Don't Come Home A Drinkin'

I reckon will try somthing here tonight and put multiple videos into one posting.  Starting with the exciting Loretta Lynn.  Brings me back to a story when I was hitch hiking up from Tampa, Florida in December of 1970.  I had the misfortune of being picked up by people who were more broke than I was.  Yes, they had a car but not much else.  We managed to make it to Marion, Illinois. An infamous town for its having located a Federal Penitentiary there to replace Alcatraz.  Normally I wouldn't have much paid attention to such facts except I had been housed there about 3 years prior to my visit then.  I'd had about enough of my benefactors at that point given the woman seemed to have been uneasy about my presence ever since Birminham when I backed their car down into a gulley on a rainsoaked night outside a truck stop. To tell you the truth I was a little uneasy about her to seeing how she looked a lot like Bette Davis with a butcher knife in her hand.

Problem was I had a friend in Marion.  The 1st problem was that I had met him in prison and he wasn't expecting me to be dropping in like that. A B-rated movie was coming into focus here when the second problem reared its ugly head.  I had forgotten his name.  That little fact didn't seem to disturb me to much because he said his name was on the town square for his having fought in Viet Nam. Now its a known fact that convicts are no strangers to lying about exploits but to say you fought in Viet Nam and you weren't a politician, well I tended to believe him. But what was his name? 

I trusted that when I got to his name it would jump out at me and then what would I do. Look it up in the phone directory I suppose.  The only thing easier would be for him to holler my name as soon as I saw his name, which is exactly what he done. With a dead dear strapped to the hood of his car to boot.  Why he invited me to his home in Pittsburgh, Illinois, just down old 13, 3 miles outside of town.  I layed down on the couch and the next thing I know I'm sleeping.  Voices hung over my head "thats Richards friend." a young female voice said. A mother's size voice said, "he looks safe, he can sleep in the bed."  There were 5 of us at the supper table that night. Richard, in his mid 20's, Tammy, his 18 yr. old girlfriend, Mom and 14 yr. old Robin. And me ofcourse, with a ravenous appetite. 

There I was, still at the table, when everyone got up and settled in the living room to watch TV.  "Y'all gonna want the rest of this macaroni?" I hollered. "No, go ahead and finish it. Which I did.  I told Richard what Mom said, and he said, "man, you got it made." I said, "Where does Robin sleep."  Seeing as there just wasn't that much room in this house. "Oh, she sleeps in the bed too." All of sudden southern hospitality was taking on a whole new meaning and freaking me out.  I said ?"Richard, this ain't gonna work out, I'll do just fine on the couch. Which is where I slept that night.



Richard's girlfriend seemed to have a lot of living under her belt. Loretta Lynn was played at 5 O'Clock each night.  I looked at her with a butcher knife in her hand and thought I should limit my conversation with her as well.  Time for me to hop on the Greynhound and get back home.  We had managed to pad our accounts with the sale of some guns we had appropriated with a couple to keep for ourselves as well.  The lone cop in the pool hall was the biggest prompt however.  Our eyes locked immediately when they met and recognized each other. He the guard at Marion, I the inmate who wasn't from around these parts.  Anything gets stolen now, he's going to assume I've got.  So long Richard, see you down the road.  Which I did, in Terre Haute several years later/