I was born at Athens General Hospital a few months after daddy graduated from UGA and got a job teaching agriculture at Dearing High School. He also bought the small farm where I grew up, starting a business that would grow into 11,000 laying hens and selling eggs to most stores in the area.
The old farmhouse had an oil burning heater in front of the closed-up fireplace. That was the only heat in the house so winter evenings meant everyone gathering in that room to talk and stay somewhat warm. Bedtime meant burrowing down under thick homemade quilts.
Its tin room made summer showers a symphony of lulling sounds. No air conditioning meant open screen windows, flies in the house all summer and fans in every room.
The house sat on rock pilings that were picked up on the farm and stacked without mortar. If you looked closely you could see the ax marks on the hand hewn floor beams. One end of the house sat about four feet off the sloping ground but the other end was only a few inches off the ground.
The crawl space was a favorite place to play in the summer during the day since it was the coolest place available. Under there doodle bug traps dotted the dry dusty soil. Spiders were everywhere. And it was not unusual to confront the king snake that lived under there keeping us safe from poisonous snakes.
One of the best features was the wide porch that ran the entire length of the front of the house. Almost all summer evenings had us sitting out there shelling butterbeans and black-eyed peas.
The porch was also a gathering place on weekends when friends or family dropped by. It was not unusual for someone driving by to stop for a glass of sweet tea and discussions about weather, crops, children and other important issues.
There were not many other kids my age in the area. I started 1st grade at Dearing Elementary – one end of the same school building as Dearing High – with 25 in my class. That included every child my age in that half of McDuffie County. But on weekends it was not unusual to have cousins near my age visiting.
We spent the evenings playing while the adults sat on the porch. I had a big sandbox and we built castles and tunnels in it. The sand was dug by hand and transported by pickup from the aptly named Sand Hill Road. Catching toad frogs was an every night occurrence and we played with them like pets.
We designed our sandcastles and tunnels for them and put quart glass jars on tunnel ends for windows to see them. We also caught fireflies and either put them in a jar or fed them to the toads, watching the light blink inside the toads stomach for some time.
Rolling a roll-up bug in front of a toad usually resulted in a quick tongue flick and a missing bug. They would eat anything moving in front of them so the Mark Twain story “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” made sense to me when I read it.
I remember one night getting furious when an older cousin took one of my frogs and chased a vising neighbor girl up the road with it. We could hear her screams for what seemed like miles. But they were both interestingly quiet walking back! Turns out he was old enough to be much more interested in girls than frogs!
We had a big wooden platform near the porch where we often cut a cold watermelon. Mama had a big kitchen butcher knife and it was used to split the delicious cooling treat.
The adults used knives to slice mouth size chunks of wet, red, juice-dripping joy but we kids picked up our slice and buried our face in it. We were messy but happy!
When I was about 12 I talked mama into letting me use the big butcher knife to slice and eat my watermelon. And we both learned, I was too young to use it. For some reason after I finished I thought it would be a good idea to stab the rind with the knife.
When I did, the knife stopped when it hit the wood under the rind. But my hand did not. Slick from juice, is slide down the handle and on down the blade.
I can still see my hand as I opened it and saw the red gap running across my palm filling with blood. It was quickly wrapped and I was taken to the hospital emergency room eight miles away for my first experience with stitches.
Although growing up wild in Georgia was rough and resulted in many injuries, I survived!
I was born at Athens General Hospital a few months after daddy graduated from UGA and got a job teaching agriculture at Dearing High School. He also bought the small farm where I grew up, starting a business that would grow into 11,000 laying hens and selling eggs to most stores in the area.
The old farmhouse had an oil burning heater in front of the closed-up fireplace. That was the only heat in the house so winter evenings meant everyone gathering in that room to talk and stay somewhat warm. Bedtime meant burrowing down under thick homemade quilts.
Its tin room made summer showers a symphony of lulling sounds. No air conditioning meant open screen windows, flies in the house all summer and fans in every room.
The house sat on rock pilings that were picked up on the farm and stacked without mortar. If you looked closely you could see the ax marks on the hand hewn floor beams. One end of the house sat about four feet off the sloping ground but the other end was only a few inches off the ground.
The crawl space was a favorite place to play in the summer during the day since it was the coolest place available. Under there doodle bug traps dotted the dry dusty soil. Spiders were everywhere. And it was not unusual to confront the king snake that lived under there keeping us safe from poisonous snakes.
One of the best features was the wide porch that ran the entire length of the front of the house. Almost all summer evenings had us sitting out there shelling butterbeans and black-eyed peas.
The porch was also a gathering place on weekends when friends or family dropped by. It was not unusual for someone driving by to stop for a glass of sweet tea and discussions about weather, crops, children and other important issues.
There were not many other kids my age in the area. I started 1st grade at Dearing Elementary – one end of the same school building as Dearing High – with 25 in my class. That included every child my age in that half of McDuffie County. But on weekends it was not unusual to have cousins near my age visiting.
We spent the evenings playing while the adults sat on the porch. I had a big sandbox and we built castles and tunnels in it. The sand was dug by hand and transported by pickup from the aptly named Sand Hill Road. Catching toad frogs was an every night occurrence and we played with them like pets.
We designed our sandcastles and tunnels for them and put quart glass jars on tunnel ends for windows to see them. We also caught fireflies and either put them in a jar or fed them to the toads, watching the light blink inside the toads stomach for some time.
Rolling a roll-up bug in front of a toad usually resulted in a quick tongue flick and a missing bug. They would eat anything moving in front of them so the Mark Twain story “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” made sense to me when I read it.
I remember one night getting furious when an older cousin took one of my frogs and chased a vising neighbor girl up the road with it. We could hear her screams for what seemed like miles. But they were both interestingly quiet walking back! Turns out he was old enough to be much more interested in girls than frogs!
We had a big wooden platform near the porch where we often cut a cold watermelon. Mama had a big kitchen butcher knife and it was used to split the delicious cooling treat.
The adults used knives to slice mouth size chunks of wet, red, juice-dripping joy but we kids picked up our slice and buried our face in it. We were messy but happy!
When I was about 12 I talked mama into letting me use the big butcher knife to slice and eat my watermelon. And we both learned, I was too young to use it. For some reason after I finished I thought it would be a good idea to stab the rind with the knife.
When I did, the knife stopped when it hit the wood under the rind. But my hand did not. Slick from juice, is slide down the handle and on down the blade.
I can still see my hand as I opened it and saw the red gap running across my palm filling with blood. It was quickly wrapped and I was taken to the hospital emergency room eight miles away for my first experience with stitches.
Although growing up wild in Georgia was rough and resulted in many injuries, I survived!