Little things!

A little of my story! 

I was born in a different world than what we are experiencing today. Life was not as complicated, nor was the world going crazy with the things we have going on today. When I was born in 1947, my parents lived on a little farm that had a few pigs and some chickens. Our neighbor was a cattle farmer and raised cattle for their beef and for milk. Actually I was chased by one of his cows one day when my brother, my sister and I were walking across the field to pick up our fresh milk. Actually that day we were running and I was petrified as this cow started running toward me. Imagine the panic I felt, needless to say, my feet were in high rev! I was sure my life depended on it! Well after all, I was only 5 years old and that cow was a giant...but I outsmarted him and slid under the fence (I think I had wet my pants)... and I never took the shortcut across the field after that day - always takking the road less travelled, the longgg way around the fenced field and that nasty cow! Yes, I learned my lesson fast!

Mr. Brittain was the farmers name... he was really nice to us usually gave us cookies and spoke very kindly except one thing he would do every day is that he would tease me about wearing my pajamas. I would tell him they were not my pajamas, they were trousers but he insisted that I looked like a farmer! I guess it was because of the straps over my shoulders and the buckels that held them to my pants. I didn't understand teasing so much at that time, but I did like Mr Brittain so I just figured he was a poor judge of fashion. It actually irritated me a bit and I began wondering why my mom dressed me like that! 

Oh yes, did I tell you that our little farmhouse had a bathroom, but there was a problem, no toilet! Yep, our toilet was an outhouse in the back yard - gross! Imagine going out there in the night!!! That's probably why I wet the bed!  Never thought of that before!  As if the embarrasment of how I dressed wasn't enough, but going into a little square wooden box called an outhouse - why did they call it an outhouse when nothing about it remotelly looked like a house. Gosh my little playhouse was much better than that stinky place! And I remember always looking into the "hole" to make sure there were no animals down there. Remember I was only five and five year olds have vivid imaginations! 

One scary day when I was in the house playing there was a knock on the door - I ran to answer it and to my surprise there was a big "black" man standing there! I didn't waste anytime in running away and hiding in the bathroom. I was shaking when my mother finally coaxed me into opening the door, assuring me that he was gone! I'd never seen a black man before and it was quite overwhelming for me. My mother explained that he was from the Doukhabor Colony nearby. She said they are Black Russians people. Today I really enjoy "Black Russians" (if you get my drift) and the people too, but at five they coudl have been from outerspace for all I know. 

I also remember a time that we had a visitor, his name was Mr. Wideman and he used to visit us a couple times a year. He always carried a paper bag with his clothes, not a suitcase, but a paper grocery bag. I don't think he was poor, but he was definitely not flaunting rich! Well a few days before this visit, dady had brought home a baby collie. We were having a heck of a time naming, evryone wanted something different. Five people 5 different opinions! Well we can thank Mr. Wideman for helping us find a name, you see, that night he left his paper grocery bag outside on the porch and in the morning, our puppy had torn up all his clothes and they were scattered all over the yard. When Daddy saw it he said, "that rascal ripped up all of Mr Widemans clothes last night! Well there you are all of a sudden the light went on and the puppy's name became "Rip". This is a photo taken back in 1951 or so, and that beautiful collie is Rip!



Guess who I am - yes the little.blondie, with curly hair, but only on Sundays.  Normally it was straight but our mother put our hair in rags and it became curly overnight like magic! 

My first driving lesson was with my brother - he was almost 7 after all, and he was showing me how to drive. We got into our father's panel truck and he was showing me how it worked! He told me to steer and he would work the pedals. And we were just enjoying pretending to be on the highway when all of a sudden to our surprise the car started moving and went all the way across the field into our front fence! Daddy was not impressed and I never drove a car again until I was almost 17 and that was with much hesitation!

Oh yes, remember the playhouse I mentioned earlier, well we loved playing house, my big sister who was about 8 at this time was the mom and my brother, 6 1/2 was the dad and I of course was their child. Well mom asked daddy to go and bring some meat home for dinner. He was gone for a while and then he came home and handed her some rubber hose cut up and said they were hotdogs. My sister(mom) recognized the rubber used for making the hotdogs and she was pretty upset with him. You see, he had cut up her skipping rope! I thought it was pretty inventive myself, but you don't want to stick around when mom is angry! My sister was a little on the overweight side and she was tough - even had fights with boys at school... so we left pretty quickly and no more playing house that day or actually that week, or was it month! 

Oh well you get the point! I'm sure we all have stories from our childhood. I must say my childhood was pretty normal, at least I thought it was, but as I grew up I found out I had quite a few insecurities. And, because of these "insecurities" I was quite shy!  Most who know me now would hardly believe this but it was true! 

Moving right along so I don't bore you ----- I want to come up to modern days! I'm now almost 70 years old, and I've seen a lot of changes in the world since then. I remember the first black and white TV and the wall phones with "party lines!" Yes we've come a long way! So tomorrow (if I can find this blog again) I'm going to tell you a little more about my life, not sure how much but I'll try to be as open as possible. My children might be following my blog, so of course I want them to keep believing I'm super woman, but I'll bend a bit! And if I can get through a few more storries, I'll get to what has really been capturing my thoughts these last number of years! 

I've been married 3 times, not too proud about that, but I have learned how not to get into that mess. And the last time I basically left with the clothes on my back or you might say "a shopping bag" full of clothes - but that's another story we'll keep for next time. Have a great day, remember to be grateful and laugh a lot!
Faye