HATCHETS and PEACE PIPES

HATCHETS and PEACE PIPES 

“Well well!! The last person I expected to see darkening the portals of my home was you. What brings you here after all the years? And before you ask the answer is no, I will not lend you any money. Actually from past experience the meaning of the word ‘lend’ is not within your grasp. It means you have to pay it back."

“I’m not here to ask for money.”  

“What then?”

“We are both getting to the twilight of our lives I think it is time to bury the hatchet.”

“What do you mean we should ‘bury the hatchet’?”

“Don’t you know anything? Are you saying you do not know what bury the hatchet’ means?”

“Oh you are quick, picked up the gist of my question in no time. Obviously age hasn’t dimmed your brain. So what does it mean? Seriously, if I take it literally I would have to tell you I do not now, or have I ever owned such an implement. Even if I did, I fail to see what possible benefit would be gained by burying it. They don’t grow in the ground do they? You cannot plant one hatchet and hope it produces two tomahawks. Even with my limited knowledge of the hatchet I do know they do not breed, even if buried.”

“It is an old saying, you ‘bury the hatchet’, not plant it. Can I come in, what I have to say is not the sort of thing one discusses in a doorway?”

“Perhaps you should have thought of that before you knocked. After what you did assuming I would want to talk to you at all was presumptuous in the extreme. Anyway I assumed it was a saying, you are not clever enough to make one up. I suppose you better come in. You can explain what it means. So far I supposedly have an axe like piece of equipment you suggest I should bury. The reason for this strange behaviour is currently known only to you and whoever coined the phrase.”

“The American Indians used to do it.”

“The American Indians buried their hatchets? Concerned someone might steal them were they?”

“Are you being deliberately obtuse? For the life of me I cannot believe we are arguing about this. Are you arguing for the sake of arguing?”

“No. I am not arguing, I am just pointing out you need to explain what is meant by the term. It was you who suggested we should ‘bury the hatchet’, not my idea at all. In simple terms to point out the futility of what you propose, I do not have a hatchet to bury. Is that something you can comprehend?”

“You haven’t changed one iota. You still use big words to try to confuse me. Forget the hatchets. Would it be easier if I used a different phrase? We can try ‘kiss and make up’ or ‘let bygones be bygones’?”

“We have known each other for many years, never at any stage during that time had the prospect of kissing you ever invoked the slightest appeal. Why suggest it now?”

“It’s another way of saying ‘bury the hatchet.”

“Even without knowing why one does engage in that particular activity, I far prefer it to the prospect of kissing you. What was the other? Something to do with bygones? What are bygones?”

“You are as thick as a sack full of hammers. Bygones are things that have happened in the past, but are best forgotten.”

“You mean like the reason why the American Indians buried their hatchets? What has that to do with hammers? Do they bury them as well or just keep them in sacks?”

 “Hammers have nothing to do with why they buried their hatchets or  anything to do with bygones. You remember when you and Judy broke up forty years ago over her having sex with me that one time? You haven’t spoken to her since, but IF you forgave her, that would be letting bygones be bygones. It’s the same as ‘burying the hatchet’.”

“Or the hammers apparently. For someone who wants to forget the hatchets, your short term memory gets a fail mark. If I was in any way inclined to kiss and make up with Judy, which I am not in any way disposed to do, the only place I would want to bury a hatchet would be in her head for being unfaithful. Is that what this is all about, you wanting me to kiss you and make up because you had sex with my wife?”

“I’m sorry I mentioned the hatchet again. You are making this far more difficult than I imagined. I will try another way. We have been at odds for over forty years over that one indiscretion. it is time to forgive and forget. We can smoke the peace pipe.”

“I haven’t smoked for eleven years, filthy habit. Why would I take it up again, and a pipe for God sake. Judy is the heavy smoker, perhaps you and her could reignite your one night of passion over a plug of tobacco.”

“A plug of tobacco? Are you sure tobacco comes in plugs?”

“Of course it comes in plugs. Sherlock Holmes always had a plug. He would cut off what he needed from the plug for whichever pipe he was using that day.”

“What? Holmes used more than one pipe? I only remember him having the one.”

”He used three. All look alike, the Calabash style, however they were made from different materials. I suppose the Indians would have used clay for their Peace pipes. There are not many Cherrywood trees in America.”

“Tell that to George Washington. It was chopping down a Cherrywood tree got him into all sorts of trouble.”

“Now I suspect you are going to explain how George Washington made a pipe out of the Cherrywood tree and that pipe became a Peace pipe which he gave to the Indians,”

“Not so, their pipes were clay, or I should say are. They still use them,”

“As well as hatchets? What about hammers?”

“Very amusing.”

“I suppose we could also assume if the hatchets were buried in clay that would mean the hatchets being buried would become a sign of peace.”

“A theory worth checking. Now where were we? Ah yes Judy. It wasn’t that important, I would hardly call it a night of passion. From memory it would have been two hours out of a lifetime at the most.”

“You spend two hours with my wife and you call it ‘not important? Well it was to me. What were you smoking in one of your Peace pipes? Probably an illegal substance if the truth be known, no wonder she gave in to you. Were you both smoking?

“It was her idea.”

“Judy had a Peace pipe? Never! She had the occasional role your own weed, but never a pipe, not Judy. You have some weird American Indian fetish you have kept secret don’t you? First it was their custom burying a hatchet, which I recall so far has only been satisfactorily explained by my reasoning of them being buried together Now we have moved on to them using their clay Peace pipes to encourage wives to be unfaithful.”

“Apparently they still do. Smoke Peace pipes that is, not encourage wives in any way.”

“If it wasn’t smoking the pipe that caused Judy to succumb to your advances, what was it? Judy would not have been one bit interested in why you became an authority on American Indians. Whatever was in the pipe you were smoking?  First you quote their strange habits with hatchets, now it is the use of Peace pipes to encourage physical contact with someone’s wife. In Judy’s case mine. And two hours! Are you sure it was Judy? Hold that thought, there is someone at the door.

Judy, come in, we were just talking about you. There is someone here you know. I do love the Pocahontas outfit. Under the circumstances it is very appropriate. How is Mr Smith these days?”

“He is in the next room down the hall. Not one bit happy the nurse took his hatchet away either. The rules in this institution have become untenable. I had to stop smoking my pipe.”

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