Z is for Zoo and Zealous

Okay, our family fits both of these.  The house was always a zoo with so many people in it.  We also were over zealous about everything growing up.

 Happy Little Sisters courtesy of David Castillo Dominici 

All of us would become so enthusiastic playing games that we hurt ourselves at times because we were laughing and cheering each other on and not paying attention.  This resulted in a few mishaps that caused nothing more serous than bruises or scratches.

Thinking back on my childhood, we were a bunch of crazy kids.  Something was always going on and we would get crazy over mundane everyday happenings.  Maybe we spent too much time on the farm, or maybe we were just a bunch of happy kids.  That had to be it because we had very little, except each other.

 Countryside courtesy of Dan

We don’t have those times today.  I almost feel sorry that things have changed so much and the kids growing up now will never experience the pure joy of all the simple things we had before technology took over.  We had to use our brains back then to think of things to do to occupy ourselves.  We never heard of computers, ipads, or cell phones.  We didn’t even have a TV until I was six.  It was black and white and had rabbit ears.  We didn’t have Dish or cable in those days.

I don’t remember when we got a telephone.  I think I was a teenager and we were on a party line then.  The phone was a big black one with a rotary dial.  I don’t think they make them anymore.

Today I’m a big computer user and cell phone user.  I wonder how we managed without those things growing up, but we did fine and probably were healthier for it because we played outdoors all the time and learned to make due with what we had.

I want to thank all of you for stopping by to read my crazy childhood tales during the past month.  It was fun reminiscing about all those times.  I’ll still post some more tales later, but will go back to my regular stories of my daily life and my cats.

Q is for Quiet

Life on the farm was never quiet in our house, not with seven kids.  There was always a commotion going on over something, unless it was the middle of the night and we were sleeping.

I think that fact is what made up my mind not to have any kids of my own when I grew up.  I was the oldest in this group and ended up doing many chores from about the age of six onward.  I changed diapers for my siblings, fed them bottles, and rocked them to sleep.  I also stood on a chair to wash dishes because I was too short to reach the sink in the kitchen.

All the noise usually came from our excitement over something, but there were times when we fought with each other too, but soon resolved our conflicts.  The only ones who could never wave a white flag and settle on peace were my two bothers.  They were never close and aren’t to this day.

Once we moved to town, we all had to watch it, if they were at each other about something, because shoes would fly over your head sometimes.  They hurled things at each other a lot in those days.  I’m surprised they never had any fistfights, but if they did, I never knew about it.  They were eight and eleven when I moved out of the house, so this could’ve happened.

 Sunset in the Desert - Sunni's Pics

I do know one thing, Mama loved kids and started taking in kids to babysit once we started growing up.  This shocked me and I hated it because I was glad for the quieter times.  I don’t know how she could put up with all the racket, but it didn’t seem to bother her a bit.  She would have made a good little old lady in the shoe with all the kids.

P is for Pasture

When we were kids, pastures surrounded everything, if it wasn’t cropland.  We could walk behind the house and come face-to-face with cow or two.  We always had quite a few cows, some were for milking and others were for meat.

 The corn barn was also located in the pasture.  After harvest season, we would pull the trailer out there and shovel corn into the barn for the cows.  This structure stood up on stilts with open cutouts for windows.  The cows would always surround the place looking in at us, hoping to get anything we dropped on the ground.  The guys would usually do the shoveling and we girls would get inside to scoot the corn around so there was enough room.  It was hot and humid in there.  We always had a bead of sweat on our upper lip anyway in the summers.  By the time we came out, we were itchy from playing in the corn particles.  Usually, it seemed cooler once we stepped outside, even though it probably wasn’t – just not a confined space anymore where we struggled to stay upright on the ears as they rolled around under our feet.

We dreamed up many forms of entertainment as kids, but it wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the ball games in the pasture.  We would all get together with our cousins and play baseball using the dried cow patties as bases.  We had to watch out for the fresh ones, of course, and make sure to run around them or jump over them when running the bases.  We had a few mishaps along the way but not too many considering how many of us there were.  I’m still not sure why we didn’t pick another place for the games and use rocks or something for the bases.  I guess it was a lot more interesting this way.

