FOX OVER THE HILL !!!!!!!

FOX OVER THE HILL!!!
1619 Grand Avenue

There was a fox on the hillside! We were about 5 and 6 years old. "Mommy! We saw a fox over the hill!" Anne and I looked at each other, waiting for Mom's response. I was so excited I could have just popped! Never mind that we'd been terrified when we saw it. We lived in North Fort Worth on a hillside over-looking Jacksboro Highway. All of us played along the hillside that ran along the highway, and invented games as we ran in and out of the Johnson grass and the cane that grew wild to cover the hillside. All of us eventually outgrew that wonderful time. Each of us eventually arrived at an age where we were too old for that stuff. To us it had been the greatest adventure in the world, and the very best source of inspiration for inventing games to play.

Anne and I had been nosing around the hillside and were playing on an old sycamore tree that had fallen years before. There was no bark left on it and we were just inventing a new game, when out of nowhere a fox appeared. As I recall, it looked exactly like the pictures in one of our storybooks. Wasn't there a picture of a fox in Grimm's Faerie Tales or Peter and the Wolf, or maybe Peter Pan? We were terrified and both of us started screaming. You know, that high pitched piercing scream that little girls do? Those are the kind of screams that would surely set off sensors at Carswell Air Force Base and probably ionize the lower cloud layer.

Finally our next-door neighbor appeared at the top of the hill. At last! Someone was going to come save us. We continued to scream so he'd be sure to know exactly where to find us. Finally he was close enough that he could see us, and then he shouted, "SHUT UP!", and turned and walked back up the hill. What in the world was wrong with him? Couldn't he see that we were trapped and in danger? Why didn't he come rescue us?

The little fox just sat there a few yards away, probably wondering what we were, and how we could possibly make a noise just like an injured rabbit. I think we'd both stopped breathing, eyes transfixed on the monster before us that would devour us if we even batted an eye. After what seemed like forever, the little fox almost shrugged and then trotted off. We looked at each other and wondered if it was safe to run up the hillside to the house. Would the fox come back and chase us? We ran all the way back up, just in case. Whew! That was a close one!

Mom wasn't even surprised when we told her that we'd seen a fox. She said, "Well, it probably came up from the river to hunt for mice to eat. Somehow, it took some of the excitement and adventure out of having been "trapped" by a fox. It only wanted mice? Our older sister didn't believe it, and said we'd made it up, and then she poked her nose back in her book. Our brother got all excited and ran out the door to try to find it.

After that, we looked for the little fox every time we went to play on the hillside, but we never saw it again. We never forgot the little fox and it proved to be another source of invention for games to play until we no longer needed to be chased by a fox.

A little break from growing up history................

THE TEMPLE OF MY SOUL
Women never get too old to hate their bodies, and I hear it's a sin not to be satisfied with what God gave you. I am also told it's a sin not to take care of the "Temple of Your Soul", and I've always wondered if I'll be punished for being vain. What I mean to say is; I want to regain and maintain my youthful appearance because that's what society says is acceptable, not because it's the Temple of My Soul. There. Maybe that's the best way to put it.

If I'd really been concerned with The Temple of My Soul, I'd have taken better care of it from the beginning. Didn’t Scat Man Carruthers say that first? No smoking, no drinking alcohol, no carbonated drinks, no coffee, no sugar and no salt; no sun bathing no stress, get plenty of sleep, all the right foods, at least 8 full glasses of water a day, cleanliness, floss, floss, floss, keep the skin lubricated, and don't forget to exercise the mind and the body! That alone would take up nearly all of a person's time. Can you believe that there are actually people who do this?

So, I still hated my body. Always had; my teeth, my towering height, my small breasts, and my thighs, long feet ... Why couldn't I have had blue or brown eyes like my siblings. Why couldn't I have perfectly straight teeth like Mom had? I didn't just want to be like someone else, I wanted to be someone else. So, since I couldn't be someone else, I decided to make do with what's just me, never letting myself get over weight, and always staying active, which wasn't a problem for me. I'm certified A.D.H.D., so, keeping myself busy and "presentable" for 55 years wasn't all that hard. Looking back, I think that the Powers That Be really gave me good stuff to start with. I was very fortunate. I just abused the hell out of it.

Now, I've seen enough at 60 to realize that I should count my lucky stars for the healthy years I have remaining. What would that be? Ten, twenty years? Only God knows. I've been through quite a lot, as have a number of my peers. My particular wrestling match was with treatment for a disease I caused myself, using my "free will" to smoke. I was diagnosed early enough, cut on and treated with chemotherapy and radiation. With that treatment, I lost about 25 lb. that I really couldn't afford to lose anyway. I looked drawn and gaunt, and my eyes were sunken in. My belly button actually rubbed my backbone. No kidding! My treatment had to be stopped until I could re-gain some of the weight. One of my oncologists told me to drink as many as eight Ensures a day. I also couldn't have done it without Roy’s constant love, devotion and help. He fed me ice cream and took me to Denny’s to eat pancakes. My many siblings took turns coming to help, and bolster Roy. Finally, I gained enough weight to resume treatment. I am truly grateful to have gained the weight back, because I would have had to start all over from scratch with the treatment had I not.

