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Joy
Ride
By Ben Showman
It was a hot Sunday afternoon on Homer’s
Happy Hog Farm (Homer is my dad). The usual crew was
assembled, looking for something to do. We took inventory of
our resources. There were four of us: my older brother, Sam,
the engineer; my younger brother, Luke, the guinea pig; my
friend, Dave, who was just along for the ride; and myself,
the expert driver. We also discovered a pulley, some fence
posts, lots of nylon rope, an inner tube from a tractor
tire, and an old car, all of which were just asking to be
used. Sam and I decided it would be fun to build a water
ride.
We
trudged through tall, dusty grass and poison parsnip to
Wildcat Creek, a muddy little stream that runs through our
pasture. All itchy and sweaty, we arrived on the bank with
our supplies in tow. While the rest of us wallowed in the
water to escape the smoldering heat, Sam surveyed the area
and selected a section of our creek between two bridges.
"Hey, you guys, let’s pull the tube up this stretch
with the car," he hollered, pointing upstream.
Construction
began with Sam pounding three fence posts into the shallow
water, while I scoped out the terrain, looking for a path
that the Mazda could negotiate. There were way too many
bumps and washouts for my taste. "Dave, go get the skid
loader!" I barked. I never did like to waste time doing
things by hand. When Dave finally got back, I proceeded to
smooth out a runway by using the skid loader to scrape the
bumps into the washouts. Meanwhile, Dave wandered off to
join Luke, who was keeping cool under a bridge.
"Ben,
stop messing around and get over here!" Sam grumped. He
had suspended the pulley between the fence posts, tied the
rope to the inner tube, and started clearing some weeds from
the rope’s path. Our rope wasn’t quite long enough, so
we had to tie two ropes together. The ride appeared to be
ready for a test run, so I trotted back to the house to get
our favorite off-road vehicle, an ’81 Mazda GL. Sam tied
the rope to the rear bumper while I sent Luke downstream to
take the first ride.
"But
I don’t wanna ride the stupid tube," he whined.
Nevertheless, he stretched out across the big tube and
hunkered down.
"Ready?"
Sam yelled as he put the car in gear and began to
accelerate. Dave and I stood watching, safe on the bank. At
first, the tube didn’t pick up much speed, but as it
lifted out of the water it seemed like someone had kicked it
into high gear, because he was really moving! Sam drove the
Mazda too far and ran the knotted part of the rope right
through the pulley. This broke the rope and bent the large
T-beam fence posts. After a quick fix, we realized that we
needed some sort of marker so whoever was driving the car
wouldn’t pull the knot through again. I got some flags out
of the car and put them where the old GL needed to stop.
Now,
with me behind the wheel and Dave on the tube, we resumed
the insanity. After many pulls, I improved my driving
technique to the point that I could reach about thirty miles
per hour before coming to an abrupt halt on the three
hundred-foot long runway. At this speed, the tube made a
huge wall of water rise up and smack the drenched banks.
Eventually, Dave got off the tube and scrambled up the bank
to trade places with me so I could ride. He slammed the door
shut as I jumped off the bank to get on the battered tube.
Sand flew as Dave pulled the car away. I noticed the rope
stretch a little, but before I knew it I was riding on a
wall of white water that reached from bank to bank. It was
hard to hold onto the tube as it was yanked forward through
the rock-hard water. When the car reached the markers, the
raft came to a screeching halt and I was thrown into the
water, just missing one of the posts.
"Hurry
up! Let’s do it again!" I exclaimed. But as I
struggled to my feet, I saw Dad’s white pickup truck on
the bridge; he’d seen the whole thing.
He
stepped out of his truck with a quizzical expression on his
face and yelled, "What are you kids doing?!"
I
responded with something to the effect of, "Just
rafting up the creek."
"You
boys cut that out right now!"
I’m
sure we protested this, but our day of fun in the water
screeched to a sudden halt, just like the Mazda when it hit
the flags. Dad laughed a bit, then got back in his pickup
and drove to the house to report what he’d seen to Mom. He
told her that he saw a kid flying up the creek on an inner
tube, not knowing that the Mazda was pulling it. He claimed
that he didn’t have any clue as to how we managed to zoom
up the creek bed so fast until he saw the Mazda backing up
for the next run.
It
was a hot Sunday evening on Homer’s Happy Hog Farm. The
soaked and sandy crew went straggling back to the house,
hoping for something to eat.
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