I’m Next! And Other Snowbird Stories

I’m Next!

Johnny Belyeu
Johnny Belyeu

On this trip to Snowbird, our hideaway in the mountains of North Carolina, there were 20-some people there, family mostly. People were just starting to get up but, already, there was a line waiting to get in the bathroom.

It would have been a long wait for Johnny Belyeu, Brother Pop’s son-in-law, if he had not gone back to his tent and got his pistol.

He pointed his gun at the sky and fired several rounds  and shouted “Bear! Bear!”

When everyone rushed out of the cabin to see what was going on, Johnny walked inside, into the restroom, and closed the door.

Twice Was Enough

Captain Dave
Captain Dave

There’s a bridge over Little Snowbird Creek at the Denton Place, the end of the state-maintained road to Snowbird, that no one has ever had trouble with but Dave.

My brother dropped a tire off the right side a few years back. He had to chew up the ends of the bridge planks a little but he eventually got it back up on the bridge and we went on.

John Sullivan was riding with him.

The very next time we went to the mountain I’ll be darn if he didn’t do it again, dropped a tire off the right side of the same bridge, only this time he had to call a wrecker.

John Sullivan
John Sullivan

John Sullivan was riding with him.

The next time Sullivan rode with Dave he told him to stop when they got to that bridge, and then he got out and walked across.

I guess he figured: 

“Fool me once, that’s your fault.”

“Fool me twice, a, that’s still your fault.”

“Fool me three times, No, wait! Wait! I’m getting out.”

Wasn’t Me

We were up at Snowbird, sitting around the fire chewing the fat, when Pop said, “The Highway Patrol stopped me on the way up here.”

Charles T. "Pop" Stith
Charles T. “Pop” Stith

“Were you speeding?” I asked.  “Did you get a ticket?”

“No, I wasn’t speeding. I didn’t get a ticket.”

“Then why did the trooper stop you?”

“He said somebody had called in a complaint about a red pickup truck with Alabama tags, pulling a four-wheeler, weaving all over the road.”

“What did you say?”

“I said it must have been some other red pickup with Alabama tags, pulling a four-wheeler.”

Coming Monday: Hexed

You Can’t Make Me

When I was a reporter for The News & Observer several of us were standing around one afternoon shooting the bull with our publisher, Frank Daniels Jr., and we got to talking about retirement.

Frank Daniels Jr.
Frank Daniels Jr.

Frank said we would have to retire when we got to be 65 years old.

I said, “Frank, I’m not going to retire when I’m 65 and I don’t think you can make me. I think there’s a law against that.”

And Frank said, “Oh, I’ll make you alright. I’ll put you in a room by yourself and make you write obits.”

I said, “Frank, that would do it.”

Postscript: By the time I turned 65 Frank Jr. had sold The N&O to the McClatchy Co.  I was 66 years and four months old when I retired and went to work full time for an attorney. And, no, I wasn’t writing obits at the end.

Coming Friday: I’m Next! And Other Snowbird Stories