But hold on a minute !!!!! The weight just kept coming on until I could no longer wear the clothes in my closet. Geeeeeeezzzzze! I had to buy two sizes larger! I HATED MY BODY!!!!! It was imperitive that I slam on the breaks. It wasn't until about about two years out from treatment that it started to level off. I wasn’t happy at all with the weight. I simply could NOT eat the way I used to, all of anything and everything I wanted, and expect to not gain weight. One of the reasons is because I'm missing some of my breathing apparatus, so I can't be as active. Here's the truth of the matter. Shedding all of the extra weight I gained after treatment may not be a very good idea. Guess I'll need to keep some of this "extra" weight to fill in the wrinkles on my face and....oh, well... here and there and everywhere else. So, I'll do the best I can.

It's really not so bad, getting older. I just don't want to get old and useless. If I had my druthers, I'd like to just keep some of my so-called rational mind as I grow older and yes, OLD. I have a number of friends that have also been through the medical malady mill as well. Some of them haven't come out very well, and some not at all. For what I put myself through I'm pretty well off, and for that, I am truly grateful. The Temple of my Soul has made a remarkable recovery. I think I can say that I actually do like her. She’s amazingly resilient.

After having looked at my parents, and my mother-in-law, and having been to a few class reunions, I've come to realize that you just don't get to keep it. Beautiful youth has something to do with the survival of the fittest. If you look at it that way, it's absolutely true, and makes a lot of sense. In our youth, we strutted our cute and adorable stuff under the noses of the opposite sex, courted and snared one another, and spawned our very own successors. We are so busy with our own agendas that we didn't even think of the new generation we were creating as actually replacing us. We still thought of ourselves as invincible, irreplaceable and immortal. We'd always be here. This is a condition called burying our heads in the sand, not looking at the whole big picture, or....denial. We just never planned on getting old.

Society has delegated people of advanced age as "old and ugly", In our society youth is valued and synonymous with usefulness. No wonder our elderly clam up and get crabby. They are no longer looked upon as vital and useful, and it terrifies us. Here's another way to look at it. I think it's because everyone fears and dreads the unknown of getting to that point (old), and rejected. People fear getting old because they don't want to lose their usefulness; and death, because we don't really know what's beyond life on earth. Come on....we don't really know. My daughters have a nice petting zoo all picked out for me. I’ve told them that I don’t mind that at all, as long as I have everything I need and love. Really, it won't be bad at all.

I hope that when my number is up, I can don a red and purple hat and gracefully waltz out the door. There are no pockets in the shroud, meaning you can't take it with you. Maybe I won't even put that hat on. Just like that.....no drama or fan fare.....no lingering. I will have been here long enough....no procrastinating. I suspect there will be an agenda to attend to when I get to uh, some where else.

Growing Up in Fort Worth (1950 thru 1966)

SMELLS AND AROMAS THAT WILL TAKE YOU HOME

Everyone has memories of their childhood and growing up places and times. Often a smell or an aroma will waft by my nose that will suddenly place me in a place and time of Remember When. Most of these aromas stoke very fond memories, where there are some smells that speak of an age of times gone by.

Several days ago, while at the grocery store, a clerk was cleaning up an ammonia spill on Aisle #16. The distinct smell of ammonia abruptly caught my attention and reminded me of the smell of growing up in Fort Worth. If you are one of my age group peers, you would think it smelled like a diaper pale. If you are 39 years old or younger, you don’t even know what a diaper pale is. The smell is unmistakably the smell of a rendering plant, Uh...yes, that's it!

It was the Swift & Company Meat Packing Plant in North Fort Worth by the Stockyards, where they were rendering fat and making anything from lye soap, lard and dog food to fertilizer. I must say, that this process was evident more than often, and it really stunk! I haven't smelled that in visits to Fort Worth in years. In 1971 Swift closed its Fort Worth meatpacking plant. Two fires in the mid-1970s destroyed the plant, leaving only the firm's administrative offices, which later housed the Old Spaghetti Warehouse Restaurant. So much for the history of the "Stinky Smell of the Swift & Co. Meatpacking Plant ".

There was another very familiar smell, and I will try to get these out of the way quickly. It was the North Fort Worth Stockyards. I say it was stinky, but actually, it was very endearing to all people who lived in that vicinity. We were and are proud of the North Fort Worth Stockyards. There is nothing like ambling through the shopping area or the Exchange Building and smelling the distinct smell of horses, cattle and leather. This is not unlike wandering through the exhibit booths at the Livestock Show and Rodeo. It's just a wonderful reminder of what used to be, and what really made Fort Worth grow. Cattlemen found hot meals, saloons, gambling halls and bordellos. Because Cowtown was in the middle of the Chisholm Trail, Fort Worth prospered as a leader in the cattle business. To quote Dad (almost)… the history of Fort Worth is “richer’n 2 feet up a bull’s uh…rear-end”. Ok, I said almost a quote. Dad was a bit more graphic in his discription.

There were so many familiar smells. I'll start with waking up in Fort Worth. The aroma of the sheets still smelled like sunshine and fresh air. No one hangs sheets out to dry any more. Homeowners Society will see that you get fined if they catch you hanging sheets out to dry. There just aren't any softeners or dryer sheets that can duplicate the smell of sheets just taken off the line. There was definitely the smell of dew in the mornings, and on many mornings, the aroma of freshly mowed hay or grass. It went nicely with the sounds of owls, mourning doves, meadowlarks and whippoorwills. And, later on in the morning, you could almost smell the heat of the day when the locusts would start rattling their song.

