The Last Race

The Last Race
Written by Fletcher “Butchwax”Ferguson

Track and field was, next to baseball, a sport that I  had relative good success with. Relative in the sense that the small college I attended was an NAIA school which competed against a level of competition that wasn’t much better than some of the  high school aged competitors I have coached. Having been burnt out with baseball, I turned down a Division II school's offer to play ball  and accepted an offer to run track and cross country at the small college.

During our first indoor season I was fortunate enough to set an indoor school record in the 440 that stood for twenty years. That aside, I had the pleasure of being the anchor leg of a mile relay team that established itself quite a legacy. With the exception of one race our freshman year we were undefeated in that endeavor for the four years we competed.

The one race we lost was at the Heart of America Conference Track and Field  Outdoor Championship our freshman year.  The meet was a close one and the mile relay had to win the race if the team was to be crowned champions. The mile relay was comprised  of “Smokin” John Lafferty, “Mighty Mouse”  Bob Mac Pherson, “Trucker” Bob Sloan, and of course yours truly. As the race developed we ran from behind the other seven relay teams in the race. Smokin John  came in off the lead off leg a very close seventh as the teams made the exchange. There was not a tenth of a second between John and the first place runner.   Mighty Mouse held his own and gained a place before giving the stick to the “Trucker”.   Then big Bob Sloan closed the gap and moved us into a solid third with not more than a step between us and the leaders. When I got the stick it was three abreast for four hundred and forty yards each runner inching in front at one point or another.  It was an exciting race to watch according to those that did. We were nipped at the tape and beat by an eyelash taking second in the race and second in the meet.

As a group of four we made a vow to each other and the rest of team, that was never going to happen again. Our relationship was a brotherhood we ate, slept, drank, dreamed and trained together with the goal to never be second again. We adopted a philosophy. “There are those that will and those that won’t, we were four that will.” We were a bit sullen after that race and took the blame for the team’s loss. Everyone said it was the greatest, most exciting race they had ever witnessed. They said at least you  guys tried.  That statement stuck in our gullet. Those that just try never win. You never hear a winner cross the finish line and say “Well I tried.”

The next two years afforded many dire case scenarios where we had to win the relay to win the meet. It was a team effort but in some very close races when the meet was on the line I had to come from behind in order to win. I was real good at it, but only because of the efforts of those that ran before me. Sometimes I would purposely allow a few runners to take the lead only to blast a round them off the final turn leaving them behind down the stretch. I would always feel the pressure and pleaded with my team teammates to just keep us close. They always did, more often we were in the lead when I received the baton. Each one of them doing the extra to enable us to keep the streak alive.  The togetherness and the confidence we had in each other was like no other relationship.

We were a tight foursome.  All four of us felt the pressure of the undefeated streak. Every team in our limited competitive neighborhood was after us.  Putting up countless challenges.  We were all some times just plan sick with nerves over the ordeal. Time and time again, race after race we were put in the position of having to win the mile relay to win the meet. The whole track and field team would line the track barking and screaming encouragement as the foursome dealt the competitions another loss. The big discus thrower was especially animated as he lurked around the area of the last turn where I usually made my then notorious move of blasting around the other runners, finding another gear and racing towards the finish line. He put the fear of God in all of us as we rounded that corner of the track.

At near the end of our senor season we had maintained the undefeated mile relay streak and set the school record many times over. We had participated in our graduation ceremony and were still hanging around campus for the last meet, the NAIA District Sixteen Track and Field Outdoor Championship which we had won  as a team the last two years. John and I had appointments in Columbia. Mo. at respective areas of study for graduate work. We were to drive to Columbia on the Friday morning before the meet, visit with the grad schools and then drive to Branson, Mo. To compete in our last race.

On our way to Branson John’s car and old Volvo had a fan belt bell housing crack and we were stranded.  These were the days of no cells phones. We pushed and coasted our way to Osage Beach, Missouri where we scoured the yellow pages for a mechanic, a parts store or somebody who could get us on the road again. Foreign car parts were hard to come buy in the big city much less the little rural community of Osage Beach. Mo. We finally connected with a buddy who bought the part and drove to Mobley where the parents of another buddy relayed the part and tools we needed to fix the Volvo.

We had been told that there was a guy by the name of Gary Mueller that worked on foreign cars in the Ozark area. He was elusive. Every place we checked for him he had either not been seen or had left.  He was a phantom mechanic.  Years later I called John out of the blue and said I was Gary Mueller returning his call.  We had a good laugh.

John and I sat by the side of the road. Out of dimes and out of time. Night fall was upon us. We had left a message at the front desk of the motel we were to meet the team at, hoping that the coach would come rescue us but he choose not to as he was put out with us for not traveling with the team in the first place.

