Mah and Pah live down in Kings Mountain, Kentucky. That's where I done did mah growin' up, and that's where they do most o' there livin' now. Over Turkey Day, my cousin Butch done brought us a bird for the roastin' that he done hunted down the week prior. We cooked that sucker up in all kinds o' juice and wine and ate it with a side of corn puddin' ol' Aunt Sheryl and Uncle Clyde brought up from Faubush. We got to talkin' 'bout the state o' things where she lives (on a farm with her husband Clyde) and whatnot with this here talk about them's takin' away those ethanol subsidies that Clyde gits. I was tryin' ta 'splain 'bout all the learnins I been doin' at the University and how it ain't necessarily real good for the energies that ya gotta put into cookin' ethanol compared with the energies ya get back. I talked my argument real clear-like and gave all the folks round the table a good listen:
My Mah's been a schoolmarm since I was a just a babe-child-boy. But she's got herself a little garden in the back for tomaters and beans and whatnot. So she's got kinda the same relationship with the earth and whatever like Uncle Clyde do. And, well, shoot. She said it ain't right and it ain't fair that Uncle Sam gon' take away the moneys he been given to ol' Clyde all this time just cause it ain't as good as gas. Firstly, it's wrong on account of unclehood she said. And second, ain't no sense in hangin' poor Clyde out to dry like my basketball shorts when he done put so much dang work into gittin' him some land and some corn and some big machines. Ain't nothin' right about none o' that.
Pah, who ain't never seen nothin' purdy 'bout farmin' (and kinda takes to hatin' his sister's man) said that it serves him right for not helpin' him (Pah) with gittin' his local jewelry store started up. Pah's in the jewelin' business and gots all kinds o' rings and sparkly gemstones for the folks in Kings Mountain. He said he ain't never got no subsidy from Uncle Sam for his jewel store and Clyde should just be a man and quit whinin' bout them takin' 'way his precious corn juice moneys.
Now Clyde, who musta been drinkin' before we even done put Butch's turkey on a spit, got hisself a tad excited when Pah started blabberin', seein' as his acreage is at stake with the state. I saw him swearin' 'neath his breath when Pah was talkin', but he let him say his piece. Then he talked about raisin' little Butchy on them lands they got and how ain't nothin' in the world that'd make him trade all that away even without them ethanol subsidehs. I was fittin' to tell him 'bout some real smart good farmer boys like Wes Jackson and Wendell Berry, but Uncle Clyde wasn't havin' none o' that--said ol' Wendell was too dang busy writin' pansy poems to see how good the new farmin' technology was gittin'. Clyde said he done invested too dang much in his ethanol corn and ain't no way he can afford to change everything about his farmin' process in a year, or even live for that there matter, without them subsidies.
Aunt Sheryl was sittin' quiet-like for most o' the evenin', but she done hollered up when Clyde's voice was gittin' cranky and said, "Let's eat!"
So we did.
