Strong Street and the Cemetary

This is the Hoffman house which was right before our corner on North Strong Street.  Mr. Hoffman was quite the gardener and he first built a basement house and then built the house on top of it, but they lived in the basement for about a year.

 And here is the N. Strong Street sign.  We were so proud when they put it up because it made us think we were really important.

When we lived here we had a bare board one story house with a cracked cement front slab porch.  There were 2 big catalpa trees in front one of which we could climb and survey our kingdom.  This is the same place under the Catalpa trees that Jake and I used to listen to the Grand Ole' Opry.

There was also a walking stick cactus on the property line between us and the Reinke family.  We used to push each other into it.  Ask me if those things are sharp!

 This is all that seems to be left of the Catalpa trees. Just brush.  I never see a Catalpa that I am not transported back in time.

 I do not remember where this house was located, only that it has replaced one of the houses on Strong Street, because they are all gone now.

Next stop is the cemetery.  This is the tombstone for my sister Josephine's little son that was born dead.  I was there when that happened, but I think I told you about that.  Jack Lamb brought the tiny casket to the house in his car.  We had the service in the front room of her house.  I remember the tiny little face and the tiny little hand holding his blue blanket closed over his little body.  He looked like he was sleeping.  That was so sad. 

In the corner of the cemetery to the left of the entrance in the front was a bunch of brush and in it was these tiny tombstones.  They are hard to read.  I used to walk over there on hot days and go to that corner because it was under a big tree and it was cool there.  I would sing to these little kids and in my photo album I have a picture of the corner as it appeared than.  I took a picture when my brother came back from Germany and brought me a Kodak camera.  Sixty years later and they finally cleaned out that corner and laid these few pieces of tombstones together in an effort to preserve it as it was then.

This is the only grave that actually survived the years.

And so I leave.

 Wildmead Cemetery will always be in my mind and the little friends I had that were my company when I needed them most will remain behind.  I always felt so safe in that place under that tree.

I doubt that I will return to that cemetery again in this lifetime, but it will always be a part of my heritage and while I did not know the kids in the corner I was accepted by them and I am sure some where in another place and time, we will meet again.

Only God knows what goes through my mind, but I am trying to piece it together and find peace. 

Nickerson on the Ailmore place.

Here we go down memory lane.  This first picture is Roy Keating's house just up the road from us.  Roy raised pigs, and I mean really big pigs.  I have rarely seen pigs that big.  They were black and white.  He also had a chicken house.  I gathered eggs while dad took care of the pigs.  Mother had told him what would happen to him if I got eaten by one of those damned pigs.

Going on past and then taking a left turn would bring you to Bull Creek.  Normally it was dry, but this spring it was almost out of it's banks.  This is the same Bull Creek of that bull frog episode that occurred with sister Josephine.  Made me want to get out of the car and wade like I did all those years ago.

 Right past the creek was the Rumble house.  I was surprised that it was still standing, but houses were built to last back then.  Mr. Rumble told me one time that if I learned the words to the song "Buttons and Bows" he would give me a shiny dime.  That was a fortune back then for a snot nosed kid, but so was the song playing on the radio.  I have since learned most of the words, but sadly no one wants to hear me sing!

 I think this is the Barthold house where I used to spy on the sisters drinking tea in their back yard.  Damn!  I know now what an obnoxious kid is, and I sure think I qualified!

This is all for today.  The computer is not wanting me to do this.  

Tomorrow I will journey down Strong Street and go to the cemetery.  I want to thank you for joining me down memory lane as I confront and exorcise my demons.  This is something I have wanted to do for years and knowing you are with me makes me stronger.

I love you all!

Off to a roaring start!

Well, I spent Saturday night in Lakin with Dona and Joey.   Woke Saturday morning and after breakfast we did errands and in due time were on the road to Hutchinson.  All this was well and good until we passed Macksville and Stafford.  Gets pretty few and far between for rest stops at that point.  Of course as soon as that happens the old bladder kicks it and demands attention.

