Storytelling

How to Get Your Yard Work done in Three Simple Steps

My dad had a fool-proof plan to get his yard-work done easily and painlessly (for him).  Let the leaves and tree debris pile up pretty high in the fall and spring.  Mention casually a couple of times, “You kids are gonna’ have to clean up this yard in a few days.”  Let a couple of days pass so they hope you’ve forgotten or gone blind.  Come home from work on Friday afternoon in a jovial mood.  This works best if you are normally a real grouch.  It’s best if one of your brothers is visiting and your kids ask to spend the night with Cousin Becky, Susan, or Joey.   Implement step #1 

“No, Y’all  have to clean the yard tomorrow, but they can stay with you if they want to help.”  

He was serious about them staying, always hoping to get a little of work out of them.  Even though there were no Einstein’s in our family, no cousin was ever that dumb.

“No, I am not staying!  I don’t   wanna’ clean the yard!”  They were in the car before the screen door slammed. 

Traitors!

Step #2   The next morning he’d roll us out at six am, anticipating a good day.  We didn’t talk much at breakfast, especially avoiding the words yard, sweep, work, and leaves.  It’s amazing how often a word jumps out when you are studiously avoiding it.  “Billy didn’t LEAVE any jelly for me.” 

“Don’t worry.  You’ll get all the LEAVES you want today.”  He made crappy jokes, playing on our dread.

Finally, he’d push his chair back, “Time for the friendships to end and the work to begin.”

I would have enjoyed flailing the genius from whom he’d picked up that cruel witticism.  He routed us into the one-acre yard where the lecture began.  “Now, get the wheelbarrow, rake, and yard broom.  I want all these sticks picked up first.  Then one of you can rake, the other sweep and the other pick up the leaves and haul them back yonder to the burn pile.  Now, I mean for this yard to be clean when I get home.”   

With that, he was off to whatever he had planned that day.  The task looked endless, with drifted leaves from dozens of trees, shrubs, and fallen sticks.  I would have gladly traded places with Sisyphus and his rock.

We had to fight a while before we got started.  Phyllis was the oldest, so she commandeered the yard broom, the prize implement.  Billy and I got stuck with the rake and wheelbarrow for loading and hauling leaves.  Of course, we had to fight a while before we made a good start.  Mother usually brought the little girls out and redirected us before she got back to her work of the day.

Step #3   Cleaning that yard would have been a huge job for a yard-proud person.  Three fighting kids cleaning a yard didn’t go that well.  The first time or two, we were of the mistaken belief we could make a pathetic excuse and get by with a half-done job.  Daddy was of the opinion that no well-balanced kid could get through a day  without a good whooping, anyway, so he was happy to oblige.  He frequently quoted, “I might as well whip y’all first thing in the morning and get it over with.”  A few stripes paid off handsomely in the next day’s efforts, and he had the satisfaction of knowing he hadn’t “spared the rod and spoiled the child.”  We were motivated to do the job right.      

Yes, indeed, Daddy knew how to get his yardwork done in three easy steps.  Just so you know, I am not advocating this plan.  

How Not to Get in Good With the Snotty Girls

imageAs I ran to the playground, I spotted my “sometimes friend” Betty Green deep in conversation with Rita Lawson, the principal’s snotty daughter. The choice of friendship each day was Betty’s. Her mother and mine were friends, so when when we we at my house or hers, chances are she’d be nice to me, unless she wasn’t.  I was a friendly kid and would have played with a rattlesnake. When Betty saw me running up, she turned her back, making it clear she didn’t want my company when she finally had Snotty Rita all to herself.  Ignoring her cue I tromped right in. “Wanna play chase?” They didn’t. They were both squalling and loftily resumed their tearful conversation, bonding over shared grief. It seems each had recently discovered the existence of a baby sister, dead and buried long before either of these two snotties were born. I listened in awe, caught up in the drama, knowing I had nothing to offer on the altar of their shared grief.

I rushed in and questioned Mother as soon as I got home. “Did you ever have a baby that died?”

No she didn’t. I had heard women whisper of losing babies. I had no idea what that meant, but it might be worth a try.

“Did you ever lose a baby?” She was hugely pregnant at the time and quite touchy.

