As I considered what to make my hairdo do today, I started to think about how snazzy mustaches can be. I decided I’d try to create a couple with my hairs. Here’s my stab at a Fu Manchu. You can see my mustache-styling skills are quite limited. I can’t even do a Fu Manchu that looks right. The important thing is that I tried. Just for y’all, I tried.
My ‘stache makes as much sense as my Prince-Albert-in-a-Can Bow Tie o’ the Day. I mean, these young whippersnappers nowadays have no clue about the old routine of prank-calling a store that sold tobacco and asking: “Do you have Prince Albert in a can?” And when told YES, saying “Well, you better let him out.” I have to do a lot of explaining when I wear this piece. And the young wonderers still don’t find it amusing. And that gets me to thinking about how much more isolated Delta was when I was a kid. Oh, it was still 140 miles from SLC, but without cell phones, texting, and the internet, your mind was near-completely soaked in the confines of Delta and its offshoots. A phone prank and toilet-papering a house was about the funniest crap you could pull, without causing a town civil war.
Don’t think for a minute that Delta was boring back in the day. There was plenty to do: for example, sliding down the flumes easily morphed into cliff jumping; tubing down the Sevier could end up planting you at the reservoir for a swim and a bonfire; throwing a couch in the back of a truck (Yes, we rode in the back of trucks.) often ended at an Oak City canyon party– complete with a campfire and s’mores.
Like most kids, I was allowed to ride my bike everywhere from the age of zero. (Slight exaggeration.) I was allowed to play on the railroad tracks. They were pretty much our front yard. I was taught the rules, and then set free to explore. Of course, being bored in Delta was your choice. Some people were, and I felt sorry for them.
Delta was also packed with characters who had made their individual lives a little iconic by their bigly actions. For example, there were Bernell and Blanche Ferry (son and mother) whose accidental antics included Blanche falling out of their old truck’s passenger door as Bernell rounded the corner to turn onto Main Street. She rolled like a roly-poly into the gutter, stood up, and waited for Bernell to go around the block and come pick her up again. That’s right: he did not stop for her. He went around the whole block. When he came back around and finally stopped by Blanche, she hopped in the truck, and off they went on their merry way. The scene looked like they were following a script– like they had done this a million times before. I felt privileged to observe the entire event. I’m still I awe of that old woman’s un-breaking bones.