Storytelling

Learning to Knit for a Total Beginner: starting with the Basics

I am teaching myself knitting

This is the first challenge I’m facing. My precious little lapdog is very needy. He’s just realized how much he always wanted to knit.

I went for a couple of sessions of knitting class just before the COVID shutdown. I managed to cast on and do a couple of rows in the first class. We were instructed to do a few more practice rows before the next class. I waited to continue until right before the next class. Everything I had struggled to learn in class abandoned me. Bud offered to help me after studying what I’d done. When I got back, the instructor was impressed. “You can help me teach this class.”

I had to fess up, Bud did the work I was showing. I plugged on through the class making no progress. COVID cancelled the class. I wasn’t sorry.

Anyway. I am giving it another shot. I gathered my supplies, found a Youtube tutor and set to it. So far, I did moderately fair with casting on. Time to go back and study the Tutorial so more.

A Spoonful of Sugar

goat poopI think I’ve mentioned my cousin Corwin was interesting. He was still hauling his bottle around when he started school. His teacher made him leave it at home, so first thing after getting off the bus, he’d get his bottle out of the cabinet, fill it up, and enjoy it along with his after school snack. A hearty eater, he’d grab up a handful of Gravytrain Chunks out of the dog’s bowl as he headed out to play football with his big brothers. As a crawling baby, Corwin had started shoving the puppy out of his bowl and just kind of got hooked on Gravytrain. It added a interest to the game to see Corwin playing football with his baby bottle sticking out of his back pocket. One of his brothers or cousins invariably snatched his bottle and ran, passing it on to whichever kid was new to the game. The chase was on. Corwin carried a grudge to the bitter end and picked up a stick or rock and bash the bottle thief’s head in long after the game of “Keepaway” concluded. His older brothers felt this bit of info was on a “need to know” basis, so new kids had to find out the hard way.

When he was about five or six, Corwin decided it was funny to pee the space heater. He’d fall all over himself to beat his mama in the front door, drop his pants, and spray the open flame with a stinking deluge that spattered, steamed, and spewed up the whole house. As he sprayed from side to side, kids would be scattering to avoid the stream. Should he have any ammo left, bystanders got it. His mother made a token protest, followed by, “I don’t know what makes that boy act like that.” Daddy told my aunt he’d hooked an electric shock to the heater, so Corwin would be electrocuted. She believed Daddy, so made Corwin give it up. I was sorry it wasn’t true.

Corwin was horrible. We all hated him. To make a long story short, Corwin was so darned mean, nobody would have stuck up for him. About that time, Daddy brought in some goats. At any rate, when Corwin saw goat pills littering the yard, he thought, they were chocolate M&Ms and gobbled quite a few before he noticed the taste was off. My brother and I made sure he had all he wanted. Seemed like justice.

Gnawful Cousin

My brother weighed ten pounds at birth. He was born in the car on the way to the hospital but that’s a story for another day. My cousin Eddie, a colicky, pint-sized baby, was about four months younger. One afternoon when Billy was about five months old and Eddie about one month, Mother and Aunt Bonnie put both babies on a blanket on the living room floor while they had coffee in the kitchen. Billy cooed and played happily while Eddie wailed incessantly, as usual. When they finished their coffee, the mothers went to check on the babies. It turns out Poor Eddie was crying for a good reason. Husky Billy who was teething had maneuvered himself around where he could gnaw on Eddie’s skinny little leg. The poor baby’s leg was red from ankle to above the knee.

Hard Time Marrying Part 28

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Emma spent the night and eased Anya’s concerns about baby care and breast-feeding.  If she thought Anya seemed less than experienced, she voiced no concerns.  “Don’t worry.  It’ll all come back to you.  After you’ve had six or seven, you’ll be nursing one, luggin’ one on your hip, an’ swattin’ one out of trouble without turning a hair.  You sure birthed this one easy.  You don’t look like you got child-bearin’ hips, but she didn’t give you a bit of trouble.  I got a lot wider hips than you, but when I had my Marthy………..”  Anya enjoyed the tenor of her friend’s conversation, but was lost in admiration for the tiny baby.  Her ears perked up when Emma moved on to a discussion of the baby’s size.  “I do believe that’s the smallest, healthy baby I ever seen.  My Melvin would’a made two of her, but he was a big ol’ lunker.  I swear, this baby could sleep in a shoe box.!” 

Joe looked alarmed.  “But she’s big enough, ain’t she?  I’m a big feller, but my ma never weighed ninety pounds and she could’a whooped a bear.”

“No, Joe.  She’s breathin’ fine, her color’s good, and she’s nursing like there ain’t no tomorrow.  This baby’s just little, not puny.” Emma laughed at his concerns.

Anya acted huffy.  “Now don’t go making my baby out to be too little.  Give her time and she’ll set you straight.  I ain’t never been big as nothin’ but I can take care of you two if you keep picking on my baby.”  She smiled and nuzzled its sweetness.

