Barney's Bullet

The other day I was reminded of the ‘size’ of our little town. The day before I had taken our dogs for a walk in the local city park, babbling stream running through it and all.

‘Goober’ and ‘Gomer’ were playing checkers under the spreading maple tree. Meanwhile, ‘Floyd,’ the barber, was feeling up ‘Aunt Bea’ in the back seat of his Buick Riviera. Well, you get the picture.

The dog’s paws get pretty wet and muddy after our visit to the park and they pretty well mucked up the seats in my truck. I resolved to vacuum and clean the truck the following day.

So on Easter Sunday we head for downtown Mayberry to walk the dogs and clean the inside of the truck. To say this town ‘shuts down on Sunday’ is like saying that Pat Robertson is a bit conservative.

It has only been recently that anything ‘Open on Sunday’ is up to and including the Vacuums at the local carwash. The other carwash still puts a chain and lock around everything on Sunday, but the owner of the new carwash apparently feels “OK” about it as long as he doesn’t collect the money on Sunday.

Other things you cannot do in this town on Sunday:
1. Buy liquor, no way, no how.
2. Mow your lawn, no way, not even with a cow.
3. Wash your car, well at least not in your driveway.
4. No dancing, ever. Regardless of the day, it could lead to… well, we won’t go there

So I drop my wife and the dogs off at the local library, also closed on Sunday, so she can walk the dogs through the clearly deserted streets of our little town.

I head for the new carwash to clean said truck’s interior… baseball hat and dark glasses in place of course. In the course of cleaning, I notice something shiny lying on the ground. Behold a hollow point, 38 caliber bullet…very much a live round of ammunition.

I scoop up the bullet and finish cleaning the truck. I drive to pick up my wife and the 2 pups in front of the local church (actually, you could throw a rock, blindfolded here and hit a church.) This particular church however has great meaning to us.

It is the same church from which I was ex-communicated in the early 70’s. Our oldest dog clearly has no idea what that might mean; but, for some reason, she has deemed the front lawn of that church as The Place to always do her ‘business’. I love that dog.

OK, with bullet in hand, we head to the local police station to hand them the ammo round. Well, what was I thinking!?! Of course, they are closed on Sunday; no dancing, no booze must equal no crime.
We call the number on the front door, thinking we could just talk to whomever and see what we should do with the bullet. We get the Border Patrol, who handles all of the crime on Sunday since they don’t get Sunday off.

At this point, I think maybe we could just drive over to Sheriff Taylor’s house, where he would be strumming his guitar and visiting with Barney and the recently ravished Aunt Bee. Heck, it’s probably Barney’s bullet and it had just slipped out of his pocket when he was cleaning the squad car. But I digress…

So the Border Patrol patches us into the local cop who is actually On Duty. We explain that we have found this bullet and so. He actually sounds annoyed and asks me what I want him to do about that? I try to explain I was just thinking about leaving live ammo on the ground… seemed like a bad plan and we would be happy to give it to someone to dispose of it. After a brief pause of silence, he replies by saying ‘why bother, since he would just toss it in the garbage anyway.’

So, I guess we’re not in Orange County anymore.
I thanked the Officer for his help and input. We headed home with the bullet.

One of these days, he is going to be face to face with someone dancing around their recently washed car and not be able to find the bullet he needs to shoot the beer out of the culprit’s hand.