1. This is a response to a survey: "25 Little Known Things About Yourself".
2. I was born at a very early age, in the offices of Dr. Williams & Dr. Cochran.
3. My family at that time lived in a 2 story house, built by a plantation owner in 1823.
4. Remodeling through the years consisted of removing the rooms that had collapsed.
5. The house was something of a weather predictor. You knew it was snowing, if snow drifted in through the cracks in the back door of the center hall.
6. My sister and I shared bunk beds in the center hall. We had to knock on the kitchen wall to see if it was warm enough from the coal stove for us to get up.
7. Our farm at different times had sheep, cows, a pony, ducks, chickens... and all the grasses and feed for each one.
8. By age 5, testing at TEPPER CLINIC demonstrated that I was allergic to every animal, grass, and tree on our 320 acre farm... father's cigarette smoke was just an added bonus to the list.
9. I loved living on the farm, working with brother and sister, riding my bike, roaming the woods, playing with the "hired man's" children, going for family walks, taking our ducks to the creek.
10. One time in the creek, a snake shot out of a small hole, and bit me on the knuckle of my finger. I knew to walk, not run home, and show mom the teeth marks. She didn't believe me. I didn't die.
11. My dad could fix anything. He had been a glider pilot in WW 2, then trained Veterans in the new farming skills that had developed in the years they'd been off in Europe or Asia. Everything I know how to fix, I learned from being at my father's side.
12. My first memory of my mother is her being sick in bed. She was sick a lot, and off at the hospital for weeks or months at a time. But she loved us, and was a great cook. That came to mind, eating Father's fried bologna/cheese sandwiches (don't ask) while she was away.
13. One time we got a pony. I didn't cinch the saddle tight enough once. Galloping in the back yard, the saddle slid to the bottom! Fortunately, hitting a metal pole sideways kept me from scraping the ground. I have always assumed that a pole to the gut beat a hoof to the head!!
14. My sister taught me my ABC's and to count to 100 before school started. I always thought that was why I did well in school early on.
15. I cried EVERY DAY for 2 weeks in the first grade. Mrs. Elizabeth Emerson finally learned to teach the class and hold me like a baby for hours. I missed the farm and home so much.
16. My brother, 9 years older, would come home from college and give us rides on the local roads on the back of his Triumph motorcycle.
17. Our first phone number was 935-3470. We were part of the Ringgold Telephone system, still a pioneer today in technology. They even had rotary dial car phones, back then!!
18. Our first TV was a black and white Motorola. Reception could be improved by me going outside in whatever weather, and turning the pole the antenna was on until somebody yelled "that's it"!!
19. We were poor, in some ways. It was bigger than Christmas when Aunt Robbie or Aunt Imogene brought bags of clothes and things that cousins had outgrown. I loved Popular Science magazine, even though I only got it 5 years after the publication date.
20. I loved astronomy. With no street lights, and living in a valley, you could actually see the stars in the sky that were in the books. No trip to a dizzying planetarium necessary.
21. When a bad storm came, it was believed you could avoid a tornado destroying your home by opening the southwest facing windows. We always did.
22. A night thunderstorm was the best time to go catfishing in the creek. The electrical activity, and the wind blowing things onto the water, made the catfish stir, and easier to catch. Always take a raincoat on these type family adventures.
23. My dad once bought a bulldozer that had transmission trouble. He could weld accurately, and over several months repaired the thing, and was able to open up the creek banks so the cows could get water better. The EPD would have him in jail today for that.
24. I learned years later, that though we only had one car, each of our tractors cost 4-5 times the price of one of the kinfolk's 2nd cars.
25. I have come to believe that if you can't sent your children to college, just raise them poor on the farm. They will learn everything but the calculus... and when are they going to use that? (Except in GA TECH football cheers, and those can't be written here.)
