Day 235
Dropping the red
hot lid into the cistern and
using Uncle
Freddie’s big magnate to fish it out
We
located a ten acre parcel of land for sale and negotiated the purchase; on this
“view” property I constructed our first new home. The spectacular view offered
a panorama across the limestone bluffs through the Mississippi River valley to
the mighty river and beyond some thirty, or so, miles into neighboring
Missouri. Gorgeous sunsets live in my memory to this very day.
And…I
promptly…Sold that little piece of heaven, swimming pool, barn, and,
all!
For
the “Gypsy-man” six years at one location seemed an eternity; I pocketed the
Profit!
Moving
our little tribe to a farm, we lived in the old house for two months while I
built our second abode. We had electricity but no running water. Talk about
“roughing” it!?
A
cistern just outside the kitchen supplied our water needs. All I had to do was
drop a five-gallon bucket attached to a rope into the cavern, allow it to fill
with liquid-life and hoist the elixir to the surface. Simple-enough!? Right?---Hmm!...wrong! Ah! The best laid plans!?
The
pump on the cistern did not work, thus the “bucket-trick”; it got worse since
the access to the cool water was protected by a steel lid which had to be
opened to accept the bucket. Simple!?
That
there cistern sat on the backside of the old farm house facing a western
exposure; an evil afternoon sun heated that steel lid scorching-hot! Yep! I
dropped the molten lid into the cistern.
My
ears refused to hear the telltale “Splash!” echoing my “idiocy”! Candy and the girls’
ears couldn’t believe my bellicose “sailor”-vocabulary as I voiced my
displeasure at the incident.
Uncle
Freddie had a super-large horseshoe magnet about 2” X 3’ X 5”, very powerful.
That damn misbehaving lid now cooling
in the sweet cistern water weighed about ten pounds; I left for Freddie’s farm
to “borrow” his savior-magnet; he had a good laugh at my temper!
Laying
on the boiling-hot concrete on my belly while dropping that magnet attached to
the “bucket”-rope and letting out some twelve feet of line, I fished a good half-hour trying to
retrieve that recalcitrant “hiding” lid. Finally!
Success! I “caught” the elusive steel plate on the magnet and gently pulled my
prized “catch” to the surface. Yea! I
am invincible! (Ha! Ha!) No! I’m not!
Leaning
the “mean” ole steel lid against the pump housing, I dropped my re-attached
water-bucket into the reservoir to fetch clear, cool, life-saving liquid water.
That bucket had taken a lesson from the lid---I reckon that’s true enough. Hard
as I tried to get the bucket to hit the water surface just right to tip so the
water could fill it, the bucket refused to co-operate! Patience!
After
a dozen failed attempts, my “infamous” temper won out and I exploded with some
well-intentioned “sailor”-words and gave that pump housing a “Chuck Norris”
devastating side-kick dislodging the newly retrieved lid which did a slow-motion 3 ½ -Gainer on its
“practiced”-plunge into the depths of the pool! Anybody got a powerful
“magnet”! I gots “sperience”!’
Just
maybe, for a brief instant, I may have agreed with my family that I was an idiot to uproot them from a
“resort”-type home to an ancient “little-better-than-a-cave” adventure!? Hmm!
Never
could settle for “just-one”---“two” just has to be…Better!
Okay!
So I ain’t none too smart---nobody likes a “smart”-ass…but, I am entertaining! Hmm!
Ah! Cookie Jar Sweet “Uh! Oh!-again!” Memories!
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