“No, now get started on your homework. If you don’t have any, help me with supper.”

I recalled lots of homework. Remembering an ancient picture in a box in Mother’s closet, I prowled till I found it. Aha! This will surely get me in the dead baby club!  I slipped it into my math book, the first time that book had been opened at home that year.

Betty and Snotty Rita were still best buddies at recess the next day. I ran up, ignoring their cold looks, as I pulled my prize out of my jacket pocket. “Look, I have a picture of my dead baby sister. She died before I was born.” The sad image of an angelic baby in a white Christening dress, laid out in a homemade wooden coffin, her eyes closed in death was undeniable. Her black hair curled around her tiny face. They examined the picture somberly, giving me sympathetic looks as tears sprung to their eyes. I enjoyed their friendship for about thirty seconds until Betty turned the picture over and found scribbled, “Carrie Louise Perkins, born and died July 7, 1904.” I was out!!!

Now, That’s Lost!

Joe Crater, our neighbor, took his dog, Ol’ Boots and walked into the woods behind his house one afternoon intending to hunt squirrels for a while.  The woods stretched for miles behind his house.  It was easy to get lost, even for a fellow who’d grown up there, like Joe.  He didn’t remember leaving his compass home till he reached for it a few minutes before just before dusk that cold, fall afternoon. Rattled, he walked the direction he thought was home as it started to drizzle.  He thought he recognized a landmark in the distance a time or two, only to be disappointed one he reached it.  Finally, as dark closed in, he realized he was just getting more and more lost.  He’d expected to be home long before night, so he had no flashlight.  He only had his gun, his dog, and the clothes he stood up in.  He decided he’d better make a fire while he could still see to gather wood.  He gathered a sizeable pile of deadwood and fallen brush, knowing he’d make it through the miserable night if he could just stay warm.  Fortunately, his Zippo lighter was handy.  It was a long, wet night.  As soon as he could see well enough to walk without stumbling, he walked till the woods thinned enough to see the lights of a farmhouse.  He was so turned around by now, he couldn’t begin the guess where he was, but had no qualms about walking up to a stranger’s house and knocking on the door, after the night he’d just endured.  The dog must have passed just as bad a night as Joe since he broke and ran when he saw the house.  That wasn’t like Ol’ Boots.
Exhausted and chilled to the bone, he knocked on the back door of the stranger’s house, hoping someone would give him a hot cup of coffee.  A woman in a housedress, flannel shirt, and frazzled hair opened the door.  She looked like she’d been “rode hard and put up wet.”
“Where in the world have you been all night?” she demanded.  “I been worried crazy!”
After the night he’d just passed, he was in no mood for jokes.  “Lady, don’t give me no trouble.  I been lost in the woods all night and my wife’s gone be worried to death.”
She looked at him like he’d lost his mind.  “Joe, it’s me, Louise.  Where in the world have you been?  I was just fixin’ to send for yore brothers to go lookin’ for you.”
He was so confused it took some convincing that he’d stumbled up on his own house.

God is Great, God is Good, Pass the Beans

Our firstOur first photograph together.  Bud is little guy in back row on far right.  I am the diapered baby just in front of him.

