Days
of Uncle Ernest -
Chesapeake City and the World – Babs, Chapter 1
You know something,
Nina? I thought I’d never get Uncle Ernest to tell me what happened next with
his hot air balloon. But, finally, one afternoon the next week, we got together
on the double chair under the maple tree in the side yard. “Where in the world
did that contraption land you next, Unk?” I asked.
“Believe me, Moose, I was so tired after
my all-nighter with Maggie that I must have slept for a long while. When I
awakened the balloon was descending and I could see nothing but clear blue sky
all around and above and below. ‘Geez,’ I thought, ‘I must be in outer space.’
There was so much oxygen that I could breathe effortlessly. I literally felt
twenty years younger. As the balloon descended I kept looking below to see
where it was taking me this time. What do you think I saw?”
“Beats me, Unk. Did
it set you down with a bunch of dinosaurs? What did you see?”
“Nothing! I
couldn’t see a blamed thing in all directions but clear, baby-blue sky. After a
while, though, I noticed that there was an ocean down there. Then I could see a
speck of green, which got larger as I descended. Moose, I was going to land on
a vast, beautiful island, with meandering streams and flowered trees of many
different colors.
“When I got closer
I could smell the fragrant blossoms. It was amazing. I was sure that I had
ventured, somehow, onto another planet, but then I could see many familiar
animals moving around in different areas below, so I knew I was still on good
old Mother Earth.
“After I landed and
hid my balloon and basket, I could tell that there was no place like it on
earth. I started walking along the river banks and discovered that the living
conditions were delightful—perfect temperature, plenty of fruit, nuts,
vegetables, and refreshing spring water.
“Even all of the
animals were friendly; they didn’t run from each other or from me. I continued
walking, checking things out, until I came upon a guy sitting under a tree
scribbling numbers in the dirt with a stick, and do you know what, Moose? He
was stark naked.”
“Crap, Unk, you
landed in a nudist camp!”
“Not really, this
guy was just strange. He had an adult body but the mind of a three year old. He
was definitely a goofy-looking bird. He had a small head, thin arms and legs,
and a gigantic distended belly. The belly was startling, bigger and rounder
than the largest pregnant woman’s I’ve ever seen. He was sitting in the dirt
with his legs crossed, and surrounding him in small piles was every kind of
fruit imaginable: plums, pears, apricots, peaches, bananas, grapes, oranges,
and so forth.
“I’ll tell you what
now; it was bizarre, for he was stuffing himself with the fruit, going from
pile to pile, eating with his left hand as the juice ran down his chin and
dripped onto his gut, giving it a chartreuse-tinted sheen. With his right hand
he was writing numbers in the dirt with a stick, drawing lines under them, and
writing more numbers. Then he’d erase it all with a piece of bark and start all
over again. The creature was entirely covered with thick hair. His head was
slightly pointed and his face was covered with so much black fuzz that I could
see only his eyes and flattened nose.
“I'd say he looked
to me like a cross between a large chimpanzee and Yogi Berra. He may have been
the missing link or something, but he was definitely not completely human. He
looked up at me and said, ‘Me workin’,’ and gestured towards a field of fruit
trees—cherry, plum, apple, peach and others—that he had planted and numbered.
'Me plant’m,' he grunted. Geez, Moose, he was beyond belief. I've never, ever
talked to anybody that dense in my life, not even in Cecil County.
“I said to him,
‘Hey, you’re a whiz; what’s your name?’ When he gave me a blank stare I
shrugged and said, ‘Well, I’ll just call you Bud.’ I sat with him for a while
and then, bored, walked on towards a large orchard in the distance. I walked
into the orchard and saw magnificent wild flowers everywhere. Many species of
songbirds were flitting about and perched on the limbs of the fruit trees. A
black panther was stretching under one of the trees and, believe it or not, a
blue jay was perched on his back, just as unconcerned as could be.
“It was about this
time that I saw her, Moose. She was sitting on a log behind a large apple tree,
eating a red apple about the size of a grapefruit. She was dark complexioned
and had long black hair. But, you know, that’s not the first thing I noticed
about her.”
“She was naked,
too, like Bud. Right Unk?” I asked, trying not to seem too excited.
“You bet your life,
and she was beautiful, and not at all ashamed that she was totally bare. In
fact, when I said ‘Hi’ and sat next to her on the log, she wanted to know why I
had those funny things hanging from my body. ‘Those coverings must be
abrasive,’ she told me, and made me take all of them off so I’d be comfortable.
Well, I felt pretty strange for a while, but after a few minutes it felt as
natural as could be.
“ ‘My name’s Ernie.
What’s yours?’
“ ‘What would you
like it to be?’ she asked, showing me that she was a good bit smarter than Bud.
When I asked her what the other people in the area called her, she said that
the only other person was the guy playing in the dirt, the goof I had just met,
Bud. She said that he didn’t talk to her much unless he wanted her to cook him
some rhubarb or something, and then he’d call out: ‘Hey You!’
“Then I noticed
something really strange about her. She was a real knockout to be sure, but she
had no trace of any belly button and, later, when I was able to get a good look
at Bud, I saw that he didn’t have one either.”
“Geez,” I said,
gulping and wide-eyed, “maybe some aliens from another planet hatched them from
eggs and placed them there as an experiment.”
“Beats me, Moose.
That idea’s as good as any, but I wonder about it to this day.” [To
be continued Tuesday, 11/13/2012]
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