To make a long story short, we solved that problem.  And then I had a brilliant idea!  On 50 highway just a ways past Sylvia is the house my grandma Haas lived in before she moved into Plevna.  Over the years I had watched it set empty and seen it deteriorate.  I had taken pictures of it from the shoulder of the road , but never gotten brave enough to walk up to it alone.  Today I had a partner who was going to help me!  So I pulled off the road and parked.

The prairie grass was waist high, but we forged onward.  I took pictures through the broken windows of the ceiling laying on the floor.  Time had taken it's toll of the old house and it was hard to imagine my little granny ever having been a wife and mother in that place.  

We walked on back to where the chicken house was.  It was in way better shape then the house, but not by much.  With all my curiosity sated it was now time to wade back through the grass to the car.

We arrived in Hutch just in time to wait for a freight  train to very slowly wend it's way through the crossing on Monroe street.  I thought I felt something tickle my neck so I reached my hand up and felt something that was not a hair.  I pinched it between my thumb and forefinger and looked down at a fat little tick!  Visions of a slow painful death from Lyme disease clouded my vision.  As soon as the train passed we drove quickly to Evelyn's house. (As quickly as one can drive when they do not remember where she lives.) In short order we were at Evelyn's and in the shower.

Next stop was sister Donna's house.  Donna and Karen have a new dog,  I forget what kind it is, but it is a tiny one that barks all the time and it is a very high pitched bark.  It is Pomp(somemoreletters) and it is the dog that guards the Queen of England.  It is black and white.

Now it is the next day and I have already eaten two times and am scheduled for another feeding at 5:30,  I went to Nickerson today and have a lot of pictures of the old places I used to know, but I can not download them to this laptop so you will have to see them later.  For now I am going to go do something even if it is wrong.

Have a good one.  More from the road tomorrow or the next day.

Currants are just pretty nasty tasting by nature.

Titled this and then thought I better go out and try one just to be sure my memory was correct.  Yep.  those currants are pretty nasty tasting things.  Well, that is assuming that it is actually a currant bush and not some deadly poison bush that the wicked witch of the west put out there to trick me with.

When I was a kid growing up on Strong Street, the fence row on the way to the chicken house was lined with currant bushes.  As I recall, they went from dead green to a kind of opague looking sort of amber berry.  Just in case I am wrong, I am not going to eat any more of those currants and if I do not wake up dead in the morning I will be very happy.

But if you think the currants are nasty, you ought to try a Gooseberry.  Now the mother in law was very proud of her gooseberry patch when she was alive.  I think it has pretty well dried up and gone to weeds now, because not everyone was as fascinated with those gooseberries as she was.  Oh, when Bret and Shellie were little tykes she let them pick gooseberries for her.  Being kids they had to sample their wares.  First one was kind of funny look, second one was a look of revulsion and the third one never happened.  Why God puts some of this stuff on earth for us to eat is almost more than I can understand.

Blueberries, Strawberries, Raspberries, Blackberries and stuff like that are good.  Eat one and you know immediately, but then try the gooseberry or the currant and just wonder why you did that.  Now I could understand if I was stranded 800 miles from a food source that eating that nasty stuff for survival might be necessary, but I do not plan on being that far from good stuff.

And then there is the Kale to consider.  Now if it is young, tender, organic Kale, I can eat it.  Course I rate it right up there with Lamb's Quarters.  When we were tender little kids mother used to round us up in the springtime of the year and walk the fields in search of Lamb's  Quarters.  We had to pick only the young tender ones and not the big ones.  Of course when one is picking little plants about 3 inches tall, it takes a long time to pick a "mess".  That is what is enough to make a meal.  Instead of saying "meal" mother called it a "mess."  We would take the stuff home, wash it good, and cook it with a little bacon grease.  Today I eat Spinach, but if I could find a bunch of Lamb's Quarters I would eat that.

And on the subject of bacon grease, it seems that the bacon grease we always ended up with was from some old boar hog and it was strong enough to stand on it's own.  If we weren't eating weeds and strong bacon grease, that mother of mine was seining for carp.  Now I do have to say this for the carp, that is a trash fish and I am damn glad I do not have to eat that now.  The only way that stuff was palatable was if she canned it and then in the dead of winter when there was absolutely nothing to eat, she would make patties and fry them in the rancid bacon grease.

