Gingo
Scott Mclean
My favorite outdoor humor writer was Pat McManus. People find his stories far fetched and outrageous but anyone who grew up in the country back when would find that they did things just as goofy and sometimes dangerous. In Pat’s books there is a Backwoods character named Rancid Crabtree who taught the boys things they should not know.
Steve and I had our own personal Rancid in the form of our Uncle Gale who I called Gingo when I was younger for unknown reasons. He lived roughly 50 yards from us so was a handy font of improper knowledge. We only had a shower in the house so on Sundays we were allowed to go to Gale’s for a bath. He would sometimes teach us songs or jokes we didn’t understand at the time. If we repeated these at home we would be swatted and Mom would head out the door hollering “Gale!” Hopefully for his sake he had a head start.
Mom was a force to be reckoned with. A Jehovah’s witness came to our door one day and informed my Mom that my Dad was going to hell because he fought in world War 2. Mom chased her back to her car with a broom saying she was going to send her to hell.
Anyway back to Gale. A lot of the houses at the time had wood burning heat. My brother and I were helping Gale cut wood with a tractor powered buzz saw. Gale always had a can of Copenhagen or snoose as he called it. He would offer it to us, usually accompanied by an off color remark. Steve was about 4 at the time. That night Steve held out an empty Copenhagen can to Mom and said “Want some, just like eating p____.” I’ll let you fill in the blanks. The result was Steve’s head almost bouncing off the walls and Mom heading for Gale’s house with a full head of steam and murder in her eye. I made myself scarce because Steve’s hijinks sometimes got my butt swatted as well. Any country boy who did not have an uncle who was a bad influence was missing something. Gale will be in more of my stories to be sure.
Bye for now.