Marley Huie has always had a knack
for bringing smiles and making people
laugh. Born to a hard-working farming
family in Ropesville, Texas, Marley
was a pro at hoeing cotton by age
seven, and a budding comedian as he
strove to make his older siblings, Ronnie and Teresa,
chuckle as they walked the rows together, chopping
away the weeds that threatened to choke the cotton
plants. Working in the fields from sunrise to sunset,
Marley came to appreciate the value of having a terrific
sense of humor, which became a survival strategy. The
West Texas sun was merciless on those long, hot days.
It, and the hard labor, would have turned most kids into
bitter chumps, but not Marley. It inspired him to seek
the comical side of life.
In addition to humor, music played an important
role in Marley’s survival arsenal. In the fields, Ronnie,
Teresa, and he sang hymns and pop songs by heart.
In the evenings, Marley played the harmonica, Ronnie
strummed the guitar, and Teresa played the piano and
the flute.
As he grew older, Marley graduated from hoeing
cotton to driving the tractor, planting and ploughing the
crops. In those days, his tractor didn’t have a radio or air
conditioning. As a teenager, he was ecstatic the day that an
AM radio and a shade canopy were installed in his tractor.
In the plains of West Texas, farming skills and
abundant harvests are subsequent to Mother Nature’s
whims, and the unpredictability captured Marley’s full
attention. Crops often failed due to twisters, hailstorms,
sandstorms, flooding, and drought. Finding the humor
in those disasters was challenging, but it was the way of
the West Texas farmer. Marley listened attentively to the
conversations in the cotton gin, the gin café, and the
grain elevator office.
The talk amongst the farmers was
both entertaining and educational, especially about the
hardships and successes of farming. Internalizing all
this, Marley was profoundly affected, realizing that these
farmers kept their humor in the face of adversity, and
even when the current year’s production was minimal or
none. He determined that they laughed so that they could
keep enduring and continue placing their hope and
faith in having an abundant harvest the following year.
Marley was fascinated by all these life-enhancing
lessons; yet, he decided to leave the farm and pursue
a career in Sales. His friendly demeanor, his abilities
to build relationships and inspire trust, and his jovial
humor quickly catapulted him to success. Working for
various companies in differing industries, Marley rose
to the top in national sales achievements with each job.
Entrepreneurial at heart, Marley then owned multiple
businesses. In 2020, he sold the final one and retired. Soon,
he began the journey of writing My Socks are Dirty,
where he employs humor to laugh at himself, his health,
and the aging process.
Today, Marley resides in the peaceful Hill Country
of Texas with his devoted, loving wife, Laurie,
and their 82-pound male Boxer named Murphy, who was
rescued from the swamps and bayous around Houston.
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