Pop Bottle? I thought it was a Turtle!

Throughout much of the 1970's, my family and I lived in Broughtontown, Lincoln County, Kentucky. We had a good neighbor who lived just up the road named Simon Greer. Mr. Greer was an old man at the time, and was a pillar of the little community. He had a pretty home, yard, and garden, along with a few acres of farm land. He was married, but I don't remember ever meeting his wife. He drove a pretty nice blue step side Chevrolet pickup truck. I never saw him in anything but bib overalls, and he always chewed tobacco.

Mr. Greer had one very unique trait, and that was he oftentimes left out some of the syllables, or even some of the words in his sentences. With his advanced age, compounded by a large chaw of tobacco in his mouth, he was often very hard to understand when he talked to you. By this time of his life, he, like most older people, couldn't see or hear too well either.

On up the road from Mr. Greer lived Elza Bishop and his son Glen, along with the rest of their family. The Bishop family were delightful people as well, and all in the community thought very highly of them. Glen, as we used to say, was never the "sharpest knife in the drawer", but always worked hard right alongside his daddy.

Elza and Glen had rented Mr. Greer's tobacco crop this particular year. For some reason or another, they had poor success with their tobacco plants that spring. My sister and brother-in-law, who also farmed at the time, had excess plants they offered to give them. All they had to do was go get them.

Early one morning towards the end of May, we arranged to go get the tobacco plants. We would need to drive to Lancaster, pull the plants, load them into the truck, and bring them back to Broughtontown to re-set in the field.

Those of us who would make this journey would be Elza and his son Glen, Donnie "Dino" Smith, Mr. Greer, and me. Mr. Greer volunteered to drive us to get the plants. Donnie was my second cousin and a younger brother of Dennis Smith, who I've mentioned on other occasions in memories of my childhood.

We loaded into the pickup truck. Mr. Greer was driving, Dino sat beside him, then there was me. On my other side, seated in the passenger seat, sat Glen. He rode with his right arm out the window, while smoking a big cigar. Elza was in the back of the truck. We rolled down the highway, four across in the pickup truck seat, with Mr. Bishop holding onto his hat while riding in the back.

We were somewhat of a motley crew, but we were on a mission.

Some may not understand, but back in the days of my childhood, NO ONE ever thought of wearing a seatbelt. Safety was never considered in any thing we did. We just did it. Traveling along with the windows rolled down, and the air rushing into the cab, made it very difficult to hear our conversation. Mr. Greer would repeatedly ask what someone said, Dino or I would repeat it, and then Glen would echo it again from across the windy truck. Often Mr. Greer would make a comment and we would try to decipher it. He wasn't easy to understand when it was quiet, and nearly impossible now.

Mr. Greer's driving wasn't good. His limited vision and lack of hearing was a detriment. He also just about wrecked every time he turned to spit tobacco juice out his driver's side window, which was very often. Dino and I were tickled, and tried to suppress our laughter as we contemplated our predicament. It's amazes me how sometime it's just so funny when you just know you're about to be killed in a tragic vehicle accident. We couldn't help but wonder why Mr. Greer had been chosen to drive.

We finally made it safely to Lancaster, where we set about to pull what seemed like a million tobacco plants. We pulled enough plants to set nearly everyone in Broughtontown's tobacco. Dino and I were worn out and ready to head back home.

After we visited with my sister and her husband for just a little bit, we loaded up and headed back to Broughtontown. Our seating arrangement was the same as before, only this time Mr. Bishop had to sit in the back of the truck on the now stacked up tobacco plants. We were loaded down, with Mr. Bishop nearly invisible in the back of the truck, nestled in among sack after sack of plants.

We were rolling along, piled into the pickup, and again trying to have some semblance of a conversation. It was difficult, indeed. Looking ahead, Dino said, "Look out Mr. Greer, there's a pop bottle laying in the road!" Mr. Greer asked, "What?" Dino repeated much louder, "I told you there's a pop bottle in the road!" Then Glen, smoking the big cigar with his arm still out the window, echoed, "Yes, Mr. Greer, there's a pop bottle up ahead in the road." About that time, Mr. Bishop, sitting in the back of the pickup, buried in the tobacco plants, pecked on the back window and yelled, "Mr. Greer, there's a pop bottle in the road up ahead!"

Mr. Greer drove that little blue pickup truck directly over the pop bottle, hitting and crushing it completely with both his front and back driver side tires. After hearing the bottle explode underneath our loaded down truck, Mr. Greer exclaimed, "What was that?" Dino said, "You #$^*& fool, that's the pop bottle we all told you about!" Mr. Greer replied, in his unique and special way, "Pop bottle! Swear to God I thought it was turtle!"