Momma and the mink jacket.

 I recall the growing up days in Nickerson as the worst kind of poverty.  Looking back there are a lot of things I endured that were worse than the stigma associated with the Strong Street years.  Many times, I have longed for the security of that dilapidated old house with the outhouse behind it.  Through all the times of trouble and strife Momma kept food on the table and Dad kept the wood box full of wood to burn for both heat and cooking.  I remember the first butane cook stove we had.  What a luxury that was!  It was only used for cooking special meals.  But I digress!

When momma finished her course at the Salt City Business School, she found a job with Franklin Fee Investment Company.  She wore a dress to work and set at a desk doing desk stuff.  We finally moved from Nickerson to Hutchinson.  We first lived on Avenue A, but then Momma got a chance at a house on Fifth Street that she could buy.  We became homeowners.  At that point in my life, it meant little to me. What mattered most was the house next door.  It had an enclosed front porch and a sign out front that said, "Elledge Furs".  Inside the window stood a mannequin wearing a mink jacket.  Her eyes were blank as she stared into the abyss that was her life.  But that jacket caught my mother's eye!  

Mother went to Mrs. Elledge and made arrangements to pay money on that jacket "every time I get a little extra".  And she did!  We never missed a meal, but sometimes momma would pick up a little babysitting or house cleaning and that was "extra", so it went on the jacket.  We never missed a meal and at some point, the jacket was paid for, and it came to reside in our closet.  I am not sure I ever seen her wear it, but the glory of it was that my Momma had it and it was real mink!  She modeled it when she brought it home and that was the last I saw of it.  I will have to ask Donna whatever became of it.

The last time I went to Hutchinson, I drove down 5th Street.  The plumbing shop was a sewing shop and Elledge Furs, along with our house and the next few houses around it was now an apartment complex.  Dillons was still across the street, but it had gotten a lot bigger.  So much has changed since I lived there!  I recall an old adage, "You can't go home again".  Momma said that and you know what?  Momma was right!

Momma was always right!

Peace!

Depression rules this month!

 October and November are the two hard months for me.  Of course, when you get to my age there are anniversary deaths and birthdays every month.  And they occur in every month, but it just seems like fall and winter are the most prolific.  And then I have momma whispering in my ear to remind me that I am getting older.  I almost said I am getting old, but older works better in this context!  My mind is still fairly clear and for that I am grateful, but when I look back at the people who have left me, I get very sad.

Earl, Richard, Gene, Josephine, Jake, Mary, Dorothy, and of course, mom and dad are all gone, along with a myriad of aunts, uncles and cousins.  Just Donna and I are left to carry on the heritage.  I have lost track of all the cousins and their lineage.  I figure I am doing good to remember my kids and their  kids and those kids's kids!  I had a great granddaughter graduate high school last year!  I think I have 8 grandkids and 11 great grandkids.

Longevity seems to be a given in our family.  Either you pass to your great reward in your sixties, or you are doomed to a long and fruitful life.  Since I am now 81 years old, I am assuming I will be a centurion in the future.  Kenneth passed 20 years ago, and I have dated a few times, but I cannot bring myself to think I want to have another husband at this stage of the game!

I tend my geese and raise a garden.  I can my produce and bake and cook.  I drive myself to church and shopping and change my furnace filters when they get dusty.  I need to paint, but that is not happening.  I got the smoke detector down from the top of the wall, changed the battery, but cannot seem to twist it just right to put it back up there.  I am assuming it will beep if it needs to!  It will be much easier to turn off laying on the sewing table by my bedroom door!

Well, the day has begun and the geese want out of their house.  They need to forage through the weeds on the back acre looking for a stray grasshopper or a treasure trove of seeds.  I need to brew up a cup of coffee in my little french coffee press and get ready to face the day.

Momma always said that the old people are like the seasons when it comes to dying.  They either die in the fall like the leaves on the trees dropping to the ground, or they die in the spring, like the new leaves opening.

Momma knows!

Life in Plevna, Kansas

 It must have been about 1955 when I went to live with my grandma'a in Plevna, Kansas.  It was also the year I started high school.   Now there were only about 40 kids in the whole high school.  High School was on the second floor and grade school on the first.  But all that is irrelevant.  

What matters is that it was in this place I began my high school education.  Now, as luck would have it, the lady who lived right next door to the grandma's was the daughter of the man who lived next door to my home in Nickerson!  They also had an old car that ran pretty good and traveled back home to Nickerson a couple of times a month.  Mother made arrangements for me to ride with them when they did go to see her and father.

Now it becomes a little fuzzy in my mind, but I think the lady was named Elsie and I think she was blind.  I do not think they had any children.  All that is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. So once a month, I think, we would pile into the car and settle in for the 20-mile drive.  The man would fit the crank in the front of the car, wherever he fitted it, and give it a hard pull.  The engine would roar to life and he would jump into the car and as soon as the engine was running smoothly, he would retrieve the crank, close the hood, and prepare to drive the car.  It was when we traversed the road to highway 50 that the fun began!

