A Camel Named Clyde at Global Wildlife!

Clyde, a smiling two-humped camel!

Thanks Ken for putting A Camel Named Clyde in the Global Wildlife gift shop!

William with the girls that run the show!

Bonnie sneaks food from the bucket when no one is looking!

Here Comes the Deadline...

April 15 loomed around the corner. Carl turned to me and said, “Get our cancelled checks together. We have to square away with the Internal Revenue. How many deductible kids we got?—”
          “Four.”

          “We’re missing one?”

          “Gary. He got married last summer, so he’s not technically ours anymore.”

          “Four.” He calculated. “Wish we had ten.”

          “Heaven forbid.”

          He went down to the next line. “Medical bills?—”

          “Covered by insurance—” I suggested Dr. Austin.

          “He doesn’t count,” Carl replied. “He’s the vet.”

          “Why not?—we spent more on the pets than we did on the kids.”

          Next on the form—donations: “Did we give 10% to the church?” he asked.

          “Now you wish.”

          “How much?—”

          “Not nearly enough to pay for all our blessings. Maybe we could add a little zero at the end?”

          “Can’t—the revenuers will frown on that. Anybody blind?—”

          “No, but I think you could use a hearing aid,” I said.

          “Let’s not get personal. Could we claim your mother? She’s over 65 and widowed.”

          “Let’s go for doubles and claim your dad, too. He’s 80.”

          “Amazing thing,” Carl mused, “neither one is blind, but they're both deaf. Why is there no tax exemption for deafness? Hmmm…let’s see. What can we come up in the category of “other”?”

          “Work clothes?” I asked.

          “Only if they’re a requirement of the job—”

          “My job requires it,” I said. “My customers would faint if I appeared naked.”

          “It must be a uniform, like a nurse or police outfit.”

“Scratch clothes—how about your safety boots?” I pulled straws.

          “We tried that last year. They disallowed it if the boots were also used for hunting.”

          “Safety helmets?—”

          “Good thinking. I lost a dozen last year $50 each.”

          “Gold plated? Were they monogrammed?”

          He frowned, deep in concentration. “Be quiet. Don’t disrupt my thinking.”

“Food?—” I suggested.

          “Not deductible. Hey, I’ve got it!  Sales tax! We bought a car. There’s a lot of tax on a new car. Can you find the bill of sale?”

          “Sure—it’s behind the refrigerator.”

          “How’d it get there?”

          “I filed it where I could put my hands on it when we needed it and the only major appliance in this house that no one can move is the refrigerator. Come help me.”

          Moving the fridge wasn’t easy, but we managed. After a few hours of mathematical juggling, I ventured to ask, “How does it look?”

          Moans and groans from the principal bread winner in the family. “Terrible! I hate to pay Uncle Sam. Ridiculous the way the government throws away our money. All those politicians eating at the public trough, living high off the hog…”

          “Write the check.”

          The writing on the check is smeared and squiggly. It’s hard to watch a grown man cry.                                                                                                                                  

                                                        ***

   (Nowadays my bank mails no monthly statement, sends no cancelled checks.

My tax accountant files my return electronically. The only thing that hasn’t changed in all these years is that I still must pay.)

Best Dog He Ever Had



 

My late husband, Carl, had a minor investment in a registered bird dog he’d bought from a breeder and trainer near Belzoni, Mississippi. It turned out “Tammy” didn’t come up to sniff. She flushed birds. As previously agreed, Carl returned Tammy to Mr. Hill, who promised to resell the pointer and refund the money.

After six weeks or so, we drove to Mr. Hill’s old farmhouse to check on the progress of the sale. A thin, wiry, elderly gentleman came down the rickety steps. “Howdy,” he said, right away recognizing an unsatisfied customer. “If you come to see about Tammy, she’s all right. I ain’t sold her yet, but by durn I sure hate to part with that dog, she’s the best dog I ever seen. There ain’t too many people wanna buy an expensive dog like that, but I’m telling you I’m a-trying, even if it breaks my heart to part with Tammy again. I took her out yesterday. I never hunt any dog but her, you know I raised her from a pup, best dog I ever had, I hated to part with her. If you hadn’t come around here when my pocket was empty I can assure you, you’d never gotten that good dog off of me. I took her out for a run, and sure enough, I lost her, just like you said you did, and I thought, well, maybe she’s hunting a mite too wide, and I looked for that durn dog an hour, then I came out on the road over yonder, and saw a car easing along, and I thought, by golly, them people done picked up Tammy and stole the best dog I ever had. So I walked on down to the store, and sure enough, that black car done stopped there previous.

People bought  five dollars worth of gas and two Moon pies, but the boy said they ain’t had my Tammy with ’em. So I stopped over by that trailer,” he pointed in the direction of the gravel road running away from the house, “and asked them folks had they seen Tammy and they said no and this worried me some more.

“I come on back to the house and had the old lady fix me lunch, took me a little nap, then got up and took them two setters there out for a run, see if maybe they’d scare up a scent or something. I’m trying my durnest to train them setters for a man, but they just ain’t got it, they like to flush birds and play around, they ain’t at all like my Tammy, best dog I ever did see.

“Well, me and them setters went across the field, past the creek bottom and into those woods over yonder.”  Mr. Hill spat tobacco juice and pointed to the horizon where the sun streaked gold through the pine thicket. “And directly a bird flies past me, but by the time I get my bearings and my gun up—“ he lifted an imaginary gun to his shoulder, cocked it, and squinted a sharp eye down the imaginary barrel— “the doggone bird is plumb outta my range. I can hear them setters barking and raisin’ Cain, so I hurries across and into the woods and good lord almighty, there is Tammy. That dog been holding that point twenty-four hours.” Mr. Hill looked down at the ground. His scruffy cowboy boot raked dirt into a little dusty hill. “You sure you won’t reconsider keeping her?”