Bynum: the snake-wrestling grandpa

If you head east out of Fresno, cross the Kings river at Centerville
and then climb the first long grade into the Sierra Nevada foothills,
you will come to Squaw Valley. If you turn off the highway at the
Squaw Valley Fire Station, and take the narrow winding road up the
mountain, you will see a forty-foot trailer house perched on the side
of a very steep hill. The trailer sits in a notch carved out by a
bulldozer and has a big wooden porch built across the front of it. The
porch, with its railing, runs the entire length of the house. The porch
is twelve feet wide and decked with 2x6’s that are spaced one-half inch
apart. It is enclosed around the bottom by a concrete retaining wall
that is about five feet high on the front side and slopes up to less than
three feet where it joins the trailer. I am bothering with such a
detailed description of this porch because it is here, on and under this
porch, where our story takes place.
A fenced-in yard spreads out in front of the porch. An old oak
clings to the mountainside at the edge of the yard spreading its
welcomed shade over the homestead. Beyond the yard, the land
drops off into a ravine that is littered with broken piles of granite
rocks and manzanita brush; in other words, it is good snake country.
It is here that John and Mary Bynum brought together their
children from previous marriages and made a home for themselves.
The kids are all grown now and have moved on; but the grandkids
often return to spend time with grandma and grandpa.
John Bynum (who everyone calls Bynum) recently retired from
the Sierra School District as their trusted bus driver. He raises
parakeets now; but otherwise, has become a man of leisure. Since he
has become a man of leisure, he has also become an accomplished
babysitter – or as his wife, Mary, likes to put it, “Bynum has an
opportunity to get to know his grandchildren.”
One such opportunity came last Saturday when the grandkids
came up to stay for the weekend. The older two, Jesse and Theresa
were playing up on the porch while Bynum sat in his favorite lawn
chair under the oak tree with little Buster up on his lap. “Am I your
Buster, paw paw?” Buster, who was going on two, asked Bynum.
 “Yes honey, you’re paw paws Buster. Now hold still,” Bynum was
trying to buckle a sandal on Buster’s little foot, “ hold still ‘till we get
these new sandals on. There, now you won’t get no more stickers in
your feet.”

A breeze eased its way down the mountainside under the growing
heat of a late morning sun and everything was going along just fine
until one of the kids dropped something down a crack between the
boards on the porch.
The kids came crying to Bynum, “Grandpa, we need to get under
the porch.”
“No way, Jose,” Bynum shook his head. “This time of year, there’s
liable to be rattlesnakes down there. You’ll have to wait ‘til winter –
they’ll be sleepin’ then.”
“I told you,” Jesse poked at his sister, “we’re in for it now.”
“In for what – with who?” grandpa asked.
“Grandma”
“Oh –oh, what is it you kids dropped down there anyways?”
Things got real quiet until Theresa decided to land the first blow.
“Jesse tried to grab it from me.”
“No sir,” Jesse said.
“He knocked it out of my hand and it fell through the crack.”
“I never touched it,” Jesse fought back.
“Yes you did. He wanted to tear it apart to see what made it tick.”
“Tick? Tear what apart?”
“Grandma’s watch.”
“What watch?”
“The little gold one.”
“Oh, no! That’s your grandma’s grandma’s watch. What in Christ
name are you kids doing with that one?”
“Playing dressup.”
“Dressup? Does your grandma know you have that watch?”
Ignoring the question, Theresa said in her best pleading voice,
“Will you go get it for us, please, grandpa.”
Now Bynum knew the answer to that question was ‘No’; but for
some unexplainable reason he could not quite bring himself to say it.
He tried, he really tried, but then he tried to slip around his

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granddaughter with, “How am I suppose to find a watch in the dark?
It’s dark down there, you know.”
“You could use a flashlight,” Jesse, who is ten, made a helpful but
somewhat sarcastic suggestion.
“Where is the flashlight, Jesse?” Bynum asked.
“In the kitchen drawer.”
“That’s right. And where do you suppose your grandma is this
time of day?”
“In the kitchen fixing dinner.”
“Right again. Can you see the problem, son? If we go to the house
for the flashlight, your grandma will ask, ‘What do you want with the
flashlight this time of day?’ And you know as well as I do that it
doesn’t do any good to lie to your grandma. (Bynum knew he had
them there.) The kids both hung their heads.

