Turtle Tank

When you were a kid, did you have a critter collection?  Did you catch lightning bugs and put them in a jar?  Or capture baby bunnies and try to keep them alive?  Ours were always dead the next morning.  Something about the shock and trauma of being caught and handled.  Did you fill a bucket with toads?

Our house is not at our farm.  We were lucky to find a habitable dwelling in the country, much less one that was handy to where we worked. That being said, if we needed an item at our house, it was a good bet we could come up with something at the farm and drag it home with us. That is how we got a small stock tank in which to keep the kids’ menagerie.

It was about 4 feet across, and if you propped one side up on a couple of bricks, you could have a pond on one side and dry habitat on the other. A maple tree provided plenty of shade.

My kids were always on the lookout for box turtles. The best place to find them was when they crawled across the country roads.

“Stop the car, Mom!  Can you get that turtle for us?”

One must assume the average person knows why you would never, ever bring a turtle inside a vehicle. If we were close enough to the house, good ol’ mom would apprehend said turtle, roll down the drivers’ side window and proceed to the hacienda holding the creature as far from the car as her arm would reach. Just in case you haven't ever held a wild turtle, they STINK! The turtle itself probably doesn't reek. Its self-defense mechanism is to emit a foul smelling urine that seeps into your hands and takes two or three days to wash off. The safest way to pick them up is from the top and hold the side edges of their shells. Keep your hands away from the tail!

Into the tank it went, while said youngsters raided the refrigerator for pieces of lettuce or carrot tops. It was nothing unusual to have three or four turtles in the tank during the summer. The kids diligently caught hop toads and added them to the menagerie, but they kept jumping out. This mom didn’t know toads could jump that high. Did you know toads also pee in reaction to being picked up? Their urine doesn't smell so bad, although I think that's why dogs don't bother them after one experience. It must taste terrible.

One day, about this time of year, I was rotor-tilling the garden plot with the Massey-Ferguson in preparation for spring planting.  It was cool and the toads were still burrowed in.  I unearthed one and hollered for the kids to come and get it.  My four-year-old daughter came running and took the new find to the tank.

Suddenly, I could hear her screaming over the noise of the rotor-tiller.  

What the heck?  Did a wasp sting her?

By the time I ran to the tank, not more than 20 yards away, the toad was in pieces and my innocent daughter was in total melt-down. Four turtles equal four toad limbs to tear off. Did I forget to remind the kids to feed their turtles? 

The carnivorous turtles were released and the stock tank returned to the farm where we never used it to corral wild animals again.

As God is my witness, I thought all those other toads jumped out.

Mint Juleps

Grandma Selma raised spearmint. It grew in a two-foot wide strip of dirt between the foundation of her house and the sidewalk. Mint is a perennial which spreads by runners which live just under the surface of the soil. The walkway prevented the plants from escaping and taking over the yard. Mint will grow in the shade, but it thrives in sunlight unless it gets too dry.

When we purchased our home, she graciously allowed me to transplant a few sprigs with a warning to keep it contained. I needed some greenery on the barren north side of the garage. Just in case it tried to get away, I made a border of bricks, burying them at an angle about 6 inches deep.  The mint transplanted well and stayed where I put it the first year.

The following year the vigorous underground runners crept up to the bricks, grew right over the top of them and took root on the other side.  The next year I chopped some out and gave it to my dad. The mint grew as fast as the recipe for Herman Friendship Cake. The more I pulled out and gave away, the more it spread until eventually a 10 X 20 area of my flower garden was knee deep in fragrant mint.

And it was durable! Kids, dogs, cats, nothing hurt it. We had a flock of ducks that liked to waddle through the patch catching the insects that were attracted to the plants. My dad used it as a mosquito repellent. In the early summer evenings, before he checked on his cattle, he would rub a handful of leaves on his arms and neck to keep the pesky bloodsuckers away.

After baking in the sun all his life, his skin must have been tougher than mine. I tried his all-natural bug dope once when I was mowing. I ended up staying in the house with what amounted to a chemical burn from the volatile oils in the leaves.

I gave up trying to corral the mint and let it grow, occasionally tricking my friends into taking some starts. Just for fun, I made mint jelly. You are supposed to serve it with lamb. Since I didn't know how to prepare lamb, I gave the confection away to anyone who would take it.  Dropping a few leaves in boiling water makes an all-natural air freshener. It is easy to dry and store for use in the winter. Just pick it before it blooms.

I received a phone call from a lady who identified herself as the wife of our meter reader. She had learned through him that we had a bed of spearmint. (I bet his shoes smelled like mint every month because he had to wade through it to get to the meter.) She explained that their daughter was getting married in a few weeks and that she and the bridegroom wanted to drink mint juleps at the reception. This lady and her husband had mint juleps at their own wedding.

