Oh, I been here a long time, yes sir. Lived here all my life. I know ever’body and ever’body’s daddy in these parts. Naw, I get along with most folks here but I admit there’s a few I had my run-ins with.

See that young feller there? No, right there, that one in the striped bibs over there at the corner of the bar talkin’ loud with all his buddies.

That young feller there likes to say, “I won’t go ‘round believin’ in God until I sees some proof!”

He all’ys says stuff like that when he’s had a few like he’s lookin’ for a good fight, ye know? When I hears people talkin’ like that I admit I tend to get a bit consternated. And people ‘round here knows I’ll say what I want when I want and I don’t give a damn what they think about that.

One time I says to him, after he went on and on about that stuff agin at the bar, I says, “Then I reckon you’ll be goin’ ‘round ‘til kingdom come! ’Cuz if you ain’t seen no proof of God by now, then you ain’t been lookin’ too hard, have ye?”

Ha!

Well, that flustered him a bit, I guess. And then he turns my way and he says, “What you mean?” all serious like.

So I says to him, I says, “Well, just think of ye orchids out yonder in yer pasture! Are they not the most beautiful things ye ever seed in yer life? Where in the hell do ye think they came from and how do ye think they got forever in yer fields?”

And he says, just as dumb as a two dollar mule, he says, “Well, they just blew in on the wind, settled down in there somewheres, I ain’t got no recollection of who planted ‘em.”

“God!” I says!

“Aw, now yer talkin’ like the fool ye really be” said he.

Now, Joe, there, the bartender, was getting’ ready to have a good laugh at that since he could see what was comin’ and he knows I ain’t no fool. Hell, I know’d his daddy when he was just a tadpole and I know’d his daddy, too.

But then that boy in the bibs over there went to flappin’ his gums even more.

“Let me tell YOU sumpin’, Mister,” he says all fired up. “I ‘magine ye ain’t seen them there orchids more’n once ner twice in yer whole dern life. Yer most likely conjurin’ up memberances of what you saw of them things last summer, as I recall. I’s out there jest this week and they’s all shriveled up and died, aint’ nothin’ like they was. Is that yer God’s beauty for ye?”

I sharpened my eyes but smiled at Joe who knew what I’s up to and I said, “That there’s the beauty and the mystery of God’s ways, my friend!”

Now, that shoulda shut him up but it didn’t. Young snappers like him jest don’t know when to quit.

“You don’t know nuthin’,” the young feller shot back at me.

“Yes, I does,” I said.

And then he says, “Well, you fer sure didn’t know them orchids all dried up by now. Fer all you knew, they’s still bloomin’ in the pasture!”

And I thought to myself, I thought, goddamn, who is this kid trying to tell me what he thinks I know? I was farmin’ the fields around here a’fore he was even swimmin’ in his daddy’s sack. Like he’s gonna tell me sumpin’ diff’rent than I already been through! Why … I tended crops, sorghum and beans, and cut bales of hay like he’d never even ‘magined, raised my own damn horses for years and years … if I’s jest a few years younger I’d a given him a ass whumpin’ he’d never ferget.

“They’ll be back, laddy,” I says, “they come back each and ev’ry year. I do ‘member how beautiful they were and I know how they got to where they be and I musta seed this a hunert times when them orchids died out and then in the spring, jest when you’d think they’d be gone forever, when they all a sudden popped right back up through the dirt like nobody’s bizness.”

“Yeah, that’s fer sure nobody’s bizness,” he laughed, “specially the part about you seein’ anything a hunert times, much lest once in yer dern life, you old blind fart. Ye say ye know all that about them orchids and I say ye don’t know squat, that’s what I say.”

That there was jest about more than my old ears could stand, ye know?

“Well,” I told him, “I guess I may not know much but I damn sure do believe they’ll return.”

An’ I slammed my hand down on the bar just like that! Lookin’ back now, I guessed I was lettin’ him get my dander up too much. I shoulda let him be right then and there.

“Oh, looky here,” he puffed up to those who by then was’t listenin’ in at the bar, “Old man’s changin’ his story now, ain’t he?”

And I said, “What you mean?” all serious like.

Then he stands up and starts to really fussin’ about.

