Wed Oct 03, 2018 6:19 pm by nikkinutshop
I never met my Mother's father. He was known for having a really bad temper and being generally miserable. He died in 1938 from what we now know was cancer. The local hospital opened him up and determined his condition was too much for them to deal with. Grand was wrapped up and sent home to die. Mom said her father was in the parlor for a day before he died. She said her Father was yelling at Picobac tobacco can he thought he was seeing floating around the parlor. Grand was a heavy smoker. I have one of his PICOBAC tins for no reason other than I like the graphics.
The church was about a mile away. After the funeral the family walked home. Soon after going into the house, "the heavens opened up" as Mom would say. and hail pounded the crops into the ground until there was nothing left bt piles of ice crystals. The story goes, the daughters were crying and suggested, first we lose our father and now the crops. Grandmother said, "all is not lost, someone gather up clean hail and we will make icecream."
Our farm was about four miles from Grandmother's farm. My brother and I used to walk both ways. Before I started in grade one, Dad bought my brother and I a 22 rifle. Mom told us top always carry ammunition and the gun and if some stranger stopped and tried to pick us up, shoot him! There was one time a saleaman type offered us a ride and my brother fired a shot into the guy's car door. The driver floored the engine and was gone. When we told Mom what had happemed, she said, " aim higher next time. That was about 1951, the year Rural Electrification came to the farms. Thoise were rough times before Rural Electrification.
I remember there being a neighbour who liked to "womanize" and he developed a reputation of "visiting" with the wives of farmers who went logging in the winter for extra money. My Father said this guy was captured by local farmers and taken to the veterinarian where he was castrated. No go Joe, as he was known, stayed home and had the nicest garden in the district.
I would rather have tools I do not need than to need tools I do not have
Thinking risks being controversial and possibly being offensive