She went on to say that they had checked into ordering mint leaves from a florist. Unfortunately, if they had to pay floral prices, they wouldn't be able to afford the drinks. Getting to the point, she asked if I would consider selling them some mint leaves.

Sell them? Lady, you can HAVE some. Would you like some plants so you can grow it yourself? Her husband must have told her how much mine had spread over the years, as she quickly assured me all she wanted was fresh leaves.

Oh, wait. I can't give this lady any of my mint, especially if it is going into beverages. My conscience wouldn't allow it. I sheepishly told her about the kids, and dogs, and ducks. Especially the ducks.

Undaunted, she assured me there was no problem.

No, really, ma'am. You don't understand about ducks. Ducks poop everywhere they go. Even if they haven't pooped on the mint, their feet are dirty, and they have walked on it. Really, I can not let you have any leaves.

Her daughter must have really had her heart set on drinking mint juleps at her wedding because I was informed any foreign substance would wash right off.

A couple of weeks later my meter reader, along with his wife, daughter and future son-in-law, showed up and picked mint while I stood by wringing my hands and wondering if duck poop caused salmonella or botulism. Did people catch typhoid fever these days? Apparently, my fears were unfounded. I didn't hear of an outbreak of food poisoning.

I planted the first spearmint starts in 1976. During the extreme drought of 2010 through 2012, a lot of the plants died. I still have a few plants in the shade of the garage and have been encouraging those to spread. By next summer it should fill in the gaps enough to start trying to give it away again. 

If anyone in my area wants to make a mint julep, I no longer have ducks.  :*)

Driving Lessons

My grandfather always drove a pickup with standard transmission and a stick shift. He was one of those old farmers who drove real slow and drifted onto the wrong side of the road while he checked out the crops. He didn't drive much faster on the highway, but he did stay on his side of the pavement. 

Since his pickup had four gears, he used all of them even though he seldom drove more than 30 mph.  Also, he had large feet and was in the habit of resting his size 13's on the clutch pedal. He burned out a clutch on the average of once a year.

He and my dad rented a pasture to graze their cattle. It was a picturesque spot with a creek running through it. His in-laws, my great-grandparents, lived in a modest house on the property.  It was a lovely spot for a picnic or wiener roast.

I was twelve years old on one of the times everyone in the family had gathered there. He took me for a ride in the pasture where he aimlessly drove in circles and figure eights. I knew we weren't counting cattle because they had all moseyed off to another section of grass. He went through the gear sequence a couple of times without ever topping 10 mph. 

With no warning, he took the pickup out of gear, coasted to a stop, and got out. 

"Okay. When you can change gears without making a screeching noise bring it back to the house."  He turned and walked off toward the house with his long legs eating up the ground while I sat in stunned silence.

Wait. Come back. You were giving me a driving lesson? All sorts of uncharitable thoughts whirled through my mind as I contemplated running after him demanding to know why he hadn't mentioned that I was being schooled or that there would be a pop quiz. Instead, I reluctantly slid across the bench seat and adjusted it forward until I could reach the pedals.

I had been driving the car ever since I got tall enough to see over the steering wheel at age ten, but this was a different situation. The car drove itself while I steered and gave it some gas.  Driving the pickup involved an intricate ballet of using two feet to manipulate the brake, clutch, and gas. One hand finessed the stick shift into the proper gear while the other stayed on the steering wheel. 

I already had a pretty good idea that I didn't want to shift from a forward gear into reverse. But how was I supposed to find the gears? Fortunately, the shifting pattern was printed on the knob of the stick. Gritting my teeth and hoping I was shifting into low, I moved the lever up and to the left, gave it some gas and eased out on the clutch pedal. The pickup lurched a little but didn't die on the spot or let out any audible complaints. 

I was a natural at this driving stuff. Before long I was running through the gears although I knew perfectly well from comments my dad had made that one shouldn't use the higher gears at low speeds. 

HA!  Take that, Old Man. Joyfully, I steered toward the gate and eased out onto the dirt road. Everyone was looking at me a few minutes later when I turned into the driveway. I was feeling pretty cocky by then. I was running out of driveway when it occurred to me I didn't know how to make the pickup stop, at least not gracefully. I put my foot on the brake and it died. 

Oh, well. At least I didn't run into my great-grandparents ancient 1940's sedan. I got out of the pickup and sat down at the bonfire. Grandpa didn't say a word to me about my driving, and I didn't say anything to him either.

