Y’all Ain’t Gonna Believe This: Southern Short Stories With Mississippi Flavor

By Jarvis King

Can a twelve-year-old boy win a fight with a gobbler? Do you remember your child’s first deer, or maybe your dad’s last? Is moonshine, a spotlight and a .22 rifle a wise combination? Is it wrong to trespass if you don’t poach a turkey? Can you coax a squirrel from a hollow tree with a forked stick? Can you train a beagle to run away from a rabbit? You’ll find the answers to those questions and more between the covers of this wonderful anthology of Southern humor. This is master storytelling cooked up with Mississippi ingredients. From Lafayette County to Lamar County; from Vicksburg to Philadelphia; these fun and memorable tales were collected from folks across “The Magnolia State.” Come with us and enjoy a respite from the harried hub-bub of our modern world. Laughter is indeed soothing medicine for the soul. So fix yourself a glass of sweet tea, pull up a rocker and set a spell, ‘cause…Y’all Ain’t Gonna Believe This!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu Publishing Services
• Release date: Sep 17, 2019
• ISBN: 9781684709250

Book preview

KING

Copyright © 2019 Jarvis King.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted by any means—whether auditory, graphic, mechanical, or electronic—without written permission of the author, except in the case of brief excerpts used in critical articles and reviews. Unauthorized reproduction of any part of this work is illegal and is punishable by law.

ISBN: 978-1-6847-0924-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6847-0925-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019913021

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Scripture taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Lulu Publishing Services rev. date: 09/05/2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would first like to acknowledge a kind and gracious Creator and thank Him for the pleasure of writing. He has been most generous to me.

I would like to give a big shout-out to the folks who trusted me enough to share their stories. I thoroughly enjoyed the interview portion of this project. Y’all were great!

A special thanks to a couple of ladies who helped me tremendously: Tobie Lambert for her editing assistance, and Skylar Noblin-Laminack for drawing such a zany cartoon for the cover. Ladies, you were both a joy to work with.

I’ve thanked my wife, Cindy, many times, but she deserves another one. Thanks, sweetheart.

I would also like to thank the admin of the Facebook group, Mississippi Whitetails, because they allowed me to post samples of these stories for folks to read. I appreciate it, Richard Cox. Several members of that group have stories in this book, and many of our Prostaff Members were most encouraging throughout the writing and publishing process. I really appreciate it, y’all.

DEDICATION

This work is dedicated to the man who taught me gun safety and shooting skills, how to hunt and fish, how to work and play, and, basically, how to live for Jesus while making a living. I still miss you, Daddy.

INTRODUCTION

GRANDMA’S TILT-A-WHIRL

Clifton! Grandma yelled. She was standing on the back porch calling one of my first cousins.

Clif was the oldest, and that meant his name was always called first. It also meant he was compelled to endure the first whuppin’ when the need arose. You see, in the rural South of the 1960’s, there existed the disciplinary tradition of administering corporal punishment in chronological order—eldest to youngest. Some may see the practice as fair and judicious, but, oh, how I beg to disagree. Being next to last in a line of five stair-step boys, on Grandpa’s farm in Franklin County, Mississippi, meant I had to witness three other boys get flogged before my turn came.

Aaron! He was the second oldest, and my brother. Not only was Aaron mean; he enjoyed being mean.

The dread I felt must have been something awful for little Lorne. He was the baby, and fifth in the whuppin’ line-up, so he was forced to squirm and squall while the rest of us got it. Obviously, Grandpa had compassion on the youngest, because, by the time Lorne’s turn came, Grandpa usually let him off with a stern warning. Personally, I believe it was because Grandpa was just tired. Grandma never seemed hindered by Grandpa’s lack of whuppin’ stamina.

Jerry! Jerry was the middle boy and usually the most compassionate when one of us was injured after accepting yet another dangerous dare.

Jarvis! That’s me, and I was fairly certain I heard some pre-whuppin’ raspiness in Grandma’s voice. My concerns were heightened by the fact that she was calling everybody in order, and as a general rule of thumb, that only happened for two reasons: either it was time to eat, or it was the whuppin’ hour. Seeing as how it was only three in the afternoon, I suspected some act of mischief, which we believed to be secret, had no doubt been discovered.

Lorne! The last name came floating around the barn and across the lower pasture. Lorne started squalling immediately.

After wriggling under the barbed-wire fence that separated the pasture from the back yard, we could see Grandma standing on the porch holding one of her blue enamel pans with white speckles. She wasn’t merely holding it; she was moving it around in a fashion that reminded me of a slowly moving Tilt-A-Whirl.

Grandma was not happy.

Come here, boys, and see what Grandma found.

As we ambled nearer, we could hear an odd, rolling, metallic sound emanating from Grandma’s enamel pan.

Hurry up and git over here! She had tired of our slothful movements. Y’all know mighty well what you did.

While Grandma was usually right about most things, she was dead wrong this time. We had no way of knowing which of the day’s forty-seven whuppable offenses she was alluding to.

Looky here, boys, she said as she tilted her pan.

