Jack Tales

  Jack and his family were dirt farmers, out a-ways in Nevada, where there weren’t no big cities, just little towns that nobody never heard of no-ways. Literally, they farmed dirt. Oh, they’d tried to grow things in the dirt, but nothing ever did. Jack’s Momma kept chickens and some goats, so at least they had milk and eggs, though Jack got mighty tired of always eating eggs for every meal. For a while, she had a passel of sheep and a sheepdog or two, but eventually the dogs must’ve got tired of all them eggs, ate the sheep and headed off to find greener pastures. Jack sometimes saw them dogs a mile or so down the road, so evidently they didn’t have to look too hard for them greener fields.

Jack’s brothers, Will and Tom, dropped out of school early – around 8:30 their first morning. But not Jack. He trudged his way down the road, past them sheep eating dogs and in to the little school. He didn’t have no real apples to leave his teacher, but he had plenty of dirt, so he made her apple-shaped mud balls and faithfully gave her one every day. She never said what she did with them mud ball apples, but Jack figured she must want more, because they disappeared every day.

Jack wasn’t sure just why he kept going to school, except that the school yard was blacktop, and it was a break from all the dirt at home. Some of the other kids played tetherball or dodgeball or four-squares at recess, but not Jack. He spent recesses trying to figure out how the blacktop grew with all them straight lines and circles. He went to school for twelve years or so and never learned the secret of growing white lines and circles on blacktop.

One day, Jack’s teacher made mention of going away to college. Now, Jack didn’t think that he needed no more schooling, but he sure didn’t want to stay home and farm dirt! So, he applied to the University up at Reno, just to get an extra day off from dirt farming. He never bothered to check the mail – ain’t nothing never arrived except junk ads, anyway – so if the mailman hadn’t brought up a whole mess of mail – at least a couple months’ worth – Jack wouldn’t never have knowed he’d been accepted. ‘Course Tom and Will teased Jack something terrible and Momma didn’t think it was a good idea, but Jack was determined that he was going. He didn’t know what all he was going to study, but he figured he might just ask some college educated teacher how to grow white lines and circles on blacktop.

Jack didn’t have much to pack, just a pair of pants, a shirt or two, underwear and mismatched socks because his socks were always getting divorced and one would run off with a blonde. Jack knew that was what happened because his socks were mates and his parents had been mates afore Pa upped and runned off with a blonde. Momma said that Pa’s ‘ho had done drug him off to live on a beach in Caly-for-nigh-a. Jack didn’t understand how Pa’s hoe had drug him anywhere since the thing was laid upside the barn, rusting.

But anyway, Jack took a bus to Reno and he got in at night. He took one look at all the buildings, lit up like Christmas trees on the Fourth of July and decided to move into the one with all the fireworks on the side in flashing neon. He unpacked his clothes and the next morning, walked up to the University, strolling past them slot machines with their fancy doh-dahs and ringing bells. He went into the bookstore and picked himself up a catalog to look for classes on growing blacktop. He didn’t see no such classes, but he figured that maybe they just wasn’t listed, so he went to find some help.

Jack walked into the Administration building and saw himself a gaggle of people going in and out of a box with sliding doors. It looked like there were a bunch of numbers above the doors, flashing up and down before them doors would open again. Ain’t none of them people never came back, so Jack figured it must be eating them or something and took the stairs. Jack was sorely disappointed to learn that he’d have to take some bunch of pre-wreck-exquisite classes afore he’d be able to study something in a major. He didn’t want to join no army or nothing, just learn how to grow lines and circles on blacktop, so he thought he’d just maybe skip them major classes and stick to the regular ones. The girl at the counter played on some sort of foreign contraption for a few minutes afore she handed Jack a scrap of paper with some classes and told him to hurry on and get started.

Jack went back to his firework home and wrote a letter to Momma and Tom and Will telling them all about his new place to live and his school. He didn’t ‘spect that they’d read it or nothing, but it was something to do until the next day, leastwise.

Now Jack had been going to his classes for a couple of weeks but he didn’t get to know nobody so he didn’t have no one to ask about growing lines and circles on blacktop. But he wasn’t discouraged or nothing. He was just glad that he wasn’t doing no dirt farming! He went home one day after school and found his door had done been left opened – and he didn’t remember doing nothing of the sort – so he was kinda cautious when he went inside. He didn’t need to be, though, ‘cause it was just Tom and Will sitting on his bed, drinking his so-de pops from his little Frigidaire. Jack just sighed ‘cause them two done drank his last so-de pop.

“Hey, Jack,” Tom said, gulping down the last of the so-de in his can. “Aintcha ready to come back home yet?”

“Nope,” Jack said, “I ain’t learned the secret of growing lines and circles on blacktop yet.”

Tom and Will whooped and hollered with laughter. “Ain’t never gonna learn no such thing,” Will said. “If that’s what you wanted to get educated for, you coulda just asked us and we’d’a told you.”