He liked to sing!  I strongly suspect that he may have also liked to drink a bit!  Of that I am not sure!  But he did like to sing.  One of the songs went like this:

" Oh, I won't go hunting with you, Jake, but I'll go chasing women!

So put them hounds back in the pen and quit your silly grinning!

The moon is right and I'm half tight, life is just beginning!

I won't go fishing with you Jake, but I'll go chasing women."

His wife would try to hush him because there "was a child in the car," but he just sang all the louder.  He seemed to know lots of songs. but that is the one that sticks in my mind.

Sundays at our house were always special because we usually had meat of some sort.  Special was when we had a roast.  That did not happen very often, but there was always hope!

At 4:00 we would hear the car roar to life next door and momma would make sure my face was clean.  Then the horn would beep (ooga, ooga) and I would run out to the street.  The man would open the door, I would jump in, and he would close the door.  Then began the 20 mile one hour drive back to Plevna.  

I wish I could remember his name, but I don't.  Life was so simple back then!  Needs were few.  Pleasure could be found in walking barefoot in the hot sand road of Strong Street or running the back road to the sandpit.  Kick the can was the game of the night and the moon was the only light we had after the sun went down.

Go to sleep, all my childhood memories!  I sometimes long for the day when I can run out the door, jump in an old jalopy and go see my momma.

Peace!

Where did that girl go?

I found this picture among my souvenirs.  I think it was probably taken when I was in my senior year of high school.  For the record, I did not graduate high school.  I was too busy doing what I thought was more important, like dancing and "stuff".  After all, I had a job at some burger drive in and could bring home as much as I needed for cigarettes.  Looking back, I think I was pretty.  Even given that, I never dated.  I went to dances and had plenty boys wanting to date me, but I just wasn't interested in settling down or at least not until Earl Duane Seeger walked into the Crow Bar that night back in 1960.

That is me on the far left.  Looking at this picture makes me sad because I am the only one left setting at that table. He passed in 1994.  Larry and Maude passed in the last 2 years.  So that just leaves me.

So time marches on and this is a picture from last year.

 This is from the high tea last year and all of these kids are my great grandkids!  Not grandkids, GREAT Grandkids. I am the little wrinkled up old lady in the center.  These kids are capable of making me a great, great Grandmother! Where did the time go?

Mother called it like it is when she said,  "When you are over the hill, you pick up speed."

Rest in Peace, Momma.

 

Momma

As I look back down the road that brought me here to where I have lived for the last 40 years, there is one person I see that quietly shaped me into the woman I am today.  My momma.  She was the glue that held our family together.  She was a very proud woman.  I only remember her holding me a few times, but those were times when I needed held or I would have surely shattered.  Once was when the baby calf died and the other was when I lost my brother, her only son.  I am sure that hug was what both of us needed at the time.

My first memories of my life centered around the Stroh place.  Those were the good days.  Those were the times when dad worked and took care of us.  Momma belonged to "club" and attended once a month.  She dressed in her "good dress" and wore a hat.  Josephine and Jake were old enough to stay home but I went with her.  I had to set on the floor beside her chair and be quiet because children were to be seen and not heard and I seemed to be the only kid there.  The women discussed recipes and sewing and stuff like that which any 4 year old kid would not understand.  Never anything personal.  God forbid!

I do not know what my dad did for a living, but I am pretty sure it was shady because I have snippets of memory of a big 3 story house across the river and my dad went inside and left me in the wagon.  I was terrified of that big horse and some times it looked at me and snorted, showing his big yellow teeth, which added to my fear.  Then some time after that we loaded all our "stuff" on a hay rack and moved down the road to the other side of town to the Ailmore place.  It was at that time that Dad quit whatever he was doing and mother started cleaning houses for the "ladies" in town.  By this time I was in first grade.  Then, whoosh!  we moved again.  

This time we were buying the house on the other side of town.  Dad was share cropping with a man named John Britain.  Momma took business classes at Salt City Business College and then started working as a secretary.  Dad started running the Domino/Pool Hall up on main street in Nickerson.  In my Junior year we moved to Hutchinson and it was downhill from there.

The point of this is that through my life, my mother has been the one constant in my life.  She was always there.  She was never the "touchy feally" mother in the story books, but she was always the backbone of the family.  She made sure the food was on the table.  She made sure we had clothes on our backs.  She was the one that inisisted we go to Sunday School and then sit quietly in church.  My first communion was at her knee.  My first poem was published in some kids magazine and she bought it and kept it for years.  

 When I married my first husband and went to her with my first black eye, she explained that "this is a man's right and you need to try harder."  That was the only time she tried to guide me through my "wifely duties."  My method of dealing with my children when a husband hit them was much different from my mother.  "Divorce the a##hole!"

But I digress. This is about my mother and the examples she set for me.  From her I learned a deep and abiding love for my saviour.  Jesus Christ is never far from my thoughts and I do not make a decision without first running it by him and then thinking "What would momma think about this?"  Now granted, I do not always do what I know either one of them would recommend and I usually regret my decision.  Good Lord made the mistake of giving us "free will".  That means he lets us make our own decisions.  In those instances, I usually end up regretting my actions which brings into play the next lesson, "live and learn."