You could smell the first blue norther of the year just before you could see it in the northern sky. Soon after that, you could feel it. This was a ceremonious ritual. We'd start talking about it as soon as we could smell it. We'd go out in the front yard to play (in our shorts) to watch it come in. It was truly a steel blue sky. As soon as it hit, we'd run in the house to help mom get all the wool blankets out and start putting them on the beds............The old wool, olive drab Marine Corps blankets............USMC was emblazoned across one end of the dark olive drab blankets. The whole house smelled of mothballs for a couple of days. Well, I liked the smell. There was yet another smell that falls in this category. That would be the smell of an electrical storm. We could go out and stand on "The Wall", which was a stone retaining wall above the hillside to Jacksboro Highway. You stand up there and feel the wind and watch the electrical storm come in. It was a real display to watch.............aaaaannnnd, you could smell it!

There were many, many aromas that come to mind, but one particular one was Mrs. Baird's Bakery in Downtown Fort Worth. That alone could make a person start drooling as you walked outside the door. As we got older, we'd snag a stick of butter from the refrigerator and get our dates to drive the back door of the Mrs. Baird's Bakery, where we could get a free loaf bread, fresh out of the oven. We'd drive down to Forest Park and sit there and slather the butter on and just eat the whole loaf right then and there. Couldn't do that now, for a lot of reasons.

As I said, there are many more memory stoking the smells and aromas of Fort Worth in the 50's and 60's. I'll just mention one more. It can't be helped. At the end of a day, my little brothers would come in from a hard day of "playing over the hill"; sweat and dirt streaming down the sides of their little faces. They would have been playing a number of games; army, cowboys and Indians, cops and robbers, or just hanging out...building a fort with the bamboo cane that grew in abundance "over the hill". Okay... here it is. They always smelled like little goats! We couldn't wait to get them in the bath tub, if we could catch them before they fell asleep on the floor in front of the television or in their own beds to dream of more forts to build.

LILLIAN MILLS (The Help)

LILLIAN MILLS
The Help


Soon after we’d arrived back in Fort Worth, and I was over the chicken pox, I started snooping around the big house at 1407 Grand Avenue. Our sister, Claire painted the picture of the house that you see here.

Let me tell you, there was a LOT to see! There were all kinds of closets and drawers for children to investigate. Munnie soon learned that if I wasn’t in sight, then she’d better find me. Normally, Anne and I hung around together, but I was just enrapt with all the interesting things I was finding. First, we found the hidden drawer in the bottom of a vanity/dresser. It was full of costume jewelry as well as some dentures that Granddad had had made up (down at the funeral home) of used teeth fitted in plastic gums of pink, brown or even black. They often went to what Munnie called Tacky Parties. I found out later that this is where they would dress up in all sorts of costumes and get-ups. Granddad would pick a pair of dentures to enhance his costume. I did get to see them once, on their way to a Tacky Party. Anyway, The way I learned about those dentures, was that Munnie caught me snooping, and fussed at me (just a little), and then explained the dentures to me, as well as letting Anne and me play with some of the costume jewelry.

There was a big cedar lined closet in the “middle bedroom” at the top of the stairs. It had some of Munnie’s furs in there. There was an Indian princess costume with beads and fringe on it that, I think Aunt Ollie made, and a HUGE scrapbook with newspaper comics pasted in it. I don’t know what ever became of that book. Even then, I thought that scrapbook must have been ancient. There were some nursery rhyme blocks in there, and I think Bryan has them, unless he’s traded them with another of our siblings.

One day, after I’d snooped in just about every corner of the big house, I was wondering what other treasures I could feast my eyes on, and then in walked Lillian Mills. I wish I had a picture of Lillian to show you. I can still see her in my mind. She was a slender black woman, and I’m guessing that she was in her late 40’s, and probably looked a little older than her years. She had mahogany skin that was slightly lined around her eyes, and gently graying hair, straightened and kept at a medium length and smartly styled. She was what Munnie called (besides calling her Lillian), “The Help”. She had on a crisp gray and white uniform dress that buttoned up the front, with a crisp, white apron.

I made Lillian my very best friend, following her about her chores until Munnie had to stop me. “Uh….Little Missy….. We don’t make friends with The Help!” “You just leave poor Lillian alone so she can do what she came here to do.” That only deterred me a short while until I’d happen upon Lillian again, vacuuming or cooking, and I’d latch on to her again. She was very sweet to me and explained everything she was doing. “You’re a sweet little girl, but Ms. Shannon, Yo Grandma, sho ain’t gonna like you in here.” And, “I’m ironing your Granddaddy’s khakis. He likes ‘em with a sharp crease in ‘em.” I wondered (out loud) as I sat on the tall stool watching her wash dishes, how she could put her hands in that hot water. “Just used to it, I guess.”. Anyway, Munnie caught me again and sent me on my way.

After a while, I found another way to catch up with my newest very best friend, Lillian. It hadn’t taken us very long to find the back stairs. This was just fascinating! You could actually go up the stairs, through the middle room, the room over the garage, and find the back stairs in the hall way. These magic stairs would take us back down stairs and into the garage. You could either go back into the house through the kitchen, or the other way, into the laundry room and/or into the meat locker room. Much later, as we got older, we would find these back stairs very beneficial.

