Drowning Worms and Other Stories

In the early 50’s there was still a hand pump at the kitchen sink for water and a wood burning stove to cook the meals and heat the bath water. Drinking water came from the well, cranked up in an oak bucket and dipped out with a gourd dipper.

The toilet was a wooden structure behind the chicken house, barely held together with hand-made nails and baling wire. At night we used a bucket because there were wolves and foxes in the yard trying to snack on the chickens safely locked in their house laying eggs for breakfast.

We drowned dozens of worms hung from bamboo poles and played on the hand-built wood swing. We climbed trees, camped in the hayloft, bothered the chickens and calves, ate blackberries, petted the cats, and had neither curfew nor parental interference in anything other than to watch out for snakes in the “crick.”

The closest town was Penny, a one room country store located at a fork in the gravel road and surrounded by farmland. It had a wood stove to keep it warm in the winter, an oak counter worn smooth, and two faded red gas pumps out front with round glass globes perched on top.

Granddaddy would sneak us onto the ancient tractor, and drive a ways up the graveled road to the store to show off his “grand-babies” and  buy us one of the little “coke-cola” six-ounce bottles that were kept in the red cooler in front of the counter.

On a few exquisite occasions, we would arrive at the same time as my cousins from Minnesota. At a recent wedding of one of the children of those cousins, we spent several hours talking about the great times we had “back on the farm.”

*A longer version of this story can be found in my book Do You Believe In Always available on this site.