So here I set in the sunset of my life, thinking about momma.  I wonder what my life would have been had I actually listened to her?  She was a wise woman.  Compassion for other people and for the citizens of the world was paramount in her life.  I knew my mother loved me as surely as I know the sun will come up tomorrow.  My mother was wise and kind and when I would tell her that she say that I was prejudiced.  When I told her she was the best mother in the world she said other kids thought that about their mothers.  

But I do know this, I did have the best mother in the world.  She may not have been the best mother for other kids, but she was best for me.  God put me right where he wanted me to be to learn the lessons I needed. Some day I will get it right and be right up there in heaven with my sweet Jesus and my momma!  I may see a lot of people I know, or I may not see any.  It will all be revealed when the time is right.  

But until that day, I shall watch and wait, and I shall remember my sweet momma.  While I mourn my brother and my sisters that have gone before me and yearn for my grandmas and the grandpas I never knew, I am filled with anticipation!  Some one asked me once if I believed in the hereafter and Jesus.  I told them this, "If I did not believe I could not continue to put one foot in front of the other here on this earth. "  

My goal is my crown and my hope is in my salvation and all of that is centered around my saviour and my mother.

Any more questions?

.  

My very own Big Chief !

The kindness of my readers will never cease to amaze me!  Yesterday I heard the Fedex knock on the door which sounds much akin to a black limousine speeding past and throwing a body out the back door and into the street!  That has never really happened out here, but you know my imagination.  Those drivers and delivery people do not linger long.

Upon closer investigation I found a package on the milk crate.  Inside it was this:

Inside it was this: 

And for a closer look: There are 4 of those suckers!

Now some of you may remember that I wrote a blog on the Big Chief  tablets that I got for Christmas  back when I was 9 years old and how much I enjoyed the blank pages just waiting for me to fill them with my imagination.  Apparently Linda Kulp way up in Wyoming was listening!

Well, most of you know I have been through a rather rough spot and I want you all to know that the kindness shown by so many of my readers has touched me in a way this old tattered and leathered soul can not even begin to express and in ways I did not know was possible.  Beth Perry sent me a daily devotional that I read every day.  

I have had phone calls and notes from so many people.  Kind words over the phone with a simple "We are here for you" mean so much.  I will survive, but you all need to know this:  knowing that you are all out there and you all read or hear what I say means so much to me.  From California to Florida and Texas to Wyoming, I have the most empathetic and caring people in the world.  

Sometimes you may not agree with the words I write, but through this I do know one thing:  My readers are human and kind hearted people.  You may not be legion in number, but you are callosal in spirit!  Every day I get a little better and while I doubt that I will ever forget this experience, I will come through on the other side a better and stronger person not because of it, but in spite of it.

So thank you to all of you.  Know that I love everyone of you and some day soon, you will tap into this blog and I will make you laugh again, or at least smile.  Or better yet, remember the good old days when I made a trip to the outhouse in the middle of the night and had to wait with the door locked and huddled inside for daylight because I thought something in the dark was waiting to eat me!

I love everyone of you!  I thank God for giving you to me for just a few moments a day!  

I think my daughter said this but I always say, Momma said it best:  "What doesn't kill you will make you strong!"

  

Momma and the elusive hummingbird.

When I moved to Colorado from Kansas way back in the early 1970's, I left my dear momma behind.  Well, to be honest, I left a lot of things behind, the least of which was a string of broken hearts and many friends.  Momma had the key to the house and the restaurant and I had a husband and a 1967 Chevy.  But I also had hopes and dreams. The husband did not last long and he took the Chevy when we parted ways.  The hopes and dreams would never die.  

To make a long story short, I touched lightly on husband #4 and  then moved on to a single life.  Life was good.  I had friends and I had to work 2 jobs to survive.  My momma back home missed me and I missed home.  So once a year I would travel back and in the spring or she would ride the train to  La Junta.  I would pick her up and bring her the last 50 miles.  Once she traveled with a lady we both knew.  That was not a good idea!  

My momma loved the hummingbirds that live in Colorado, but not in Kansas, or at least I never seen them down in Hutchinson which is very hot and muggy.  It soon became her quest to see as many of them as she could.  I loaded her into the car and we drove to Beulah.  It rained and the hummingbirds stayed hidden in the trees.

By this time I had married Kenny and we lived on the mesa.  Momma really liked that. I had a feeder hanging in front of the big window in the front room and I could spot the little fellows all day, but dear momma was not so lucky.  She liked to set in my rocker in front of the window and work crossword puzzles while she waited for the tiny birds to appear.  My office has always been on the upper level and I have a clear view of the window, so I was the look out.

A bird would come to the feeder and I would call out to her, but by the time she finished writing the word in the puzzle, the little feathered creature had flown away.  Then she would set staring at the empty perch waiting for the colorful little bird to come back.  After a few minutes of staring out the window at nothing, she would go back to her puzzle and wait till I spotted another one and we would repeat the whole scenario.