But then, that little granddaughter of his started bouncing up and

down with excitement, “I know – I know; I’ll take my necklace with
the cross and hang it down through the crack, so you can use the
guiding light of Jesus to find your way.” She was so proud of herself
for solving the problem. “Jesus will help us - right grandpa?” Well,
she had him there. They kept after him like kids do and finally,
against his better judgment, he gave in - like grandpas do. Everyone
was happy; except Bynum, that is.
Theresa, who is eight, took Buster by the hand and went up on the
porch where the kids had been playing. They knelt down on the deck.
She took off her necklace and lowered it reverently through the crack
between the 2x6 decking to mark the spot. She took Busters little
hand, closed her eyes, and began to prey.
Jesse helped grandpa lift the cover off of the crawl hole; they both
peered down into the darkness. “Get me that stick,” Bynum pointed
with his chin to an arm-long stick leaning against the house. When
Jesse fetched the stick, Bynum poked it down into the hole, probing
around and listening for the bone-chilling buzz of an agitated rattler –
he heard nothing.
Bynum has killed over three hundred snakes since he moved up
here. He usually kills one with a shovel by pushing the shovel blade in
front of its face. After the rattler strikes at the blade, its head will
drop to the ground as it draws back to recoil; that is when Bynum

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raises the shovel and chops off its head. It is one thing to face a snake
when you are on your feet with a shovel in your hand, but quite
another to be trapped down on your hands and knees - of even worse,
down on your belly, eyeball to eyeball with the poison fangs of a
ruthless viper that strikes like lightning.
Bynum dropped the stick down the hole and placed a hand on each
side of the opening – “Well, here goes.” He grunted as he lowered his
aging and ample body down into the hole, emitting a groan when his
knees settled into the dirt. He was blind. His eyes struggled to adjust
to the low light. “It feels like walking into a dark bar on a bright
afternoon,” he told himself. When his eyes finally did adjust of the
small amount of light that filtered through the cracks, he searched the
ground around him. After brushing the cobwebs from in front of his
face, he began to crawl.

Now the last time Bynum had crawled, he had been a horse (or as
Mary liked to suggest more like a baby elephant) and he had been at
the mercy of his ‘gitty-up’ grandkids, kicking his ribs with sharp little
heals and jerking at what little hair he had left; but, that had been on
the carpet in the house and had been fun. Down here in the dirt with
lumps of decomposed granite poking out of the ground to bruise his
knees and scrape his hands raw, he was not so sure about the fun –
especially if he was to come face to face with a rattlesnake.
Bynum searched the ground for snakes and sign of snake. “Who’s
idea was this anyway?” he muttered to himself as he crawled between
the piers. Near one of the piers, he noticed several tubes of yellowed
cellulose – skins the snakes had shed and left behind.
When Bynum ducked under the joist, he found himself looking up
into the bright red belly of a black widow. She was perched in the
center of her web, spreading her eight long black legs out and moving
her body in a pulsating rhythm; the web shook with her seductive
dance. The little brown spider, which was the male counterpart of the
black poisonous beauty, stood poised on the edge of the web straining
against the strongest urge of life itself. Finally, unable to resist her
alluring dance any longer, he made a mad dash across the web to
complete the mating, knowing full well that certain death awaited
him. Bynum picked up the stick and smashed both of the spiders up

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against the timber, smearing them out, leaving a ball of black and a
smudge of off-white juice on the stick along with a wisp of cobweb.

Bynum pushed on towards the eight-inch drainpipe that crossed

under the porch and lay directly in his path. He could get over the
pipe if he crawled all the way to the retaining wall; but instead, he
decided to take the shortcut and squeeze himself under the pipe
where he was. He reached back to retrieve the stick and used it for a
tool to dig away some of the dirt before he tried to slip through. He
poked the stick under the pipe and waved it around like a sword in the
hands of a blind man. Then, with his chin on the ground, he slithered
through, poking his head out the other side of the pipe. His old eyes
strained at the blackness and probed the murk for patterns of
diamond-back and movement of any kind - It was all clear.
He dug in his toes and pushed. He did fine until he got to his big
belly; sucking in his gut he struggled along, plowing through the dirt,
kicking up dust and scooping sand down his pants. He finally got an
arm through and was able to reach out and get a hold of one of the
piers. Inch by inch, grunt by grunt, Bynum drug himself free.
He got back up to his hands and knees and shook like a wet dog
trying to shake some of the sand out of his pants. He scanned the
scene: his eyes passing over barbed wire and fence posts stored down
here long ago; they came of rest on a rusty pair of fencing pliers. “So,
that’s where those went,” Bynum thought, “and I blamed the kid’s for
losin’ ‘em.” He chuckled to himself, feeling a little guilty. Bynum was
relaxed enough now that he began to feel the pain of crawling around;
his pants legs were full of sand that ground into his knees and his
back was aching.

