A Weak Mind Feeds a Strong Heart

“Do you like yabbies?” Barry asked. I replied “Are you sick! I’d just like to ask you; now is the Pope a Catholic?” … So we headed off across the ranges, where Barry’s cousin Ray, had a dam that’s full of them on a property near Yea. There’s no sophisticated fishing gear that we needed to get. Just a stocking, string, piece of meat; plus a wobbly old scoop net. The dam was quite a big one with tussocks growing ‘round the rim. Within an hour I had scooped a bucket filled up to the brim. We knocked off to have some lunch and to have a beer or two. but in that hour we sat down we knocked down quite a few. When I resumed my ‘yabbying’, my head’s spinning like a top, and then I saw a frightening sight that made me quickly stop. A big brown snake was sunning, between me and the dam. The beer had made me brave enough to give this bloke a slam. I picked up an old dry limb and gave it one tremendous whack; it squirmed and twisted in death thro’s; then lay dead upon its back. Barry claimed I was a hero when he’d seen what I had done, not many tackle brown snakes; they slide faster than we run. “Is that so” I said to him, and was sobering ‘quick smart’, watching Barry in his stupor pick up the snake and play his part. He opened up the mouth and then he got out his pocket knife. Put the blade behind a needle fang, “Here’s what takes your life”. Then said “I ought to skin him; it’s prob’ly worth a ‘pretty pound”. Then just for fun he grabbed the tail and swung it ‘round and ‘round. “Be careful mate!” I turned and ran; making sure, I’m out of the way. “What’s the matter?” Barry laughed. “This mongrel’s had its day. I‘ll show you something else” and held the snake behind the neck, then put its head into his mouth; then he gave it’s nose a ‘peck’. Barry seen that I was nervous; that he held me in his palm. He watched me flinch and shiver when he wrapped it ‘round his arm. “Ah that’s enough” he grinned, but I reckon he’d been rash, then he swung it high into the air. We watched it fall and splash. Barry laughed, “That’s ‘gunna’ give the yabbies quite a feed”. Then something happened in the water that Barry didn’t need. We turned to walk back to our strings - Barry’s face turned ashen grey. It took a while reviving him when the brown snake swam away.