KING OF DIRT
Just the appearance of the truck made me feel dirty. The grubby yellow paint gave little hint to the fact that the truck had started out white. I walked around the truck, being careful to stay upwind. On the driver’s side door was a trail of what looked like dried dirty water, which on closer inspection was revealed to be tobacco spit. The door handle was grimy to my touch. The smell made my nose hairs curl as I opened the door. Trash completely filled the passenger side like some filthy companion.
“Clifford sure did leave us a mess,” I said, pinching my nose with my fingers and looking at Mike.
“Us,” he said, lifting his eyebrows high onto his forehead, “I’m afraid you’re shit out of luck if you think I’m helping you with that.”
I didn’t cuss him. I didn’t want to touch it either, but I needed the truck. I found a trash can and started cleaning.
I stood there picking through the rubbish that ranged from old scratch-off lottery tickets to dirty underwear, all of it making me gag. All this from the dirtiest man I’ve ever known.
He was hired as a farmhand to assist his aging father, who was already our farmhand. He had lived with his mother and father, and they seemed to make sure he had kept reasonably clean. However, when his mother had passed away and his father entered the nursing home, he was on his own. His filthiness went from grade C to grade A.
Everyone in town knew and considered him the village idiot. He didn’t know any different. He just went through life lazily, living for the next paycheck.
The reason why my father kept him around was, to my young mind, unreasonable. Clifford was the idlest person I had ever known in my short life. I remember my father sending me and Clifford to work on the farm equipment. I knew what needed to be done, and upon arriving at the job site set in to change the hydraulic filter on a tractor. Clifford found himself a seat on an empty bucket and dug in his pocket to retrieve a bag of Durango Chew. Dipping his grungy, coal-black fingers into the bag, he produced a golf-ball-sized chunk of chew. Wadding the chunk into his toothless mouth, he swirled it around with his tongue like an old Jersey cow. He then spat a tar-colored solution in between his Velcro tennis shoes. I’d ask him to hand me a tool from underneath the tractor. He’d let out a small groan of displeasure and coarsely hand me what I’d asked for. The day was filthy hot so, believing I wouldn’t get any work out of him, I decided to send him for a soda.
“Clifford, I need some paper towels… And, while you’re out, stop by Casey’s and get some sodas,” I told him as I climbed out from underneath the tractor. I wiped my hands on an old, dirty shop towel and removed some cash from my wallet. I handed him the money, and he stood up off his bucket and limped off to the white farm truck we had lent him. The truck roared to life, and Clifford jugged his way down the driveway. A big eruption of tobacco spit came from the rolled-down window as the truck rounded the corner out of sight.
“Clifford ‘Dirt’ King… The dirtiest man I’ve ever known,” I said, climbing back underneath the tractor. “Well, at least it won’t smell like a wet dog in here for a while.”
When Clifford finally returned, he handed me a Coke and the paper towels.
“Clifford, you know I drink Dr. Pepper. What’s this?”
“Well, I would’ve sworn you’d said Coke,” he stated, kind of shaking his head. I took the Coke, opened it, and took a long pull. It still tasted good, and I noticed Clifford studying me. I put the Coke down and stared back, noticing he didn’t have a Coke.
“Cliff, where’s yours?” I asked, taking a breath and another sip from the Coke.
“Wells, you said just to get one’s for yourself,” he said, taking his place back on the empty bucket. I couldn’t believe him. I had handed him a five-dollar bill, plenty of money for three pops.
“Well, I didn’t know I had to tell you to buy one too. I thought that was kind of implied as standard operations around here,” I said, becoming a little defensive. He shrugged his shoulders and spat on the ground.
That’s how the day went. I finished changing the liquids on the tractor, and Clifford sat. I wasn’t mad about it; the job seemed easier if he just stayed out of the way.
That evening I told Dad about Clifford not buying himself a Coke. Dad just smiled and shook his head.
“That’s Clifford: dirty as a dog and as loyal as one too,” he said, taking a bite of potato, “Cliff may be lazy and dirty, but he’s the kindest-hearted chap around.”
Three years later, I was thinking of my father’s words as I power-washed the inside of the old white farm truck. In the time I knew Clifford, he had never said a cross word about anyone. Clifford befriended anyone, like some neighborhood mutt.
Clifford’s lack of self-care led to his developing diabetes; he didn’t change his diet, and no one was able to ensure he took his medicine. His legs and feet swelled up to the point that he had trouble walking, and his Velcro tennis shoes barely stayed clasped shut. Every bit of physical labor had been a huge mental task for Clifford before; now, it had truly turned into a physical battle.
My family helped all it could. Clifford had good health insurance and was given time off to see his doctor. But he became lazier and less steadfast with what minor tasks we assigned him. And his health kept failing.
During this period in early November, my family spent the weekend hunting deer on our farm. Clifford was never seen. The next week he turned in false hours, claiming he fed cows that weekend.
I think it was hard for my uncle to fire him. Whoever is hired by our family usually ends up feeling like family, but it had to be done. He handed over his keys, and my dad drove him to his brother-in-law’s house.
I was told he laid down on the couch and wouldn’t get up. When they finally did get him to the doctor, the doctor declared him incompetent of self-care. He was taken to a local nursing home.
From there they bathed him, monitored his medicine, and watched his diet. His health improved, so much that my grandmother didn’t recognize him when she came to visit. He even got a girlfriend, a patient with Down’s syndrome also under the care of the nursing home.
The truck slowly released the grit and grime Clifford had created on the truck. The seat was forever soiled, and we replaced it with another from the local salvage yard. But no matter how much I cleaned, the truck smelled, not a run-for-the-hills smell, but just enough last shards of funk that when someone new got in for the first time, they’d ask:
“What’s that smell?”
In spite of Clifford’s attempt to make the truck useless, I drove the Ford for years before it finally burned a valve. And Clifford’s last memento was scrapped.
Although Clifford’s health improved, some stains don’t wash out easily. Diabetes even made it necessary to remove one of his legs. After the surgery he developed pneumonia and died. He was fifty-seven.
