MARKET!”

            Stealing ‘Her’ garden?  Pilfering ‘Her’.  That’s right:  Pilfering ‘Her’.  Yes or no?  What puzzle table are we putting this on?

            So in the barn there’s her old... hardly ever worn... ever... “Woolrich” “hunting coat” ‘hanging’ up...:  “She didn’t wear it”.  ON the table that PUZZLE PIECE is ‘out of character’; she only ‘had’ what she actually used (one third bushels of beets).  “SOMEONE GIVE THAT TO HER... and she KEPT THAT... ‘cause of that; they give it.”  Could that be a GIFT from a THEIF?

            Now... her bushel basket ...hoard... back past the coat in the dark barn... “She kept too many of those.  MICE living in ‘em SEE there’s one NEST in the BOTTOM OF THAT ONE.”  The rest of the stuff there too... that birdseed bag:  “PRICY” that stuff is she USED THE BEST”.   “Huh.”

            “We’ll get that CLEAN OUT right along.  TOO DARK for pilfering huh;’ NEEDED a light IN THERE.”

            “They don’t STEAL them BASKETS.”

            “Well you CAN SELL ‘EM right now.  (late ‘mid fall’).  A LITTLE scramble RIGHT NOW for ‘em”.

            “YEAH BUT not a STEALING scramble.”

            “Yeah right.”

            “THAT’S her TOOLS.  ...Two pitchforks huh.”

            “One’s bigger that the other.  I use them SMALL ones all the time MYSELF.”

            “Put it on the table”.

            “THE TOOLS?”

            “Oh I’m sorry.  Put ‘em in your truck.  I was just thinking out loud”.

            “Am I stealing her tools?” ...I said to myself.

            “IS YOUR WIFE GONNA USE ALL THE LEEKS.  I’d like a HANDFUL for MY WIFE.”

            “Take the ones in the wheelbarrow.  Take that too.”

            “She’s got a few more (wheelbarrows) inside the shed.”

            “We’ll get ‘em”.

            I put the single sweet potato from the cellar stairs up on the dash of my truck.  I didn’t want to loose it.

            “SHE LIVED... as CLOSE to the GROUND as anyone I ever know.  AND I SKIN THINGS IN MY BACKYARD.  I don’t think I EVER seen her wearing SHOES in the SUMMER.  THEY SAY SO but I never ever seen her SPIT.  SHE was a LADY.  NOW YOU KNOW she had all the money SHE EVER NEEDED and I SEE that she didn’t ever NEED MUCH OF THAT.  But she was FINE; her... being a LADY.  But you know that.

            “She look you... you know.  Up and down.  ONCE SHE KNEW I WASN’T A HALF WIT we were JUST FINE.  ASA (Part One)... him STEAL’EN her.  Little mousey RAT HIM around HER what she DOING keeping HIM AROUND.  WELL THEN I FIND OUT that of course HE’S CUT from that SAME CLOTH.  Somewhere back there HE IS THAT.  ONCE.  But SHE:  She was ALWAYS a LADY.”

            Is that another card table I need to set up?  NO.  It’s the second issue.  I already said that.

            “SHE HAD... her chickens.  So then MR. FOX would get her chickens.  SO she say to me.  I can get Mr. Fox I say.  NO she says; I like him too.  So she run out of chickens.  Fine ok she says she don’t eat many EGGS anyway.  So she BUY a few eggs at the (farmer’s) market.  You know; just TWO.  EGGS.  And she buys everything else TOO.  Her little pocket book; her little CHANGE purse.  YOU KNOW:  SNAP.  Everyone LOVED HER.  Didn’t NEED MUCH.  Never.  I always said SHE knew more about FARMING than a FARMER.  They took her TREE.  ONE TIME.  The town said it had to go.  Big (white) PINE by the road.  Down at the END of her (Coon Hill) ROAD.  They took it.  SOLD IT.  They didn’t treat her right.  STEALED IT they did.  That wasn’t right; a lady like that.  YOU CAN STILL SEE the stump.  You do that to me your friggen DEAD I told one of ‘em.  Then he claimed she CHEWS and SPITS.  IMAGINE if she HEAR THAT.   Might hear it NOW she’s DEAD.  She was that way YOU KNOW:  Magic.  I always loved her.”