At any rate, Lo and behold! I’d found Lillian again in the laundry room; washing and ironing. Soon, she’d helped me up to sit on the washing machine to talk to her while she ironed. She usually had a filterless cigarette hanging from the corner of her mouth (I think it was Pall Mall’s) when she was ironing. She starched just about everything; Granddads shirts, his khaki’s, our uncle’s jeans and shirts and absolutely everything got ironed….starched or not; Sheets and pillow cases and even Granddad’s boxer shorts got ironed.

I think after that, Munnie gave up on trying to keep me from following Lillian around. Lillian didn’t object, and it didn’t keep her from getting her job done. I watched her every move, and I can actually say that she taught me to iron. I also watched her make her peach cobbler on more than one occasion, and I’ve since been able to duplicate it. It’s the best!

In the laundry room was a HUGE double sink of galvanized metal. Anne and I found it very useful when we’d been playing in the mud….making mud pies along the side of the house. We just got covered in mud ….. just caked with mud ….glorious mud!; and we decided that the best thing for us to do would be to fill those double sinks up and get in them to get the mud off. We did just that, right up to our necks in those giant sinks. That didn’t do much for keeping us out of trouble for making such a mess along the side of the house. We got in trouble for it because there was so much mud in those sinks, that it stopped up the plumbing and a plumber had to be called to fix it. I think they knew not to blame it on Lillian.

I don’t know whatever became of Lillian, but she just quit coming. I asked Munnie why Lillian didn’t come any more, and she said that Lillian was sick, and would die. I was heart broken. As little girls do, I asked her “Why?” again, and she told me that Lillian had syphilis, and that she was dying. That just broke my heart. I asked Munnie once again “Why?”, and she said, “All the Niggras have it.” Now, Munnie was never cold or uncaring. I know she cared deeply about everyone. She was the thread that held us all together. I just don’t remember her ever sugar-coating anything. I didn’t know what syphilis was, but it sure made me sad again. Later I found out that it was a government experiment with syphilis, and I wondered how they could do that to another human being.

I Think of Lillian often, and what an impact she had on me as a 5 year old girl. And I wonder what my life might have been had not moved from St. Louis to Texas.  I've thought of how my persona would have developed had I not met the gentle and kind Lillian Mills.

ROSEBUD, MISSOURI

ROSEBUD, Missouri


ROSEBUD, Missouri

After Sappington, there was another place we lived near St. Louis called Rosebud. It was west of St. Louis on Highway 50. We must have lived there for at least a year. My memories are a little vague of that place because I don’t think we lived there very long. I remember the driveway was graded, and lead down hill from a highway (I’ll bet it was Hwy. 50) to the house. The house was a two-story white stucco with a carved front door way out in the country. It also had light colored hard wood floors. There was a huge oak tree several yards from the house. Its branches dipped down almost to the ground. Anne and I made that our play house, and I remember drawing the parameters in the dirt with a stick.

We acquired Fannie while we lived there. She was a medium sized, short haired, reddish puppy. I remember that right after we moved in that house, there was a big storm with lightening and lots of rain. Dad got up in the middle of the night to check on us, and I think Fannie had left a pile on the floor. Dad burst into a string of profanities and then I heard him smacking her with a newspaper and poor Fannie howling and yelping. I think he threw her out in the storm. She was the first dog we had, and we had her for about 13 years. I don’t ever remember her having an accident ever again.

Joanie had to ride the bus to school, and Mom said she didn’t like it at all. I think there was a road back behind the house where she caught the bus. While Joanie was at school, we had time to play in our “play house”, and/or help mom out. One time, Anne and I decided to cook something while Mom was upstairs. We got coffee grounds, and carrot peels and mixed it with some oatmeal in a coffee can we found on the sink. When Mom came down she found us in the kitchen with that can full of, uh…..stuff just stirring it. I think we were going to take it to playhouse under the oak tree.

Going to church……Well, I know we went, but I don’t remember anything about it except getting ready to go and getting in the car. I’m pretty sure Mom smocked our little dresses (Mine was green.), and Joanie, Anne and I had the exact same shoes, white Mary Jane’s with crepe soles.

Uncle Jack and Aunt Pat came to visit us. I think they’d picked up a new ambulance to take back to Fort Worth, and they stopped to see us on that trip. Mom didn’t want me to get near Aunt Pat, because she was pregnant with Trey, and I think I had the measles. She was cooking a ham and lima beans, and I remember that because the smell just really made me sick. I guess it was because I was sick anyway.

Mom and Dad were going out one night. I think they were going dancing. Mom wore a black, gray and white taffeta dress. It was a large plaid or checkered pattern. She wore a perfume called Straw Hat by Faberge, so I’m guessing it was summer, and they were going out to celebrate their anniversary in July. Her perfume in the winter was Tweed. Looking that one up, I’ve found that it was Tweed Green Irish by Creed. Mom also had a turquoise and brown tweed suit that she wore in the winter. And of course, she wore the Tweed perfume with that. Hmmm….. Interesting that I should remember that.

There was a huge yard (field) in front of the house to play in. One day, while we were out in the front yard, Joanie and Anne and I saw a man with a suit case standing by the highway up at the end of the driveway. We took that as our cue to go investigate the poor man. In stead of being friendly, he sort of looked perplexed that we were standing there asking him questions. Thinking about it now, I can see why he was annoyed with having three little girls right there with him. First of all, we were interfering with him getting a ride. He did have his thumb stuck out, but we didn’t know why. Second, I’ll bet we made him very nervous. What if he were accused of harming or trying to kidnap us? He kept telling us to “Scram!”….”Git!”…….”Beat it!!!” Poor guy……………..

