The Big Itchy Yarn

“Howdy y’all! Boy, ah shore am itchin’ to tell you this doozy of a yarn! Git along, just sit right here on ol’ Pappy Walters’ big itchy lap! Go on, git! I ain’t gonna begin mah big itchy yarn ‘til you plop yore ol’ itchy butt onto the ol’ Papster’s patented lapster, an’ boy, ah shore tell you, this is one helluva yarn! You could practically knit a sweater from it!”

Pappy Walters chuckles til tears turn the dust in the folds of skin surrounding his eyes into mud. He slaps his knees vigorously. He wheezes alarmingly. It sounds like he will die if he does not stop laughing. This display frightens away the youngster, who is technically Pappy’s uncle. Abruptly, his laughter ceases.

“Never mind Pappy’s sense o’ humour! It’s almost as bad as Pappy’s dwindlin’ sense o’ smell! Haw! Where you goin’?”

He grabs the unwashed youngster by the arm. It is prosthetic (it ends with a hook) and he yanks it straight out of the socket. Pappy Walters is exasperated.

“If ah don’t tell mah story, ah will shorely ferget it! Ah beg of you! Ahm mighty itchy!”

He uses the hook hand to snag the collar of his youthful uncle’s filthy shirt. He reels in his catch, setting the wriggly kid on his lap. Everything is in place. He scratches his scalp with the hook hand, dislodging a chunk of dandruff which lands on his uncle’s long lashes. He remembers how the story begins:
“Now, this story happened not mighty long ago, in a place a stone’s throw away from that place that’s a stone’s throw away from this very spot. It all began with the greatest, intelligentest, most handsomest Pappy. He piped out that darn tootin’ voice o’ his ‘Howdy y’all!’”