The Confirming of Trouser Cloninger

*Dont follow leaders..Watch your parking meters. *

Bob Dylan



All the corn had been buffered from the cobs and the husks ground into nix for the hogs. This earned Trouser Cloninger most afternoons off from his chores. When school was out he raced home to enjoy his brief freedom.

Grain Cloninger allowed his only son to drive the Ford 8-N tractor as long as it wasnt needed to tow the hay truck through the muddy pits that formed around the animal pens. Trouser loved the 8-N and the brief relief from his thirty milking teats and the purging of honeybee hives. He spent most of his free time down at the creek that traversed the south end of Low Melody Farm.

It was a calm creek for nine months of the year. Then early spring soakings changed its friendly meander into a swollen serpentfull of rage and thrashing its newly-discovered bulk about. Runoff from the soggy pastures was like a mammoth enemaflushing and cleansing all the loose cockadoo from
the Farm.

When the pouring of the heavens overran the creek, every Little Ned from two counties came to cast night crawlers into the brown swill that collected just beyond the highway culvert. Some of them reaped fishes sufficient enough to fill their silver lard buckets, while others had none. But the Low Melody corner post stood at the preferred spot where this creek and another converged to form Caddo Pool. Having Caddo Pool inside the property lines of Low Melody was like owning a reserved parking spot at the County Fair. All the Little Neds from town had to stand at its confluence and seek permission to enter. Trouser Cloninger denied them all.

Caddo Pool is but for me, he said, with a smile that showcased two missing front teethcasualties of his stepping on a hoe blade and slapping its handle into his face. Many of the Little Neds cursed and showered stones at him as they stomped away to seek other spots to gather their fishes. Trouser Cloninger did not worry about their ire. He knew the Neds were fickle. As soon as the fat creek returned to but a tinkle, all of them would retreat to
Hank Aaron Park for the summer.

Trousers father once read a newspaper article to him about the park and its games. The story told how Smokin Barney Cansons curve ball and slider had resulted in a final score of 5-4 versus Harleton. The home town won despite
Harletons star hitter, Clovis Red Bibb and his personalized black walnut bat. Clovis went 0-3 against a better pair of knickers. Despite the fanfare his father gave the event, Trouser preferred his most hated chores to the Hank Aaron sort of rule games. He would gladly shovel pig cockadoo than play organized tasks of folly. He preferred the unscripted adventures of Low Melody to the Woodlawn Phillies blue and white.

Much of the time, Trousers adventures were but dreamslong, semi-conscious respites beside the iron ore pond. He had a pallet of cornhusks placed just so--with both his feet in the water to his ankles. There he slept. The coolness of the water made him dream. He envisioned strange worlds both
around and within him. This day as he slept it rained again, much like the days before. His body was wet, and he dreamed he was Master FerroHigh Priest of the fishes of Cloninger Pond. The vision came to him in clarity. It was like a picture book, but so real he recalled the names for all that traversed through the mire within his head:

* * *

Ferro swam around a pool that was always calm and peacefulbound on all sides by good iron-ore. It was said that once in each lifetime, the water would exceed its rocky cuffs. Ferro had not seen that everuntil today.

The torrent from the sky had peppered the calmness for eight turns of the globe. Now there were new boundaries green fronds dipping into water that once was soil. These green fronds brought fresh fare into easy reach. Ferro
seized upon the opportunityand the fruits of the sinking fronds became known to all his Loyals.

Ferros world was being challenged. The pool was rushing into a furious cleavage at what he called Hell Gate. Hell Gate was where dirt met shining, and this day there was no separation of the two. Smaller swimmers were fighting hard to remain clear of its rush and swiftness.

Ferros father had often spoken of Progundera place beyond Hell Gate. He said it was forbidden to the unworthy such as he. Ferro respected the words of his father and the knowledge that had allowed the Wise One to live a full
life in peace. He demonstrated his respect when his father grew too old and weak to forage the fronds and reeds. Ferro brought snails to him every day until the wave of the old ones plates tired, and he cast himself as sheen upon the surface of the pool. His father did not move again and the furries consumed his float.

Since the Wise One fled the humble pool, such things as Progunder were left for Ferro to ponder. He fanned and tacked, and moved carefully toward the sucking wash of the Gate. Close behind him, in awe and admiration, were the first-year fingerlings and the shiny new hatchlings that came from the cypress-knee nests. Ferros steering fins and his dorsal commander kept him clear of Gate s foaming funnela magnet that beckoned him closer. He sensed the pull of the current against his plates as he watched the wisps of moss and the bigger leaves skate hurriedly by and join in the plummet.

Ferro sensed that the Forbidden Place must surely be a richer world. Yes, past this pool must lay the promise of an abundance of crawlers and masses of careless flies falling into easy grasp. It was a place that did not rely
on the benevolence of dipping frondsit was Progunderwhere play and merriment would replace the trials of hard forage.