Do not think for one minute that I do not appreciate all my mother did for me, because I sure do.  It is just that I have honed my culinary skills and now budget my money so I can buy the finer cuts of meat and the tender vegetables.  I drink homogenized milk because raw milk has tiny pieces of cream that used to get on my lips and I am a spoiled.

I think I will just stay out of the back yard and away from the currant bush and let the birds feast on the fruit.  I may go make me a Bacon Lettuce and Tomato sandwich with the thin sliced maple flavored bacon, store bought tomatoes, and fresh crisp lettuce.  Oh, and mayonnaise.

Be careful what you wish for: you just might get it. 

A Black Widow Spider by any other name....

This is a Black Widow Spider.  It is round like a marble.  This is the female which is larger than the male.  After she has mated with the male she kills him and eats a good portion of him.  I am scared of spiders of any kind but I am scared shitless of this mother!

I learned very early in life to spot this lady.  She likes to build her nest in dark places and behind doors.  Spider webs are soft, but the web this spider builds is very strong.  I can spot one.  I have lots of spider webs in the garage and around the yard, but this one is special.  When you look at it , it looks different than the little webs of other spiders.  I take a stick and catch a part of the web and tug just a little.  If it is a harmless spider web, it will break, but the Black Widow web is strong and will crackle when I tug at it.

By simple showing you this picture and telling you about this mean spider, I will have nightmares tonight.  I have managed to get through my life with out a spider bite or so I think.  I read an article once that told me how many bugs and such the average person swallows in their lifetime and I can not dispute them.  I can live with sharing space on earth with the harmless little garden spiders and even the one that lives in the front yard and carries all her babies on her body so she looks like a fur  ball until you step on her and 659 millions babies run off in every direction.

Now I do not know just what brought on this blog about Black Widow Spiders and I am not going to try to figure it out.  Just rest assured that this is one mean mother, so stay away.

And, oh yeah, sweet dreams!

A day late, but relative nonetheless.

I was about 20 years late getting into the fight for Gay Rights, but when I got on board I gave it my all.  Stonewall was nothing to me in 1969.  I did not know any gay people because there were not any in my world of western Kansas at that time.  Little did I know that my 4 year old son would open my eyes and make me see the injustice of discrimination.  Little did I know that less than 20 years later I would be not only waving the flag, but it would be one I stitched with care.  I knew nothing about PFLAG in 1969, but by 1973 I was a whole lot wiser.  By then I was single and working at the Red Rooster Restaurant with a little guy named Gibby.  Gib was a very good friend of my mother, so of course he was a friend of mine.  Gib was gay.

I had never to my knowledge ever even seen a gay person, but now I was friends with one.  And it was nice to have a male friend that I could go dancing with, or hang out with and not have to worry about a romantic involvement.  Then I started my journey  that has led me to where I am today.  I moved to Colorado in 1977 leaving Gib and my mother and siblings behind.  Soon after the "gay disease" reared it's ugly head.  In June of 1981 the CDC  published a paper about a strange disease that was affecting gay men.  And thus began the AIDS epidemic.  I am not here to give you a history lesson, only to tell you why I am where and who I am today.

Gibby was one of the first to die.  He is buried in an unmarked grave somewhere in central Kansas.  He is only one of many that received the same treatment.  Fear held us in it's paralyzing grip.  There was talk at one point of isolating the "victims".  The CDC scrambled to set up guidelines and finally succeeded in calming the fears, approving new meds and I am happy to say that now it is not even

mentioned as AIDS, but is HIV and it is a manageable condition.  I speak of HIV only because it led me to the gay rights movement.  

In 1983 I married Kenneth and for the next 8 years I lived a fairly mundane existence.  This all ended when the religious right groups headquartered in Colorado Springs put forth Amendment #2 for the Colorado Constitution that basically stated that gays and homosexuals were to be denied civil rights protection.  This was on the ballot for the November 3, 1992 election. It was known as the "Hate State Amendment 2". 

