A long time ago…when the earth was green and there were more kinda’ animals than you’ve ever seen…Momma told me a story…part fact, part fiction and maybe, just maybe, part fibbing.
It seems when Momma and her Sister-Who-Taught-Her-Most-the-Things-She-Knows were playing in the forest one day, they met up with an old man, wearing an indescribable plaid shirt, flood pants held in place with ratty old suspenders, a bulging gunny sack slung over his back. He did not look left or right but trudged forward, a stoop in his back from the weight he was hoisting.
Now Momma and her Sister-Who-Taught-Her-Most-the-Things-She-Knows recognized everyone in Seven Counties so they raced home to ask their Mama (who we’ll refer to as Grandmama) whoever could it be. Grandmama explained it was The Hermit who lived way back on the Third Concession, who only came out once a year in the summer to get supplies like sugar, flower, tea and coffee…other than that The Hermit lived off the land, fished from the streams, hunted for meat…like wow…people actually still did that?
Just their luck, their Papa (who we’ll refer to as Grandpapa) walked in as Grandmama was telling Momma and her Sister-Who-Taught-Her-Most-the-Things-She-Knows the Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth….that is when the Secret was revealed…time those girls learned so they could pass it on to their kids and so on and so on… till death do us part.
Grandpapa explained, yes, you saw The Hermit….but…he is also The-Man-Behind-the-Moon. It is his job to take a pitchfork, a mega-long, long pitch fork and put the moon up in the sky every night and take it down every morning…and The-Man-Behind-the-Moon was eternal, not like Dracula drinking helpless victim’s blood, but being kept alive all these years by moon beams (not moonshine, moonbeams). No death and resurrection for The-Man-Behind-the-Moon…He was, He Is and Ever Will Be!
Momma and her Sister-Who-Taught-Her-Most-the-Things-She-Knows looked at each other, then Grandmama, then Grandpapa. By now you know, Country Folk are Believers…they Believe in God Almighty, Sweet Baby Jesus, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, Wee Fairies and Gnomes in their garden… and in no particular order. Yeah, Country Folk Believe in everything….well, accept Donald Trump. Only Right Wing Republicans Believe in Trump… sometimes, most of the times.
Many a season has come and gone. Momma and her Sister-Who-Taught-Her-Most-the-Things-She-Knows have had children that had children and they still have not heard of the death of The Hermit, AKA (also known as) The-Man-Behind-the-Moon and in small towns, well, they have match box coffins and funerals for even the country mice…..give them a proper send off…which leads them to Believe (there’s that word again), Grandpapa was maybe on to something…
Not like Grandmama would give him up…she was no Conspiracy Theorist but she sure had the Best. Ever straight face of a World-Class Poker Player.
So what do you think? Any guesses???
