[Ago]

A story of Patience, Love, Tolerance, and stupidity

Chapter I Granpa's story

I am an old man now, and have had many problems, most of which never happened. I grew up in a small farming community, where we grew a small plant we called "Sobriety". It took us many many years to learn how to successfully develop this plant, and we used to have town meetings every night to discuss the most effective way to cultivate "sobriety"

A little background is in order, when my Grandfather was young, they way they tried to grow "sobriety" is they would get a handful of seeds, close their eyes and just fling them randomly. A number of people tried staring at the seeds REALLY hard while contracting their anus and stomach in an elaborate pattern, they thought if they concentrated just right, and squeezed their butts perfectly the seeds would take root, they called this method "will power" because they would literally "will" the plant to grow. Occasionally a seed would fall on fertile soil, and get the right amount of water, and this method would work, and since the person always did this alone, they called this the "self will" method, the "self will" proponents were incredibly vocal, but were few and far between since it was successful so rarely.

Another way is many people worshiped the Grand Poobah, a mythical man that may or may not have existed who supposedly had magical powers, who preached a message of love that somehow his followers would argue about....and then kill each other. They also killed anyone who didn't believe in The Grand Poobah after torturing them first, most times just by lighting them on fire. They were considered the upstanding members of society.

So these folks would ask the Grand Poobah to grow their "sobriety". They would make Juvenile Primate begging gestures to the Grand Poobah. since TGPoo was their "alpha male" and ask TGPoo for help, and lo and behold, sometimes a seed would fall on fertile soil and it would grow.

The Self Willers and The Followers of The Grand Poobah hated each other, each insisting the other was wrong, when the truth was neither method worked very well.

Anyway, in my Grandfathers Day, one of the followers of The Grand Poobah kept trying to grow sobriety and wasn't having any luck. We refer to him now as "Bill" because he 'came" in the "male". He was quite a salesman and ladies man, Bill was, anyway, so he was trying to grow his own sobriety and he was having any luck, so he started studying, really studying what worked, he watched the self willers, he went to professors, and feed stores, he went to poobahpreachers, he tried everything, and lo and behold, he found if he cleared the field, pulled the weeds, got the ground ready, planted the seed, and put a ton of hard work helping others his field would grow, but was unable to teach anyone else how to grow their own sobriety.

He tried for years, brought in a nice field but was unable to teach anyone else, after four years he was getting frustrated, and was going to go back to selling toilet seat covers to the Air Force ($600.00 bux a piece, don't laugh) but instead called a PoobahPreacher and asked if there was anyone in town that was unable to grow sobriety. "There sure is" said the man, walk two miles, then turn right, he's easy to spot.

Bill followed directions and turned where he was supposed to and found himself at a lake. Surprised he walked around the whole lake looking for this fella he was supposed to meet. He was just getting ready to leave when he spied a head in the water, he hollered over, "hey, YOU bobbing in the water, you a follower of the Grand Poobah?" The fellow answered in the affirmative, so Bill asked "You trying to grow sobriety?" The guy said "yeah, but I'm not having any luck, as a matter of fact, I'm drowning!!!!"

So Bill dragged him out of the water and asked him what his name was, "The fella said, "Well usually I'm behind a SkiBoat so everyone calls me Skip."

Bill thought that was the dumbest thing he had ever heard, so he just called him "Bob", since that's what he was doing when they met.

Anyway, they started talking about growing sobriety, Bill told him about his progress and success but inability to help anyone else." Well, hell son, that's EASY, the secret ingredient is WATER, you got to WATER the seeds!!!!!"

The two started a new crop and it came in like Gangbusters, they found others willing enough to give this a try, and they helped them clear fields, plow rows, plant seeds, and then let them grow. After they had a few fields successfully planted, someone came up with the idea that chicken poop was helpful, so every morning they religiously gathered their chicken poop and spread it on the field while chanting "keep spreading Poo it grows if you spread it"

They became known as the "Messcan Two steppers" because they watered from Messcans they had got in the Army, and anytime someone watched them planting, since they actually took two steps, then stopped it was called "Doing The Messcan Twostep". Bill actually was caught a few times watering some girls that were wearing Tshirts, he'd take an extra step then 'accidentally" "water" the front of the girls shirt, ever since then we always called that "Three stepping".

Anyhow, once they had devised a successful method, they wrote a manual describing EXACTLY how they cultivated sobriety. Since they were both Followers of The Grand Poobah, they wrote the manual using the Grand Poobah in the format, but were very clear and very explicit that you could use ANY form of a power greater then themselves, they learned that the seed grew and they didn't MAKE it grow, it grew by itself, or with "The Grand Poobah's" help as it were, but they knew it didn't matter if you used Thehippygod PeaceLoveGranolaGuy, or even the one from Overseas Thegreatfatfook, or even a lake, you just had to realize it wasn't YOU growing the seed, that you were responsible for clearing the field, fertilizing it, plowing it into rows, weeding it, and keeping it weeded on a daily basis, they realized that farming was actually hard work

Chapter II Next "The Town Meeting"