“Yer all fer sure about God and orchids and things one minute and then yer all a’guessin’ about Gods and orchids and things the next! First ye says ye know and then ye says ye jest believe! Call me too young or whatever you want but I don’t think believin’ is the same or nearly as good as really knowin’. So, which is it gonna be old man?”

Now, I could tell by the way that young feller was jumpin’ up and confrontin’ me with this line of talk that he really din’t wanna hear what I had to say, he was just a pontificatin’ in front of his friends and all but, you know me, I went ahead and said what I said anyway.

“I’m gonna tell YOU sumpin’,” I said, “There’ll come a time in yer life young feller when believin’ in things is all ye got. There’ll be times when all the things ye thought ye knew run away from ye like wild horses from a barn fire and leave ye with nuthin’ but burnt ashes and foggy mem’ries. And maybe there’ll be time or two when what ye once seed and what ye once ‘sperienced all of a sudden consternate what ye see happenin’ right in front of yer own damn eyes. And when it comes down to those hard times, then trust me on this one laddy, believin’ is better than knowin’.”

Now, Joe looked at me like he thought I might be ‘bout to have one of them cardiac episodes, like I was gettin’ too hot or sumpin’, but that there done shut the young feller up for a second or two. That boy pondered what I said, with that dumb mule look a’ his and those squinty little eyes goin’ side to side, and then he comes up to me and says some more.

“Mister,” he says, “I reckon this is one more bunch of horses that done got away from ye. See, here, among the many things ye claim ye obviously don’t know, now you can add another. This past week I done plowed that pasture of mine and yer samples of God’s beauty and mystery was in my way. So, I dug them bulbs up and took ‘em over to my momma’s house so she could tend to ‘em. Now, ye can go on believin’ whatever fool thing ye want to believe, but I’m here to tell you them orchids ain’t even in the same county any more, they’s already moved on like you shoulda done years ago. Ye guess yer God planted them things, decidin’ what ground they’d grow in forever, but I’m tellin’ ye I know I done dug ‘em up. That jest goes to provin’ that what I know trumps yer believin’ no doubt.”

“No, it don’t,” I said.

“Yes, it does,” said he.

Well, I got a tad perturbed with him right about then, so I says to him, “Youngster, it don’t matter none if those orchid bulbs is in yer field, in yer momma’s garden, or comin’ out yer ass, they’s still gonna pop up through the dirt next spring jest like they all’ys does with or without yer help ‘cuz that there’s the way God done tended it to be!”

“An’ besides,” I says to him, “I seed how ye go a’farmin’ yer fields and I know what kinds of details ‘casionally miss yer practiced attention. I ‘spect there’s still two or three of them bulbs out there no matter what ye THINK ye did ‘er not did. I gotta dollar says them orchids come back up in yer field next year all the same.”

See, that’s one thing he didn’t know I knew, that being what a poor farmer he really was. His daddy had told me on ‘casions where the boy’s faults were on that matter.

“Yer on!” said he and I said, “Fine!”

Oh, he was just so full o’ piss after all that. I seed it a’fore, ye know, why … I was probably more like him when I was younger than he’d ever realize. Now, I didn’t really know if he dug up all those orchid bulbs or not but me and him, I tell ye, me and him jest would not have got along at all when I was a boy, not at all! I could tell he was jest tryin’ to act like the big man in front of all his friends that day, and let me tell ye I had my ways of bringin’ a lot bigger men than him down to my way of seein’ things long a’fore he ever showed up. He was jest all wrong about damn near ever thing he ever said and I was boun’ determined to make him do a sight more believin’ in what he believed and do a lot less believin’ in what he seed.

Now, then, see here, weeks went by after that an’ I ran into his daddy sittin’ right there where yer sittin’ now and his daddy says to me, he says, “Bub, ye should see what the boy’s been up to. He’s been out there in that field day and night searchin’ for orchid bulbs. He says he’s gonna prove ye wrong one way t’other. I think,” he says to me, he says, “I think ye done skeert him pretty good!”

And his daddy laughed, oh, he laughed and then he bought me a beer. Ha! Ain’t that sumpin’? Dumb old man like me skeerin’ a young feller like that.

Mmm-hmm.

Ehh, what? Huh? Oh! Did those orchids come back in his field like I said they was the next year?

Well, I be goddamned if they didn’t, laddy, I’ll be goddamned if they didn’t!

Cheers,