The tale of the country camel

By Staff
Leada Gore, Editor
The following column was written Sept. 4, 2003. As far as I know, the camel is still there.
Sept. 4, 2003
"I was driving down this road one time and I saw an elephant standing in the field," Greg said. "There was a camel, too."
I turned my head and looked at Greg in disbelief and then I just started laughing.
"You saw an elephant? And a camel? In the middle of a field in East Nowhere, Mississippi? I think you were probably seeing pink elephants that day," I replied.
Greg and I were in the middle of East Nowhere, Miss. headed to his mother's annual Eastern Star picnic. She was providing the dessert and had to be there early. Greg assured me he knew how to get to the picnic's location.
What he told his mother and what turned out to be the case were two different things. It was during our driving search that the story of the camel emerged.
"I swear to you," he said. "I was driving down this road and I looked to the side and there was an elephant. And then, when I looked again, there was a camel standing in a field."
While he was telling me this, he turned around and headed in the opposite direction.
We kept driving. And talking.
"Greg, there is no way someone would keep a camel, much less an elephant, out here. Are you sure it wasn't a horse or a misshapen llama? Are you telling me a story about a poor, misshapen horse who has been made fun of all his life because he looked like a camel?"
Greg pulled the car off to the side of the road and turned around again.
"I know that place is around here somewhere," he mumbled. "It wasn't too far from the camel."
I laughed.
"Oh look!" I said, "There's a dinosaur over in that field. He's standing next to a unicorn."
By now I was laughing so hard I was crying.
Greg pulled the car over into a gas station. He was laughing, too, as he walked in and asked for directions. I was stunned he was actually asking for directions. He got back into the car and nodded when I asked him if he knew where we were going.
He turned the car around and headed in what he now knew was the right direction.
We drove for about a mile when, off in a field, I noticed a large creature.
It was a camel. There was no elephant but it was most definitely a camel, not a misshapen horse or homely llama.
I have now seen it all. Greg stopped for directions and there was a camel in the middle of a field in East Nowhere, Miss.
The world is indeed a wondrous place.