Thinking that all was lost we got into the beer we had brought for the trip home. By nine p.m. we were good and drunk. That’s when the part showed up. We fixed the Volvo thanked the good people who made the delivery and raced to Branson. The beer continued to go down.

When we arrived in Branson we went to the front desk and located Coach’s room where we thought he had a room for us. He didn’t. I’m sure he could smell the beer on us but said nothing.  Not having a room John and I were forced to sleep in the same king size bed with the old cinder boss. We about got in a fist fight over who had the middle.Both John and I had to pee real bad but neither of us wanted to risk letting on a hint that we were beer drunk. What a miserable night.

At the meet the next day John and I had less than banner efforts in the open 440. I finished seventh and John a close eighth. The School of the Ozarks finished one, two, three, four sweeping the event. Their runners posted 440 times faster than any one on our team had ever run. The mile relay streak was in serious jeopardy.

Long before the race the four relay members made a group decision,. In an effort to keep our undefeated streak alive we would not run the relay,let the freshmen run it and went to the parking lot, fired up the hibachi and got into the beer, again. After several beers and an a couple of bratwurst, “Mighty Mouse’s” mother came out of the stands in a fury.  She kicked over the hibachi, knocked the beer out of our hands and scolded us with extreme prejudice.  Full of guilt, we relented and got warmed up for the last race of our lives.

We started the race more relaxed than ever. We knew we were gong to be beat. “Smokin” John ran the race of his life, besting his previous best mark. We were still a distant third. “Mighty Mouse”  also posted his fastest split ever closing the gap a bit but we were still third. “It was the performance of  “Trucker” Bob that put us within striking distance. His effort was both thrilling and exciting as his long and strong legs churned up the crushed brick track with a two second best effort split. S-of O’s anchor leg was three seconds better than I had ever run. I WAS PETRIFIED. As “Trucker" blasted through the exchange zone, S-of O highly regarded anchorman muffed the exchange and gave us all that we needed to finish the race in first, win the meet and maintain an unbelievable streak of undefeated mile relay races. We were champions to the end. We set another school record that day, despite bellies full of brats and beer.  The streak was what had mattered most to us. We owe it all to a mother.

The Lord's Cathedral

The Lord’s Cathedral

Then the Lord God seeded the earth
   With His mighty hand  He formed it all,
And  caused His Angels to watch  instead
    All that’s green to be man’s bed.

No nearer to heaven than in His Heart
   Beset the eagle to fly with the lark,
Grow oaks that hold  the vast and blue
   As grass comb breezes on the hue.

Made white waters to lick the soil
   And charged the rivers to create a roar,
For thunder speaks the mind of peace
   He sent the elk to kiss the meek.

Sensing the Spirit’s shining force
   The sun does lighten the garden’s course,
No nearer to God can one man be
   Than nestled in the woods near lasting sea.
       
                                    S.E. Hicks

Big Boy

Big Boy
Written by Fletcher “Butchwax” Ferguson

Bow season was rapidly approaching. I could barely contain my excitement for another chance to match wits with the wise, old,  gray muzzled patriarch of the woods that had eluded my arrow these last few years. On several occasion I could have shot him with a rifle but the challenge of getting him with my bow was more appealing.  I took a shot at him last winter, but he blocked my arrow with his antler. It was a thrilling, heart pounding hunt that December morning but it was the last time I had seen any sign of him.

In late July, after a considerable dry spell, we had two weeks of on and off heavy rains. The wet ground afforded the chance to study the deer tracks left behind in the mud. While doing my chores I would take time to take a gander at the tracks, making a mental note of new tracks and patterns the resident does left for me to conjecture over.. Big Boy left a unique print. His front right foot was a tad larger and the outside toe was turned in.  There was no sign of him.

As things dried up I had a task of cutting down some undesirable hedge trees and an old storage shed that was nothing more than an eye sore. We excavated a big pit, filled it with the trees and the remains of the shed for the purpose of burning. Once covered with dirt, it left a large area of bare ground. After a light rain one night, I found a clear series of  fresh tracks stretched out across the mud over the pit. The tracks belonged to Big Boy.  He was back. Lord only knows how old he was. Heck, he had to be nine maybe ten years old.  I had been hunting him going on five seasons.

At the start of bow season, it was just plan hot. Way to hot to consider hanging a deer, so I used the warm weather to scout and study patterns. Changing weather conditions alter deer behavior, as does the lunar cycle. The time of day the doe hit the food plot varied, and needed to be mentally recorded.  Where there are doe, a buck is surely lurking somewhere. The goal was to use the food plot to attract the doe, use the doe to attract the buck, then shoot the buck.

