WhatFinger


Jimmy Reed

[em]Jimmy Reed is an Oxford, Mississippi resident, Ole Miss and Delta State University alumnus, Vietnam Era Army Veteran, former Mississippi Delta cotton farmer and ginner, author, and retired college teacher. This story is a selection from Jimmy Reed’s latest book, entitled [strong]The Jaybird Tales[/strong]. Copies, including personalized autographs, can be reserved by notifying the author via email (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)).[/em]

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Eerie Ed Eddards

Eerie Ed EddardsOf all the men with whom I worked during two decades as manager of my father’s Mississippi Delta farm, Ed Eddards was the strangest. Eerie describes him better. One day when my lifelong friend and mentor Jaybird and I were repairing a tractor’s flat tire, he appeared suddenly. “I need a job,” he said abruptly, causing us to whirl around. Growling, Guv’nuh, my Doberman Pinscher, scooted close against my leg, and Jaybird whispered, “Something ain’t right about that man.”
- Wednesday, January 5, 2022

Easter Hands

Easter HandsOne fine spring day, on my father’s Mississippi Delta farm, Jaybird, my boyhood best friend and mentor, told a story to a group of us children, a story he called “Easter Hands.” As the old black man slipped into the hypnosis of his bullfrog bass voice, we little ones clustered at his feet, leaning toward him like eager flowers toward the rising sun. He told us the story of Easter. We had heard Jesus Christ called different names — Savior, Messiah, the Nazarene, Son of Man — and our young minds were confused. Jaybird explained in a way we understood.
- Tuesday, January 4, 2022

Don’t Dare Do Deputy Duty

My lifelong best friend and mentor Jaybird warned me not to be deputized, but our little Mississippi Delta farming community was too remote for the law’s long arm to reach quickly, so I accepted the badge offered by the sheriff. “We’ll soon learn how tough a deputy you are,” the old black man said, as we left church. “Tump Thompson is trying to court Pete Plugg’s daughter, Lottie Lou. Don’t dare do deputy duty.”
- Friday, December 24, 2021

Don’t Bet On Beatrice

Don’t Bet On Beatrice Glaring at the Volkswagen Beetle in front of the commissary store on Dad’s Mississippi Delta cotton farm, my boyhood best friend and mentor Jaybird said, “That ain’t nothing but a coffin with wheels on it.”
- Thursday, December 23, 2021

The Craziest Pilot Who Ever Flew

The Craziest Pilot Who Ever Flew When the caller asked if I would fly to the Gulf Coast and get his dead brother, I didn’t know what to say. “He died while vacationing, but the local ambulance company charges too much for the trip,” he said. “If you’ll do it, I’ll rent the airplane and pay you $100.”
- Wednesday, December 22, 2021

A Crawfish Cook Calamity

A Crawfish Cook CalamityThat warm, spring Mississippi Delta Saturday was ideal for doing anything outdoors, but the calamitous way it turned out was far from ideal. Nobody outperformed my lifelong best friend and mentor Jaybird in preparing delicious, deep-South cuisine, especially crawfish. When my friends and I asked the old black man to boil several hundred pounds of them, he said, “Boys, that will be a great way to spend this glorious day. Y’all load up my big cooking pot; let’s enjoy some country-style cutting up.”
- Monday, December 20, 2021

A Cotton Gin Christmas

A Cotton Gin ChristmasWhen I complained to my father that the cotton gin’s crew and I shouldn’t have to work through the Christmas holidays, he said, “Son, we finished ginning last year’s cotton crop early, and you duck hunted all winter. Be thankful for that. Fall weather has been mighty unfavorable to the Mississippi Delta this year. Because of steady rains, we are way behind schedule. The gin must run nonstop until we’re caught up; this current dry spell will not last long.”
- Sunday, December 19, 2021

Cookin’ And Eatin’ Crawfish

Cookin’ And Eatin’ CrawfishWhen my three daughters invited me to a crawfish cook, I was thrilled — nothing boosts my ego more than being with my pulchritudinous progeny. After enjoying the succulent crustaceans, we parted ways. I strolled homeward, reflecting on how blessed I was to be loved by those girls. I also thought about the first time I ate crawfish.
- Saturday, December 18, 2021

Clara The Clunker

Clara The ClunkerAfter saving for several years, I bought my first hunting vehicle: an old Ford Bronco. Even though my lifelong best friend and mentor Jaybird shook his head when I showed her to him, I was totally in love with the four-wheel-drive beauty I called Clara, named after my significant other at the time. “Shoot, that rattletrap would get stuck in a mud puddle,” Jaybird mumbled. “Clara ain’t nothing but a clunker.”
- Friday, December 17, 2021

Chitlins

ChitlinsIf rereading novels in old age that were read in boyhood indicates regression into second childhood, I’m headed that way. Before my tenth birthday, I read everything Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote, especially the Tarzan novels. I even memorized the special language for communicating with jungle beasts taught to Tarzan by the gorillas that raised him, and preferred it to English, which drove my mother batty.
- Monday, December 6, 2021

Chippie Cashed In His Chips

Chippie Cashed In His ChipsMy brother and I were unalike as brothers could be. He steered clear of what I didn’t: trouble. Occasionally, though, his saintly behavior betrayed him, as it did when my boyhood best friend and mentor Jaybird captured a chipmunk. The old black man loved wild creatures, and if he trapped one that he thought could be domesticated, he brought it home. After transferring the creature from the trap to a large birdcage, he asked us to name him. I suggested Monk, but Jaybird preferred the good boy’s choice: Chippie.
- Sunday, December 5, 2021

