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Ramblin' Roses and Flyin' Bricks
Alabama has made such a mess of selecting "official" things that I'm mighty afraid we might wind up with a potlicker hound. Take our state flower, the goldenrod, for instance. Actually, I don't believe it's a flower in the first place. What I think it is, is a weed. It is generally found growing along with the ragweed, which is guilty of bringing on attacks of sneezing to hay-fever sufferers. I wouldn't like the goldenrod, even if it were pretty. It keeps the wrong kind of company. Maybe you didn't know it, but our state has an "official" fish. It's the tarpon, which is found in all parts of the state except in that particular region known as Alabama. The average fellow in Clarke County wouldn't recognize a tarpon if he met one in the big-road. If Alabama has to have an "official" fish, which I very much doubt, it should be the catfish. Negroes first discovered the delicious flavor of fried catfish but, being smart, they didn't say anything about it for a long time on account of they didn't want the white folks to eat it all up. Finally, though, it got out how good it was and most everybody likes it. Tarpon Scarce The catfish is found in every direction of Alabama, whereas I'll bet you could fish the entire length of Hal's Lake until you were blue in the face and never catch a tarpon. You might catch one out in the Gulf of Mexico, 20 miles or so from Mobile, but when you do you're actually worse off. They aren't fit to eat and you'll have the thing mounted and your friends, every time they come to visit you, will have to listen to you tell how it pulled and fought and all that. Our "official" state bird is the yellowhammer, which is a fair feather friend, and when it gets cold he checks out for the warmer direction. A yellowhammer ain't nothing but a woodpecker in technicolor. I reckon the Federation of Music Clubs will get mad with me, but I don't think so powerfully much of our "official" state song, "Alabama." It sounds pretty bad as a song and as a poem it leaves me kind of flat, especially that part where, "From they Southern shores, where groweth, by the sea the orange tree." It's all right except that we don't have a sea and we don't have orange trees. Then, over in the second stanza the lady has poor give-out Moses climbing "lone Nebo's Mount to see, Alabama, Alabama, we will aye be true to thee." I never could figure out how Moses got in the act. Seems like she could have let Moses climb Birmingham's Vulcan where he could have seen more in a shorter time. There's something bad wrong with the tune. Last night I tried singing the song to the tune of "Blueberry Hill" but it sounded worse. Next I tried using "Mona Lisa" but that didn't work either. Tonight, if my neighbors are away from home, I'm going to try using the "Green Door" tune. I believe it'll work. Now for the Dog When we get around to picking out a state dog we're liable to get in bad trouble. You have to automatically eliminate the hound dog on account of Tennessee having a prior claim. We'll also eliminate the Dachshund because they're built so close to the floor you can't tell if they're fixing to kick a piece of furniture and you don't have time to yell at 'em. That still leaves a wide variety from which to choose. Noah must have had a lot of trouble. (If they can get Moses mixed up in a state song I reckon I can use Noah in my column.) If he got two each of every species on that ark he sure had a boat-load. Some people will almost fight when they get in a discussion involving the merits of various dogs so we had sure better go slow in making a final decision. I owned a female hound once, who wasn't sure of her paternal ancestry, and she had a litter of pups. It's a shame I didn't keep one of the male puppies. He would have made an ideal state dog and nobody could have felt slighted because their favorite breed wasn't selected. There was a sort of United Nations flavor about that litter of pups.
If anybody gets mad about what I've written in this column I'll certainly make a public apology. I still think, though, we can get along without an "official" state dog.
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