Emma laughed and Joe looked alarmed.  “I ain’t talkin’ against the baby.  I just got worried when Emma said she was too little.”

Emma threw a towel at him.  “I ain’t never said  nothin’ was wrong with being little.  I was just saying she’s smaller than them buffaloes I birthed.  I think that was right smart of Anya to cook up a little one.” They all got a good laugh out of that.  “I do believe I’d keep her away from other folks till she catches up a little so she don’t catch something.  What do y’all reckon on naming this big ol’ gal?”

Anya looked to Joe.  He thought long before speaking, “Well, if you ain’t opposed, Anya.  I’d like to name her after two of the finest women I ever knowed, Rose for my mama and Anya for you.”

Anya looked at him with love.  “I’d be right proud to call her that.”

Corwin and the Hog Dog

imageAunt Essie, like all of my aunts, was a wonder of fertility, if not child-rearing acumen, raising seven of the meanest boys outside Alcatraz. Thank God, her reproductive equipment gave out before she managed more. I thought Mother exaggerated when she said they’d all end up in jail or dead before they were thirty. She was wrong. Only four of the seven did jail time, and of these, one died in a bar fight after he was released at the age of twenty-eight. Most of rest passed their time boozing it up at Aunt Essie’s house when they weren’t begetting children or needed in jail. Contrary to Mother’s unjust prediction, all but one made it past thirty and one never went to jail.  The meanest of the lot turned out to be pretty boring. He opened a very successful auto body shop, married a good woman who got him in church, and became a deacon.  I hope Mother learned her lesson about being judgmental.

When Aunt Essie’s boys weren’t trying to kill us, they could be entertaining. Uncle July was an avid hog-hunter and was extremely proud of his Catahoula Cur Hog Dog, Catch. Out on the hunt, Catch would go berserk with hog lust and “catch” wild hogs by the ear, hanging on until commanded to turn loose; not a nice dog. Uncle July kept him penned up, sternly warning us away from the fence. Catch might rage through the fence, “catching” us by the ear.

Aunt Essie and Uncle July heard “catch” noises from the dog pen and were horrified to realize one of their angelic three-year-old twins was missing. They rushed out and found Corwin and the monster dog rolling around in the dog pen. Expecting to retrieve the bloody corpse of his precious child, Uncle July leapt into to the pen to find Corwin latched down on Catch’s ear, blood pouring from the tattered edges. When asked why he bit the dog, Corwin replied, “Dog bite me.” Corwin was fine except for a few drag marks.

Considering his tender age, it seemed premature to categorize Corwin, but he showed all the hallmarks of a psychopath. Energized and empowered by his encounter with “Catch”, his strange little mind focused on the unfortunate beast, making the dog’s life a living hell. Despite his concerned parents’ warning, he was soon back in the dog pen and had Catch cowering in a barrel half-buried in the dirt that passed for a dog house, howling piteously for rescue. Realizing he was no threat to Corwin, Aunt Essie and Uncle July abandoned poor Catch to his misery, knowing Corwin was off their backs as long as poor Catch was crying. Catch wet himself and ran under the truck next time Uncle July tried to take him out hog hunting, his spirit broken. Uncle July swapped him off to an unsuspecting buddy for a pirogue the first chance he got.

Surviving five horrible older brothers made Corwin and his twin Kelvin dangerous little devils. Their parents doted on all the boys, seemingly unconcerned about their reputations as hellions. When people complained about their bullying, their stock reply was, “What did your Johnny do to them?” artfully ignoring the obvious fact that the damaged kid was three years younger. Aunt Essie grieved because the twins would be her last babies, so she let them carry their baby bottles till the school put a stop to it. It was bizarre to see them coming in from playing football with their brothers, pull their bottles out of their back pockets, and fill them for themselves. They were fluent in profanity from the time they could talk.

As an adult, between stints in jail, Corwin lived in the dugout of the local ballpark. He’d worn out his welcome with Aunt Essie and his tippling brothers after attempting to burn her house down over their heads. He was forcibly extricated by the more sober among them, but did live to the ripe old age of forty-one. After the immediate threat of roasting in her bed passed, Aunt frequently mentioned letting him move back in, feeling he’d learned his lesson in jail, but her other boys had a longer memory and wouldn’t allow him back in.

Corwin spent the rest of his life residing between the ballpark, jail, and homeless shelters, except for brief stints with friends when he was flush with cash from his drug sales job.

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Biting Cousins

Cathy and Linda0001When I was about three years old, my cousin Cathy’s parents moved their tiny egg-shaped trailer house under a big shade tree in our front yard. It was about as roomy as a nice bathtub. Like any right-thinking parents with two tiny children, they quickly moved into the house with our family, leaving us with four adults, a six-year-old, a three-year-old, an eighteen month old, and two newborns in a three bedroom house.  The women cooked, cleaned and watched the kids together every day.  Mother said it was a great time.