One day while Joanie was at school, Anne and I decided to clean the tables in the living room for Mom. She was most probably upstairs tending to Joe and Claire. I got the Bab-O (scouring powder with bleach) and started cleaning all of the mahogany tables in the living room. Actually, I don’t know if Anne was in on that with me or not, but I didn’t understand why I got in trouble for that. Most of the time, we were together.

We must have lived there for at least a year. We stayed long enough that I remember a big snow fall, and Mom trudging out the back door to feed the little straggling sparrows that were hopping around looking for food. I don’t know if Mom and Dad were actually buying that house or leasing with an option to buy. At any rate, it had been decided that we’d move back to Fort Worth. Some people came over to have a look at the house, and while Mom was trying to talk to them and show the house Anne and I decided to jump on the couch and run wildly all over the house. Anne was in on this one. We both got in trouble after the people left. Mom made us sit on the couch with our hands together while she walked the couple out the door. I knew that the switch was in the draw of the little oval drop-leaf table, and I went over and got it and broke it up in to little pieces. Well, that certainly didn’t improve Mom’s mood. She just went out and got a bigger one.

After that, we moved back to Fort Worth. I had the chicken pox, so I came down with Dad on the train while everyone else came down with Mom.

SAPPINGTON (St. Louis), MO.

SAPPINGTON (St. Louis), MO.
ABOUT 1951 thru 1953



There are no pictures of this house that I could find, but I do remember watching Dad make spinach soup in a blender (our first) when I was four or five. We were in Sappington, Mo. I distinctly remember Joanie whaling that she “…..hated spinach because it was always dirty.” I think it was because she’d tasted fresh spinach that didn’t get rinsed enough.

I remember living next door to the Powers, Elanore and Gary. Cammie was their son’s name…Joanie’s age, and they wouldn’t play with me. Mrs. Casky, the kindly old lady on the other side gave us heart-shaped lollipops. The Lovelaces lived across the street in a huge white house. I found a cat skelleton in the alleyway behind their house.…….Richard Strumph, a boy my age lived down the street. I don’t think his candle was lit (sadly). He always had a runny nose. I probably just didn’t know about my own runny nose, but noticed his. He got his head struck in the ladder on Joe’s fire truck that he used to peddle up and down the sidewalk………and Chris Pobaninsky (my age) down the street the in the other direction. Pobaninsky is spelled just how I remember it was pronounced.

Funny, how many bits and pieces you remember when you’re that young. I was about 5 years old, and that would make Anne 4 and Joanie about 7 ½. Joe was toddling at about a year and a half or 2 years old.

I remember the big brownstone 2 story house, the basement with the coal chute Anne and I used play on and slide down the furnace where we used to burn our trash…. The cellar…..… Being able to stand up under the house. There was lattice covering the area directly under the house in the back, but we could squeeze in……. Mom built a large fenced in area with flagstone for Joe to play in, because he kept running off down the street. I don’t think that stopped him. I found him down the street once, sitting in a neighbor’s dog house……diaper in hand. Needless to say, Mom was pretty frustrated with Joe’s antics at such a young age, and she already had her hands full with Joanie, Anne and me…..not to mention that she was probably pregnant at that time with Claire.

Joe had a propensity for climbing anything over 6” high. Mom was worried that he’d hurt himself so she cleared all the furniture out of an extra room upstairs for Joe to play in. After all her efforts, Joe managed to break his collar bone when he fell off the radiator that was still in the room.

On mentioning the coal chute, I remember that Mom used to dress Anne and me first for church. She’d send us out to play with instructions to “stay clean!” Then she’d dress Joanie, who wouldn’t think of getting dirty before church. While Mom was busy with Joanie, and her long golden curls, Anne and I would have great fun sliding down the coal chute in the basement. It was a shame, too. The dresses were white. I think after a while, she changed the order in which she dressed us.



I remember Christ the King Catholic School, where Joanie and I went to school……2nd grade for Joanie and kindergarten for me. Those nuns back then were really mean. I was the new student there, and didn’t know that on certain days they went down to the cafeteria to get a treat (candy), nor that I was supposed to bring money for it. On the first candy day I got in line with the others. My kindergarten teacher (nun) asked me if I had money to buy the candy. I told her that I didn’t, so she told me to go back to my table and wait for everyone else to return. She walked a few feet away and casually put a few coins on a table. I thought she’d left them for me. After she left, I wandered over and picked up the coins and took them down to the cafeteria to buy candy. I know now that it was play money. She came up to me and asked me why I wasn’t still upstairs at my table. I showed her the coins and told her that I had money to buy candy. She told me that I was a thief, and said she was going to call my mother and settle on a proper punishment for me. I was really terrified, but nothing ever came of it. It was a good thing that we didn’t stay there very long. That nun probably would have had me thrown in prison. It wasn’t until 6 six years ago that I mentioned it to Mom. She said that she never knew anything about the incident, that the nun had never called her. Boy was I set up!