We set in the front yard under the Ash tree and waited.  Of course as we waited we talked and the birds did not like that so they stayed away.  Her trips were always planned around the start of summer before it got to hot for the little hummers.  We did travel to Beulah a time or two and parked to watch for them, but by this time her eye sight was not as clear as it used to be.  I did get a picture of two hummingbirds and mounted it for her, but that was never the same.

As momma got older we worried about her riding the train alone, so someone would bring her to me.  At this point of her life she was now into my cooking more so then the hummingbirds.  When she arrived, she would get out of the car and in her hand she had a list of food she wanted me to prepare.  

"They feed me that crap out of cans and I do not like it."  She would hand me her list and my work was cut out for me.  It read like this:

1.  Tomato soup.  Not canned tomato soup.  The kind you make with tomatoes where you mash and boil them and put soda to take out the acid.  And made with milk!  Not water.  And I like a grilled cheese sandwich with that.

2.  Liver and Onions.  Calf liver that is floured and browned in the skillet.  Saute the onions and then put the lid on with a little water and turn it on low and let it steam.

3.  Cinnamon Rolls.  Made with yeast and flour and let the dough raise then roll it out and lots of brown sugar and cinnamon.  And let them raise.  Not out of a can!

4.  Chicken and Noodles.  Boil the chicken and make good broth.  Homemade noodles made with egg and flour and cut on the counter.  Not those slick things that come in a cellophane bag.

There were other things she liked me to fix, but those were the staples that she had traveled 400 miles and all day to eat and by the gods above I better not screw up those four things!  And light on the salt!  High blood pressure.  "You can always put salt in, but you can not take salt out, so take it easy with that salt shaker."

Yes, momma! My sisters swore the frozen stuff or the canned stuff was as good or better than homemade, but momma wasn't buying that crock!

I miss my momma and that is a fact.  I used to have a big family, but sadly I am down to only one sister.  When momma was alive I always went home, but now it just isn't worth the effort.  Course I am not a spring chicken any more.  I like to go see my kids, but this past year, I have not done so.  The pandemic, you know.  I miss that.  I miss momma.

I often wonder if I will ever get old enough to not miss her.  Probably not.  I think my kids still miss me, but I am wondering if I showed up on their doorstep with my menu in my pocket, what the reception would be!  First thing is that since there are no hummingbirds in Kansas, I would have to watch the crows.  As I recall those damn things were as big as chickens.

So I guess I will just set here and miss momma and wish I was young again and she was planning a visit.  We have to love them while we have them, because that is how life is designed.  And I wonder, if I had it to do all over again if I would do it different.  I kind of doubt it, because momma had a saying for every occasion and another of her favorites was, "Try getting that toothpaste back in the tube."

So there you have it!  RIP my mother, you are sorely missed!

Mama always said....

It is without fail that I wake up every morning to my mother's voice in my ear reminding me of something she thinks I might have forgotten.  Today it is the one about "If you can reach the end of your life and count all your friends on one hand, you are blessed."  Once more, I can see the wisdom of her words.  She defines a true friend as someone who carries you in their heart.  Someone who knows your deepest secrets and will take that secret to their grave.  It is someone one that you can call after months or years of absence and both of you are happy for the call.  Someone who knows the good and bad about you and accepts it as normal.

And this morning I counted. There is one in Kansas.  One in Missouri.  Those 2 go back to the Red Carpet so they are my oldest friends.  Now that Renate is back in my life, I realize that makes 3.  John Tenorio was #4, but he passed two years ago and has not been replaced.  His brother has pretty much filled that vacancy because I can bitch and moan to him and tell him my thoughts without him thinking ill of me.  Number 5 is solid.  I met him when I first came to Colorado and we have remained friends for all these years.  Now let me tell you about this friend.

I do not talk to him very often, but we both know we are just a phone call away.  And I know I can count on him to understand.  He was one of my first phone calls when I lost Kenny.  He called when his dad died and again when his mom passed.  Our first conversation in several years occurred about my Anthony two weeks ago.  He kept jumping ahead in the conversation with "Did you get married again?"  "Are you going to get married?" When he heard the outcome of the story, he was devastated as I knew he would be.  He lives in a pollyanna world where good things happen to good people.  That is not so in the real world.  The real world hands you happiness and just when you think it is alright, you learn it is not.  And that is why we need friends.

So, momma, if you are up there, and I am sure you are you need to know that the scrawny little brown haired girl you raised to be a full grown woman actually listened to you.  I do very little in this life that is not influenced by things you taught me when you thought I was not listening.  Your picture is the last thing I see when I leave my house.  There is another by my bed on the stand where the Bible should be.  I remember to cherish my friends. I do not lie, steal or cheat.  I try to treat everyone fairly.  I do not let my left hand know what my right hand gives away.  I love my fellow man.

I try really hard, but some days life just sucks.

South of Nickerson?

