Life on Earth

By Richard Jack Rail

Richard Jack Rail offers an interesting assortment of stories from real life, fiction, and life mixed with fiction. Entertainingly, his pen conveys the comedy and the tragedy inherent in daily living, especially in the things we do by choice. He presents distillations, pieces where only the barest physical descriptions support characters living out intense experiences, requiring readers to fill in the gaps from their personal backgrounds. Here also are found pensive reflections on the deeper questions that have bedeviled men since the beginning.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Oct 28, 2022
• ISBN: 9798886163575

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Life on Earth

Richard Jack Rail

ISBN 979-8-88616-356-8 (paperback)

ISBN 979-8-88616-357-5 (digital)

Copyright © 2022 by Richard Jack Rail

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

The Coonin' Basset

Mr Banks

Of Death & Dinosaurs

Something about Baseball

Confrontation

Of Boys and Baseball

A Love of Trains

For God and Country

Panama, Sweet Panama

Horsing Around

One of Those Things

Fathers and Daughters

Fathers and Sons

Signs

Moments

Looking Back

Hero

Characters

More Characters

A Difference of Opinion

Hobbs and Mr Best

Life and Times

More Life, More Times

About the Author

Dedicated to the memory of

Lance Corporal Alfred E. Anderson,

USMC, 2240223,

2d Battalion 5th Marines

You didn't get to live your life

So I've tried to do it for you.

The Coonin' Basset

Where he came from I don't know, but the old man loved that dog. One day he brought out a funny-looking pup, looked to be mostly basset with a good mixture of black-and-tan hound.

I call him Whiskey, pop said.

The name fit. He looked slightly tipsy, as bassets will. His wrinkled face, thick chest and long, low profile, the droopy ears and huge feet, all bespoke basset DNA. Lying in the yard, he was a beautiful animal. The beauty vanished, however, when he stood on his short, stumpy legs. They were so short that, in tall grass, the unknowing observer might think he'd not stood at all but had maybe just shrugged.

Hounds are a particularly lovable breed of dog, and coon hunters like my old man take special delight in these ungainly animals. Bassets in general are more ungainly than other hounds, but in Whiskey nature had excelled herself. Most of that had to do with those too-short legs. They were ridiculous. His forelegs bowed so pronouncedly that they seemed caricatures, not functioning limbs. By contrast, his rear legs were so thickly corded with muscle that they rolled on each other, frequently causing him to trip over his own oversized ankles.

Whiskey was outrageously awkward. The locomotive equip-ment with which he had been endowed cooperated so little that the other hounds would laugh at him when he practiced running. Four or five separate motions attended the act and none was coordinated with the rest. Depending on your turn of mind, you might be reminded of a galloping crab or maybe a loping inchworm.

Hilarious, fun-loving and good-natured, Whiskey was to the last hair a hound lover's hound. And the old man did love that dog. He painted a picture of him on his pickup, captioned Whiskey, the Coonin' Basset. Not so much to advertise stud service as to delight in his favorite hound.

Whiskey was put down in his fourth year, his life and disposition having soured after a truck crushed his left rear leg. Pop invested a fair sum in vet's bills trying to ease Whiskey's plight but the nerve had been messed up and wouldn't respond to treatment. The leg never worked right after the accident. It palsied, and at odd moments he would yelp in pain. He tried to hunt, but on three legs couldn't keep up with the pack. The frustration and pain made him irritable; weight loss signaled the beginning of the end.

From that point it was inevitable, his being put to sleep. But though pop often talks of Whiskey he seldom refers to that. He remembers Whiskey in his prime.

Pop sat back with his coffee and laughed. Of my old man it would never be said he had forgotten to smell the roses along the way. He enjoyed living, and he enjoyed talking about the things he'd built his life around. That unabashed satisfaction with his world kept him always in good spirits and made him excellent company. He was at his best recounting Whiskey's misadventures.

Whiskey had a problem with fences. He'd do okay with a fence this high – indicating a five-footer – "because he'd crawl under it like the other hounds did. Three-footers were a different matter. He always wanted to do what everyone else did and when he saw the other dogs jumping over such a short fence, then he just had to jump over it too. Pride, y'know.

"But a ‘jump' to any other dog was a ‘climb' to Whiskey. He was so long he couldn't coordinate his front end with his back end and actually leap. So he'd climb a fence the way a cat climbs a tree.

One night Mr Banks and I had the hounds out. We were slipping and sliding our way up a bank in the dark, and suddenly Whiskey cut loose with the mournful yowling he you ever heard. We got to the top and there he was, rocking back and forth on a wire fence. He'd slide backwards, scramble forward for all he was worth and get hung up on his middle appendage. If he'd been a ‘she,' there wouldn't have been a problem. Poor guy was so frustrated, sliding back and forth on that fence, too proud to get down and crawl under. Old man Banks laughed so hard he lost his footing and slid all the way back down the embankment into the creek. He was still laughing when I got down there to help him out.