Just before I peered into the pan, I caught sight of a whole bundle of peach switches tucked firmly inside her apron tails. That poor peach tree had to be plum near nekked. What could it be rolling around in Grandma’s enamel pan?

I wrung the necks of two chickens for supper. One of y’all wanna explain why I found these when I plucked’m?

Every member of our outlaw gang peered into Grandma’s pan. We were struck with abject horror at the sight of seventeen copper BB’s rolling round and round.

As Grandma lined us up—eldest to youngest—Lorne fainted dead away…

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I was six years old at the time of the poultry shoot, and that incident is embedded in my mind as the first memory I have of stalking and shooting something. In reality, they were only poor chickens, but, in the mind of an imaginative six-year-old on his grandparents farm, those laying hens were elusive and dangerous creatures found nowhere but the jungles of darkest Africa.

At the time of this writing I am 55 years old, and as the clock ticks relentlessly into the future, I find myself reminiscing more and more. Many of the incidents that come to mind have been given a special place in the stories of my family and friends. The stories which hold the most prominent places in my memory are almost always connected in some way to the woods, fields and water of Mississippi.

For the past couple of years as I have reminisced about my own experiences, an idea began to germinate. Then one day I thought, Wouldn’t it be interesting to compile a book of hunting stories from all around Mississippi?

Since I was sitting on a deer stand at the time, I initially considered only stories concerned with deer hunting. However, after a good deal of contemplation, I decided to include the stories of different people, across different forms of hunting, from one end of our great state to the other.

I made a few contacts and pitched the idea. And what do you know? The response I received was overwhelmingly supportive. As it turns out, I’m not the only person who fears that the time-honored, Southern tradition of storytelling seems to be dying, no doubt the result of the wide variety of screens we stare at much too often. In no time at all, I had conducted several interviews and collected enough tales to reach my desired page count for a book of short stories.

Because it is about different kinds of hunting, you will find this work separated into chapters. Each chapter deals with the pursuit of the different game animals and birds common to the sporting life of the Mississippi hunter. At the beginning of each chapter, you will read my personal perspectives and observations about the different types of hunting we enjoy. Each story will be attributed to the person who shared it, and will include the name of their home town, where the story took place, and the approximate date of the incident. When the story happens to be one of my own, I will simply attribute it to ‘The Author.’

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For the Native Americans, the pioneers and the settlers, as well as many of their descendants, hunting has been as integral a thread in the fabric of our nation as any other. Even so, most of our fellow citizens don’t realize how unique hunting is to our country. Sadly, in many areas of the U.S., our people seem to be completely disconnected from the land and its resources. In these modern times, it seems that millions have little knowledge of, or appreciation for, what the tradition of hunting holds for so many of our citizens.

I can speak only as a son of Mississippi when I say that hunting, for so many of our families, is an important tool employed for shaping the character of our children. When taught ethically, hunting is one of the best resources available for instilling respect for others as well as appreciation and respect for the land and its animals, not to mention training in firearms proficiency and safety. We have a duty to pass it on.

While it may not be unique to our state, no matter where you work, go to school, attend church or participate in social activities, if you listen long enough, you will eventually hear a conversation about hunting. It is part and parcel of what makes us who we are as a people. For that reason this collection was written with the perspectives, attitudes and even the language of my fellow Mississippians, because, not unlike the salt pork and seasonings in our black-eyed peas, without our deeply southern vernacular, these accounts would have far less flavor. If you are not a resident of the Deep South, and especially of Mississippi, it may be useful to read this work with a trained Magnolia State interpreter on hand. We make no apologies for the smooth, eloquent and southerly usage of the English language.

In several of these tales, names have been changed to protect the innocent, especially in those stories that feature outlaws. Unfortunately, at times the nature of hunting presents certain temptations which often prove too strong for some among us. The moniker, outlaws, has been adapted by many in our community to cover actions ranging from pouring corn out where it is prohibited, to killing a certain game animal out of season, to cruising dark, country roads in the wee hours of the night while employing the ol’ one-eyed beagle here and there. We do not condone these actions; however, many of us in one way or another have lived the outlaw life at some point in our hunting careers. To you young’uns out there—don’t be taking our outlaw stories to mean you’ve got to get out there and act a fool. Trust me you’ll have far less trouble in life if you’ll simply play by the rules.

The stories you are about to read are not purported to be the greatest hunting tales ever told. They are real stories from average folks who were kind enough to share events that made a profound impact on their lives. I hope they will elicit a chuckle, perhaps a tear. But more importantly, my desire for you the reader is to reflect upon memories of your own. Perhaps in your mind’s eye you’ll see your grandpa shaking a vine on a squirrel hunt. You may remember the mouth-watering aroma, not to mention the flavor, of your grandma’s fried rabbit. Members of a by-gone deer camp may once again tease you for an attack of buck fever. Maybe you’ll hear your daddy’s voice as he so proudly congratulates you on your first turkey.

After all, each of us has our own set of memories. It is my heartfelt prayer that this little book will help you to not only remember but share the memories that make us who we are as individuals, friends and families.

Disclaimer:

If you happen to be one of those misguided citizens, who believe the Second Amendment is outdated and