It was worded in such a way that it was confusing to say the least and it passed.  Barely, but it did pass and the gay community was devastated.  At that time there was a catering business on Elizabeth and for some reason we congregated there.  We were all so disappointed because what this bill did was basically declare open season on gays.  The place was filled to overflowing and that night "Pueblo After 2"  was born.  We knew that as gay and straight we had to band together.  As a straight person I could advocate for my gay friends.  Warren, David, Joe, Carolyn, and the list goes on.  Along with  Nancy and Jalia, PFLAG was born in Pueblo.  Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.  It was the local chapter of a national group.  

Events and times become confused in my little mind and I think I should have kept a journal.  But I did not.  I did what needed done with the help of my colleagues. Westboro never stood a chance with us.  Pueblo After 2 morphed in Southern Colorado Equality Alliance.  Southern Colorado AIDS Project was borne of the need to take care of our afflicted children.  

At some point in time I conceived the Pueblo AIDS Memorial Quilt which is hung at the Rawlings Library the end of  November through most of December.  World AIDS day is observed on the 4th floor every December 1 and I am guest of honor.  

We have come a long way, but there is still work to do.  I was given a lot of awards over the years, but none as prestigious as the mother who thanked me recently for giving her son the strength to acknowledge who he is! That is called "coming out" in case you wondered.

Kinda' makes it all worth it.

Let them eat toast

Back in the late 60's and the very early 70's I worked at the Red Carpet in Hutchinson, Kansas.  I think I was there a total of 6 or 7 years.  My mind does not retain dates well at all.  The point was that I was not married to Duane any more and needed to work to feed 5 kids.  I was cook, kitchen manager and baker.  I decorated cakes as a side job for extra money.  I also worked in the Bakery down on South Main.  I did that at night.

Any way, if you know anything about restaurant work, you know that it all revolves around the cook.  If the cook does not like you, the orders are slow coming out of the kitchen and might not look quite as neat as other orders, so it is a good idea to stay on the good side of the cook.  My waitresses loved me.  Any excuse for a holiday was reason to shower gifts on Lou.  One birthday I was sent to Wichita to the Charlie Pride concert because I loved that man!  Also that entailed a plethora of 8 track tapes being bought and delivered to my hand by my workers.  I miss the 8 track players.

This morning I lay in my bed remembering those days.  And I remembered that one birthday they gave me a 4 slice toaster because I had mentioned that my toaster no longer worked.  It was a very nice toaster, all shiny and clean.  As luck would have it I kept my empty freezer full of bread because that was more efficient than running an empty freezer.  And bread was cheap.  I think it was 5 loaves for $1.00.

I also had a live in babysitter.  Her name was Janice and she was married to the boss's son who was in Viet Nam at the time.  That is a whole 'nuther story.  She was not the most ambitious person I had encountered, but she did keep the kids off the streets at night.

My regular shift was 5:00 AM-2:00 PM.  Then I came home and had a nap and went to work at the bakery at 10:00PM-till the bread was all sliced and sacked.  On Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday I came back to the restaurant and was back up cook, dish washer, salad girl, or whatever needed to be done.  This one particular night, after I received the toaster, I worked backup.  So I was there from 5-10 and then at the bakery until 11:30.

When I drug myself home, it was almost midnight.  The house was dark and everyone asleep.  I let myself in the back door  and flipped on the light over the kitchen sink.  My eyes fell on a plate full of toast on the counter.  And then another!  The whole counter on both sides of the sink was filled with plates full of toast.  So was the kitchen table!  And the stove!  And the wash machine!

I was still staring at the piles of toast when Sammy came out of the bedroom rubbing his eyes.  He came over and hugged me.  Then the mystery was solved when he said,

"I made you supper!  I ran out of butter, but I thought you could get some more tomorrow."

It is 50 some odd years later and I still remember the look on his face.  He had made supper for him momma.  He was so proud.  I am not sure just how much toast he thought I could hold, but this was a bonding moment.  He and I were alone in the half lit kitchen while his sisters slept and we ate dry toast in the middle of the night.  Probably the best mid night snack I have ever had.

I do not remember what became of all that toast, but I am sure some where there were birds that enjoyed a feast.  (At that time we did not know that commercial bread was not good for ducks, and crows and other feathered things.)

I kind of miss the good old days with the kids, but I rather imagine they are glad those days are behind them.  But just for old time sake I think I will go make a piece of toast for my breakfast.  I actually have butter!