Grandma Z's Gift Of Gab - Don't Read This If You're Eating

My grandmother had a gift for gab. She just had a way of telling a story that kept you riveted; you would hear about the people she knew and the experiences she'd had and they seemed to come alive right in front of you. I need to edit, rephrase and polish my stories. People don't appreciate that at a dinner party so that consigns me to being a better writer than a storyteller.
Grandma had a story she would tell about being a waitress at the Twin Ponds Country Club. Some group of men, Shriners or a local company, were there for a banquet and after having drinks, began hitting on my grandmother. She wasn't even waiting on their table, but she was quite an attractive woman back in the day and lots of men used to approach her. She'd had enough of these clowns asking for her name every time she walked by and decided to make up a name to try to get them to leave her alone. The next trip past their table went something like this:
Drunk banquet guy: "C'mon sweetheart, what's your name?" he asked, a Lucky Strike dangling from his mouth.
Grandma: "Zelda Glutch, now leave me alone; I'm trying to work, you jerks."
Drunk banquet guys at table: Stunned silence.
They never bothered her again.
What makes this story even more interesting is the fact that this name stuck with her for the rest of her life; everybody called her Zelda from then on. Growing up, she was my Grandma Zelda. I don't remember how old I was when I found out her real name was Pauline. I heard my mom say something about my Grandma Pauline and responded with, "Grandma who? I didn't know I had a Grandma Pauline."
"That's your Grandma Zelda."
"Oh, huh. Why do we call her Zelda then?"
Grandma's stories were always interesting and funny, no matter how many times I had heard them. Many of them I absolutely enjoyed hearing again simply because of the life she injected into their telling. She often told the story of one of her friends, a man who had moved away from the upstate New York area when he was young and had returned many years later for a visit. As a child he used to go jump off one of the local bridges into the river beneath. Unknown to him, the water level had dropped considerably since the last time he had jumped at this particular spot. He excitedly drove out to the bridge for a fun trip down memory lane and flung himself off with abandon, just like old times. He landed in two feet of water and stood up covered with cuts, cursing and spitting pebbles out of his mouth. Rocks were also sticking out of the skin on his chest. At least he could stand up. I always cracked up at the way she told this story.
That’s country living for you. People doing stupid things and getting hurt; as long as it isn't too serious, always gets a laugh. I honestly don't know where the line gets drawn between laughter and concern, maybe a certain type of compound fracture or a specific volume of blood loss; I'm not sure. Things are different in the country; people seem tougher, yet also kinder; real salt of the earth types. We seem to lose touch with an important part of ourselves living in cities and suburbs. Namely, the part that laughs at other people getting injured. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate supermarkets and indoor plumbing, and I'm sure city kids do their fair share of laughing at their friends who get hurt; but there are so many other fun experiences that city and suburb kids don’t get to enjoy nowadays; it really is a shame.
Like turd fights. At least, I'm assuming city folk aren't participating in these. But just ask any country kid about getting in a turd fight, they’ve all done it. Out there cleaning the corral, feeding the animals, the temptation is just too great. One kid gives in to it and lobs a cow plop at his or her friend and chaos ensues. I’ve heard the horror stories about being careful to keep your mouth shut, but at its heart, this is just plain country fun at its best. Grandma had stories about turd fights.
Grandma Z also used to tell me about the time my great-grandfather went swimming in the Barge Canal, near Utica, New York. He and his friends used to go jump off a bridge into the canal. I guess jumping off bridges was the best, cheap thrill available at the time; it seems better than the cheap thrills kids seek out today. I wonder, did mothers harp on their sons about flinging themselves off the nearest train trestle while their kids argued, "C'mon mom, everybody's doin it!" like kids do today? Probably, people don't seem to have changed that much in 100 years.
Musings aside, this particular year there had been rain for several days and the canal was rising up and over its banks; perfect, deep water for jumping off the bridge. Stan; my great-grandfather, and his friends spent the day jumping, swimming and having a good time. One of Stan’s friends jumped in and shot back up to the surface, screaming and gagging, entrails wrapped all around him. A cloud of bloody, scummy looking water enveloped him in the area where he had gone in. Terrified, Stan and his friends watched from the bridge as he swam to shore; because would you jump into that gory mess to try and help him? Yeah, I didn't think so. He made it to shore, unwrapping lengths of intestine from around his body as he went. As he clawed his way up the swollen bank, they could see he was unhurt. Their eyes went back to the canal and from the remains of the carcass floating in the water they pieced together what had happened.
With the canal flooding over the banks the normally dry, solid ground that contained the river was soft and muddy. Somewhere upstream from where they were swimming some unfortunate cow had slipped into the canal and drowned. Its bloated body continued downstream just under the surface of the water and Stan’s buddy had unknowingly timed it exactly right to plunge straight through the corpse, tangling himself in the entrails in the process.
Of course this was hilarious to everyone but the poor guy who went through the cow. Heck, maybe it ended up being funny to him too, he was a country kid, after all. Grandma said they laughed about it for days.
They also made him walk home fifty yards behind them. He stunk.

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Speaking of rewriting and editing, this is an edit and rewrite from another blog of mine. I hope you enjoyed it!