Years later, sitting around with my cousins, reminiscing about the grandparents, I related this story. My two oldest boy cousins perked up and said he had pulled an identical stunt on them when they were about the same age.

The Goat Who Ran Out of Gas

My grandfather on my mother's side was a backyard mechanic and ran a little shop from his farm. We're talking subsistence farming on 40 acres, raising alfalfa, a handful of pigs, a milk cow, and hens.  He rented a pasture where he had a modest cow/calf herd. 

In the mornings, when my grandma left for her job in the school lunchroom, half the neighborhood men convened at his house.  After drinking a couple of pots of black as tar coffee made in a glass percolator on the stove top, they adjourned to his shop and wasted away another half of the morning smoking roll-your-own and telling stories. (Boy, did my brother ever get in trouble for repeating a word he heard!) The shop was dark and grimy. Everything had a generous coating of black axle grease or motor oil on it. He didn't own anything modern like a parts washer, so there were dishpans of black, oily gasoline sitting on the floor for rinsing off bearings and the like. I always worried those men would burn the place down with their matches or the ash off their cigarettes. 

Each fall it was a combined effort to chop enough sorghum to fill everyone's silo to feed their cattle through the winter.  Each man had a job they knew very well and they went from farm to farm until it was done. One of the neighbors was also a first cousin of my grandfather. His name was Orle. I don't know exactly what was wrong with him. Easy explanation was that he was 'simple'. He always crowded into a persons space and got right in their face. If he asked you a question, he didn't wait for an answer, but would say Huh? way down in his throat. He kept that up until he got an answer. Once, my dad decided he would just ignore him.  Dad lost. Another neighbor was a cousin by marriage. He had a bird dog named Jack that stuck its nose in my crotch every time I got near it. Not exactly germane to the story. 

These three cousins plus two other neighbors usually filled silo together. They used an ensilage cutter much like this. One day they were taking a lunch break, sitting around on the ground under some shade, and a goat kept trying to get into everyone's lunch pail. My grandfather sarcastically asked his neighbor what he would take for that goat since he was so proud of it. He said a quarter and Orle (the simple one) reached into his pocket, threw the man a twenty-five cent piece and hollered SOLD. The joke was on grandpa, and this bunch made sure the goat went home with him at the end of the day. 

I don't know what kind of goat it was. I expect a meat breed. It had horns that curved back and seemed pretty big to a 7-year-old. It must have been someone's pet. My brother and I named him Billy. He stayed around the yard and didn't get out on the road. We tried, unsuccessfully, to get him to pull a little red wagon by tying a rope from the handle to his horns. Technically, he pulled it, because it moved at great speed when he ran off.  On the other hand, the wagon was bouncing on its side, and my brother and I were in a tangle on the ground. Not to be thwarted, we tried it a few more times and decided Billy didn't have enough training. 

After retrieving the wagon and rope, my dad took Billy by the horns and led him into Grandma's HOUSE. The goat was already upset from the wagon treatment. The results were worse than the time Dad tucked a thirty-pound pig under each arm and let them loose in the kitchen. 

My brother and I had been outside recovering from the wagon wreck. Hearing shouts, we ran to the house. When the goat's hooves hit the hardwood floor, it went spraddle-legged. The more it struggled to stand, the crazier it got. It also lost control and rained goat droppings all over the dining room floor. 

Soon we were laughing, jumping up and down, trying not to step in anything, and generally adding to the chaos. My mom screeched at my dad and took a rolled up newspaper to the goat. Dad told her it wasn't the goats fault, so she brandished the paper at him. My grandpa collapsed into a chair and held his feet off the floor as he clutched his ribs. "It's playing marbles!" he guffawed. When the over-excited animal was back outside, my grandma cleaned up the mess. She never did get mad at my father for any of his tricks. My Mom had serious words with my Dad, but he never did quit grinning.

Billy did everything that goats in children's storybooks did. It ate tin cans, for instance. We thought he was great.  He had one talent, or vice. He liked to hang out with the guys in the shop. He lapped up gasoline out of the pans on the floor. The first time I saw that I was sure he would die.

One sad day we went to see Grandpa and Grandma and couldn't find Billy. We looked everywhere. We were frantic.
 

My dad told my brother and me that Billy had wandered away from the house, ran out of gas, and couldn't get back home. 

My brother and I were traumatized by Billy's disappearance. We imagined dreadful scenarios of him getting run over by a truck, or laying down in some distant field and starving. We talked about him all the time. I mean until we were in our 30's. Really.

Several years ago, I got in my dad's face and told him I was a big kid now. I could take the truth. What happened to Billy?  He laughed and told me. I called my brother up and bragged that I found out what happened to the goat. Then I kept him in suspense for two years before I gave him the answer. Dad played along and kept it on the QT as well.

