Guest column by Ricky Harpole

I wish to take this opportunity to explain a few things and justify my obvious condition as potrayed by Ms. Starr’s satrical cartoon that was recently published in The Panolian. The truth, (and sad truth is), is that it is an all too accurate depiction of actual events. The characters that she sketched there were all immediately recognizable to me, with the possible exception of one of those insects buzzing around my supposed corpse.

The character facing you and poking me with that d… stick is her brother, Bill, and the individual shoving gingerly at my backside with her foot is Ms. Starr herself. I know her by her hat. At the time this portrayed event took place (1998-1999?), I was enjoying life at the Starr’s camp, which is an extremely rural part of Panola County, when I was not forcing myself to travel about the country in pursuit of “mischief unmentionable.”

Now, these are the facts:

I was out of state doing ground work on a demolition site, which turned out to be a two week jump. I had always made it a  habit to call my beloved ex every few days to make sure that our collective children were healthy and not recently arrested, or over medicated. Well, just about the time that my part of the job was finished, their rural Arkansas phone service was interrupted (service, when applied to Southwestern Bell, is a far too kind of term) this condition continued for several days. While those communications were down, a corpse was indeed discovered in East Tunica County. It was tentatively identified as me. The rumor spread like old mayonnaise. When I showed up later that week, wearing no more bullet holes nor shrapnel than I had left with, there were mixed emotions of grief and disappointment. After all, my youngest daughter had never been to a funeral, and was anxious to actually see one in progress. I had deliberately allowed my life insurance policy to lapse, causing untold grief to my beloved ex. For as long as two years afterwards, I would run across people who had known me when I was still alive and were immediately startled. They acted as if they had seen a ghost.

While I was using Starr’s Camp as my “Relaxation Headquarters,” I amused myself with traditional Redneck pursuits. Pond fishing, wildlife observation, trail walking, coon hunting, with borrowed dogs etc. It was the coon hunting that caused me to literally stumble over the Family Still, that August morning. And a still is something that deserves meticulous inspection. As you can see by Ms. Starr’s astute observation, as drawn.

There was no consumable evidence left. Neither for the prosecution nor the market. Then I knew where Rainer had gotten the courage to strap that saddle onto that plane down at Diffee’s Airfield, and ride it. There was “proof” in that puddin’. My hat is off the Ms. Starr, she caught it all.

 
Just the Facts Ma’am,
Ricky Harpole