Pictured above are my cousin Cathy and me.  She was much smaller though only a year younger than I.  She also developed a nasty habit of biting.  After I was bitten a few times, Mother told me to “bite her back.”  She didn’t specify how hard.

The next time Cathy bit me, I bit her just below the eye and hung on.  Cathy screamed and Mamas came running.  Still I hung on.  Mother told me to turn loose but I was too wrought up to hear her.  She had to smack me to make me turn loose.  It hurt my feelings.  “You told me to bite her.”

“I didn’t tell you to bite a chunk out of her face.!”

Cathy had a bruise showing all my tooth prints.  It turned from purple to green to yellow.  I’m sorry, Cathy.

Conquering Corwin (part 2)

imageAunt Essie got her nose out of joint when her little guys came home bringing tales of how badly Uncle Bill had treated them, so he didn’t hear from her till she fell on hard times a couple of years later. She had married her own fella named Bill by that time, strangely enough. This Bill was an affable enough guy, though he must not have taken time to meet the boys before they married. He’d also been married before and “wadn’ payin’ no child support to that whore of a woman after the way she done me. Besides that oldest ‘un never did look anthing like me, ner that little one neither, if you git right down to it.”

The long and short of it was, they needed to get the heck out of Dodge or her sweetie would have gone to jail. Like any landed gentleman of the South, Daddy had always maintained he’d provide a place for any of his sisters who fell on hard times. She magnanimously forgave Daddy. Over Mother’s furious objections, he set up a mobile home on their farm for Aunt Essie and her family. The situation went downhill fast. Aunt Essie wore her slippers to check the mail and slid down. She asked Daddy for the name of a good lawyer so she could sue. He told her she’d have to move if she sued him, so she changed her mind. Her Bill had a heart attack within a month of the time they moved there. He never worked another day, leaving them penniless until his social security kicked in. Guess who supported them.

All that aside, they had the added joy of daily life with Corwin. Corwin quickly dropped out of school, a reasonable decision, since the only thing he was getting out of it was a bus ride and two free meals a day. When he got suspended for harassing little girls, it was a relief to everyone in the system. Bill and Aunt Essie went somewhere in Aunt Essie’s car one day. Wisely, Bill took his keys, knowing Corwin would certainly take off in his truck the minute he left. One of Daddy’s horses had died three or four days before. As farmers do, instead of burying it, he hitched the dead horse to his tractor and dragged it as far to the back of his place as he could, leaving it to the varmints. Corwin had been puzzling over whether or not the varmints had gotten to the horse carcass yet. Corwin showed some industry in hot-wiring the pick-up, but not in driving in the muddy fields. He got stuck and had to leave the truck buried up to the hubs next to the bloated horse. Bill was livid when he came in and found his truck missing. “Where in the Hell is my G—D—- Truck?”

“Stuck in the mud on the back of Uncle Bill’s place.”

“What in the Hell is it doing back there?”

“I drove it back there to see if see if that dead horse was stinkin’ yet.”

“Well, what in the Hell were you gonna’ do about it if it was?”

Not too long after this, Corwin and Kelvin were found to be growing a lucrative crop of marijuana on Daddy’s place. It was a good time for the family to leave.

Playing Among the Headstones

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Sometimes we are fortunate enough to look past what lies on the surface and find pleasure in unexpected places.  Before our children started school, we decided it would be best if I put off working until they started school.  Most days, the children and I were home.  I rambled the lanes around our rural home were on foot pulling the little ones in a red wagon behind me.

We frequently strolled to a lovely old pre-Civil War cemetery with off a gravel road near our home..  The children were fascinated by the tall, graceful tombstones and loved running between them, seeking out their favorites with angels, little lambs, ornate curlicues, or crypts enclosed within wrought-iron fences.

In their exuberant innocence, they played happily in the deep shade under the ancient oaks, having no knowledge of death or its connection to their favorite destination.  Sometimes they sat in the sand of the unpaved tracks, playing with their trucks or other small toys.  To them, it was no more than a park.  As often as not, I spread a blanket on the grass for them to picnic on peanut butter and jam sandwiches, milk and cookies.

Later, they’d stretch out on the blanket while I read to them, sometimes drifting off for their naps.  Late in the afternoon, We’d walk home in the long shadows as they searched for little treasures of pretty stones, colorful bird feathers, or bright flowers or toss small stones from their vantage point on a small wooden bridge into the clear creek below.

I cherish the memory of those lovely afternoons and hope that the souls resting beneath that cool green carpet of grass enjoyed the laughter of children playing and the time we shared with them.

Dozens of Cousins

Neither Corwin nor Kelvin could be rounded up for this  cousin picture.  They had other fish to fry.cousinsAunt Essie, like all of my aunts, was a wonder of fertility, if not child-rearing acumen.  She had seven of the meanest boys outside Alcatraz.  Thank God, her reproductive equipment gave out before she managed more.  I thought Mother was just exaggerating when she said they’d all end up in jail or dead before they were thirty.  She was wrong.  Only four of Continue reading →