By Dan Bodine

If this isn’t a patch of one of those bad-ass, prickly pear cactuses that’ve claimed North Central Texas as mecca of its holy lands, then it’s a sure “kissin’ cousin.” A favorite abode of rattlesnakes, too! (Wiki Commons)

You know how it is when something shocking happens to you in your growing-up years, and the event(s) become seared in your mind? Forever! Decades later recently, reading something on the wonders of Big Bend prickly pear cacti instantly flashed me back to just such an event.

It began with two teenage boys outside of Cleburne, Tx, in early 1960 — who’d been hired by a rancher to clear prickly pear cacti from his pastures one Saturday.

And ended not only with the discovery of the biggest damn rattlesnake surely God ever created, but also the death of a prized cow to boot. Simply because the snake scared all senses out of the two boys! Continue reading →