The mirror that had always been his sky was disturbed. Its flatness was severed and it wobbled against unknown pressures as it drifted toward the draw of Hell Gate. Ferro turned his wide body to the Loyals who awaited his next move. They were assembled as uniform legions, in columns stretching almost out of sight. Their tight unwavering formations paid no heed to the disorderly green fronds that were happily waving their farewells.

We must go where the Father calls us, Ferro said, and we must know that His Firmament is right and good. It is the calling of the Highness Pescadora. He has said in his thunder-voice that we must go and seek Progunder.

With these words, Ferro hurled himself over the narrows and into the swirling wrench committing them all to his unmapped adventure of faith. The slapping of his tail pushed against the cascading mud and leaves to make a
trail for the Loyals. Ferros tail had become the battle flag for those who followed.

The iron-ore pond quickly retreated behind them. Echoing through the froth that surrounded the travelers could be heard the song of a mournful Mymeetie. She had been Ferros sidefish during this memorable year of only ten complete moons. She paused at Hell Gate for a moment, then fanned her
long body back into the safe cuffs of the pool. She shed a tearabsorbed and unseen. Mymeetie was alone now. Soon she must mass her roewithout the fan of Ferro.

The current swept them all into its violent ribbon, contorting through stones and shards of grass that were yesterdays meadows. Over and over they rolled along a tumble-course to an uncharted destination. Ferro stayed well
in front of the trusting. He knew that all of them were dependent on him for their safe deliverance.

Onceonly oncedid Ferro regret the calmness left behind. *Red shame! *He must never think of the iron-ore pool again. Such thoughts were soft and weaklike the carp left behind because their spines were of gel. The followers must never know of his brief misgivings and his lapse of great
purpose.

Ferro felt a sudden floatfree of all things touching him. He lost his view of the sky and the dirt at once. There was free-fall and then blackness. Ferro did not see again until the next light of the Great Globe awakened him.

Morning disclosed a pristine place. Yellow spears of sun shimmered through early haze to light a crystal pool. Around him were his brethren, bruised as he. They beckoned for his first words like good soldiers with long-empty
sacks. Ferro composed himselfstiffening his dorsal and assuming a rigid and unwavering posturelike all leaders of free domains must do.

See this! We have found the promise-pool and it is ours. Look at the majesty of the dripping caverns within Progunders cuffsexamine the bounty laid before us. Celebrate the majesty of Highness Pescadoras world! It is
a world that He has given us without asking for tributenot so much as a pittance. Roil in His plenty.

And the Loyals roiled aboutfeasting on the abundance of prey that yielded themselves freely to the superior numerical force.

Ferro is a good mastera wise Pescadorian! Said the plentifully blessed.

It is a place without toilwithout carewith ample mollusks and grubs, echoed one of the despised whiskered-fish. Whiskered-fish had been known as the lazy ones at iron-ore pond. They forsook the honor of the hunt to forage
the bottom for distressed and dying swimmers who could not escape their glutton-girth. But at least this one gave rightful praise to Ferro.

But Master, said a Loyal who was still too tiny to be someones evening meal. The pool has no egresshow can it be a boon to us compared to our iron-ore pond? How might we make our way onward? Our travel past here is blocked by soils and wood.

Ferro smiled as he forgave the display of innocence by the young Loyal. He replied, The only true knowledge of the morrow is owned by the swimmers who lay the orange roe. They are the chosen lotsthose who can swim north against
churning south-flow. But that is not us. Our morrows are this Progunder.

But Master Ferbegan the Loyal again.

Ferro stiffened his dorsal once more. Who was this Loyal so small but with such a voice of peril? He raised his tone:

You must not ponder mehave I not delivered you to Progunder? I have seen and heard Highness Pescadora the Host of Hosts, Lord of Lords, the Knower of Knowers. Ferro is the voice of His faithmy truth comes directly from
Highness Pescadoras swirling fin dorsal.

With that, the little Loyal quietly withdrew to the backside of a stone larger than himself.

Ferro had spoken directly from the Tablet. The Tablet was something he wanted to withhold for a more distressing or threatening timenot for this day of celebration. But now it was said, and no gill would dispute Ferros place in the Great Divinity.


* * *

Trouser awoke in what he first thought was sweat--rivulets of rain traversing his temples down to his neck and rushing under his collar. He had slept for hours it seemed, and his feet were withered and crinkled like prunes from the water. The lay of the day looked late afternoon.

I must complete the task of my journey, he said, his unheard words falling lifeless upon the cornhusks. He was thinking of the tractora magic carpet to the destinations of his imagination.

I will be carried to this place, he muttered.

He drove the tractor past the cow pens and beyond the sign that said, *No TrespassingEven With Permission. * His fathers sign was fair notice to the Bowers boys who often tried to ravage the Low Melody fields of deer and
other game. At neighbor LeMasters pond, the Bowers boys once begged to fish--then crank-telephoned the waters to steal all but its lowly mud turtles.

The ride to Caddo Pool was his favorite, and he went there every week. But this day was different. He saw that the water was full of squirming new fish that must have escaped the creeks before they dried. He netted about, catching a few but turning them backhaving little enthusiasm. The swirling scene below him mirrored that of his dream.

