Thanksgiving Stories

Laura, Grace, and I ventured north of the Texas border to celebrate Thanksgiving with some of my great uncles and aunts in Oklahoma. Besides the tremendous amount of food and beautiful countryside, the best thing about the trip was the stories. I love listening to the assorted tales of my family, so I will try and retale a couple of the more memorable ones.

The Truck Stop

My Uncle Buck and Aunt Sut (whose house we went to) have been in the horse business (among many others) for as long as I can remember. One night they were delivering a horse to someone on the other side of Oklahoma and were headed back home rather late at night. Aunt Sut was in the back seat asleep and Buck decided to stop at a truck stop about an hour from their house to fill up. As he is filling up, Sut wakes up and walks in to use the restroom. After she is done, she walks out to the truck to discover that there is no truck. She walks completely around the store thinking that he might be maneuvering the trailer but there is no Buck and no truck. Keep in mind that it is about 2:00 in the morning. So she walks back in and asks the two Indians behind the counter if the man in the truck paid. They said he did and that he left. Sut takes a seat and waits for Buck to realize that he had forgotten his wife but he doesn’t ever come back. She approaches the clerks again and asks if they can call her husband. After reassuring them that it probably won’t be long distance, they call Buck’s cell phone (not allowing Sut to touch their phone). The resulting conversation:

Buck: Hello?
Clerk: Sir, you forgot your wife at the Flying J truck stop.
Buck: I think you have the wrong number, my wife is asleep in the back seat. (not even checking behind him)
Clerk (to Sut): What’s your name?
Sut: Carra McAdams
Clerk: She says her name is Carra McAdams.
Buck: (slowly turning around) Oh…


The Deer Hunter

This story stars out with Uncle Bubba (Sut’s brother) arriving early one morning on a visit to Buck and Sut’s house. In the early morning twilight he is walking to the door when Sut bust out in a nightgown with a deer rifle. After Bubba quickly starts to apologize for every thing he ever did, Sut explains that the gun isn’t intended for him but a lame deer they saw in their pasture. Bubba takes the gun and kills the deer and asks Sut for her deer tags. Well she hadn’t got them. Bubba after raising a fit about $6000 fines sends her to the local feed store to go and get some tags. So here is Sut at the counter:

Sut: I need some tags quick!
Clerk: Why are you in such a hurry? You think you’ll get a deer today?
Sut: I do believe I’m going to get a buck.


I thought I’d close with some hay bay jumping and other random country activities. Hope everybody else enjoyed their holiday.