One cool morning I climbed up into the tree stand that over looked the food plot.  For the first time in six weeks I saw not a single doe. Something had changed. This outing coincided shortly after the spotting of Big Boy’s  tracks. While in the stand I noticed a bare spot on the opposite edge of the food plot.  Upon closer examination it was in fact a scrape that reeked of urine. Cool. Big Boy was working the night shift.

A week later one of the Christmas trees we had planted had been destroyed by a buck. Big Boy’s track was clearly visible. He was staking a claim. That evening, while in the stand, a single mature doe came into the food plot. She was acting weird. Jumping around, kicking up her heels like a playful cotton tail does. She suddenly bolted from the food plot, cleared the fence to the west of the food plot and darted out into the middle of the freshly seeded winter wheat field. Out of a cluster of wild plum came Big Boy. The doe clearly was glad to see him, as was I.  Big Boy, without any foreplay mounted her. The rut was on. Despite my rattling,  use of my doe bleat and a grunt tube, the old buck just sundered off to the south with a satisfied stride.

I saw him again a week later. He had all the doe rounded up and corralled down in a little area I call twin fawn valley. It is a  heavily timbered area with a thick underbrush of gooseberry, buck brush and a little creek. A day later, to my surprise, there was a new buck with the doe. A rather handsome ten point with good size. Big Boy had lost his harem over night, never to be seen again. This ten point looked haggard and was not in the best of shape. Big Boy must have given him a good fight.

The doe pattern had not changed much, but they did start coming into the food plot from a different direction, out of range of my bow. The new buck was always right on their trail. Sometimes there was only two or three doe, other times as many as a dozen. The ten pointer kept out of range. I decided to relocate a stand from the other side of the property that was not in a productive spot. As I was hanging the stand, which I did at a time when the doe typically where not around, here they came. Trailing them was a different buck.  A smaller eight point. Evidently he was working the day shift. This buck chased thirteen doe off the property. Great, all the work, all that time scouting, all that effort and this non shooter had ruined the weekend hunt.

Two weeks went by before the doe returned to the food plot. The ten pointer had been spotted clear on the other side of the property a couple times by duck hunters. He had abandoned the doe in the valley and was working another small group of three doe that resided in the timber north of our marshes. I was determined to get him. As I had no stand in that area, I planned to set up a pop up blind and use the old shot gun loaded with a slug to get him. He was usually seen in a cluster of willows at the edge of the marsh between eleven o’clock and two. I figured with it being rifle season,  I would hunt the food plot in the morning and then move to the pop up blind down in the marsh.

I was a little late getting into the stand up on doe ridge that Saturday morning. I had barely got settled when a group of six young bucks came into the food plot. One buck looked like the ten pointer I was seeking. I thought it weird, all those bucks together. I suppose they were about to settle their differences. I was just about to raise my shot gun and take the ten pointer when a truck load of duck hunters came down the gravel road towards the marshes. The noise of the truck rolling over gravel spooked the bucks and they scattered. I was a little pissed. These guys were not supposed to be down there until next weekend, or so I thought.  I was wrong.

As I sat in the stand and fumed over the circumstances, I just could not make up my mind what to do. I just sat there in the stand with shattered hopes.  Thirty minutes later here comes the triplets. Two year old doe I had actually touched when they were still wet from birth. I was not about to shoot one of them. Then here comes the twins, right on the same game trail. Two of the prettiest doe you ever did see. The darn things looked like they wore make up. Can’t shoot them either. Then a mature doe came up the trail with twin button buck yearlings. She was a big doe but I felt she should have the chance to give those two boys a fighting chance over the winter. So I passed on her.

The  button buck yearlings had come in sight first, followed by the doe. She stopped just at the edge of the food plot where the timber was just starting to thin. She raised her head to sniff the air. I was busted. She snorted the alarm call, raised her tail and bolted. At the same time she does this, a huge buck came to a dead stop back down the game trail. He was forty yards back still in the thick of it. My heart started pounding hard. I had never seen this buck before.  He was huge. His antlers were hidden from me due to the thick brush. All I could really see was the base of his white neck. He was facing me. I did not hesitate, raised my trusted thirty five year old shot gun, put the bead of the open sight right on the base of the buck’s neck and pulled the trigger. The slug found it’s mark, dropping the buck instantly. He did not even twitch.

I waited a few minutes in order to collect myself, then I climbed down still shaking from excitement a bit. I could not believe my eyes as I stood by the big white tailed buck. His antlers where spread wide apart. Only six  heavy beamed points. The brow tines, both of them broke off. That was a real shame, he would have been a mountable  Boone and Crocket trophy had it not been for that.  I did not want to field dress him right there, as it might effect future hunts, yet another tag to fill. I tried to drag him out of the thicket. He was way to heavy  for me to drag. Maybe in my younger days I could have, but not now.