It was in St. Louis that I befriended Cowboy Jim, and Joanie still had Pinkie and Lemon in the dirty clothes hamper. Actually, I was Cowboy Jim. I don’t know where I got that character, except maybe from a radio program. We certainly didn’t have a television. I fashioned my Tinker Toy set into a two way radio, and who knows why Cowboy Jim required a two way radio? Anne’s imaginary friend was invisible, even to her. According to Mom, Anne used to sit on the stairs and talk to it, enumerating how many fingers and toes she had. One day, Mom listened to this one way conversation….counting fingers and toes, and Anne ended the conversation with, ”And what have you got?....... Nuffin’! “

I (Cowboy Jim) had to have stitches in my/his bottom lip from jumping off the dresser onto the bed, to make my/his stick horse go faster. Unfortunately we (Cowboy Jim, Me and the horse) missed and smacked our mouth on the foot of the bed. My two top front teeth exited through my bottom lip, and I carried them down in my hand to show to mom. I didn’t know my face was a bloody mess. The next day, Anne fell down the front steps and cut her chin, which also required stitches. We both had bandages across our chins and Mom said that she had a hard time telling us apart.

Joanie hated her saddle oxford shoes. What a surprise, and didn’t we all? One day when we were all playing in the front yard, Joanie kicked one of her saddle shoes. She kicked it so hard that it flew up and broke a second story window. She got in a world of trouble for that one.

I remember Uncle Goonie coming to visit us. I don’t think Aunt Joanie came with him on that trip. I think it was closed to Christmas. He brought candy for us, and Mom hid it in the carved wooden box that Dad had brought back from China. The box always had its’ special place on the mantle. I think one of my brothers still has the carved wooden box. I think that was the same Christmas that Santa brought us a train set. Dad said it was for all of us, but I don’t remember anyone playing with it much except for Dad. I don’t remember seeing the train set after we left St. Louis.

Claire was born in St. Louis, October 27, 1952, just before we moved back to Texas. I remember Gammie coming to help Mom out while Mom convalesced. I remember her getting us ready for school. Dad worked for Corning Glassware, and was on the road most of the time. I vividly remember watching Mom change Claire’s diaper, and wondering if I could do that. Later, I sneaked back in the room and stood on something and changed Claire’s diaper, just to see if I could. I remember being satisfied with the job I’d done, and Mom coming in. She said something about it, but I didn’t get in any trouble. I’ll bet that made her think about just how helpful J., A. and I could be.

It was about that same time that I got sick. One day, while playing outside, and Joanie and Cammie were ignoring me, we (Cowboy Jim and I) just decided to lie down in the grass and take a nap. I remember Mom carrying me into the house and vaguely hearing her tell someone, possibly Gammie, that I was sick. I remember an earache. A doctor showed up next to my bed, taking my temperature and giving me some kind of medicine. Next thing I knew, I woke up in Mom’s bed, and the first thing I saw was a really beautiful green wool snow suit hanging on the door. It was sort of a get well thing. I think Gammie bought it for me.

BRENHAM, TEXAS 1950 - 1952

BRENHAM, TEXAS
1950-52


We made it back to Texas from Elmira, N.Y. just after I’d turned two years old. Joanie was 4 ½ and Anne was almost a year and a half old. Joe was a newborn. Dad was still in sales with Corning Glassware. He traveled constantly, thus leaving Mom with four children under the age of 5 to care for while he traveled. My memories of Brenham are very vivid for 2 1/2 - 4 year old.

The picture featured in this story is an actual photo of the house were we lived in Brenham, Texas. The car you see parked near by is the family car, a 1949 light green Chevrolet Sedan two-door. It was my first memory of a family car, and probably the first one my dad ever owned. On the other hand, it might have been a company car.

I remember Dad lining us all up before getting in it and giving us a big lecture about how “If you kids distract the driver, we could have a wreck, and the metal in this automobile would become razor sharp and could CUT YOU TO RIBBONS!" I remember those exact words as though it was yesterday. Then he opened the car door, pulled the driver’s seat forward and told us to get in. I was terrified to get in, so Dad helped me get in, but I curled up in a little ball behind the driver's seat on the floor. I was afraid of the car, that it would "cut me to ribbons!" If I made myself as small as possible, maybe I wouldn’t get cut to ribbons.

Since Mom had the four of us to take care, she hired two maids to take turns helping out with the house and kids. Dozzie, (for Dorothy), and Marie were two very large God-fearing black women. Polio was going around then, and I remember whoever was there on any particular day would pour scalding water on the dishes after washing them, to make sure they were free of any polio virus.

There are so many little clips of memories associated with Brenham and the people there. Dozzie and Marie both knew that we were afraid of the daddy long-leg spiders that we would occasionally see in the bathtub, so if the weather permitted, we’d get bathed in a galvanized aluminum tub in the front yard. I remember one day one of them, Dozzie or Marie had brought a cow to graze in our front yard. She grazed right next to our front yard tub bath. I wanted to ride her.



Then there was Sergeant. He would come whistling down the graded road on his horse with a pony in tow. For a nickel, he’d let a little kid ride the pony. One day, Dad caved in and let me “wide da’ hossie” I can still remember my first smell of “horse”; a very curious smell, indeed. Sergeant was a very proud veteran of WWI. You can tell that just by looking at the picture.



Many times, Mom would tell us not to stray from the yard, and certainly not across the railroad tracks. I don’t’ think I knew what railroad tracks were. We did try to obey and stayed close to the house. One day in particular though, I found myself wandering on the other side of the railroad tracks, unbeknownst to me. There was a kindly old black woman, who took me up on her front porch. She’d gotten a branch from her tree and had painted it white. While I was there, she let me help put gumdrops on the ends of each little branch. I probably ate more than I helped put on the branch. She gave me the little gumdrop tree, and I was so proud of it. After we’d done that, the woman calmly took me by the hand and lead me back across the tracks and home. Mom had been almost hysterical with worry. I believe that was my first ever spanking.