Pop leaned forward on his elbows, watching with interest as two of his hounds dashed out to challenge a third dog who was trotting along the road.

"That dog on the road out there's Clyde. Whiskey used to be the one who jumped all the strange dogs wandering in from other neighborhoods. He and the other hounds would be lazing around out front, and a new dog would come down the road. Whiskey would run out and get it started, then the other hounds would rush out in a pack and join in. Once it was going real good, Whiskey'd trot back into the yard and watch.

"So one day Clyde came along, just about like he is now, minding his own business. Whiskey tore out after him, even though Clyde was a lot bigger. Whiskey figured his gang was right behind so he wasn't a bit bashful.

"Well, this time his gang didn't move. They sat there, all cool and comfortable in the shade while Clyde gave Whiskey the thrashing of his life. Not that he hurt him. Whiskey was short but he wasn't small; he could take care of himself. But he was no match for Clyde.

"Pretty soon Clyde got tired of fooling with him and Whiskey limped back into the yard. He dragged himself in front of the other dogs and just glared at them. Pop acted out the part, baring his teeth and glaring. You could see the other hounds felt embarrassed at leaving him in the lurch like that. One by one they got up and ambled off, looking all ashamed and guilty."

The old man laughed, lighting a cigarette with a lighter I remember from when I was a kid, putting it back into jeans starting to tighten around his mid-fifties waist. Active and alert, average-sized, he was proud he could keep up with younger men in the auto body business in Kansas City. His hair had kept its brown color, though beginning to thin on top, and he still wore the crew styles of the Fifties. Wire-rimmed glassed reflected light as he continued.

Whiskey played some smart tricks when I fed the hounds. He was so short he'd get lost in the shuffle, so he'd sneak under one of the taller guys and nip another one on the ear. That one would get into it with the one Whiskey'd be hunkering under, and pretty they'd all be fighting to beat the band. All but Whiskey. He'd eat his dinner like a model citizen while the war raged around him.

Yes, pop loved that hound. His eyes glowed as he remembered his awkward basset. He described Whiskey's problem in trying to breed. Pop bred him to a black-and-tan bitch that towered over Whiskey by a considerable margin. Breeders will recognize the technique of putting a box behind the female, boosting the stud up where he can get at his work. I used to think that was just talk, but pop said it worked well with Whiskey. Except sometimes he'd get all excited and fall off the box.

Whiskey was mighty special to the old man. Daddy was an avid coon hunter, but hounds are a business as well as a pleasure. Pop would trade or sell any dog he had for a good profit. Any but Whiskey. He always said no when asked about Whiskey.

Six months after the accident pop could no longer bear to watch the agony of his best-loved hound. It was always been his way to personally put down any of his dogs reduced by age or injury. He felt it part of his duty to the hounds who looked to him to set the pace of their lives. But he just couldn't do it with Whiskey.

He drove him to the vet's. He fondled the drooping ears and looked into the brown, unhappy eyes. He left him there. He'd always said no about Whiskey, you know? Whiskey was special, one of a kind. He was the old man's Coonin' Basset.

Mr Banks

My folks lived for several years in rural Olathe, Kansas, next to the Banks family. Mr Banks was a good ole boy of average height with jet black hair and ordinary features. He was about daddy's age, a child of the Depression, strong as a bull. We were changing a front tire on a '68 Ford Galaxy and the jack slid out. Banks laughed and, with little apparent strain, picked up that part of the car as we scrambled for jack stands.

Banks and pop were coon-hunting buddies. While daddy got his kicks from his hounds, Banks was fascinated with firearms. He liked to bring over his new acquisitions to show and admire. One time he had a pistol he wanted the old man to shoot, averring it shot truer than any handgun he'd ever owned.

Daddy liked weapons and agreed to try it. I'll shoot the low-hanging hedge apple out of that tree, he said. The tree was 50 yards away and he was just spoofing, but the round he squeezed off shattered the hedge apple. He casually handed the pistol back to Mr Banks.

Yeah, that's a nice sidearm.

Banks' eyes were big as saucers.

He showed up one day with a new rifle. Daddy was unhappy about a squirrel that had been robbing the bird feeder. There he is, up there in that elm. Shoot that thing, Mr Banks. About the time Banks drew a bead, the squirrel ran behind a branch so that only its tiny head was showing. Banks couldn't see enough of it to shoot.

Pop looked at me. Hit that squirrel with a walnut so Mr Banks can get a clean shot.

Yeah, right. Wasn't much of a target and there was no chance of actually hitting the squirrel. Hoping to get somewhere close, I limbered up my arm and fired a fast one up into the tree.

Squarely into the squirrel's just-visible face. Almost cold-cocked the squirrel, which hung dazedly by one arm from a limb, trying to get its senses back. Banks, eyes enormous, jaw slack, almost didn't get it in his sights