Brahma bull

Occasionally a bull would get out of the pasture.  When one escaped the fence, it was exciting and all of our eyes peered from the door or window while we watched for it to come running down the road.  We knew if we valued our lives to stay indoors while the men rounded him up and mended the fence.  Only one time my sister, Scherri, and I were out in the field when the Brahma bull got out of the fence.  He was the meanest one we ever had and we were both scared of him.  But this is a story for another post.

All of us kids could take pleasure in the least little thing out of the ordinary because nothing much happened on the farm.  The thrilling moments offered a great diversion from ordinary life.

We laughed, cried, and generally made the best of all situations.

N is for Nests

There are many kinds of nests on a farm.  Chickens nest, usually in the chicken coop in boxes filled with hay.  Birds build nests up in the trees in the spring, filling the air with sweet birdsong.

Courtesy Wikipedia

But there are also rattlesnakes, which we’d see occasionally on the farm, but never did see a nest of them.  Usually Papaw would come with a hoe and chop the head off, if Daddy wasn’t around to take care of it.

One thing we had plenty of on the farm was army ant nests.  These are mounds of fine soil with a hole on the top about the size of a nickel.  They were everywhere.  You never knew when you’d run across one.  I think the ants constantly weaving in and out of there broke the dirt down into the sandy texture.  The dirt on the farm was usually black and hard unless it rained.  Once the land got dry again, big cracks formed on the surface layer.

If one of these ants bit you, it really hurt and left a small red welt.  If you accidently stepped onto a mound, they were on your legs by the hundreds.  Daddy would pour gasoline or kerosene down the hole in the top and set the hills on fire to get rid of the ants.  This was an on-going battle and part of farm life.

Bushel Baskets of Peaches



Well I’m home from my little jaunt to Vegas to see one of my sisters.  Tired would not even begin to describe the state I’m in right now, but it was so very nice to see her since it’s been almost three years.

As you can imagine we did very little sleeping and talked non-stop to catch up before the time ran out and it was time to board the shuttle again for the airport.

I came home with laryngitis and blisters on my feet.  We walked just about everywhere we went and that amounted to about 8-9 miles a day.  I know this because she had a pedometer with her and keeps track since she went on her diet.

The only time we caught the bus was to go downtown to

Fremont Street

to “the experience” there because it’s 6 miles each way from the strip where we were staying.  The action there doesn’t get started until dark, so we both didn’t think it would be wise to walk the streets back to the hotel at midnight, or later.

Of course when I called my husband the night before we left, he said, “Are you sick?  What’s happened to your voice?”  But I know this was really a blessing to his ears since he thinks I talk way too much anyway.

But this was about peaches, so I better get to it.

I slept all weekend and today I was standing at the kitchen sink eating a ripe peach before starting to weed through all my email.  I wanted to watch all the wildlife in the back yard and also it was juicy and messy and this reminded me of a childhood story.

In the summers, when all of us were still at home in the sharecroppers shacks, daddy used to bring home bushel baskets of peaches once in awhile from one of the many fruit stands they had in those days.  My grandmother did have one peach tree in her yard, but between the thirteen of us kids (7 of us and 6 cousins) we could strip that tree in nothing flat so it was pretty much off limits so she could use the peaches for baking.

I think those bushel baskets of peaches used to cost about $2 in those days and I suppose that was still a lot of money when you lived on a farmer’s salary.

But they were the most delicious peaches you ever tasted!  They were huge, and very juicy.  Of course being kids everything seems bigger so maybe they were just ordinary size, although, I think the ones you get these days are smaller than the ones back then.

All seven of us would crowd around the big trash can in the kitchen and eat the peaches over that so most of the juice wouldn’t get all over the place.  Of course some still did because there was pushing and shoving going on in the process.

Now this may sound gross to some of you, standing over a trashcan of all things, but it was so much the norm for us to crowd around things all our lives that we thought nothing of it.  We were just delighted that daddy had stopped to get the peaches and we relished the sweet taste among giggles and oooh’s and aaah’s.

I’ll never forget those days and the fruit stands all along the roads overflowing with fruits and veggies.  I guess those are times gone by and people can’t make a living doing that anymore.

Of course I probably mentioned in an earlier post that Rosenberg Mamaw had a large garden, as well as the peach tree, fig trees, pecan trees and a mulberry tree, but we always bought 50 pound bags of potatoes and onions and bushels of peaches at the fruit stands.  I’ll write more about that garden later on as that’s a story in itself with all the remedies my grandmother had for bugs.