Marvin's Day
Posted: Wednesday, July 15, 2009
by Maxine Headd
It was a beautiful day and we were out in a flooded ditch. We were swimming in the flood waters of the Southeast Missouri countryside. We were having a great time, and we had found a boat just floating in the water. It looked like the boat was a little bit leaky, but it would do for what we wanted it for. We didn't want it for any other reason but to play with. The flood waters were a little bit higher than they usually were. It had been raining off and on every day. Southeast Missouri had five flood ditches which drained the water off the farmer's fields. This controlled flooding allowed the ditches to keep draining flood waters off of the fields. These drainage ditches helped to keep the fields dry. This allowed the farmer's access to their fields when they needed to be there. Another thing the flood ditches were good for was swimming in a hot dry season.
Now Marvin was also a good person like that. He put everything that he had into doing things that others could not do. If there was a way to do something Marvin would find it and do it. Marvin was good at working on cars. He could find parts or recycled parts or even make parts for cars. Above all, Marvin was a smart boy. He made A's in school. He had no problems with math, science or any other subject. We did not think there was anything Marvin could not do. He was just that smart and we knew that he knew. That was why Marvin could make $36.00 a week just by picking cotton. He would pick each day except Sunday. He would pick three hundred pounds of cotton a day. By the end of the day he had three hundred pounds picked all by himself. He would pick a hundred and fifty pounds in the morning hours, and one hundred fifty pounds in the evening. We also knew Marvin was smarter than us because he just looked smarter than us.
Ronnie Lynn and I liked to tease Marvin. We teased him because he was bigger than we were and because he wanted to chase us all over the yard. We liked chasing Marvin like that. We were better runners than Marvin was. It'd be hell to pay if he caught us, but we were going to see that that did not happen to us. We just wanted to run and run is what we did. It did not matter what we called Marvin, he would chase us and we loved it. We had many good times with Marvin chasing us all over everywhere.
But today Virginia was with us, and she was playing with us, as was Marvin and we wanted to have fun. Virginia and Marvin were older than me and Ronnie Lynn. But Ronnie Lynn and I would team up together against the other two. We liked to do that. That teaming up actually made Ronnie and I stronger than Virginia and Marvin combined. We felt exceptional in our abilities to do things together. Together Ronnie Lynn and I were smarter than Marvin, and today we were going to prove it. We had a boat, we had flood waters, and we had a little assistance in the water and that would be Virginia. So when Marvin said "let's play King off the Boat" We readily agreed. We just knew who had to be the "King of the Boat" and it wasn't going to be Marvin if we could help it. Well the water was deeper today, and the top of the boat could be grabbed by little fingers looking for a good hand hold. But Marvin stood right up in the center of that boat and steadied himself against us. We didn't seem to be able to do any more than just simply rock the boat.
While that was o.k. it was not all right for us, we needed to unsteady Marvin, in order to throw him off balance enough to get him out of the boat. Our next attempt was to try and pull the boat over in the water so that we could get him unstable that way. So we grabbed both sides of the boat in order to get him unstable, but that did not help either. Marvin was still in the middle of the boat waiting for us to dump him over the sides. Ronnie Lynn and I along with Virginia were getting desperate to win. We were never going to be "King of the boat" like this. But then Ronnie Lynn and I made a joint effort. Both of us pulled on the sides if the boat and we managed to get him a little unsteady. Would you know, we tipped it a little more, and Marvin fell out of the sides of the boat?
Hot dog! We had it. We had tipped the boat enough to dislodge the big guy. Marvin was in the flood water with us and coming after us. We were trying to get in to the boat and away from Marvin. Because Marvin was quickly up out of the water and we felt like he was coming after us. He was laughing and rubbing water from his hair, but he was not standing still at all. We climbed up and into the boat. Then we stood and gave a yell. Oh, hey! Ronnie Lynn and I, we were the " king of the boat." Then Marvin easily dumped Ronnie Lynn and me out of the boat. Then we let Virginia take a turn in the boat. When she went back into the water I came up laughing, and Marvin was laughing. Then Ronnie tipped Virginia out of the boat again. We just had a good time that day in the water playing in the leaky boat and just having a great time. We sure had a great time that day playing in the flood waters that day. I can remember it just like it was yesterday, but it was along time ago.
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