Chinquapins Crave Crunchy Crickets

My friend Mark, owner of Fratesi’s Grocery, a famous Mississippi Delta country store, is a superb perpetrator of practical jokes, a skill shared by my boyhood best friend and mentor Jaybird. Mark sells a variety of baits, including crickets for bream fishermen. Before spending a day on the lake fishing for Chinquapins, the biggest, scrappiest, best-eating bream of all, Jaybird and I always bought crickets at the store. Grady, a grouchy, mean-spirited, surly character, also bought bait there, and never failed to insult Mark, especially when he ordered homemade sandwiches, the Delta’s tastiest. Sneering, the old reprobate always asked, “You make these sandwiches three days ago, or four?” Although Mark prepared them daily, he ignored Grady’s insults, knowing that someday he would even the score with the cantankerous curmudgeonly coot. The opportunity came one morning when Grady sauntered up while Jaybird and Mark were dressing a mess of Chinquapins. Gawking at the huge catch, he snorted, “I’ll swunnee! Where’d y’all catch all them monsters? Whud they hit?”
- Saturday, December 4, 2021

A Cherry Cracker Catastrophe

A Cherry Cracker CatastropheMy boyhood best friend and mentor Jaybird agreed with Miss Lena about the motor scooter. “Yo’ mama is right,” he said. “Paying two hundred dollars for a scooter is foolish.” Then, after thinking a bit, he said, “However, if you justify needing it instead of just wanting it, she might feel differently, and I will, too. Find a job, repay the money she loans you, and prove that you know the value of a hard-earned dollar.” In time I found a job riding the scooter while earning money to pay for it: an after-school newspaper route. Everything went great on the first run until I tossed a paper in a driveway that awakened a ferocious Rottweiler named Attila from his afternoon nap. By the time the scooter gained enough speed to escape, the enraged dog was within a jaw snap of clamping down on my leg.
- Sunday, November 28, 2021

A Cat-Scratched Hero

A Cat-Scratched Hero, saving a kittenFrom a bridge near Dad’s Mississippi Delta farm, my three daughters used BB guns to improve their marksmanship. Standing on the bridge’s downstream side, they stood, locked and loaded, waiting to shoot balloons attached to small weights that I tossed from the bridge’s upstream side. As the targets floated beneath them, the balloon killers fired away, making chalk marks on the railing for each hit. Sodas and snacks at a nearby country store were their reward for bursting nine out of ten.
- Sunday, November 28, 2021

Can And Will

JayBird, Cotton, Mississippi Delta At her country store in rural Arkansas, Maya Angelou’s grandmother tolerated a few chronic complainers, but even in the toughest times, her attitude remained positive, a mindset she instilled in her granddaughter. Once, when a chronic bellyacher entered the store, she told Maya to listen. Sure enough, he whined about everything — work, money, weather, and so on. After he left, Maya’s grandmother spoke words of wisdom that became a guiding principle of Maya’s life.
- Wednesday, November 24, 2021

Calvin Saw Catamounts A-Comin’

Calvin Saw Catamounts A-Comin’After heavy rains gave Dad’s cotton crop a much-needed soaking and halted fieldwork on his Mississippi Delta farm, my boyhood best friend and mentor Jaybird offered to take my cousin Calvin and me fishing. The night before, we pitched a tent in Jaybird’s yard, knowing the old black man, a master storyteller, would entertain us with terrifying, hair-raising tales as we sat around the campfire.
- Monday, November 15, 2021

Boldness Has Genius, Power, And Magic In It

Boldness Has Genius, Power, And Magic In ItOnce during my college teaching career, the dean told me to complete a course that lost its instructor. When I complained that the semester was almost over, that I had no idea what had been covered, and furthermore that I had never taught that course before, the former Marine drill sergeant pointed to the door and dismissed me with the same words he no doubt growled to countless terrified recruits: “Like it or not, you will do whatever must be done.”
- Sunday, November 14, 2021

The Blessing Of Balance

The Blessing Of BalanceUntil Jaybird joined his Heavenly Father just shy of his ninetieth birthday, my boyhood best friend and mentor enjoyed good health, although the beloved old black man’s lifestyle was not entirely healthful: After a long day’s work, he would often relax by smoking a cigarette or two, along with a few cold beers, but never beyond moderation, for as he pointed out, “Overdoing pleasures makes a man slave to pleasures.”
- Saturday, November 13, 2021

Big O-O-Oh!

Big O-O-Oh!While handing over the money, Jaybird muttered, “Boy, you’re a sucker for advertising. This money — a loan, mind you — will be wasted on yet another lure as fish-frightening as the Pearly-Eyed Wobbler you foolishly had to have and that I foolishly loaned you money to buy — just another piece of junk designed to catch fishermen, not fish.” Ignoring the wise old black man, my boyhood mentor and best friend, I hurried to Clyde’s bait shop, hoping he hadn’t sold all of bass-fishing’s hottest lure: the Big-O. Angler fanatics like myself had never seen anything like it. Made of balsa wood, the body’s top half was green, separated from its ivory belly by a black line. The most innovative feature was a transparent, spoon-shaped, protruding lip, positioned so that a few reel cranks sent it diving to the deep, murky depths where the biggest bass lurk.
- Thursday, November 4, 2021

Big Black Battling Bull Bream — Bite!

Big Black Battling Bull Bream — Bite!One warm, sunny April morning, while my boyhood best friend and mentor Jaybird and I lounged on his front porch, enjoying cornbread chunks in cold buttermilk, and gazing across my father’s Mississippi Delta farm, he said, “No work is going on, planting time is a few weeks off, and we’ve got nothing to do. Let’s try those big black bull battling bream in Blue Bottom Bayou.” When I opined that bream, so delicious when fried and eaten with hush puppies, probably weren’t bedding yet, he said, “Maybe, maybe not. Some years bream bed early, fixing to spawn, and that’s when they battle at their best.”
- Wednesday, November 3, 2021

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