What d'ya do?

What do you do with an old oil drum?  Well, the best thing to do is make a Spanish galleon or maybe a British clipper ship.  If you grow up in Sugar City...that's exactly what can happen.  I don't know where the oil drum came from.  I do know that some clever adult took that drum and worked magic on it.  It was splendiferously split in half.  Not into stubby little pots, but in two long, bouyant, slivers of steel.

Some people think that the barrel halves would make perfect water troughs...but the boys knew better.  The 'boys' saw adventure waiting to happen.  Not far from its temporary location in the cow pasture was a mighty tributary.  Dad and Mom warned about the dangers of that ditch, but what do parents know.  The elements were merging into the prospect of a supreme adventure.  A sailing vessel, a rivulet of ill-repute.  So, what d'ya do?  You have to do it.

Dragging the ship across the pasture, amidst the apathetic glances of the calves, was real toil and trouble...it was heavy.  But, it would be worth it.  Supreme adventures are always worth the trials that one has to pass through.  So we dragged that mighty bark closer and closer to its watery destination.  Our mission was periodically interrupted with reconnaissance to make sure that the Mother was not going to catch us having fun.  So far, so good.   We are almost there, time to make ready to set sail (so to speak).

Everything's on the ready.  Maybe one last check on the Mother. It will be a launch remembered by mankind and the calves who were still nonchalant but observing.  Without thought of failure or doom the ship was urged into the mighty waters.  It floats!  Now, for the explorers anxious to board the vessel.  One by one, the 'boys' cautiously stepped aboard.  So far...the voyage was a success...now all we need to do is to leave our moorings and set off on the journey of our lives.

Slowly, surely, we pushed off.  Silently drifting on our watery way...we found our vessel was a bit tipsy and a little bit more turvy.  Our wonderful ship, we discovered, had a few design flaws, not the least, that it wanted to spill it's contents into Davey Jones' locker.  Our salvation was the nearness of river's banks and the abundance of grassy blades and weedy clumps that allowed us to steady ourselves and continue our joyous adventure.

It was pure delight, skittering across the waves, seeing the land-lubbin' calves, passing by the scenes of our daily existence...we were sailors, we were on an adventure...nothing better in the world.  Our voyage took us sailing past the red and yellow roses on the "far-side" fence...we were never so close to such foreign and exotic things.  Our journey has taken us to new and wonderful places...and all so close to the home and family that we love and cherish.