No Swimming! ...

One day Luther DooLittle showed up at Lamar Beefeater's house carrying a conspicuously new chainsaw ... "where'd you git that?" asked Lamar, fully aware that Luther never did have more than two cents in his pockets to rub together at any given time ... "got it over at the General Store just last night" answered Luther ... "but I thought they was closed at night" replied Lamar ... "they was closed" Luther smugly responded, then proudly added "I stole it!" ... "follow me, I want to show you something" ... anxious to get an admitted larcenist along with freshly stolen merchandise as far away from his house as he could just in case Sheriff Clarence A. VanMeter or his deputy happened to show up, Lamar complied and followed Luther as he hurried up into the woods ... the boys moved stealthily along until they got to the old, farm pond in the meadow ... "there ain't no trees to cut down here" quipped a somewhat befuddled Lamar ... "ain't gonna cut down no trees" declared Luther "but watch this!" 

Luther gave that big, heavy chainsaw a heave and flung it right out into the middle of that slimy pond ... it smacked the surface of the muddy water with a sickening splash and slowly sank out of sight as air bubbles danced up from the direction of it's descent ... "what'd you do that fer?" cried Lamar ... "you'll see, now go fetch me a stick from off a tree" demanded Luther ... Lamar was well beyond shock and awe by then, so he ran back into the woods and retrieved a three-foot-long  stick from beneath a dying sycamore tree and brought it back to Luther, who then commanded his now exasperated pal to "hurl that stick out there in the pond right where that chainsaw went in and watch what happens!"

Both boys stood there silently and watched ... one now in a state of utter confusion ... urgent expectancy all but overwhelming the other ... as the water resumed its usual motionless demeanor ... that rotting sycamore stick just floating calmly about ... Lamar broke the cold silence "well!?" ... Luther eventually returned to his senses, what little he had, and disappointedly muttered "well it weren't supposed to turn out like this ... that there chainsaw was supposed to swim back up out of that there water after you throw'd in that there stick!" ... Lamar then quizzed with genuine concern "what are you talkin' about, have you lost your mind Luther?" ... frustration shifted to embarrassment as Luther angrily declared "no I ain't lost my mind ... it's in the Bible, 2 Kings 6 I think ... this here feller borrowed another feller's axe so he could chop down a beam ... all of a sudden the axe head slipped off the handle and fell into the water ... that axe head sunk to the bottom out of sight, cause axe heads can't swim, and I reckon neither could that feller that dropped it in ... so that feller went and told another feller all about how that axe head had fell into the water ...well that other feller went and cut down a stick and throw'd it into the water right where that axe head fell in ... and right before their eyes that there lost axe head swam right back up out of that water so that feller that lost it could grab hold of it ... so why didn't the same principle work fer me?" ... at which ol' Lamar humbly concluded "well I reckon it might be because that axe head was borrowed ... not stolen!"


--sja