PULLING THE SCOTTY

 

I am tossed from side to side

between my Mother and Daddy

as the little green GMC pickup truck

slowly makes it way up Old Cherry Mountain Road.

 

Every so often Mother would yell “Stop, Cecil!”

Daddy would explain for the dozenth time that

he’d have to get to the curve first.

Once we were at the level place in the road,

the three of us would climb out and trot

back down the road to retrieve the rock Mother

wanted for her rock garden.

 

Daddy would place it in just the right place

in the back of the truck and we’d all climb back in.

Occasionally I’d lollygag and end up sitting by the window

where I stretched out my hand to snap off

long fronds of Queen Annes Lace that happily

grew at the edges of the old road.

 

Daddy would go through the gears on the steering column,

first, clutch, second, clutch … and the truck would balk

at the idea of switching up to third gear, so we’d settle

into second as the rock in the back lurched backwards.

Mother laughed and Daddy would shake his head …

Mary Alice and her rock obsession! He adored her for it.

 

Merrily rolling behind us was our turquoise and white

Scotty Camper, rocking side to side like a happy drunkard,

the yellow ping-pong ball smiley face hanging in the window

seemed to echo its elation. It had followed us from

South Georgia along the slick concrete freeways that

ker-thunk ker-thunked beneath the wheels, and later

along sharply curving mountain roads where Mother was

certain it would tip over at every switchback.

 

We finally rolled into Bill and Nancy’s campsite

on Cherry Mountain and Daddy set the emergency brake.

My cousins, Tim and Jeff climbed out of the creek

shaking off water as they ran up the hill.  Mother opened up

the Scotty and began bringing out lawn chairs.

Daddy used the rocks in the back of the truck to

keep the Scotty from rolling down Cherry Mountain.

 

That night I slept in the overhead bunk in the Scotty

gazing past the Smiley Faced ping-pong ball at the same

moon I would come to adore over the next fifty years

with the cousin I would someday learn to call “Mom”.

 

-Lynn Hamilton-Rutherford

 On the Road