When dad worked for John Britain, it seems like the farm was South of Nickerson.  When I look at a map of anywhere, I immediately become directionally challenged.  Seems the only time I was sure which way I was going was when we pulled off of 50 Highway into South Hutch, crossed the river and drove North on Adams to mom's place on Jackson.  When we left Hutch to head west to Colorado, I was fine.  As long as the sun was in my eyes and I knew what time it was, I was good to go.  When we pulled into Pueblo, I was fine in my house, but when I leave, it is God only knows what direction I am headed.

So when I talk about across the river in Nickerson, I am pretty sure it was south of town.  The only time my dad had much to do with me was when he took me, and sometimes Jake, to John Britain's farm when he went to work.  It was not really a farm, it was an acreage that was used to grow crops.  The crop it grew was wheat.  When the rains came, there was a slough that filled with water and ran across the land.  Jake and I liked to play there and he built little wooden boats for me.  Jake was actually 4 years older than me.  I think his job was to keep me amused while dad was busy doing whatever it was he did.  I think it must have been either planting the wheat or getting the tractors and combines in running order for when the harvest came.

The day for going to the farm was always planned well ahead, as was the date of harvest.  I have always been fascinated with the wheat because that was at that time the mainstay of Kansas agriculture.  The fields would turn green in the springtime of the year and everyone watched the progress of the tiny green shoots.  They soon covered the ground and then began to grow upward towards the sun.  The fields were checked regularly for progress and soon the wheat would begin to "head out".   As it began to turn from green to an amber and then to dry, it was checked more often.  Dad would rub a head between his hands to determine several things.  One was how full the head was.  Another was how dry the wheat kernels were.  And then the time came that he and John determined that it was ready and harvest would be in so many days.  And then the work began.

The combine was greased and readied for the field.  Trucks were lined up and every man, woman and child had a job to do.  Dad and John ran combines.  Mother drove a truck.  I remember that one year she had to take one of the younger girls with her (I think it was Mary, but it could have been Dorothy.) She had to work.  Josephine stayed home with us younger kids.  Hell, she was just a kid herself, but that was back in the days when about the only thing to worry about was starving to death.  Jake carried fresh water to the workers.  He had to pump it with a hand pump on a well in the yard.  Somebody brought sandwiches at noon and again at night to keep the job going.  The process was slow and the old trucks crept into town and lined up with the other farm trucks to dump their grain in the elevator.  I never knew how they kept it all straight, but some how it worked.

Harvest is a damn serious business in wheat country.  I think now it has been mostly taken over by custom harvesters.  The farmers just have to be able to predict a year ahead to know when their crop will be ready.  They plant in cycles which vary by just a few days depending on who your harvester is.

Somehow it never left my mind and when I go down in the Spring, I watch to see how far along the wheat crop is.  If I go later in the fall the fields looked like they were raped.  And then winter the fields are barren.  I am not sure, but I think they used to plant in the fall and then graze cattle on it.  Then the wheat would "spool" and make double or triple the crop.  One seed would produce several stalks of wheat in the spring.  Not real sure about that because my job was to play in the dirt and watch the chickens lay eggs.

I have been gone from Kansas over half of my life, but some how I know life is going on without me.  Out here, I watch the chile pepper plants and the workers in the fields bending over in the hot sun, nurturing the plants that are so vital to this area.  Home is where the heart is and sometimes I wonder just where my heart actually lives.

It is a conundrum! 

Springtime means Mulberrys on the ground

Back in Nickerson, I bet the Mulberry tree is getting ready to spew it's harvest of the deep purple fruit on the ground.  Catalpa Beans, Walking Stick Cactus and the Mulberry tree are forever ingrained in my memory.  When I can not sleep at night, I often go back in memory to the house at 709 Strong Street.  I guess it was safe then.  It was momma's job to meet all my needs.  There was always something to eat 2 or 3 times a day.  We had electricity, but we did not use it very often.  Mostly we used an oil lamp because we were afraid we would wear the electric wires out or burn out the bulbs.

We had a sign that went in the front window for the iceman.  We could get a 10 or 20 pound block by placing the sign so the amount we wanted appeared right side up to the man on the road.  He would take his tongs and grab the block and bring it inside and put it in our ice box.  And that was what we called it, "ice box".  Momma always left the ice man's money on top of the ice box.

The door was never locked and I am not sure we even had a key.  If we did it was a skeleton key and it would lock and unlock our door and every other door in town.  If we lost it we could get another at the hardware store.  About the only time we ever needed to "lock up" was when the wind blew the door open.  Oh, yeah, and when the Gypsy's were camped outside of town.  Gypsy's were always camping out side of town.  We never seen them,but word spread fast when they were there, because the came to steal the children.  If it wasn't the Gypsy's after us, there was a pack of wild dogs attacking the children.  I do not know how any of us survived what with the Gypsy's and wild dogs after us all the time and in all fairness I must say, I do not remember anyone ever losing a child to anything except measles or diphtheria or something like that.  Oh, there was the incident of a man backing over his child with the car.  But no Gypsy's.