There was the matter of the first blue norther that I’d ever heard of. Of course I had no idea as to what that was, except that it was supposed to get cold. We were off somewhere in the car with Mom and Dad for quite some time. I remember that when we returned, we couldn’t get in the house, and Mom had to climb in the window on the porch. It might have been that everything was frozen shut, or maybe a missing key. She managed to get the door open and we all went in. There was some big to-do over a pile of wet diapers frozen to the hard wood floor. I’m just guessing that Mom had washed them and had wrung them out and put them in a pile to hang up to dry and just didn’t quite have time to hang them up to dry before we’d left for the day.



Joanie had a best friend named Vera Jean, whom she called “Very Jean”. She lived next door, and was quite a bit older (maybe 14), and Mom would let her help out with us kids. I even found a picture of her. Absolutely amazing what comes to mind just writing about childhood memories.


There is a memory of red ants that I stepped in. Dozzie came running out and brushed them off of me. I thought I was getting spanked. Those big red ants are all but extinct now, from all of the insecticides used to eradicate insects from crops. It’s a shame, because without the big red ants, the famed Texas Horned Toad is also just about extinct as well.


That’s most of what I remember of Brenham, Texas

MILK CANS AND LIMOUSINES

MILK CANS AND LIMOUSINES

Our Grandmother drove a funeral home limousine for a family car. It’s a good thing too, because she used to come to our house about every other day and load up as many of us kids up as possible to go down to the farm to get milk, eggs, and vegetables. We’d usually fight over who got to sit on the jump seats. It was the coolest car ever. 

 Munnie had what’s known as a lead foot, even though she had to drive with the seat all the way forward; and then probably needed a couple of pillows to reach the accelerator. If she saw a car in front of her, she would speed up until she passed it. Sometimes she would see someone ahead of her going way too slow and miss her turn off to the farm driveway.

The farm was just below us on Jacksboro Highway. Munnie would have to drive down Central Avenue a block, turn right, and then turn right on Northside Drive to Jacksboro Highway, and turn right. A little ways down, we’d turn left down a very obscure road. It was very steep, and my heart would just pound every time we’d head down that hill. Munnie wasn’t afraid at all. I was always amazed at how we always made it back up the hill.

Later, when we were older, we’d just walk down the hillside and cross the highway to the farm. The caretakers were Bob and Marie Fagan, an old married couple, who were the nicest people I ever did meet. Bob would let us help milk the cows, until Munnie rounded us up. I got the feeling she didn’t want us to bother Bob while he milked the cows. He didn’t like us to climb up in the barn hayloft, because he said there were rats up there. Marie would let us help her collect the eggs, and I was a little afraid of the hens if they were still sitting on their nest. While we were busy snooping around, Munnie and Marie would skim the cream off the off the top of the milk to make butter.

There was a pecan orchard on the farm and a “U” shaped fishing pond that Grandad used to call a tank. I didn’t think it looked at all like a tank. There was also a mule named Judy, and pigs and turkeys and a couple of attack geese. Those geese were really mean, and would chase us across the yard. Grandad said that turkeys are stupid because they’ll look straight up when it rains and just strangle them selves with the rain.

Munnie would gather us all back up and load us into the limousine to take us home with the milk, eggs and vegetables. She’d stand the big cans (usually two of them) on the floor in the back. She’d drop us off at home, and leave half of the milk and eggs at our house. She’d take the other can to Aunt Ollie, just a couple of blocks away. Sometimes she’d give Joanie and Anne and me a jar filled with fresh cream to shake up to make butter. Other times, she hand us a sack of purple hull peas and tell us to go out on the front porch and shell them. She firmly believed that children should always have something to do. “Heaven is for perfect people! Jesus is in Heaven! I’m still here and you’re still here. So, maybe there’s something we should be working on!”

This Is How It Started

PLACES IN TIME
1948 THRU 1966

This Is How It Started:

It has occurred to me that I’ve started posting these stories in the wrong order. Perhaps I should sort of map out… make a brief summary.

Mom and Dad (George Lewis and Alice Marie Shannon), met and married in Fort Worth. Dad was a marine stationed at Camp Bowie. Mom worked at the rationing board with her dear friend, Wanda Fae. They would watch the marines drill in the street below. Dad would be standing in the window in the building across the street from the rationing board. George and Alice Marie flirted that way at a distance for who knows how long…..weeks...... days?..... hours? ...... minutes? I suspect minutes. Finally Dad motioned to Mom that they should meet down stairs. Now, Mom says they were formally introduced. Hmmmmm......But since they had no common friends at that time, I suspect that they picked each other up. Then things started to heat up. They were married in July of 1944 at the home of her parents (Munnie and Granddad) on Grand Avenue. I believe they left for Cherry Point and lived there until Dad had to be shipped out for China and Korea.

Joanie was born in August 1945. Mom lived at home with Munnie and Granddad, and her sister Ollie and younger brothers, Jack, Bill and George while Dad was overseas. Mom and Dad would write almost daily, and Dad would send her bolts of silk fabric from China to sew into something fabulous. After he returned to the States, he and mom and Joanie moved to Elmira, New York where I was conceived and was born in 1948, January, and where Dad worked for Corning Glassware. Anne followed about 14 months after I’d arrived. And that made me the first middle child. After that, it was back to Fort Worth, Texas where Joe was born in 1950, November. We then moved to………………

….Brenham, Texas from 1951 to about 1953, and then up to….

