I reckon what you want to know is
what I’m doing in here.
I reckon it’s because I killed somebody.
But I reckon you want to know
how come I killed somebody…
so I’ll start at the front and tell you.
I lived out in back of
my parents’ place most of my life…
in a little old shed
that my daddy’d built for me.
They didn’t want me in the house
with the rest of them…
so I sat around in the shed
looking at the ground.
I didn’t have no floor…
but I had me a hole dug out
to lay down in…
a quilt or two to put down there.
My father…
was a hardworking man
most of his life…
not that I can say the same
for myself.
I mostly just sat around
in the shed…
tinkered around
with a lawn mower or two…
went to school off and on
from time to time.
But the children out there,
they were very cruel to me…
and made quite a bit of sport of me,
made fun of me quite a bit.
So mostly I just sat around
out there in the shed.
My daddy…
worked at the sawmill,
down at the planer mill…
for an old man named Dixon.
Old man Dixon was a very cruel fellow.
Didn’t treat his employees well
or pay them well.
Didn’t pay my daddy too much of a wage.
Just barely enough to get by,
I reckon.
I reckon he got by all right.
They used to come out,
one or the other of them…
usually my mother…
feed me pretty regular.
So I know he made enough
so I could have mustard and biscuits…
three or four times a week.
But old man Dixon…
he had a boy…
name of Jesse Dixon.
