Been trying to get this piece out since bout 3 am, but once again my primary mailer is having bo bo's. I'm sending from my secondary ISP now, so please excuse if this message shows up more than once if the primary comes back up today. Thanks, Herb
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- To: nfc at actwin_com
- Subject: SomeWhere ditch
- From: Herb Harris <top_side at geocities_com>
- Date: Sat, 20 Jun 1998 09:41:34 -0500
- References: <01bd9bdb$f5863b80$5bcca6ce@kudzu>
Subject: SomeWhere ditch Date: Sat, 20 Jun 1998 03:16:22 -0500 From: Herb Harris <top_side at geocities_com> To: nfc at actwin_com Its not really a ditch now, just a dried up dip between the tire ruts. Its only called SomeWhere ditch cause SomeOne cares about it, albeit too late to help the small lives that were once thriving there. Bubba didn't know. Not that he would have cared if he did. Bubba runs one of the big log skidders that haul the cut down trees out of the clear cut areas round these parts. Its his job, of course! He just thought the little ditch that was just big enough to maybe be a creek some very wet day was the shortest way to haul the logs out. So he started crossing it. Nothing new. That's the way he and all the haulers handle the job. Just get the trees out to the road for pickup anyway that's fastest. Just do it. Bubba didn't even stop to notice the slowly dring out mud slicks he was making had life in them. Never crossed his mind. He was too busy. Lots of wood to get to the mill today, got to make the boss happy. Maybe he would get that little bit extra in the check this week like he's been promised. Maybe. The kids run away from the house to get away from the dust when Bubba's truck comes tearing down the gravel road as he finally gets home Friday afternoon. He got the extra! Now he could get Molly that new fish tank she wants so bad. Don't cost a lot, but it all adds up, so he's had to work harder this week to get it for her. Just he can't figure out why she wants him to take her down to the creek back of the house to get fish. Yeah, there's fish there, for sure. He's been fishin up and down that creek ever since they moved to these parts when he was a kid better than 30 years ago. But why get fish there, and not at the store like anybody with sence would? O well, Molly always was a funny sort of girl, with her own way of seein things. Guess this is just one of her ways. There it goes! He can't get that minner! Been wadin here 20 minutes, but can't get it! She finally says "Its ok daddy, I can do it," and she does. Slowly comes over to the water's edge and gently scoops the little one that she wants up in the net. "Lets take them back to the house now so's they don't get too hot in the bucket daddy," she says. And off they go, a first for him and her, out in the creek collecting fish. But not the last. Soon he starts to ask her if she wants to go to the creek again, and he usually goes even the times she stays home these days. Bubba has been converted. He knows the lessons the creek can teach now. Why? Because someone lectured him on the wrongfullness of his ways? No. Because someone made threats against his job and the security of his family? No. Well, What? Bubba chose to hear the words of his daughter whom he loves. She alone in all the world made the difference. And a difference it was. Not for today, or next week, no. The difference will last for Bubba's lifetime, and some of his buddies at work too, cause they respect him and his judgement. And Molly? She learned about the fish in the creek being good to keep cause her teacher has got some in the class room. Miss Mathews got them from a givaway deal when she joined a group of folks that want to help average people learn about the fish and the way life is for them. Molly wants to join it too someday, but just likes the fish she and her daddy get from the creek together for now, cause she loves her daddy and likes to do thier "creekin" together. The little creek that Bubba destroyed so long ago is no more. O sure, there's water collected there every year, but its never going to be the same as it was. Never. Good thing Bubba learned in time to go around some of the little creeks and mudholes, or the whole area for miles around might have wound up like the cities with the concrete everywhere and the pavement covering over all the little runoff ditches. As long as daddy's love their kids, the little fish have a fighting chance, be it in the cities, or the country, people listen to the children before heaven or earth could move them otherwise. Want to save a fish's way of life? Teach a child the wonders of the native fish, and the joy of sharing it with dad and mom. Herb Harris
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