Cave Hill
Consumers don’t chew snuff anymore. Lip and gum cancer and containers of tea like spit have made it unfashionable to put a little pinch between the cheek and gum.
In 1981 after little league practice ended and our coach went home, a group of kids from Three Springs would gather behind the dugout and take a hit of Copenhagen.
The smokeless tobacco was like a magic potion that assisted us with our game. Professional baseball players chewed it with puffed out cheeks while playing baseball, but we chewed snuff under our bottom lip to get a special power that enabled us to climb Cave Hill.
The team would cross the crick in Three Springs that served as the right field boundary of the baseball field. Across the stream was forbidden land known as Cave Hill. Cave Hill was a mountain filled with unexplored limestone caverns– a perfect place to be while high on snuff.
According to a town legend, Cave Hill was haunted. The only way to get to Cave Hill was by wading through the little river that served as the right field boundary.
After crossing the rapids by jumping slippery stones, we were greeted by an entranceway to a limestone cavern.
We stood like grown men overlooking the Grand Canyon with brown spit and specks of snuff running town our chins. A few of us had boxes of wooden matches which we used for exploring the cave.
The caverns were horribly dark. After chewing the snuff, one could sense the ghosts of Indians while inside. There was no way of knowing how far the cave went. No one had the nerve to explore it all.
There was a deep hole in that cave that was bottomless and fell into infinity. We would sit in the dark, between lights of matches and throw rocks down the hole.
The hole was so deep that when a rock finally hit rock bottom it sounded like a fly landing on a horse’s back.
The buzz from the snuff along with the sound from the falling rock took us little leaguers to on a trip to the real outfield.
I’ve never enjoyed a high like the high I got from chewing snuff.
But I never learned why they called me ‘cave hill’ when I played left field.
I caught the ball sometimes.
In 1981 after little league practice ended and our coach went home, a group of kids from Three Springs would gather behind the dugout and take a hit of Copenhagen.
The smokeless tobacco was like a magic potion that assisted us with our game. Professional baseball players chewed it with puffed out cheeks while playing baseball, but we chewed snuff under our bottom lip to get a special power that enabled us to climb Cave Hill.
The team would cross the crick in Three Springs that served as the right field boundary of the baseball field. Across the stream was forbidden land known as Cave Hill. Cave Hill was a mountain filled with unexplored limestone caverns– a perfect place to be while high on snuff.
According to a town legend, Cave Hill was haunted. The only way to get to Cave Hill was by wading through the little river that served as the right field boundary.
After crossing the rapids by jumping slippery stones, we were greeted by an entranceway to a limestone cavern.
We stood like grown men overlooking the Grand Canyon with brown spit and specks of snuff running town our chins. A few of us had boxes of wooden matches which we used for exploring the cave.
The caverns were horribly dark. After chewing the snuff, one could sense the ghosts of Indians while inside. There was no way of knowing how far the cave went. No one had the nerve to explore it all.
There was a deep hole in that cave that was bottomless and fell into infinity. We would sit in the dark, between lights of matches and throw rocks down the hole.
The hole was so deep that when a rock finally hit rock bottom it sounded like a fly landing on a horse’s back.
The buzz from the snuff along with the sound from the falling rock took us little leaguers to on a trip to the real outfield.
I’ve never enjoyed a high like the high I got from chewing snuff.
But I never learned why they called me ‘cave hill’ when I played left field.
I caught the ball sometimes.
posted by Charles George Taylor at
7:18 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home