Jack rolled his eyes ‘cause he knew his brothers didn’t know nothing about growing lines and circles on blacktop. They hadn’t even made it through the first day of school! But he figured he ought to be polite and at least show his brothers around, so they all went to one of them fancy casinos and walked around, looking at the machines and stuff. Still, all in all, he was happy when them two went back home, even if they did take the so-de pop he’d bought to replace what they’d done drunk.

Now, by the time the next semester rolled around, Jack done learned enough to know that if you wanted to study about growing things, you had to take a biology class. Jack didn’t want to buy no ologies – whatever they were – but he sure did want to know the secret of growing lines and circles on blacktop, so he figured he might as well take the class. He could surely find some way out of buying an ology later on! He was sore disappointed when that class didn’t teach nothing about growing blacktop, but grateful he didn’t have to buy no ologies, at least. So he decided that maybe he ought to take a chemistry class next time around and see if it weren’t some secret chemical – like a special fertilizer – that was the secret. He didn’t learn nothing about growing lines and circles on blacktop in that class, neither, although he did learn ‘bout something called dyno-might from his lab partner, and figured that might be something useful to know in case he ever ran into one of them dyno-sours he’d done learned about back home. He’d sure like to be mighty if he ever ran into something that big and mean!

So, poor Jack, just taking and taking classes but never learning nothing about the secret of growing white lines and circles on blacktop. He’d been up at that University for who knows how long when one day he was wandering in the English building – and Jack didn’t know why it was called an English building when it looked just as American as the others on campus – when he chanced to hear this one professor talking about a storytelling contest to a pretty little gal. Jack hadn’t ever seen that teacher before, and he thought that maybe after all them years he had ought to have seen them all, but there this man was, just talking about this contest. Now Jack knew that he could tell stories but he didn’t figure that there was anything all that exciting about a contest for it until he heard them people talking about secrets. And Jack just knew that this here professor in the English building was like to know the secret about growing white lines and circles on blacktop! So when the gal left saying, “’Bye Dr. Fennimore!” Jack went right up and said:

“Well, Dr. Fennimore, I guess I ought to enter your here contest if you’re giving away secrets.”

Now this poor Dr. Fennimore didn’t know Jack from, well…Jack, but he invited Jack down to his office to talk about the contest. It took them a while, but they finally agreed that if Jack could tell a good enough story, Dr. Fennimore would tell Jack the secret. The contest was going to be the next morning, so Jack went home to think up his best story to tell. On his walk home, he stopped in the fanciest casino and sat down at some durnfangled machine, searched his pockets for a couple quarters and popped them in the slot. He pulled the handle and danged if the thing didn’t start spitting out quarters! Jack was scooping the quarters into a bucket when he saw one that didn’t look just quite right. Instead of putting it in the bucket with the others, he slipped it in his pocket. Once he cashed all his quarters in, he headed back home.

Only, as he was taking a side street past a littler casino, this weird old man stopped him and asked for money. Jack, being a fairly generous person, handed the old man some of his just-won money with a smile. The old man smiled back, showing lots of pinkish-white gums and not many teeth then gave Jack a folded paper flower. Now, Jack didn’t know what to do with a flower – folded paper or not – so he tucked it in the back pocket of his pants and went on his way. In his room, he drank a couple of grape so-de pops and went to bed. When he woke up in the morning, the first thing he thought about was the story he was going to tell to that Dr. Fennimore so he could learn the secret.

Jack headed out to school, humming a little to himself. It was kind of cold outside, so he put his hands in his pockets and wished he had a coat. No sooner had he thought about it, then he saw a bright red ski coat come tumbling past him. Jack was quick and caught it, and he looked around, trying to see if someone was looking for it. He didn’t see no one, so he put the coat on himself and kept on walking. He put his hands back in his pockets and then he got to thinking about how the jacket had come by, just as he thought about it. He pulled out a handful of coins from his pocket and saw that weird coin he’d done won the night before. He looked real close at it and saw that it weren’t really no coin for spending, but had the word “GIVER” on it. Now, Jack got to thinking maybe this were a magic coin and that gave him an idea.

In the English building, Jack went into the classroom with all the students to tell stories. Dr. Fennimore smiled at him as Jack took a seat. When it was Jack’s turn, he got up in front of the class and put his hands in his back pockets. He felt the flower, and got an idea. He took the flower out of his back pocket and said, “This here looks like a flower, but it ain’t. It’s a fairy, and she got trapped on a count of how she was always playing with human things when fairies ain’t supposed to. Now, this here fairy…” and Jack held up the flower, “was named Aster, since everyone knows how fairies is named after flowers. And Aster, well, she found a book one night when she done skipped the fairy dance and she got caught by the others reading it. Them fairies was so mad that they grabbed the book and smashed her up in the pages. Fairies is really small, and it took all of them the get Aster in between them pages, but they did it.