Bud and I share a unique relationship stretching back to a time before I remember.  Our families were neighbors and friends long before I was born.   The two Bethea Brothers, Odell and Lou, worked in the shipyards in California during World War II with Willard Johnson.  When the three traveled home together after the war, the Bethea Brothers stopped off in Kansas and married Mary and Mildred Johnson, Willard’s two sisters.  Before long, the Bethea Boys went to work on the pipeline and moved their families to Northwest Louisiana, where my parents had settled.  The couples spent a great deal of time together, becoming friends for life.  The children of all three families grew up together.
When I was born, Odell, Bud’s father was working out of town, so Mary, his mom brought Bud and Betty, his sister, to help for a few days till Mother was back on her feet.  Mary often said afterward, she should have pinched my head off when she had the chance.  It probably would have saved him a lot of trouble.
Our families continued to be friends as we grew up.   When I was about three years old, I asked permission to “say the blessing” one evening when we were sharing dinner.  Both families reminded me for years that I bowed my head piously and quoted, “God is great, God is good.  Pass the beans.”
Before he started school, Bud’s parents bought a little place with a country store and a tidy little house they could rent till the owner moved it in a couple of years.  Mary ran the store to help with the expense of house-building.  The understanding was, they’d get plenty of notice.  Odell  began construction on his outbuilding so he’d have a place to work and keep his tools dry while building.  In less than six months, they got the news they’d have to vacate the in days.  Odell hurriedly got the building in the dry and ran power and cold water to it.  Lightbulbs hung down on wires for lights.  He set up Mary’s gas stove in the center and in they moved with their three small children.  An outdoor toilet was hastily erected behind the barn, a galvanized tub serving as a bathtub.  They ran lines across the rafters to hang quilts and divide the open barn into rooms.  Space heaters heated the cavernous space. Footfalls echoed on the bare concrete floors.
Bud loved living in the barn, likening it to a perpetual campout.   I was wildly jealous.  They often moved the quilt partitions to set the rooms up in different configurations.  The only thing never moved was the kitchen stove and heaters, since they were hooked to gas lines.  I was fascinated to look up and see the rafters and stars winking through the tin roof, my pleasure enhanced by the story of Odell bagging a large barn rat running across the rafters.  He’d gotten rid of the rat and the resulting hole was easily dealt with.  I hoped in vain for a rerun but was disappointed when the rats kept to safer quarters.  Life in that barn looked perfect to me.
One night, my dad and Bud’s Uncle Lou worked the late shift.  My mother and his Aunt Mildred decided they’d spend the evening with Bud’s mom.  His Aunt Mid had a new driver’s license she needed to try out.  It must have been a weekend night since we got to stay way past our usual bedtime.  Our departure was delayed by a light rain.  Mary dealt with the drips by putting a pot under the leaky roof, an entertaining solution to me.  Rain on the tin roof was rhythmic and lovely till the weather escalated and the constant lightning, reverberating thunder, and pounding of the rain on the tin roof became overwhelming. The wind whistled around the eaves, giving the impression that the storm was coming for us.  Though Mother reassured me there was nothing to be worried about, I wasn’t convinced.
Betty, Bud’s older sister used her time wisely by pulling out the family Bible and showing us the picture of the Prophet Elijah ascending into Heaven in a chariot of fire.  Then she threw in a few stories about Hellfire and Brimstone she’d gleaned from a revival meeting.  It seemed a perfect personification of the storm.  I was petrified.  Finally, the tortuous storm abated and the stars came out.  Aunt Mildred, a timid driver, waited till she thought the roads were dry enough she wouldn’t slide into a ditch.
The women piled six wide-eyed kids in the car.  Though I was afraid to close my eyes, fatigue got the best of me.  I was probably asleep before the car left the drive.  The next thing I knew, I was awakened by a crash, screaming, and blinding light.  We were spinning around in a whirlwind.  Instantly, I realized we were ascending to Heaven in a chariot of fire, but then remembered the Hellfire and Brimstone which I was pretty sure that would involve bright lights, too!
The screaming kids were slung off the seats and scared mamas rattled around in the spinning car till it came to rest in a ditch.  Kids were pulled out and a head-count confirmed we’d all survived.  Mother noticed blood dripping from her forehead and felt for damage, finding a bloody skin flap hanging over her right eye.  Realizing her eye was gone, she held a baby diaper to her forehead to staunch the flow and hide her injuries from us.  I remember seeing blood dripping on her yellow circle skirt and the diaper pressed to her head.  She was clutching my little brother Billy and had Phyllis and me by the hand.  For once, I was happy to do as she said.
The supernatural force we encountered that night was not from Heaven or Hell, just the son of a prominent business owner driving home drunk.  He’d hit us head on, despite the fact that Aunt Mid (Mildred) had swerved to miss him. We spun wildly, landing in the ditch. One of the neighbors heard the crash and came to our assistance.  Like all new drivers, Aunt Mid’s worst nightmare was having a wreck.  To make matters worse, she was hysterical when she realized she’d come off without her Driver’s License.  Her helpful neighbor flew to her house to get it since we were less than a mile from her home.  All was well with her license long before the officer got there, though frankly, in small towns, little things like drunk driving and lost licenses can be swept under the carpet.
While Aunt Mid got her problems squared away, someone took Mother to the hospital where she was relieved to learn her eye was undamaged.  Her blindness was caused by a skin flap from a cut hanging over her eye.  Fortunately, a few stitches restored her vision.  For a long time, she worried that her looks would be ruined, but the cut healed beautifully.  She did have to fill her eyebrow in with a pencil for a few months.  She’d always been proud of her eyebrows.  Incidentally, the blood stain did not come out of her pretty, yellow, circle skirt.
All’s well that ends well.  The drunk driver’s daddy gave Mother two thousand dollars in damages.  Aunt Mid’s car was repaired and she didn’t get a ticket.  Mother got a used automatic washing machine for eighty dollars.  We took a trip to see one of Daddy’s old Navy buddies with three hundred dollars of Mother’s settlement.  The washer stayed on the blink most of the time, aggravating Mother incessantly.  Daddy talked Mother out of the rest to buy a used sawmill.  He made money sawing cross ties for the railroad for a few months before the demand failed, then moved the saw home to sit behind the barn.  Many years later, a burning brush pile got away from him and burned it up.