My middle son was clear on the other side of the property hunting with a recurve. I went to fetch him.  He was none to happy to be pulled from his roost. He gave me the business about shooting a deer I could not drag. “What’s the matter old man. Can’t reap what you sow cause you’re to old and feeble?“  I told him to wait and see if he could drag it. He could not. Together, we struggled to drag this buck out of the thicket. What a job. We could not begin to lift the thing into the cargo bay of the ATV. So we tied him to the trailer hitch  of the ATV and drug him up to a clearing where we could field dressed him without compromising the killing field. I had to go get the tractor and load him into the bucket in order to get him weighed and  hung in the barn. After much effort and two failed attempts, his field dressed weight was two hundred and twenty seven pounds. Biggest bodied buck I had ever shot. He had thrown his weight around for the last time. Too bad about the brow tines.

Panty Hose

Pantyhose
Written by Fletcher “Butchwax” Ferguson

One would think, having been married for some thirty five years, that I would be an unmitigated expert when it comes to pantyhose. Quite the contrary, I know very little about the topic. About all I can tell you is where they are and where they have been, and I really don’t want to know that much.

What I do know is pantyhose can be found everywhere. No woman is ever without several pair, in different colors. What is really scary is the sizes they come in. What is a plus size any way? What exactly does control top control? It certainly does not control where they have been, where they are or the behavior of the one that has them on. It certainly has no effect on what comes out of the wearer’s mouth. At my house they have been found in some of the darnedest places.

Floor space at my house is at a premium but there is plenty of room for pantyhose. That said, there has not been a square inch of flooring where a discarded pair of pantyhose has not been found, either by me or the dog. Why the wife does not find them is a mystery. Besides the floor, they are found on chairs, every chair at one time or another, in my blue jeans, in my dress shirts, inside the pillow case, in my sock drawer, on top the computer and on the dinning room table. Yes where I eat, or rather where I used to eat. Why don’t they disappear like socks? Evidently the dog has grown tried of the things and has taken to burying them in between the sofa cushions and pillows.

I like many other men, have had to wade through them on the way to the shower. Once hung to dry, they are like a polyester forest. I have found them soaking in the kitchen sink, the tub and the bathroom sink. I have found then on a towel on the back deck drying in the summer sun. Tripping over them in the dark one night, I thought I was being attacked by the “Thing!”  I believe one time I found a new pair still in the egg…  in the refrigerator . It seems one of my sons thought they were the off spring of an alien life form, a real egg and should be in the frig. Well, that’s where all the other eggs are kept. I asked him, “Did you think we were going to eat it!“  He just looked at me.

The used variety do have some use, but telling your wife to save a pair so as to be cut up in order to slop some homemade catfish bait into and tie on to a fish hook, which by the way did not work, only encourages a women to not throw them away. There are hundreds of them in grocery bags in my basement. Nobody, I mean no reputable trash service,  recycles them and you really should not send them to the land fill as they do not degrade. Even though they smell like they should. Now there is a million dollar idea, bio-degradable pantyhose. Save the planet, to order yourself a pair, dial 1-800-bio-hose.

One time, while on a trip, I lost the fan belt on the old truck I was driving. The wife had the only solution to the problem. Only problem was, she was wearing the answer, and would not take them off.  Here we were miles from anywhere and she would not take her pantyhose off for me in the truck. (She used to.) Finally, after much debate, she parted with them fully confident that they would not serve as an emergency fan belt. She was wrong, didn’t slip a bit. Besides those two functional uses and the fact they do improve on the over all looks of a women’s legs, I don’t like the damn things.

The very first reason and one that at this point is of no concern, is they got in the way of things. As a older teen, as I was exploring the birds and the bees, pantyhose were an impenetrable  fortress. They were an impossible barrier and became a real turn off. I hate the way they feel. I won’t touch them. Today I use a special pair of salad tongs to pick them up off the floor.

Finding a discarded pair under the sheets really angers me. One reason for that is that my wife would wear them to bed during a certain time of the month. She explained in way to much detail, how pantyhose helped hold her pad in place.  She then of course wanted to cuddle and would throw her pantyhose covered leg over mine. I could not sleep until it was removed. Finding a wild pair under the sheets makes a fellow wonder what else may have come loose.

As result, the sight of used panty hose disgusts me. A reaction that has given me a label. I am considered a panty waste. I suppose it was for that reason the term was developed in the first place. Tough rugged men that fear pantyhose. Pantyhose obviously are not my favorite thing. I would much prefer a woman in silk nylons. O baby now there is a accessory. Pleasing to the eye, and really nice to touch.

 I am currently meeting weekly with a men’s support group to discuss how pantyhose has affected us. We go fishing.  Yes I have PHDD. That’s pantyhose disgust disorder. There is no known cure.