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When my parents took a break from laying the cement blocks for our house in Lizard Acres, they got into the front seat of our long black Ford station wagon, and set out for a good long drive through the wide-open valleys that lay around the Huachuca Mountains. Sometimes we headed for Naco Mexico, closer than a drive into town, other times a longer ride to Bisbee, Tucson, Nogales or Cochise Stronghold. And all on twenty five cent a gallon gasoline.
Sometimes it was the radio that kept us entertained, but most of the time we amused ourselves. My father kept his big silver harmonica in the glove compartment and we sang all the classic American childhood songs: Polly Wolly Doodle (Oh I went down south to see my gal), Clementine (I particularly enjoyed the verse Till I kissed her little sister, I forgot my Clementine), and I've Been Working on the Railroad (I had a clear picture of the Someone who was in the kitchen with Dinah. He was a handsome miner in jeans and a red-checked shirt, who always flirting dreadfully with Dianah, in her blue dress and a ruffled white apron, as he strummed away on his old ban-jo).
I get a big kick out of plugging my ipod into the car when I head down the driveway, on my far-from-twenty-five cent a gallon gas. But I sure wouldn't mind a short trip back to the dusty gullies around Lizard Acres when Daddy Sang Bass and Mama Sang Tenor.