There were 8 of us living in a five room house.  We heated in the winter with a wood stove in the front room and a wood cook stove in the kitchen.  The pump for water was out back and it was the highlight of our live when we finally got a pump inside!  It was one that did not need primed and we could get a drink of water anytime we wanted one.  It was attached to a big sink that drained out the back of the house and onto the ground.  This was the favorite gathering place for the Muscovy ducks.  They were nasty creatures, but they laid eggs and foraged for themselves so we kept them.  I had 4 of them when I had my flock and I got rid of them because they could fly and they would roost on my air conditioning unit.  Nasty birds.

The cactus was on the north side of the house towards the road.  It was wild and unattended and you did not go near it without shoes.  It's sole purpose in life was to make me miserable.  There were 2 Catalpa trees in the front by the road.  One was friendly and easy to climb.  I spent many hours in it's branches dreaming about the day I would be grown and able to leave this place.  The other one was full of small branches and no way could we climb it.  Both of them produced big long green beans which I always thought we should be able to eat, but no way.  I do not know if they were poison or not.  When they dried out we could smoke them.  Or so we thought.  I lit one once and forgot to blow out the flame before I sucked on it and pulled the fire into my mouth.  Not a very bright move on my part and one that no doubt scarred me for life in more ways than one!

On the north side of the house about midway to the currant bushes stood the Mulberry tree in all it's glory.  Mother always promised that if we would pick a pan of Mulberry's she would make us a Mulberry pie.  I do not remember ever getting a pie, but neither do I remember ever picking a pan full of Mulberrys either.  I do remember climbing into the tree and birds attacking me.  I remember walking barefoot through the berries on the ground.  I do remember purple feet and hands and a purple ring around my mouth and I do remember Josephine screaming at me and whacking me with the broom for "tracking that damned mess" into the house.  There is a Mulberry tree up on South Road that I see throwing it's fruit on the road and I am so tempted to stop and pick a handful, but I have not done that yet.  Maybe this year I will!

Maybe this year I will stop and pick a few and stand there and fly away to a time and place that will restore my soul and fill the empty place in my life.  Just maybe.

Yep, I am one of Gooch's best!

These are the two that started it all!  This was their wedding picture.  Mom and Dad.  Christine and Reuben Bartholomew, January 19, 1935.  Or thereabouts.  The family record may be a bit screwed up.  The point is not that, the point is this is the woman who gave birth to me and the man who caused that to happen.  

My dad was pretty much a share cropper and did day labor for farmers in the area.  He had been in World War 1 in the Calvary.  I know this because he had a scar on his upper arm close to his shoulder where he had been bitten by a horse.  I am very careful around horses because I do not want one to bite me.  They must have been happy because they had a baby every two years right up until Dorothy was born and then they stopped that nonsense. 

Back in those days, the best anyone could hope to do was eke out a living and that is what they did.  There were 6 little mouths to be fed and 6 little bodies to be clothed.  Mom cleaned houses for the ladies around town and us kids kind of just existed.  There were two times during the year we knew we would get something new.  It goes without saying that one of those was Christmas.  Santa Claus could always be counted on to deliver to our house.  I think that might have been helped by our dear Aunt Helen and Uncle Skinny.  They sometimes came by about that time of year. But maybe not because my mother was very resourceful and hard working.  She raised chickens and rabbits and I learned  very early  how to gut a rabbit and I could then and still can now, wring the neck on a chicken and scald it and pick it faster then anyone else.  I digress.

The other time something new could be had was when school started.  We knew we would get a new pair of shoes and a new dress.  This is how the shoe thing worked; we got a new pair of shoes from the Sears and Roebuck catalog.  Our feet were carefully measured and they would be brown.  They would be lace ups and they would be leather.  And they would fit.  And they would last.  My shoes would be handed down to Donna when I outgrew them.  Donna's would go to Mary and Mary's to Dorothy.  There the cycle ended.  The shoes then left our house and went to God only knows where, but there must have been someone poorer than us!

Ah, but the new dresses were planned for the whole year preceding.  Mom went to the feed store in town for the chicken feed and rabbit pellets.  Gooch feed packaged their wares in a cotton bag with Gooch clearly marked on the bag.  Flour and sugar also came in those bags. Yeah,and corn meal.  About everything because the world had not yet become a disposeable entity.  Mother would buy matching bags so she had enough for one dress.  Then she would choose another color and pattern for the next go round.  She very carefully cut out one dress and sewed it for each of us.  That was our new dress for school.  Of course they were handed down.  

Of course there were also times when the Gooch trademark was placed not quite where it should have been and the "ch" or  "Go" might appear on the hem of the skirt, but Momma always tried to keep that in the back so we did not see it.   Now I gotta go on record here as saying that Gooch always had the best and that was their  logo "Gooch's Best."  That also went for the bags.  I sell on ebay and several years back I sold a big pile of the bags.  The bags were 36" x 36" and the least I got for one was $8.99 + shipping and I sold one to a lady in Korea for $49.00 + shipping.  I would love to luck into a bunch more of those.

