FRONT-PORCH GOSPEL: This life story begins in 1973 (kind of) part 88

Oblivious to my immediate surroundings – being wrapped between my mind’s wanderings and Doocy’s pontificating, which is a word invented for no other reason than to describe what was taking place that foggy morning – an audience had gathered out behind the truck. 

Pee Wee had gotten out and was leaning against the toolbox on the driver’s side, Hook had done the same on the other, and – this being just one of the many things I told Cheyenne that “you couldn’t make up if you wanted to” – the black Studebaker had pulled up behind Pee Wee’s truck, and the whole McClain clan – “lock, stock, ‘n bar’el” as Doocy said later when he replayed the scene – were standing in the red-dirt driveway enjoying the show. 

It was, in the words of Huck himself, more than a body could bear.

To make it worse, I had started playing along with Doocy’s one-man theatre.

“Do you thanks Mr. McClain will let me fish in the pond there any time I wanna,” I said, aging things on.

“Oh yeah, yuh betcha Pup, ever’ moanin’, sprang, sum’er, wintry, or fall, all yuh gots t’do is call,” and Doocy threw his head back and laughed at himself. Doocy’s laugh echoed off of every pine tree and every old oak tree surrounding us like Indians on top of a mountain like in those classic westerns I watched down at the fire station.

But I couldn’t let it rest at that; oh no, I had to make a plumb fool of myself, not even knowing I had any audience besides the motley crew that didn’t even matter anyway, especially with the perceived absence of Red’s notable presence.

“So, Doocy, you thinkin’ I can move on up to Rock Mills here, live all the days of my life right heah? Y’think I could build a house down here at the bottom of the hill overlookin’ that steamy pond down there?”

“Oh, Pups, yuh knows yuh can. Didn’t t’Breeze tells yuh, it won’t be five year ‘fore me and Red and yore good friend Pee Wee will be down heah a brickin’ a house thet’ll make the one on top of this hill look like a li’l-bitty cabin.”

And before I could respond to that one, he kept right on rolling, his motor-mouth no less than 700 horsepower and without any sort of low gear. 

No, with Doocy, it was all full-throttle all-the-time, especially when he got “in the spirit” as he was this morning.

Turning to Willum, he said, “Ain’t thet-a-right, Willum, ain’t thet t’gospel truth there, justa like old Bro’tha Simmons preaches ever Sunday down at Zion Bap’ist church by t’creek?”

And Willum said – or, more like, hummed, “Um um,” then got the preacher tuned up with, “Preach on Preacha Doocy, tell it, tell it high up on thet mountains …”

Oh, that was like throwing turpentine on a heaping fire because then the whole choir joined the fun, singing “Go tell ‘er on t’moun-tain,” and not only that, they were telling it just as the song says it, over the yonder hills and ‘n ever’where.

Doocy rose up above all the others and, in the most prolific paraphrase of a song ever sung, came out with “thet Pups and li’l Miss Cor’ina done had a child born …” at the tiptop of his lungs.

The chorus then sang the chorus again, like a preacher who asks for another verse to get a sinner to quit sweatin’ and debatin’ in that back pew and give in and come and repent of his sins that are made of scarlet.

And Doocy added another line, now turning more to a chant. Come to think of it, it may have been the first rap song ever sung, and I never heard rap sung until 30 years later.

“… thet Pup’s heah owns thet store, awwww yes, Lawd, Mr. Pups owned t’store down-town …”

Pee Wee jumped in – that was the first time I noticed that he was leaning against the back of the truck – “Doocy, you mean that Mr. McClain’s going to give the Pup the key to his hardware store downtown?

“Oh yessir,” Doocy said, still in his “Go Tell It On the Mountain” rhythm, “gonna give t’boy the keys ‘n the deed, the whole kit ‘n kitboodle, lock-stock-‘n bar’el – and gonna change thet there name to ‘Pups ‘n McClain.’”

Now, that one beat all, and then some.

Pups ‘n McClain.

That sent the whole bunch into hysteria. It beat anything I’d ever seen.

Coach Steven Ray Bowen served as a teacher and basketball coach at Red Oak High from 1998-2012 and recently spent two years teaching and coaching at Ferris. He and his wife Marilyn (the “amazin’ blonde”) served many years with the Church of Christ of Red Oak at Uhl/Ovilla Roads, but now spend time evangelizing in several states in addition to Coach’s work as a writer and author, including the writing of the ongoing novel/memoir here in the Press. Call or text (972) 824-5197, or email coachbowen1984@gmail.com, or see frontporchgospel.com.