A faint flash caught his attention. When he looked up, Bynum saw
the cross flicking on and off like a neon sign – it was getting close to
noon now and a spot of sunlight was shining down through a knothole
in a porch board – the crucifix was slowly spinning on its chain,
catching the light as it turned. Flick – flick – flick. He worked his way
along, one sore knee at a time, crossing the broken ground.
“Can you see the light of Jesus?” Theresa called down from above.
“Yes, honey, I can see it,” Bynum said.

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 “I knew he would help us,” Theresa assured Buster, who didn’t
really seem to be all that concerned.
Ducking under another timber, Bynum caught his shirt on a
protruding nail that ripped into the cloth and then gouged his skin.
“Ouch,” He gritted his teeth and said a few oaths under his breath; but
he shook loose and pushed on. Bynum has always been a determined
son-of-a-gun. Once he sets his mind to something, he stays with it
until it is done. They use to call him ‘bulldog’ Bynum back in his
football days.
Bynum is a good ol’ boy that likes to have a good time; he enjoys
being around people. He loves to listen to the old time music played
by the musicians that live in these hills. He shows up at the bluegrass
get-togethers down in Centerville, or the campfire goings-on at the
Music Farm up on Pine Ridge. He always brings his Panasonic tape
recorder along to record the music. You could call him a kind of a
local archivist, if you wanted to get fancy about it.
A few weeks ago Mary threw a birthday party for Bynum, his
sixtieth. His many musician friends gathered from all over the
mountain to make a contribution to the communal spirit of the day.
One of the musicians brought a big dried seedpod to the party; it was
coffee brown and rattled loud. The pod was a fun natural instrument
that many people enjoyed shaking along in time with the music.
It was this seed pod that Jesse spied lying on the porch railing
where it had been since the party. Jesse has a very active and
sometimes devious mind; so, he is always up to something. Hearing
grandpa crawling along under the porch, Jesse crossed the deck on
bare feet and snagged the rattle off of the railing. He turned to
Theresa, raised his finger to his lips signaling for her to keep quiet.
She grinned. He lay down on his belly on the deck and pressed his
head against the boards, lining his eye up so he could see his grandpa
through the crack. He held the seedpod ready.

Bynum reached the cross on his hand and knees. He reached out
and felt the ground below the cross. No watch.
“Did you find it, grandpa?” Theresa asked.
“Not yet honey, are you sure your in the right place?”
“Yes,” she said, sure of herself as usual.

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 “Well, it has grown legs then.” Bynum searched downhill figuring
that the watch probably rolled off when it landed. When he reached
around the edge of a pier Jesse shook the rattle.
Bynum exploded off of the ground and smacked his head on the
joist above him. His stomach was in his throat and he darn near
messed his pants if the truth be known. When he landed, he tasted
the blood from biting his tongue. Bynum’s hearing was turned up full
blast; he could hear his blood pumping through his veins because his
heart was pounding so hard. After what seemed a life time and about
ten seconds, Bynum took his first real breath and began to settle
down a little; his eyes swept the ground – searching. He heard a
board squeak above his head; Bynum looked up; he heard Theresa
giggle.
“Jesse, you little devil, you liked to scared grandpa to death.” The
kids laughed and so did Bynum – a little.
Because of his enhanced hearing, he suddenly could hear the
watch ticking. His hand followed his ear rather than his eyes and
there it was. “Got it,” he called out. He picked up the tiny watch and
pushed it down into his watch pocket. As Bynum turned around and
headed for the retaining wall; Theresa lifted the chain and Jesus
ascended into the sunlight.
While Theresa was busy with the necklace, Buster wandered over
to the open crawl hole, bent over and stared down into the dark with
his diapered butt stuck straight up in the air. He almost toppled in;
but, he rocked back and forth on his feet and flopped backwards onto
the deck, instead. Then he rolled over and sat up, dangling his little
legs over the edge of the crawl hole.