I won't be so mean to you, dear reader. A neighbor's grandchildren came to his farm for the summer, and they took the goat. From there? I don't know.

Uncle Cephas

In my family, oral history has been repeated and handed down for generations. I am attempting to preserve some of the more colorful stories. A favorite is about my great-great uncle Cephas.

Cephas was born in 1884. He was smart, good-looking and somewhat privileged because his parents had worked hard and provided him with more ease and worldly goods than the average homesteader.

At the age of twenty, he married a beautiful woman from Oklahoma. She came from land and money, but Hattie did not take to country life and hated the farm. She bore him two daughters. Neither infant lived more than a few days. Their farm prospered, but the marriage was unhappy. Finally, his wife moved out of their rural home, and Cephas bought her a handsome house in town where she thrived in the company of other women. Nothing made her happier than ladies’ clubs and hosting afternoon get-togethers and card parties. Nothing made her more unhappy than cigars, dirty boots and dogs in the house. Watching him eat off the same fork with his dog disgusted her.

Cephas accumulated more land and developed retail businesses in town. If he got lonely, he visited Hattie. It didn’t take more than a day or two for him to remember why he lived on the farm instead of with his wife.  He couldn’t do anything right and was nagged incessantly about farting and belching in front of her friends. Frankly, he behaved that way on purpose and seemed to delight in annoying her.

Black Gold was discovered under his land, and Hattie demanded he spend the income on her. Perversely, they continued to live apart. She loved to show off the things his money provided her with, and he seemed to enjoy buying the objects. Thus they remained, blissfully separate, for the majority of their married life.

From 1946 through 1949 the nation was bombarded with an ad campaign which changed the thinking of women everywhere. Diamonds were a girl's best friend. Diamonds were forever. Traveling lecturers spoke at high school and college assemblies, brainwashing young women to expect to receive a diamond ring from their sweethearts.
http://www.thefrisky.com/2012-02-09/the-diamond-myth-how-diamonds-became-a-girls-best-friend/

Courtesy of radio and newsprint, Hattie became convinced by the early 1950's that her husband had been remiss in not beautifying her hand. She needed something with some flash to impress her friends. She began her own not so subtle campaign against Cephas. He allowed the cajoling to continue until he agreed to buy her a diamond ring. But there was a condition. Since she had an inheritance from her deceased parents, he thought it only fair that she pay half the price of the ring. Realizing that was the best deal she was going to get, she accepted the stipulation.

St. John boasted a jewelry store, and Cephas casually told her to pick something out and have the owner send him half the bill. Leaving her house, he high-tailed it to the shop and explained the situation to the proprietor, whose business adjoined one of his own.

Cephas instructed his partner in deception to let Hattie pick out any ring she liked. Intimating that she was probably going to hold him up for the most expensive bauble in the store, the owner suggested he show her salesman samples. They were cheap metal and glass representations of costly settings which he would order from Kansas City.

The conversation ended with Cephas saying he didn’t care what ring she chose. The catch was that the owner was to quote her a price exactly twice the actual value. It didn’t take the jeweler two seconds to catch on. They shook hands and slapped each other on the back at the joke they were going to pull on her.

Hattie showed up at the jewelry store the next day and pored over the pieces in the cases. The jeweler used all his skill at flattery to convince her none of the rings did justice to her lovely hand. Slyly retrieving the samples from beneath the counter, he waxed eloquent as he enticed her to imagine the light glittering from a one-carat diamond surrounded by smaller stones. 

Hattie was carried away by the description and didn’t even blink at the price. When informed it would be eight weeks before the ring would grace her finger, she snidely thought her husband could use a couple more months of income to pay for his half of the one of a kind masterpiece. She would also receive the sample. No other customer could order her ring.

The anticipated day arrived, and she imperiously summoned Cephas to town with a reminder to bring his checkbook. When the ring was slipped onto his wife’s finger, he dutifully admired it and complimented her excellent taste. The jeweler pointed out the qualities of the platinum band and elegant setting. He coaxed her to the window where the sunshine did indeed refract light into thousands of glittering facets.

Hattie wrote a check for her half. As Cephas filled out his check, he thanked the owner for helping his wife choose such a lovely ring. He expected her to get years of enjoyment from it. As they happily left the shop, Cephas offered to take her out to a restaurant where she could show it off. Looking over his shoulder as the door swung closed behind them, he saw the proprietor tearing his check into tiny pieces.




Cephas and Hattie discovered the secret to a happy marriage.  Live in separate houses.