Feller Ships

Back, years ago, when me and Nilda first took up this here mobile, mobile home lifestye, we turned Ol’ 5th Wheel to the west so we could experience some of the country we had never scene, and with Ol' 5th Wheel a breakin’ down so often, weren’t none of that seenery exactly flyin' by. Later we finally got way out west where things looked mighty different, and if you ain’t never been to Bever Dam, Rockport, Central City and Powder City, you sure got an eyeful of natural beauty in store fer you someday.

Then we just kept on a travelin’ for months and almost afore we knowed it, we was to the place where Kentucky, Illinios and Missouri all come together. I knowed folks would be a trying to tease me, askin’ if we saw what all them tourists went to Cairo to see, but no matter where we looked, we never did see any of them syrup factories they is supposed to be so famous fer. I guess I’ll just have to fool them fellers tryin to get a laugh around them campfires, and when they ask me if I saw what Cairo is supposed to have, I'll say I sure did, meanin' the joke will be on them. See, even years afore I started writtin’ this here blog, my brain was a lot smarter than most folks a livin’ this way.

Funny how you can take a detour thru some syrup factories on the way to talkin’ about feller ships, but that’s the way of many out here on the fulltime road. Much further into our trip, I believe it were after that fourth transmission repair in five weeks, we started seein’ the most unusual sights a body could see. It were when we was out in the middle of dessert country, there not being much of anything a growin’ and if it did, it were something that jabbed ya, stabbed ya, or stuck to ya in such a way that a team of mules would have had to of pulled fer an hour to yank it out.

Mixed in amongst all this was somethin' that were puzzlating to us. Which were, how’s come there was all these here ships out in the middle of the dessert belonging to these fellers with names like me and Nilda had never run into afore. You’ll have to excuse me fer not askin’ Nilda about them, especially since she had the map and them books we was a follerin'. The ones that kept tellin’ us to stop at Mysterious Trees and Mysterious Hills, and Mysterious Houses, all of which had the same lookin’ feller out front a tryin’ his best to get you to pay to see his Mysterious whatever. Havin’ scene that Mystery Theater 3000 a time or too on the TV, I weren’t havin’ none of it.

Sorry I got away from them fellers with ships, but we’ve had so many things happen to us since we joined in the fulltime mobile, mobile life, I.M. gets mixed up every once in a short while. So there we was, right in the middle of the dessert and I starts seeing these signs them fellers was puttin’ out about there ships. Nilda and me weren't pure pigeons about this boater thing, what with my studyin’ up to help that city feller in the Keys, I knowed folks usually put the name of they’re boat on the starboard end and not out in front of it.

I tried to keep track of them and there was: Oak Tree Fellowship, Riverview Fellowship, Grace Fellowship, Community Fellowship, which might have been one of them party boats, Faith Fellowship, Victory Fellowship, maybe it was a racin’ boat, Champion’s Fellowship, which might be the feller that won all them races, St. Mark’s Fellowship, St Luke’s Fellowship, which was more confusioning cause I thought them boats were a supposed to be named after women amd not men. And then there was Refiners Fire Fellowship, which must have been the only thing left when the refinery burned down, cause there were no sign of a refinery anywhere.

The only other thing I could think of were that dessert was really an old beach, what with all the sand there and all, and with all the water long gone, all these ships was beached high and dry, and so the fellers that owned these ships had all put these big signs out in front callin’ attention to them so that anyone drivin' by, that wanted a boat would know where to look. That’s one of the joys of travelin’ down the roads in this life of freedom we live, we get an insight into the lives of some of the really weird folks that live out there. Though I never did figure out why they was only open on Sunday mornin's and Wednesday evenin's. Just it were just one of the mysterys of life.