Back to the Junkyard
In his later years, Mr Appleby would drive the pickup down to the campground and sit in it, watching people cooking meals or playing volleyball or just drinking beer. Sometimes folks would come over to chew the fat or - if Mr Appleby saw someone who he figured owed him money - he might have driven over to go calling ... or maybe not - maybe just take a little nap until later with the late May sun shining in the windshield like a greenhouse. But, for our part, we always stayed square with him moneywise, so he was pretty kindly disposed toward us.
BuggyMan especially enjoyed talking to him and could sometimes get the old man to tell tales of the Laurel Highlands back in the nether days, and Mr Appleby would use words like 'magistrate' and 'squire' in those stories.
Here's what the BuggyMan told Mr Appleby:
"When I was in Washington DC, I was at the bar and the fellow next to me turned out to be a biochemist, so I was making conversation and I told him what you said, 'Mr Appleby says, 'See that tree over there? A lot of people think that tree makes wood from dirt, but that's not so. If that were so, there'd be a big hole where that tree is, and you can see that's not true. There's probably more dirt there now than before the tree. That tree makes wood out of water.' ' "
"So the biochemist at the bar said, 'You tell Mr Appleby that he's mostly right. You see what really happens is the tree takes water - we call that H20 - and the tree takes carbon dioxide - we call that C02 - and it takes the O2 from the water and the O2 from the carbon dioxide and releases it and we call that oxygen, and then that tree takes the H from the water and the C from the carbon dioxide and makes hydrocarbons - and Mr Appleby calls that wood.'
"So Mr Appleby, I'm just telling you what he said like I told him I would." That's what the BuggyMan said.
Mr Appleby sat and looked directly in the BuggyMan's face for the clearest, longest space of time - maybe 5 whole seconds - then answered, "You know... that fellow may be on to something."
c 1997 Air Cooled Volkswagen Junkyard of Richfield, Ohio
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