Surely I have been delivered to the place of Ferro, the place of Progunder, he whispered to himself. But what had been a vivid dream was quickly becoming a remnant. It raced from his head like disturbed quail.

Trouser became beguiled with deep thought. He couldnt free his mind of something he learned at school. In his bib pocket was the lesson note he made in Miss Happy Herndons history class. He had written it downit was something she read to the class about a war general named Patton. Trouser
retrieved the note and read it again. In gist it said that after winning a host of heralded battles, a scribe whispered a warning in Pattons ear. It was the same warning once passed to Caesar:

All glory is fleeting, said the scribe.

Trouser was pondering the warning when he noted with some alarm that Caddo Pool was something less than two-thirds the size of just two weeks ago. He had noted its level by the lone spine of a Devils Spear, which was growing
between the sandstone shelf and the water. The spine was half-a-pig higher above the water than it was before. For a minute Trouser thought about raising the pool with fresh water from the well. Then he remembered his fathers lecture about the precious sanctity of their water:

Purity, clarity reserved strictly for the feathery throats of honest toil and to cleanse the sweat from able brow, his father had said. Maybe there was a way around the rule, but not today. The encroaching dusk had begun to dim his view of the pool and whatever possible remedy he might have
discovered for it. He cranked the tractor for home.

* * *

It was both sour and hot. It seared his gums and he dared not swallow its vile juice. Trouser had stolen a domino-sized bolt of his fathers Red Tag Chewing Tobacco from the cupboard and had ingested its might. It was repulsive but invigorating because it sharpened his sense of awareness. The 8-N ran more smoothly todayas if refreshed by some stimulant of its own. He herded its purr down to the rock shelf above Caddo Pool for the fourth time in as many weeks. He spat into the water and it seemed as though hundreds of swirls embraced it in panic.

*Odd, *he thought. The pool was not much more than a bathtub now. He saw fish careening about, desperately seeking a path of escape from the shrinking boundaries. It came upon him that he might rescue themnet them and put them back in the big iron-ore pond. But the memory of another of his fathers rules choked his relish:

Dont bring no more goddam varmints up here, his father had said. It was the time he found the nest of baby mice in the hen crib and brought them home. They were skin colored with no hair. Like fat, writhing, ear-lobes with dots for eyes.

Trouser started the 8-N and headed for the barn. As he drove through the pine grove into the meadow he was still thinking about saving the fish. What might it be if truly one was his Ferro? But there was little room to guess
about the rigidity of his fathers rule. It reminded him of the time his father whopped him good on the noggin. It was the time he turtled out one last smelly popperafter his father had told him not to fart again in the Chevy Nova. Some rules had no crawl space.

And there was a larger more frightening threat if Trouser tried to conceal transplanting the fisheven if he allowed that fish were not varmints:

Be sure your sins will find you out, his mother once warned. These were words spoken from pursed lipslips that once were fuller. Trouser noticed that as his mother grew older, most of her features had wandered around on her face, changing sizes and colors. Her lips were shrunken now, settling well beneath her lifelong beehive hairdo.

His mothers warning about the disclosures of all sin had been punctuated with her pointer fingerleveled right at Trouser Cloningers middle. The possibility of discovery of all of his secrets rushed forth as the purest form of frightpouring over his face like warm concrete. He was thinking about his Special Times--the private moments he enjoyed so much in the locked bathroom.

All this surfacing fear had his stomach moving on centipede legs toward his throat. Trouser turned back the tide of vomit by thinking of fig preserves. His mamas figs were always saved back special for happy timeslike when he
got a C in arithmetic.

* * *

The last week of school passed and Trouser found Caddo Pool even smaller. The fish were at its surface, pecking wisps of air and then diving away quickly as if to conceal their certain defeat. The north end of the pool had already become skunky. It emitted a gassy stench that reminded Trouser of the crotch part of his maroon gym shorts. Most of the fingerlings were missing from their once-swelled ranks. The big fish Trouser believed to be Ferro must have consumed most of the little ones. But even Ferro was
surrendering now. He was breathing in staccato gasps on the surface of what was becoming an ever-thickening muck.

* * *

The 8-N chummed to a halt and lurched forward to seize the next cog in the gear. Trouser dismounted to survey the pool. It looked like gray palette with no colored crayons. Along its cracking floor were scores of tiny-fingered imprints from coon and possum paw. Caddo Pool was now a septic of ghosts. The large fish was goneas were the last of his faithful. Not even bones were left to someday cite the struggle of Ferros odyssey and the golden place called Progunder.

*All glory is fleeting,* recalled Trouser Cloninger, whispering the verse through lips pursed by the conviction of what he saw in the mud before him. Elm leaves suddenly fluttered above him like the chatter of a departing dove. It was if an errant wind had punctuated his epitaph.

"The End," Trouser thought. He reached for the Bic pen behind his ear to record the moment.