It came out of a cold-blooded sleep and was hungry. Its mouth

opened wide in a huge yawn; the fangs folding out, dripping with
venom; its sharp tongue flicked, testing the air. Sensing the presence
of warm-blooded prey, the snake moved out of a crevice, slithering
gracefully through the broken rocks. It turned towards the falling
light of the crawl hole, attracted by the pendulous swinging of two tiny
feet.

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 When Bynum reached the clay drain, he threw a leg up and over
the pipe; he slid clear over the top, falling off the other side into the
dirt. When the dust cleared, he looked up towards the crawl hole. He
saw the snake’s uplifted head measuring for a strike. Bynum was
trapped; the snake was between him and the outside. Fear seized his
heart, his guts turned to Jello. “Why didn’t I bring my gun,” he
moaned.
Then Bynum looked past the snake and saw Buster’s little
sandaled feet swinging. He realized in a flash that the snake was
facing the other way – preparing to strike at his grandson. His fear
turned to rage and he attacked.
The snake struck at the upturned sole of Buster’s swinging sandal
just as Bynum dove in a long low arch from the drainpipe. The snake
dropped to the ground to recoil just at the moment that Bynum
landed on it. He grabbed it behind the skull with fingers that snapped
closed like the talons of an eagle; and at the same time, he landed on
his chin – eating dirt. The rattler was taken by surprise and
contracted violently, thrashing around, beating Bynum on the arms
and about the head like a living ‘billy’ club. But ‘bulldog’ Bynum held
his grip.
Theresa poked her head down into the hole and Bynum yelled,
“Git back – you kids git out of here.” She jumped up, grabbed Buster
and ran for the house yelling, “ Grandma, grandpa’s wrestling with a
snake.” Bynum managed to get to his knees and held the snake down
with his weight; getting the other hand around the tail. With the
writhing viper in both hands, he somehow got to his knees and then to
his feet and was standing waist deep in the crawl hole when grandma
came through the front door with her broom in hand.
“What on earth is going on out here,” she stormed. When she saw
her husband with a writhing snake in his hands, Mary’s eyes got big;
she said with great control in her voice, “You kids get in this house
now.” And they did. When the kids were safely in the house, Mary
asked Bynum,” John, what are you doing?”
“Just cleaning out under the porch, babe, thought I’d save this and
give it to you for your birthday, He grinned, holding up the diamond-
back with pride, “What do you think?”
“Would you please get rid of it.”

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 “O.K., if you’re sure you don’t want it.” She answered by shutting
the door – hard.
Since the kids were crowded in front of the window with the
curtain pulled back, Bynum decided to put on a little show. Still
standing in the crawl hole, he let go of the snake with one hand and
snapped it out like he was popping a bullwhip; you could hear the
bones crack when he snapped its neck. Then, he swung the dead
snake around his head several times and pitched it into the air. The
kids cheered as it sailed across the yard and disappeared over the
fence, falling down into the ravine far below. Bynum climbed out of
the hole. He shook the sand out of his britches and dusted off his big
belly; then he naturally gravitated towards his favorite lawn chair
under the oak.

Jesse sat down at the picnic table under the tree and asked
Bynum, “How did you get that snake with your bare hands, grandpa?”
“Nothin’ to it, son,” Bynum said in his slow Oklahoma drawl, “I
just jumped on him when he was lookin’ the other way; but don’t you
try it. You chop off their heads with a shovel like I showed you.”
Theresa brought Bynum out a glass of lemonade. “I sure am glad
Jesus was down there with you, grandpa.”
“Me too, darlin’.”
She started patting down his pockets, “What are you after, girl?”
“The watch, grandpa.”
“Oh!” He had forgotten all about it. He dug it out of his watch
pocket and handed it to her, “Here you go, angel pie, now take it in
and put it back were you found it.”
“Thanks, grandpa – you are my hero.” She kissed him on the
cheek and ran away, laughing. A grin broke out across Bynum’s face.
Buster came waddling up and put out his arms; Bynum lifted the
little one up on his lap. Buster leaned back against Bynum’s big belly,
settling into his spot. After a while he asked, “Am I your Buster, paw
– paw.”
“Yes, honey, you’re paw – paw’s Buster.”
All the Bynum boys settled down out there in the shade waiting to
be called in for dinner.

Wayne Damron  2000