How I Got This Way by Patrick F. McManus

Author:Patrick F. McManus
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Published: 2010-04-01T07:00:00+00:00

The 400-Pound Pumpkin

My GRANDMOTHER, A stout little old pioneer woman, had come west by wagon and never tired of torturing me with tales of her labors when she was my age. During winter she had walked forty miles to school and home again through snow eight feet deep and wasn’t absent or even tardy a single day. During summer she single-handedly cooked for logging crews of 800 men, and then, after washing and drying all the dishes, she split up a couple cords of firewood. Now, in old age, her sole responsibility was looking after me, while my mother was away at work.

“And land sakes, Pat,” she confided in me one August afternoon, “looking after you is the hardest chore the Good Lord ever thrust upon me as retribution for my sins.”

“What sins are those, Gram? Anything I’d be interested in?”

“I should say not! The whole passel of ‘em wouldn’t hold a candle to the atrocities you come up with between breakfast and lunch on an average day. Now what instrument of the devil are you foolin’ with?”

“Oh, this is Whomper, Gram, the world’s most powerful slingshot. I made it myself.” I held up Whomper in all its mighty glory: a forked, two-foot-section of trunk chopped from a thorn apple tree, woven bands of rubber as thick as a logger’s wrist, and a leather pouch fashioned from whole tongue of boot, all the elements laced together with baling wire.

Gram shook her head. “If that ain’t about the most useless thing I ever seen, not counting yourself, of course.”

“It’s not useless. I use Whomper for hunting elk.”

“Pshaw! There you go with your tall tales.”

“I didn’t say I ever got an elk with it.”

“I should think not. Why, there ain’t a man in the world strong enough to pull that slingshot.”

“Oh yes there is. Last year at the Loggers’ Picnic, Rancid Crabtree shot a stone as big as a peach clear out of sight with it. He said the strain laid him up in bed for three days afterwards, but he actually shot Whomper.” I was a little hesitant to mention the old woodsman, my friend and mentor, because Rancid and Gram were enemies of long standing.

“You stop with your fibs, young man! Still, it wouldn’t surprise me none if that lazy old fool Crabtree tried such a stunt, just to show off. Speaking of lazy, I’ve got a job for you. Go get a hatchet and help me cut my punkin loose from the vine. I told Crabtree I’d pay him a dollar to haul it to the fair for me. He didn’t want to, because it too much resembled work, but his greed got the better of him.”

Ever since I could remember, one of Gram’s pumpkins had taken Grand Prize at the fair. That’s because pumpkins were judged on size alone, with no points deducted for ugly. This year would be no different. Gram’s secret pumpkin fertilizer, its ingredients too disgusting even to mention, and no doubt why I let

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