Anyway, until I was grown and gone I was known as "One of the Gooch girls."  Until I was 8 I thought my name was Louella Gooch.  I did not give a rat's ass. My mother worked hard making clothes for us kids.  When I hear Dolly Partin sing her "Coat of Many Colors"  I remember my mother bringing home some leftover slip cover material from some place and making me a brand new coat.  It was corduroy and it was light teal.  I loved that coat and when I could no longer fit in it my heart was broken.

I also remember my mother and her "box of rags."  When our clothes reached the point where they could no longer be repaired they went to the rag box.  Mother would then carefully cut out the "good parts"  which were like the skirt and parts of the sleeves that had no wear.  These were used for quilts.  I have curtains hanging in my kitchen that I can point to and know that my mother had a blouse with that fabric in her later life.  Old habits die hard.  

The parts that were still kind of good were torn into strips.  A slit was cut in each end and they were linked together and rolled into a ball.  This was then taken to the "weaver lady down by the doctor's office, "  where they were woven into a rug of whatever length we had scraps to make.  We could come home with a nice rug for a couple dollars.  

When mother got something wool she was in hog heaven.  Wool was cut into strips about 3/4" wide and sewn together.  She then took her crochet hook and cotton twine and somehow crocheted the strips into a thick rug.  Wish I could remember how she did that.  

Sometimes she was Momma, sometimes she was Mother.  She was also Mom.  And later grandma.  She was the driving force behind the woman I am today.  Not because she made me who I am, but she emolated who I should become.  I wonder if someday one of my kids will sit at a computer and remember me with the same all consuming love that I still have for her?  We will see.

Hot days make me remember Momma.

Seems we are enduring another 100 degree day.  I can hear the central air and feel it blowing on my legs.        Makes me wonder what we did back home on Strong Street.  I do not even remember us having a fan.  I can remember going to Bull Creek and wading.  I can remember running down a sandy road to a sand pit somewhere.  I knew how to swim up until the time I was 15 years old and I fell over an underground ledge in Sterling Lake and had to be resuscitated.  No more swimming for me.  I did go to the YWCA and take swimming lessons just long enough to learn how to save myself.  I have never overcome my fear of water, but I have learned how to live with it.  I do not get myself into a situation where I am going to need to do the roll over on my back and float technique.  I just stay out of the water.

So what did my dear mother do to cool off on hot days?  Back in those days she cleaned houses for ladies in town.  She walked to work and then walked home.  Pretty sure she did not stop off at  the sand pit for a dip.  I can recall laying by the window and hoping for a breeze.  That did not happen often.  I remember in 7th grade she had a hysterectomy and she had a bed in the front room.  Seems back then if you were ailing or had an operation you could not recuperate in your bed, but had to be in the front room in case company came.  You never entertained in your bedroom.  It was for sleeping, not visiting.

For those of you who do not know, Kansas and Colorado are different in the way the temperatures fluctuate.  See, here in Colorado, when it starts getting evening and then night, the temperature goes down.  Colorado is not real humid so nights are cool.  In Kansas, the only thing that happens at night is it gets dark.  If it was 90 in the daylight, it is 90 in the dark   And humid!  On a hot day you can climb out of the shower and never know when you got dry.  And that towel you use might as well be tossed in the hamper because it will be sour before it ever air drys.

We cooked on a wood stove so that was added heat.  We did heat the wash water outside in a 3 legged kettle.   When we moved to the big city, that thing was left behind because we were going where there was hot and cold running water and we would never need that again.  Man I wish I had one of those today!  Don't know why, just wish I did.

We did not have dogs growing up.  I know we had a cat because momma had a canary and the cat ate it. A chirping canary can still send me into flashbacks.

I do remember setting on the front porch a lot.  We had two big Catalpa trees out front that shaded the house and gave us something to climb.  The bottom branches were worn smooth from our climbing.  Besides that the beans were what we used for cigarettes when we were playing movie stars.  That and climbing on top of the pig sty's next door and jumping from one to the other was our sole entertainment.  Momma had a fit when she found out we were doing that.  She told us in no uncertain terms that we were probably going to be "et by a hog."  But we weren't.  Would I do that today?  Hell no!  And there was a BlackWidow Spider that lived behind the door of the chicken house.  That could have bit us, too.  We did learn to recognize the web which crackles when you poke it with a stick.  The male is small and the female eats him or feeds him to her babies.  That is creepy.  Oh, and when the Preying Mantis mates, she eats his head.  Learn a lot growing up country.  Glad I never picked up any of those habit.

For now.....

This is a little family in the making, if you wonder what one looks like.

If you wonder what the life of Riley looks like, just take a gander at this little chickadee, all kicked back and taking it easy. 

 Now here we go just having a little peek at Grandma Lou.  This is the little angel that Grand Daughter Deven chose to weave a blanket and give it to her for Christmas.

And there she is hid behind all the toys that it is necessary for a tiny baby to tote around just to get through the day. 

And there is mom and soon to be dad.  I just wanted you to meet them.  I emailed her for the correct spellings on the names, but have not gotten an answer yet.  As soon as I get that I will formally introduce you to this little family who is slowly becoming a vital part of my life here in Pueblo. 

