Uncle Clarence goes Crazy, Stanley Mcqueen [feel good books .TXT] 📗

It was mid-summer in Muddy Fork and folks around the county had their gardens planted, including Mammy's brother, Clarence Wilson. Clarence is a man who takes great stock in keeping his garden cleared of weeds. He told me once he'd rather have clay dirt in both of his ears than have a garden all covered with weeds.

It was on one beautiful summer day that Pa and I decided we'd walk down the hollow to visit Uncle Clarence to see how his garden and tobacco crops were doing. We'd almost arrived when, from a distance, we heard the worst screaming and hollering coming from his shack. We ran as fast as we could to see what on earth was happening to him, or maybe one of his eleven kids.

When we got there, we saw Clarence running around his shack with every kid right on his heels. It looked as if his wife, Margarita, was chasing him. He was carrying on something awful, like a man who was in terrible pain.

"What's wrong," hollered Pa, at the top of his lungs.

Margarita yelled back, telling us that Clarence had gone clean off his rocker. "He's gone crazy or something," she declared. "Help me catch him so he won't kill himself," she begged.

Since I was a faster runner than all of them, I fell in behind him. He was simply flying. When he ran into the barn shed, he went crashing down. He scrambled up right away, screaming bloody murder, and it took me three laps around the tobacco barn to tackle him to the ground.

It took all of us to hold him down, but he kept on screaming something awful. I noticed he was trying to tear at his ear, and it was all I could do to hold his hand down to keep him from pulling it off.

Pa told me that the rest of them would hold him down if I would hop on Clarence's mule and ride over to Muddy Fork to get old Doctor French and bring him back to see what was ailing Clarence.

Margarita told Pa that Clarence's grandpa had gone off his rocker way back, and maybe the same thing was happening to her Clarence. I caught hold of the old mule and bridled it, and rode him bareback as fast as I could down the wagon road toward Muddy Fork. Luckily for me, Doctor French was home when I got there, and he hopped on the mule behind me, carrying his black medical bag.

Off we thundered down the wagon road towards Clarence's farm. It was all the old doctor could do to hold on as we were simply flying.

When we arrived, Pa and all the kids still had the squirming and screaming Clarence pinned to the ground. He had dug out a big hole with the heel of his shoes, where he had been kicking. Margarita stood there crying, and all the kids were sobbing their hearts out – so scared that their Pa was in such distress.

The doctor stood looking at Clarence, deep in thought. Then he told us to try and hold Clarence's head down on the ground and turn it sideways. We had quite a time doing that, but managed to follow the doctor's instructions. He reached into his black bag and retrieved a bottle that looked to be like honey, and as we held Clarence's head down and sideways, the doctor poured the honey liquid inside his ear.

.

As we watched the sticky stuff fill his ear, out came a big old pincher bug, with two little shiny black pincers. The moment it came out, Clarence calmed down. Doctor French looked at Margarita and grinned. "You thought Clarence had gone clear off his rocker, didn't you, gal?"

"Well, doctor," she said, "I thought he had, because of his grandpa being put in the crazy house."

Clarence looked up at his wife and said, "If the doctor here had not been a good doctor, and had not known what ailed me right off, I would have been hauled away to the Brownville Crazy House."

"Yes, that's about the size of it," replied Margarita.

Pa busted out laughing at his favorite brother-in-law, and Doctor French joined in the fun. Clarence picked up the drowned pincher bug and held it up toward the sun. "It’s strange how such a little bug could cause a man to go crazy for a while."

"You're lucky," said Doctor French. "It could have been a hornet." Everyone bust out laughing on that beautiful summer day in Muddy Fork. Uncle Clarence swears he is going to wear Margarita's bonnet next time he pulls weeds out of his garden.

Text: Stanley McQueen
Editing: Valerie Byron
Publication Date: 11-30-2012

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