A while back I was reminded of a happening by my long time friend Clay Simmons. He, Kenny and I were making a mad dash from somewhere to Marble Falls by way of Hwy 281 north, with Kenny behind the wheel. What the hurry was escapes me, but we were always in a hurry.

When we approached the railroad tracks north of town the pickup sputtered as it started to run out of gas. Having a fleet of dump trucks we commonly had a barrel of gasoline tied off on the back with a pump in it, to rescue a stranded truck.

Rather than stop, at 90 MPH, I crawled through the side window and made my way into the back, and within seconds had fuel pouring into the gas spout without so much as missing a beat.

To demonstrate the my craziness, after getting sufficient gas in, I then crawled back in the cab, rather than wait 2 minutes until we stopped.

I’m not sure why that feat was undertaken, but maybe we were just trying to impress a young Clay Simmons. I guess it worked. He remembered it almost 50 years later.

The next time you run across Clay, feel free to verify this story.

Seeing this shared on a friends wall, made me think back to this story: What do they mean “Rode in the back of a truck”?

This truck reminds me of the pickup we we in that day, a 1966 Chevrolet 1/2 ton short fleet side that was green and white.