Family

On a whim, Harvey Thompson stopped at a road-side auction while on a fishing trip in Michigan. With no intention of buying, he playfully bid on a trailer complete with three canoes, a kayak, and accessories. To his surprise, he won. He was so unprepared, he had to go to a garage to install a trailer hitch.

Harvey lived in central Iowa where water was used to grow corn and soybeans. "What in the land of Goshen am I going to do with three canoes and a kayak?"

Nature solved part of the problem by catching the kayak in an updraft, which bounced it down Highway 31 until it turned into kindling. But he still had three canoes.

Harvey got home late when the family was busy: the kids were watching a movie and Irene was on the phone. The quick welcome -- it was during a commercial -- was followed by a road-tired fisherman scrambling his own eggs and warming old coffee. But since Harvey was pooped he didn't mind.

Early next morning, Irene dashed off to work as the kids raced to school. Harvey moseyed through the morning absently brewing a fresh pot of coffee and frying hash-browns in his favorite cast-iron pan. Absently, the man looked out the back window. He saw that the leaves were still summer-green: in Michigan they had just begun to fade, some partially yellow and others showing the first hint of orange that would soon burst into blazing red. The leaves were all he saw.

The farmer dressed in the same lackadaisical mood: he knew he had all day to empty the car and store his fishing gear. It wasn't until eleven o'clock that he finally walked into the back yard.

"Land of Goshen!" he exclaimed. "Where didtheycome from?"

When the family returned, Harvey gathered everyone in the living room: no mean fete since one disappeared to the computer, another vanished to a video game, and a third vamoosed to a bevy of Barbie Dolls. He gained their attention by saying he brought each a present.

Irene could neither believe nor understand what she saw. "Now why would a full-blooded Iowan, pork-raised and corn fed, buy one, let alone three, of those things?" She walked around the trailer as if inspecting an alien aircraft.

"I let you out of my sight four days, Harvey Schooner, and you go and do a dern-fool thing like this. Pray, what was on your mind?"

"We could put flowers in one," suggested Clarence, the oldest.

"Or we could tie two together, put plywood on top, and we'd have a pontoon boat," offered Robby, the middle child.

"And I can can use mine as a mall for my Barbies!" giggled Debbie.

"I'm beginning to think," mused Mother, scratching her head, "it's not what to do with the vessels, it's what to do with Father. You're getting weirder by the day, Harvey dear."

Of course in time the Thompson's found many uses for the canoes, all in keeping with their intended purpose. When the Boy Scouts wanted to do something different from visit hog farms or checking out the soybean crop, Clarence suggested they take the canoes and paddle down the river.

When the Cub Scouts found themselves in a similar predicament, Robby solved the problem by volunteering the vessels for a day at the lake.

And when the fourth-grade girls sacked their brains for an unusual activity, Debbie blurted out, "We could use our canoes."

Even Harvey found a use for them. Steeped in Jon Boats like all mid-Iowans, he learned it was possible to fish from "one of those banana peels." Before the leaves turned red, he had two neighbors sharing his find. Of course, Harvey pretended he knew all about canoes, but we know better.

"Now, Harvey," commented friend Jason, "there's room for four canoes on the trailer but you have only three. What you going to put in the hole?"

"Why, that's for the ornery cuss who refuses to try something different. We strap him down, dowse him with honey, and let the ants do the rest."

That Winter the canoes stood vigil in the back yard. Covered by snow, they looked like white torpedoes. Russ, a neighbor, said round caskets. But that didn't stop the kids from hooking them behind Clarence's ATV and surfing and snow boarding. Debbie crawled under hers and played dolls. But as the Winter lengthened, the three reverted to their inside sports, the computer and video games. It wasn't until Spring that Father suggested, "Hey, kids, let's get those canoe thingies wet." And so they visited every lake, river, pond, and stream in Story County. And in time, they learned to

love those vessels as dearly as other mid-Iowans did their Jon Boats.

Part of the charm was the novelty. No friend had one. Also, it seemed that only the Thompsons got the hang of how to keep the banana peels from tipping over. And the third thing that made it a circus was that neighbors always saw the three in a bunch.

At first Irene thought her husband had turned eccentric. After all, he had bought vessels as if he knew what he was doing. But the more the family used the tippidy things, the more she cottoned to them herself. She even took a flotilla of quilting ladies down the river one Sunday and took pictures to prove it. The girls giggled like the first time they tried to ride a boy bike with a skirt on. It was a Story County time to remember.

One by one, the kids grew and began to leave the family. Clarence went to Iowa State on an Ag scholarship. Robby followed by leaving for Iowa City where he became a consultant for farm management. And little Debbie, nearly as big as her mother, became a Home Ec major at Indian Hills Community College in Ottumwa. So Harvey and Irene sat at home, alone with the unused computer, abandoned Play Station, and two hammocks full of well-used Barbie Dolls. But before they left, the same question presented itself as certainly as where will we get the Christmas tree this year: what will we do with the canoes once we're gone?

"We can't just let them sit in the back yard and donothing."

Each child had taken ownership to the point of naming his. Clarence named his Ezekiel. No one knew why, but he painted it as bold as day just behind the front seat so everyone knew it was his.

Robby named his Thornton. He explained to his friends it was after his dentist. "Because it looks like a big tooth." He painted the name behind the front seat as his brother had, but forgot to tip the vessel right-side up so the lettering ended upside down.

What else could Debbie name hers but Ken? She even used it as an excuse not to go out. "I'm sorry, but I already have a date -- with Ken."

When his time came, each child had to face the same dilemma: what to do with my canoe? More than one thought that the vessels should stick together.

Clarence was the first to say it out loud. "They're a family, for crying out loud. Besides, we don't have three trailers, just one."

Robby seconded his older brother's sentiments, then added that by leaving them on the farm, the whole family could use them when they visited.

And what could Debbie do? "No girl has a canoe sitting in the back of her apartment. There's only one place for Ken: on the farm."

And so Harvey and Irene spent their Winters looking at those three, fifteen-foot banana peels -- Ezekiel, Thornton, and Ken -- as if they were family members. And all because years before Father had whimsical bid on them at an auction. Strange how some families grow.