Monogramed Toilet Seat

My mother often said, “If you have kids, you can’t have anything else.”  Well, she was wrong.  We had a new toilet seat.  After installing it, Daddy looked around, stared us down, and threatened.  “I’d better not see anybody’s initials on this seat!”  Where did that come from?  I’d never heard of anybody putting initials on a toilet seat.

I went about my business, that toilet seat and  initials, foremost on my mind.  I wrote LDS in my “Night Before Christmas” book, LDS in the sand under the big shade tree, scooped up some mud and wrote LDS on the dog house. Still unsatisfied, I heated the ice pick on a stove burner and burned LDS on a green Tupperware tumbler.

Feeling strangely unfulfilled and restless, I couldn’t think of a thing to do.  Billy was off somewhere playing with Froggy.  Mother and the baby were taking a nap, so if I stayed in the house, I had to be quiet.  I slipped in the kitchen to see if there was any Kool Aid miraculously left in the pitcher.  No luck. Dejected, I went to the bathroom.

There it was calling to me, pristine in its unblemished beauty.  The new toilet seat!!!  I sat down, my bare bottom luxuriating in its cool smoothness. I got up, locked the door, and turned the seat up. Making sure no one was looking through the window, I got Mother’s eyebrow pencil out of the medicine cabinet and wrote LDS in tiny letters where no one would ever see it.  Terrified, I erased my crime.  The finish was dull from pencil smears. My heart pounded!  I was caught!  I got tissue and buffed it off.  Thank goodness the shine was back.  Relieved, I sat on the side of the bathtub to catch my breath.  A nail fell out of my pocket and clattered to the bottom of the tub.  Never has the devil so possessed a soul.  Grasping the nail, I scratched BRS, Billy’s initials, on the toilet seat.  Horrified, at the enormity of my crime, I tiptoed past the room where Mother and the baby still slept.  By this time, Billy and Froggy had gotten back.  We were throwing mud balls at each other when I heard a shriek from the house.  “BILLY RAY SWAIN!!  You come here this minute!”  I didn’t need to go in to know what was wrong.  I heard “Spat! Spat! Spat!” and in a few minutes he was out, still snuffling.

“What happened?”

“Mother whooped me for putting my initials on the toilet seat. I told her I didn’t know how to write but she said, ‘Who else would put your initials on the toilet seat?’ “

How long could it be before she found the Tupperware?

Don’t Spin Your Greens, Granny (Part 2 of Multi-Function Appliances)

greens 2https://atomic-temporary-73629786.wpcomstaging.com/2016/02/04/high-efficiency-multi-funtion-appliances/

When you live in the South and visit old folks in the country, the first thing you have to do is admire their garden. You’re liable to come home with a “mess of greens.” For the unenlightened, greens include turnips, collards, or mustard greens. Boiled down low, with a bit of pork, and garnished with a splash of “pepper sauce,” greens make a delicious meal. A true connoisseur polishes off by sopping up the juice, or pot-liquor with cornbread. If you’re above the Mason-Dixon Line, try a roll.

