Me and Jesus on a Raft With Crackers

As I get older and my brain begins to calcify, I find that odd things amuse me...things I never paid attention to before. For instance, Saturday, I participated in a three-way call with my mother and grandmother. The purpose of the call was to arrange my grandmother's visit to Phoenix. Granny always was short on patience and she hates red tape. When we got to the part about getting my grandmother to the airport in Cleveland and how we'd contrived sort of a bucket brigade of extended relatives to get her to the gate on time, she lost it.

 "Me and Jesus on a raft with crackers!" she exclaimed.

Ok, it's a flimsy plan. I don't fully trust Uncle Donald to show up at the Cracker Barrel on time for the second leg of the trip, either. But I couldn't respond appropriately to Granny's concerns because I was doubled over with laughter.

I'd forgotten how colorful Granny's speech can be. Coming from a rural area in the Midwest, she has an  extensive vocabulary of colloquialisms and homey expressions, of which "me and Jesus on a raft with crackers" is a perfect example. (I remember her yelling that at my uncles, who started a smoldering grass fire by setting off their stash of leftover 4th of July m-80s.) Any situation that causes Granny grief is ripe for a 'raft' reference.

 "What are you laughing at? What's wrong with you?" she cackled over the phone. "Sorry. Sorry Granny! What does that even mean? "Me and Jesus on a raft?" I asked, gasping for breath.

Nonplussed, she said she had to think it over and hung up on me.

She never did call me back but my father provided a run down on the phrase, as told to him by my paternal great uncle. As it turns out, "Me and Jesus on a raft with crackers" is a pretty complex little bon mot, filled with practical lessons. Such as:



1.) The situation is dire but not yet desperate. Unpleasant as being stranded on a mushy platform of boards, adrift in the middle of the ocean, without even a deck of cards, and carrying a passenger who (though benign) is also prone to talking in cryptic metaphors is... it could be worse. Your raft passenger could be somebody really awful like Britney Spears or *shudder* Mel Gibson.



2.) This is your raft and your problem. Whether or not you created the problem is irrelevant. Jesus can leave anytime he wants to as he can walk on water, but you my friend, are stuck. While some help is available, ultimately it's up to you to get yourself back on dry land.



3.) You'll need perseverance, ingenuity and a little help if you want to survive the ordeal. Jesus can replicate a lot of crackers with the loaf and fishes trick, but it's up to you to provide the fish. You're going to have to figure something out. How you do that is up to you, but you should probably get started because Jesus might have something more important to do.