they would borrow chewing tobacco off of perfect strangers. Us folks used to think that the quarrels were staged to bring the village constable within borrowing distance, as he bought the kind of tobacco that fitted grandpop’s mouth, but not his pocketbook.
Grandpop would holler, “I’ll drum at your funeral.”
Yoder would say, “You’ll annoy everybody but me.”
Grandpop would boil over and howl, “I was the youngest drummer boy in the war.”
Yoder would call him a liar and claim that he was so young they had to fill his drum with milk.
Grandpop would think a while and then holler that he was so young they had to put rockers on his drum like a cradle.
Along would come another newspaper photographer and the older drummers would stop hostilities until they had their picture snapped again in a love and kisses attitude. Then they would bust out fighting.