“So they left poor Aster in that book until some old man done come by and found it. And this old man, he cain’t read or nothing, but when he opened it, he saw that poor Aster was squished inside it and he took her out, but she was flat as a page of the book. But the old man, he didn’t want to lose her or nothing so he folded her into a flower – ‘cause he knew how to do that fancy paper folding stuff – and put her like one of them bridegroom flowers on his jacket. And then one night, the man done run out of money, so he had to sell the flower he done made out of Aster and well, I bought her. Now, I don’t know much about fairies so to speak, but I know one when I sees it, so right away, I knew what I had to do. ‘Cause I knew something that that old man didn’t know about how to make fairies all fat and normal again. Alls you got to do is blow on the stem.”

Jack put one hand in the pocket with the coin and with the other, put the flower up to his mouth. He blew on the stem end and wished and sure enough if that flower didn’t turn into a little fairy with wings and all and she started floating around the classroom singing something joyous. Everyone in the class sat there just stunned or something for a bunch a minutes until they started clapping and cheering. Even that Dr. Fennimore was smiling and clapping.

So Jack sat back down while Dr. Fennimore finished up his class. When everyone was gone, Jack thought sure he was going to get the secret of growing white lines and circles on blacktop, ‘cause sure he had to have told the best story! That Dr. Fennimore came up and sat down next to Jack and said, “Well, Jack, that was the best story I ever heard. How did you make a fairy, though?”

Jack just shrugged. “Like I said, I know about fairies is all. Are you going to tell me the secret now? Did I win?”

Now, it never occurred to Jack that maybe Dr. Fennimore’s “secret” weren’t the same as the one he was looking for. So he were surprised when Dr. Fennimore asked what secret it was that he wanted to learn.

“How to grow them white lines and circles on blacktop, o’course,” Jack said.

Dr. Fennimore looked thoughtful for a moment and then he said for Jack to wait right there in his desk and while he went and got something. Jack sat patiently for a bunch a minutes until the teacher returned with a bucket, a ruler and a paint can. When the teacher sat back down next to Jack, he gave him a long look.

“Now, Jack, most people just paint circles and lines on blacktop, but if you want to grow them, you have to have these things and a magic wishing coin. Then, what you do is soak these blacktop seeds in the paint, use the ruler to make absolutely straight lines to plant the seeds in, use the wishing coin to make a little rain and then wait to see what grows.”

“Is you pulling my leg?” Jack asked, suspicious about how Dr. Fennimore knew he had a wishing coin.

“No, that’s the way it’s done, honestly,” Dr. Fennimore said, looking all sincere and everything.

“How’d you know I got a wishing coin?” Jack asked.

“Just a guess, is all. When you go home, don’t plant the seeds everywhere, but leave places to grow other things you want. Use that coin and you’ll have the best farm around.” Dr. Fennimore was surely the smartest person at the University is what Jack thought.

So Jack took his bucket of blacktop seeds, the can of paint and the ruler along with his wishing coin and went home. He planted all them seeds just like he’d been told, wished for a little rain, and sure enough, blacktop started to grow, covering all that dirt. At first, Jack thought he’d done been tricked ‘cause there weren’t no lines or circles, but as the blacktop grew, he started to see lines and circles and all and he thought he was just the happiest boy around. When the blacktop was done fully grown with all its pretty lines and circles, Jack took his wishing coin and started wishing for fruit trees and grassy fields and all sort of normal things on a farm. Will and Tom, they was so mad that Jack done learned how to do all these nice things that they stomped off back to kindergarten so they could go to University, too. Jack didn’t bother to tell them that it wasn’t just books that had taught him, but an English teacher who knew about wishing coins.

After awhile, Jack’s Momma got some more sheep and a couple of cows and pigs, too and them traitorous sheep-eating dogs came back, but they never ate the sheep again, ‘cause there was plenty of other things to eat. And so that’s the story of how Jack went to the University of Nevada up at Reno to learn how to grow white lines and circles on blacktop but wound up learning a lot more and making himself the best farm out in the middle of nowhere in the Nevada desert. People used to drive by that farm with all its green and growing things and think that Jack must surely be the best farmer in the world. Finally, even the President of these United States came to see Jack’s farm and said that he was so impressed with Jack’s farming skills, that he wanted to make him Secretary of Agriculture back in Washington D.C. Now, Jack went for a bit to that big city, but he missed his blacktop, so he didn’t stay long.

When he was getting ready to go back, some pretty little gal showed up at his door and said that she’d just loved Jack forever and had to marry him. Jack thought she looked a little familiar, but it weren’t until she took off her coat and allowed him to see her back – where she had little stumps of wings – that Jack knew her for Aster, the fairy he’d made from a paper flower. She told Jack that she’d found her own wishing coin and wished to be big so they could get married and all, and so here she was. And Jack married that fairy Aster and they had a passel of kids, and you know, one of them was even little with wings, just like her fairy Momma and she had a whole bunch of interesting adventures, but I can’t tell that story today.