….St. Louis, Mo until about1956, where Claire was born, and then from there…

….back to Fort Worth, where we lived with Munnie and Granddad at 1407 Grand Avenue, until we moved into a house two blocks down the street at 1619 Grand Avenue sometime in 1957. Geo.III, Danny, and Mary were born there, and then……….

....Munnie and Granddad built a new house out near Lake Worth, and we moved back into 1407 Grand Avenue, where we stayed, and Caroline, Tommy and Bryan were born.


Well, that the briefest I could make this summary. You can use it as a “place finder”.

CHICKEN POX AND TRAIN RIDES

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Dad brought me down from St. Louis in the spring of 1952 on a train when I was about 5. I have to say that at the time I had no idea why Dad and I had to come down to Texas on the train while everyone else got there another way; everyone else being Joanie, Anne, Joe and Claire. My name’s Melissa and I was told I had chicken pox, and that Mom and Dad were trying to keep me from infecting my other siblings, especially our new little baby, Claire. Dad said I really entertained everyone in the dining car. I don’t remember that part, but I do remember getting to sleep in the top bunk in the Pullman car. The next morning, Daddy woke me saying that we’d had run into another train and had to change over to another train to get to Fort Worth. I don’t remember the train even lurching. It must not have been much.

I’ll just skip over the part where we arrived at the train station in F.W., because I don’t remember that either. I do remember waking up at 1407 Grand Avenue, and seeing a very sweet woman’s face. She was holding me and smiling at me. That sweet woman was our grandmother, Thelma Ulala West Shannon, aka Munnie. Munnie was a diminutive woman, but she was always in charge. She wore her hair in a little white bun. I always saw her as an authoritative figure in an apron and lace up Dr. Scholl’s high heal shoes, little fists on her hips. She sort of reminded me of Tweety Bird’s owner. You just didn’t defy Munnie, and you certainly did not sass her!!!

The next thing I knew, Munnie had me upstairs and lovingly tucked into a cot in her bedroom. She’d given me some medicine (I suspect paregoric), and I must have slept for days. When I woke up I could hear children playing in the front yard. I got up and went out on the balcony, hearing in the back of my memory, “Now, don’t you dare get out of bed!” Why did she want me to stay in bed? I sure didn’t feel sick.

As I stood there watching my siblings play, and longing to go out to play too, I got that prickly feeling on the back of my neck, like someone was standing behind me. Before I could look around I heard Munnie’s admonition, “I told you to stay in bed!” Without another word, she took me by the hand and escorted me to the bathroom. OH! She was mad at me. Why would she be mad at me? I mean to say I was SCARED! If that wasn’t bad enough, she took down my little cotton panties and put me across her lap. At this, I started to cry. I didn’t think I deserved a spanking! After what seemed like forever, I realized the spanking hadn’t even started, but instead, I felt little cold, wet dots being put on my bottom. There wasn’t going to be a spanking! Still, without speaking a word, she continued putting Calamine Lotion on the chicken pox on my bottom. Munnie knew exactly the impact she was having on me. After that, I never disobeyed her again. Her word was the law. Munnie was the boss of everyone!

GAL Oatmeal

GAL Oatmeal 1956 During the cold weather season, we could walk into the kitchen very early, and we would always find dad making up the huge ration of oatmeal. I would watch him put in the right amounts with a coffee cup for the oatmeal, water and milk; and the palm of his hand for the spices…. whatever they were. I never paid much attention to the amounts or the order in which he performed this magic. He’d dust his hands off over the revered “oatmeal pan” and assign someone to stir the oatmeal so it wouldn’t boil over or burn. 

Sometimes I had that job, but that was the extent of my experience with making oatmeal, until……………. One morning at the beginning of summer, when I was about 8, I wandered into the kitchen and noticed with amazement that there was no oatmeal made. I went in and stood reverently at the bedside of Mom and Dad.... on Dad's side. I waited, and then patted him gently his shoulder. He mumbled something quite unintelligible, and then opened his eyes and stared...like I was a stranger or something. "Where is the oatmeal?" I said, "Well, what time is it?"... Dad asked. "Well,' I said, "It's six o'clock, Dad, and you're late for making the oatmeal." 

 Dad thought for a moment, and said, "Well.............err.........uhm, why don't you make the oatmeal this morning?" "But Daaad". I said in my best 8-year-old whine "I don't know how you make the oatmeal." "Well, why don't you? You've seen me do it a million times.” He said. "But I don't know how much to put in the pan. 

Again, he spoke. "Listen carefully You put in: 3 Cups water 3 Cups of Milk Bring this to a boil and turn it down. Add: -3 Cups of OLD-FASHIONED OATS (“not that 3-minute crap!”) -a pinch of salt -a dash of nutmeg and (not too much nutmeg because it can constipate), a couple of dashes of cinnamon ….and raisins, if we had them, Simmer and stir until done." 

 Serve up in generous size bowls to however many people you have there (in our case at that time it was 7.5 kids and Mom and Dad). Garnish with a hunk o' butter, some sugar (brown is good) and a little bit of milk to cool it a little. You can add whatever else you want.......Raisins, Peaches, Dried Apricots, Apple slices, Nuts, Trail Mix, Sesame Seeds, Flax Seed is good to sprinkle on...Wheat Germ……….

And that's it.