That’s the happy ending. Now, we get down to the nitty gritty, literally. Greens have to be “looked and washed.” The first step is dispossessing the wildlife who habituate greens. Nobody wants to find half a worm or a cluster of bug eggs in their pot-liquor. You have to give both sides of each rumpled leaf a good look, wash, and then wash and rinse copiously.

I’d heard the glorious news that greens could be washed in the washing machine, cutting down tremendously on prep time. The next time Bud came in wagging a bag no of greens, I didn’t moan like normal, having recently heard the good news that greens could be washed in the washing machine. As usual, the basic information registered, not the total technique. I loaded the washer with dirty greens and detergent and hit the start button. Quite a while later, the alarm sounded, and I went to retrieve my sparkling greens. Alas, no greens remained, just a few tough stems and a few bits of leaves. A follow-up conversation with my friend revealed that I should have only washed them on gentle and not continue to spend.

Though I hoped he’d forget, Bud came in that night expecting greens. I feigned innocence. “What greens?”

It didn’t fly. “The greens I brought in yesterday.”

It’s hard to come up with an excuse how precious greens went missing. I gave up and told the truth, though I don’t like worrying Bud stuff with gets his blood pressure up. I’m considerate that way. “They went down the drain.”

“How in the Hell did they go down the drain?” I don’t know why he gets all up in my housekeeping and cooking business.

“They just did. Now don’t keep asking nosy questions!”

“Exactly what drain and how did that happen?”

“The washing machine drain.” I hoped if I answered matter-of-factly, he’d move on. I didn’t work.

“You put greens in the washing machine? What in the Hell were you thinking?” I hate it when he apes back what I’ve just said. I’ve told him it gets on my nerves.

“It takes forever to look and wash greens. Jenny told me she puts hers in the washer and it works great. I didn’t realize I wasn’t supposed to put them through spin.”

“Grouch, grouch, grouch @^%&( , #@$%! Don’t ever put )(^%&# greens in the washer, again.”

“Okay, okay. Don’t go on forever about it. I get tired of your nagging”

Since then I’ve been careful not to spin them. It works great.

High Efficiency, Multi-Funtion Appliances

imageI probably won’t have a lot of time for WordPress once I post this. Design and idea people will be beating a path to my door by tomorrow morning, or maybe even later today, once California gets this. Appliances should be multi-functional. I’ve already done my own research and can tell you some pitfalls, but the idea is great.

Ovens make excellent emergency dryers, but don’t do your hair.  Putting your head in the oven makes a bad impression. Properly done, ovens could be used for clothes, shoes, and other stuff you might not want, or be able to put in your clothes dryer. Also, the dryer might be on the blink. (Possibly from Multi-Function Appliance research) I do have a couple of cautions, however.  When drying your dainties in the oven, pre-heat it to a nice warm temp, then turn it off. Be sure to put them on a nice cool cookie sheet before you slide them in. When mine hit the hot oven rack they sizzled and melted.  Long crosswise burns across the butt was not a look I could live with.

I ran into a little problem drying my son’s tennis shoes in the oven before I’d worked all the kinks out of my system.  His only pair had to be dry for school the next morning, so in the oven they went.  It’s a lot easier to set the temperature higher than you think, believe me.  In just a bit, I smelled rubber burning.  By the time I got to them, melted shoe soles dripped to the oven floor.  Still thinking they could be salvaged, I worked the shoes free, hoping I could saw the drippy soles off smooth.  Didn’t work.  The toes curled up till the shoes looked like skis.  We ended up making a flying trip to the store with him in his socked feet, getting there just before the store closed at nine.

Bud was totally unreasonable about the whole situation.

to be continued

 

 

Pinch a Penny till it Screams

Cousin Kat was tight as Dick’s hatband, or conservative as she called it.  We learned early on stop by a grocery store before going to spend a few days at her home in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  Our first visit, she knew we’d be arriving about dinner time.  She insisted we wait and eat supper with her.  We were surprised to find she’d cooked a about a cereal bowl of full of beans, sliced a tomato or two and an onion, and cooked four chicken wings for herself and our family of four.  “I don’t eat much,” she explained.  “I don’t want to make a pig of myself.”  My fifteen-year-old son could have eaten everything on the table.  Then she stirred eight teaspoons of sugar into her iced tea.  About a half-inch of sugar settled in the bottom of the glass after she stirred.  Apparently, the rules did not include sugar.