I do know the mom is Kimmie and her favorite food is Sloppy Joes!  I do know she is working on getting her Diploma and then going to school to make herself into something the Little Princess will be very proud of, and so will we!  Going to be there to see her walk up and grab that diploma and make us all proud!

Watch for them more in future postings!

This is my first sight when I set down to the computer in the morning.  Icarus has slept with me all night, but she knows it is morning and  the routine is same-o, same-o.  See that little picture just to the right of the cd's?  That is my momma and daddy when they were young.  That was a long time ago, but she likes to keep an eye on me even today.  So I behave.  Doesn't Icarus look crazy?  She is!

After I have been up a while the sun thinks it should come up also.  These two shots are looking Northwest out my office window.  Course I know the sun comes up in the East, but I like this view of the sun just painting the clouds a beautiful pink.  The tree on the left is a Cherry tree.  It will be covered with blossoms probably in the next week or so.  I planted this when we first moved in here in 1982.  It has never had a Cherry.  The neighbors in front have a Cherry tree and it is prolific, so I know it gets pollinated.  I think it hates me!

This is looking North out the living room window.  Contrary to popular beliefs those white squares are not flying saucers, but reflections of light fixtures in the dining room.  Feel better?

                                    

Now I ask you, with a view like this who would not want to jump out of bed and see it?  Colorado does have pretty clouds.  I just love clouds and these pink ones are especially nice.

OK, so here is the real crux of the matter.  I spend 50% of my time taking pictures and 50% looking for them on this goofy computer.  I try putting them in albums, but then I have the original picture, plus the album.  So then I think I will put them in folders.  I then have the original, the album and now the folder.  Oh, plus every thing I do is backed up in Document, HP, Picassa, Snapfish and no doubt the camera is storing them also even though I use a card and delete it after each use.  Now I heard that if I actually delete pictures then they will disappear from where I have sent them, ie; blog, eBay, etc.

So here is my solution, I am going to jerk out my hard drive and take it to the geek guy over on the highway and have a little talk with the boy.  He has got to be way smarter than I am.  Hell, if he can eat without running the fork in his eye he has me beat!

Ok, Icarus is down, sun is up, fowl are out of the pen, clock is announcing nine o'clock and here I set in my jammies.  Better at least act like I am alive.  I think the wiccan is coming to help me do something downstairs.  Right now I am starving!  You have a very good day and I will surely check in again. 

The Challenger Space Shuttle has exploded.

Yesterday marked the 25th anniversary of the disaster aboard the Challenger.  What were you doing that day?  I remember very clearly, I was cleaning house.  Now I do not remember because I never clean house and this was special, but there are somethings you remember because something else happened to remind you.  On the day JFK was shot, I made cinnamon rolls and cleaned a goose.  So January 28, 1986, I was cleaning house.

Kenneth had left about 8:00 AM to go out to the Eden yard with his cutting torches intent on cutting a railroad tank car in half lengthwise so he could make it into a rock trailer for hauling.  Daughter Debbie had come from town to help me clean house, more for company than actual work.  We got our coffee and then she remarked that the Challenger with the teacher was being launched and she would like to watch that before we fired up the vacuum.  So we set down to watch.

The astronauts filed by and waved to us and I remember feeling a sort of pride that America could do this and school kids all over our nation were watching the teacher lift off and fly into space.  The rocket raising over the cape was a beautiful sight, but then something did not look right.  There was absolute silence on the television and in my front room.  Then Debbie said, "Is it supposed to do that?" and I replied,  "Nah, I don't think so."  It was a life time before the man (Was it Walter Cronkite?) on the telly noted that something appeared to have gone wrong.

Thirty minutes later Kenneth came in the back door.  Of course we were still watching the reruns over and over, hope against hope that we would catch a glimpse of the Challenger emerging in one piece on the other side of the smoke.  Never happened.  Kenneth never went back and cut that tank that day.  He thought that might have been an omen, so he stayed home.  Deb and I rather lost our zest for cleaning house that day, also.

America took a giant step backwards in the space program that day.  Two years would pass before we tried again.  We had been kicked in the pants by a leaky "o" ring.  Ever see one of those?  The ones we used on the truck was about the size of a dime and just a very thin piece of rubber, open in the middle.  Ours cost about 7 cents.  Probably that was the most inexpensive piece on that whole rocket and for want of that tiny item, seven lives were lost.  Seven bright eyed pioneers of the great beyond that we call "space".

Some where in the back of my tiny mind, I am remembering a quotation.  Help me out here if you remember it correctly.  "For want of a horse, the rider was lost.  For want of a rider the country was lost."  Now, I know that is not right.  It may actually be a poem.  Bet my Sammy can come up with it for momma!

But you get the idea.  Another one Momma used to say was, "A stitch in time saves nine."  It all boils down to the same thing.  Make sure when you do it, you do it well and it will hold up for you.  If you do not mend your clothes at the first sign of a tear, you will end up having to do a real repair job on it later.

So there you have it.  Just some short musings of where I was 25 years ago.  How time flies!