Wet Tobacco

Another weekend.

Back at the homestead.

Which sounds generous because at this point it's really just a clearing near the woods with the crustiest old camper you've ever laid eyes on. 

Which is why we were there. We needed to get that nasty old thing moved off the lot like yesterday to make way for my cabin. And I had found just the guys to do it. For free. Well, I hoped so. They agreed to take it sight unseen and let me tell you this is a SIGHT. 

I'd like to say that despite the years of mildew and mold and wear and tear of sitting untouched and unbothered, that it had good bones. But that's a lie. This thing is the pits. Top to bottom, front to back, not a speck of potential to be found. 

And that's before we even knew about the wasps. 

As Neil and I peeled back one of the chewed up wheel covers hiding the flat tire from view, a cloud of black and red instantaneously dropped down and began its angry swarm. Before I knew it, I felt the stings of a thousand needles penetrating my bones as I ran screaming, flashing straight back to Thomas J played by McCauley Culkin from the movie 'My Girl'. Dead in a coffin with hundreds of welts on his little dead face. "He can't see without his glasses!" 

Well, actually it was only two stings, and it didn't go to the bone and I'm not actually allergic but it FELT like it. We took shelter in Neil’s truck as I stopped screaming long enough to check my pulse, heart rate, blood pressure, my height, my weight, my ABC’s, and recite every US state in alphabetical order for good measure. Whew! I was gonna make it! 

Not 5 minutes later, the guys arrived. I had to fill them in. I had to turn them away. 

Bad news. Wasps. Mean ones. Pissed off huge angry red ones with an axe to grind. Oh and the tires? Flat. Destroyed actually. So if you wanna just leave and pretend you never met me I totally understand and… he cut me off. 

"We’ll take it. And wet tobacco on your stings will draw out the venom."

My first thought was wow. I could have told these guys that there were 4 rabid raccoons and a mother grizzly bear fighting with knives in the camper and I don't think they'd bat an eye. 

Second thought, eew wasps have venom!!? That sounds bad. Maybe I'm not as okay as I thought I was. Did my heart just skip? And these stings are swelling... 

And lastly I was like dude, you think I have wet tobacco? I don't even have dry tobacco. I haven't  touched or even seen tobacco since I was in junior high and my friend and I used to steal Marlboros from her older sister so we could sneak to the creek and pretend we knew how to smoke them. 

He must have sensed my glaring city-girl vibes because he handed me a cigarette and a half empty bottle of water.

Or was it half full?

Either way, I stood there grateful for this man’s generosity and… wisdom?

The optimist in me took the cigarette with a smile and thought about getting to work with my medicine man tobacco paste.

The skeptic in me pulled out my phone to Google this nicotine witchcraftery.

Not that I'm against witchcraft, I just know there's some nasty toxic stuff in those cigs and let's be honest,  I don't know this guy from Adam! For all I know he smears this stuff on paper cuts, broken bones, and bad marriages.

(Turns out, wet tobacco has actually been used for centuries on wasp stings so obviously this man is smarter than I am.)

So I slathered the shit on. 

I know you're probably wondering what happened next. Did they get the camper? Did her leg swell up to the size of a tree trunk and fall off her body? Is she addicted to nicotine now? Did Thomas J really die?

Well friends, that's a story for next time…. Subscribe now so you don't miss any of my homestead misadventures.