Over the years I have had many good friends to pass away, some from natural causes and some from not so natural. I always tried, if possible, no matter how faraway I might be, to attend every funeral. I have been a pall barer more times thanI can count - even done eulogies a few times. But by far the most unusual and most memorable funeral I ever attended was my good friend Muskrat, who passed away a few years ago from natural causes, I am glad to say. Muskrat was one of those very rare individuals that I can say I never heard utter a negative word about anyone . I never saw him partake of any kind of alcoholic beverage the entire time I knew him, which was over fifty years. His only vice to speak of was Redman chewing tobacco and I never saw him without it.

 

     I often wondered how Muskrat would look with flat cheeks, but never saw him that way. He seem to always have some of his wife's people staying at his home. And when I say always, I mean just that. Either her parents or brothers and sisters, one of them was forever there and they never seem to have jobs. And the worse part was they all were boozers and Muskrat was a teetotaler. He worked hard at the textile mill. He even had to work the night shift just so he would have a bed to sleep in. I used to feel so sorry for him about that because he couldn't even sleep during the day for all the shenanigans his free loaders were constantly in.

 

     When I got the sad news about Muskrat's passing, I was living in the mountains near Asheville but I left that very evening and headed for Pee Dee, my old neighborhood. Hearing about it later than I should have, I barely got there in time to spruce up and get to the Northam Cemetery. When I arrived, everybody was there. A lot of old friends that I was glad to see. I had the feeling right away that this was going to be a memorable experience.

 

     The first thing that seemed unusual to me was the fact that out of a hundred or so mourners, there were only two wearing suits, that being the preacher and me. The next thing was, where were the pall bearers? As it turned out, they were fifteen minutes late. Later I was told the excuse they gave was that, in their words, "The ride they were in didn't have enough class to follow that fine machine!," referring to the hearse. But I have my own ideas about it because when they finally arrived, they all were doing "Figure Eights" as they walked to the back of the hearse. It was obvious to me they were drunk. Oh yeah, one of them had on a suit about three sizes too large, and so out of date, it looked like the one Tony Orlando wore back in the early 70s. And another thing was they were carrying one of those super large "Boom Boxes" for the graveside music . And the one that was to operate it had the shakes so bad that his hands couldn't hit the buttons correctly.

 

     Now this would have been a good thing because undoubtedly they had been listening to the Darlington 500 on the way to the funeral and did not think to hit the little switch on the back that changes from cassette to  "RADIO!" When his shaky hand finally hit the start button, the one hundred plus people in attendance did not here the slow, sad music that was expected. Instead, we all heard something like this, if I can recall. "Well, here comes Earnhart around number four turn," not to mention the sound of all those loud engines in the background. With shaky hands the operator was desperately trying to stop it, and he was finally successful but not for several more laps around the track. I was beginning to get caught up in the race when I heard that Nascar announcer say, "Back on turn number two, Ole Darrel's really flexing the muscles on that pesky Johnson."

 

     When he finally got it stopped, I was so relieved and said to my self, "WOW!" If he would just get away from that thing and leave it alone. But that was wishful thinking. I realized that when I saw him shakily hit the rewind button. And wouldn't you know the rewind wheel would have to have a bad bearing, as we heard "wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wa wapp!" But, fortunately, he did get to play the song, so all was not lost.

 

     This incident just set the tone for a really awful day at Northam Cemetery. Unknown to all but the immediate family, one of the pall bearers just happened to be a fugitive from justice and in hindsight I do remember that he seemed edgy and sweating profusely. And this just happened to be a military funeral and we all know what they do at military funerals. I'm not talking about playing "taps." If you think he was edgy before, you should have seen him take off running when those soldiers fired that 6 gun salute. Running with his face pointing toward heaven and that ribbon tie waving behind his neck like a green snake. He finally realized that it was all friendly fire and sheepishly returned to his place in the ranks.

 

     Well, after the funeral, I thought I would go by Muskrat's home and talk to everyone before heading back to the mountains, as I had to be back at the office early the next morning. When I got down there on  "Hog Back," the street where he lived, they were all out there on the front porch talking about things that men usually talk about - old altercations  and things like that. After I had been there a while I heard what sounded like a jet plane coming down Hog Back. When it slid around the muddy road and finally skidded to a stop, I could tell they had to engage the emergency brake to stop as I heard the distinct rattling click. Six guys piled out and started getting their beer out of the car. It was the pall bearers.

 

     Now, they had to run the gauntlet. That is, cross the street in front of all those " Every Sunday Church Attending Christians" that also lived on the street, and you can believe there were plenty of judgmental eyeballs peeping thru those window blinds. The first one that strolled across with the old bootleg tactic, that being holding the bottle hidden against his thigh with a casual, unassuming expression on his face. Then, one by one like ducks in a row, they all used the same tactic with the same stupid expression. Now Robert, the last one, saw how they were all doing and followed the same routine. Now what made this the most humorous was the fact he did it with a twenty-four pack. But just like the other five he bootlegged it with both ends of the box sticking out about a foot.

 

     When I left them that day they were all taking turns laughing and then crying and then laughing again. It was, for the most part, a very sad day for me, but also a day that I will forever cherish in my memory.