We went out for breakfast the next morning over Cousin Kat’s objections.  The kids were starving.  It was buffet style, so Cousin Kat ate like a lumberjack, loading about six biscuits on her plate.  She wrapped the leftover biscuits in her napkin, tucking them in her purse, topping it off with packets of jam, honey, sugar, and butter from the table to take home.  “They put these out here for us!”

Afterwards, we drove twenty-five miles into Independence, the nearest town, to the grocery store.  Aunt Kat went straight for the reduced for quick sale bin where she loaded up a bag of battered fruit, several dented cans, some aged produce, and a taped up bag of flour.  Then she cornered the unfortunate manager, a guy she’d taught in Sunday School thirty years ago.  He paled when he saw her, obviously battle-scarred.  “Marty, how much do you want for this rotten fruit and bent cans?  Something has leaked on this flour.” 

“How ‘bout a dollar for the whole lot, Miss Kat?” he asked tentatively.

“Now, Marty.  I don’t think you ought to charge me that much for this flour and this rotten fruit buzzin’ with fruit flies. I ain’t sure I’m gonna be able to use ‘em.  These peaches and bananas look pretty bad and ain’t nobody else gonna buy this flour.  You’re gonna have to mark ’em down some more,” she countered.

He looked desperate.  “How much are they worth to you?”

“How ‘bout a quarter?” Marty looked hopeful.

“Well, I’ll give you twenty cents, but I’m coming back to see you if that flour’s bad,” she promised.

“Tell you what.  Don’t worry about paying.  I don’t want to see you disappointed.”  I’ll bet he didn’t.

“Okay, but I’d be willin’ to give you twenty cents.”

“That’s alright, Miss Kat.  Wouldn’t want to beat a good customer in a deal,” he finished gallantly.

I roasted a chicken, and cooked green beans, and mashed potatoes with gravy for supper that night.  We’d bought plenty of groceries, so getting enough wasn’t a problem.  Cousin Kat pulled the biscuits from her purse and made a small fruit salad from her finds of the day.  She ate heartily, since all those groceries were going to waste anyway.  She canned the rest of the fruit with the honey and sugar from the restaurant.

I Never Claimed to be Donna Reed!

My daughter zoned in on the Donna Reed Show when I started falling short in the motherhood department.  In case you don’t remember, Donna Reed was the perfect wife and mother, always prissing around in cinch-waist dresses with petticoats, high heels and jewelry.  She played bridge, called her friends Mrs. So and So, and kept an immaculate house.  If Donna had slipped in the mud, she’d have fallen daintily and ended up with a charming smudge on her cheek, whereas, I’d have busted my butt, ripped my britches, and farted.  No one would have been able to help me for laughing.  I could have fallen in a rose bed, and come out smelling like manure.

When Donna’s children lapsed into naughtiness, she’d rein them in with an understanding, quizzical smile, knowing they’d fall at her feet and confess because she was such a good mother. They only got in cute scrapes, like maybe accepting two dates for the prom or losing a library book, never anything involving calls from the school counselor or requests for bail. The queen of her home, effortless meals appeared on her dining table out of the air, no budgeting, shopping, or messy kitchen to consider.  Naturally, her handsome husband adored her.  Even though he was a doctor, it was clear he’d married “up.”

Donna never lost her cool when her children announced they needed a million dollars for a school trip as she dropped them off for school.  I have been known to be annoyed.  Should Donna’s kids want to eat what she’d cooked, she’d coax them along in the name of nutrition. If my kids didn’t want to eat what I’d put on the table, I told them, “Fine, that leaves more for the rest. It won’t be that long till breakfast.”  Donna was vigilant about nutrition, whereas,  I figure kids eat if they get hungry.

I can lay so many of my motherly shortcomings at Donna’s door, but thank goodness, she’s gone and I’m still bumbling along.