I pause a bit from the weekly journal entry to give adequate background for the true entry for the week, i.e., the Week 5.2 entry.
I grew up in the country in the early 1970s, literally barefoot and carefree, the youngest of a large family. The only television set in the house was an old black and white Admiral portable on wheels, true to form with the aluminum foil on the rabbit ears and the vertical hold and fine tune buttons in the back of the set. There were only 2 channels on UHF and VHF combined that we could catch without hitting the back and side of the set. The other 2 channels took careful fine-tuning. Saturday morning cartoons and Our Gang shorts with Buckskin Bill Black were the best! But there was no cable, no all day watching. We spent our times outdoors with hand-me-down bicycles and active imaginations.
Running around barefoot led to lots of sticker bush injuries and also the occasional “burning grass” episodes. Luckily, Mama always stood guard at the front door with her ultimate cure-all: a tub of Vick’s Salve.
Our absolute favorite pastime revolved around the massive pine trees in the front yard. We would gather fallen pine needles, measuring them out in handfuls like bundles of spaghetti. Then, we’d use those bundles to outline the "walls" of a giant floor plan right on the grass—delineating the kitchen, living room, and bedrooms. We spent hours playing house, "cooking" and "cleaning" with old tea sets. At the end of the day, we’d rake the needles into a pile by a tree, ready to design a brand-new architectural masterpiece the next morning.
The only problem? If we left those pine needle piles sitting for a few days, they became prime real estate for uninvited guests. More than once, we’d pull back the needles only to find a snake.
I'm not proud to say it, but the old-school adage back then was, “The only good snake is a dead snake.” We had many a close call with both the harmless and the not-so-harmless varieties. Through it all, I learned the golden rule of childhood snake-spotting: If multiple kids are present, one person must freeze and eyeball the snake's exact location, while the others sprint to grab a shovel or scream for Daddy.
I could scare you with even more horrific close calls from adult fishing trips, but I’ll spare you the trauma. Just trust me on this: I have ophidiophobia.
I grew up in the country in the early 1970s, literally barefoot and carefree, the youngest of a large family. The only television set in the house was an old black and white Admiral portable on wheels, true to form with the aluminum foil on the rabbit ears and the vertical hold and fine tune buttons in the back of the set. There were only 2 channels on UHF and VHF combined that we could catch without hitting the back and side of the set. The other 2 channels took careful fine-tuning. Saturday morning cartoons and Our Gang shorts with Buckskin Bill Black were the best! But there was no cable, no all day watching. We spent our times outdoors with hand-me-down bicycles and active imaginations.
Running around barefoot led to lots of sticker bush injuries and also the occasional “burning grass” episodes. Luckily, Mama always stood guard at the front door with her ultimate cure-all: a tub of Vick’s Salve.
Our absolute favorite pastime revolved around the massive pine trees in the front yard. We would gather fallen pine needles, measuring them out in handfuls like bundles of spaghetti. Then, we’d use those bundles to outline the "walls" of a giant floor plan right on the grass—delineating the kitchen, living room, and bedrooms. We spent hours playing house, "cooking" and "cleaning" with old tea sets. At the end of the day, we’d rake the needles into a pile by a tree, ready to design a brand-new architectural masterpiece the next morning.
The only problem? If we left those pine needle piles sitting for a few days, they became prime real estate for uninvited guests. More than once, we’d pull back the needles only to find a snake.
I'm not proud to say it, but the old-school adage back then was, “The only good snake is a dead snake.” We had many a close call with both the harmless and the not-so-harmless varieties. Through it all, I learned the golden rule of childhood snake-spotting: If multiple kids are present, one person must freeze and eyeball the snake's exact location, while the others sprint to grab a shovel or scream for Daddy.
I could scare you with even more horrific close calls from adult fishing trips, but I’ll spare you the trauma. Just trust me on this: I have ophidiophobia.
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Anonymous
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