Duncan Takes a Vacation

Chapter 9

             
                   Old Pops must have lived in this lonely desert for a very long time.  He quickly set up a blazing campfire and started to "rustle up some grub" (that's western talk for "cook some food").  The food wasn't that great, but I would have eaten anything because I was starving.  Beans in a can cooked over an open campfire tasted better than a feast of sunflower seeds, cracker crumbs and melons.  I remembered eating beans in the past, and they didn't really agree with my digestive system, but at this point, I wasn't going to let a little gas spoil my well-deserved meal.  I've always said, "If it tastes good - eat it - and pay the price later." 

          Now Pops handled the fire like a pro.  I watched him as he added extra firewood.  The light of the fire reflected off his sunburned face.  Calluses covered his rugged hands, and his hair and beard were as white as snow.  He looked like a true man of the desert, and I was sure glad we had bumped into each other.  

          After eating our "gourmet" dinner, Pops pulled out his pipe and lit it with a thin piece of wood from the campfire.  I watched him puff and puff until the pipe was lit.  Then he blew a smoke ring in my direction.  Next he took a harmonica out of the hip pocket of his worn jeans and began to play it softly. 

          I felt like I was watching an old cowboy movie on television.  What really surprised me was that I knew the songs he was playing.  I figured, "Why not get into the mood and sing along."  So there I was, Duncan, the parrot, sitting at a campfire, singing cowboy songs.  If only my family could see me now! 

          We sang a while longer until Pops said, "Well, Little Buddy, it's time to turn in," (that's cowboy talk for, "It's time to go to sleep.")   He said we had to get an early start in the morning if we were going to find my family.  Pops banked the fire, rolled over in his sleeping bag and said, "Nite, Little Buddy, see you at sunrise." 

          I felt safe and secure knowing he was sleeping next to me.  I looked up into the sky and saw the stars twinkling brightly.  I knew that I was not home, yet the stars above me looked familiar - very familiar.  As a matter of fact, these stars were the same ones I was able to see from my own back yard.  I felt more comfortable seeing the twinkling faces of the stars I grew up with back home.  This brought to mind a story I read in one of Jimmy's books.  The story was about a cricket getting trapped in a picnic basket under some roast beef sandwiches.  That's how I started my vacation - in a picnic basket.  Chester Cricket was a country cricket lost in the city.  I was a city bird lost in the desert.  We both had the same problem.  Chester made some new friends, and I made a new friend.  In the end, Chester made it home all right, so maybe I would be just as lucky.