Happy Birthday to ME! Another day older and …
Yesterday one of the girls who does the scheduling for my closings told me to enjoy the last day of my fifties. That sounded awfully ominous. Well, here I am today and I live, and breathe and have my being. The future’s so bright I gotta wear shades! Arise and shout!
Zippy, as much as I have pondered that old building while sitting there with my coffee, I had not remembered the confetti machine! (perforator) I don’t remember it being particularly clean up there but I’ll bet it was less so when we left town.
How about:
Strips? Corn tortillas deep fried at the concession stand at the pier at Huntington Beach. This was before Fritos.
Honda 50’s? First seen when we were in the Motel at Oxnard. The motorcycle shop around the corner had the first one’s we had ever seen. This event soon followed by the wave of “ride little Honda” songs of the time.
Seeing the WKLF tower as we came into town from the west. We knew our travel was about over and mere minutes from MamMo and Granddads.
Grandad telling what awful things went on beyond the kudzu at the CC camp.
The cigarette carouselle on the table beside Grandad’s recliner.
Watching Lash Larue on tv with Grandad followed by Gunsmoke and Paladin.
The community picnics in the park at the mill village with MawMaw and PawPaw. Complete with bottled Cokes on ice and ice cold watermelon all over the place.
Playing on the playground and sitting on the bleachers in front of the screen at the Drive In. Looking at it today it is not nearly as large as I remember it. I work the projection booth out there in ’76 and it was all there, but abandoned. No one brought the kids to watch movies any more, It was just a dark place to park.
Not much wisdom to impart today. ‘Just wanted to say Hi and get you thinking.
Westy, over and out.

she's my girl

See above.
That’s my Keelin. Extraordinary isn’t she? Not just any little girl, my granddaughter. She loves granddad. She told me, then made me a book of hearts and pictures of me and her. She’s my buddy. There isn’t much that she isn’t willing to try if granddad suggests it. She loves my truck. She can sit in the car seat between me and Nona and play my IPOD. She knows what is on there and she is very particular about what we play and in what order. The girl knows how to rock out! She learned it from me. She likes to ride her bike around the block while I walk behind. She rides ahead and then taunts me until I can catch up, then she’s off again. She is getting so tall she is going to have to have a bigger bike soon. She is still on training wheels but she is very top heavy going into turns.
She is a girly girl too. Witness the nails above. She came in from school one day telling Nona about one of the other girls at school who had plastic nails that were pretty. If I had known about it I am sure I would have gone and found them for her, but Nona beat me too it and put them on her the next time she came to the house. She didn’t bend those fingers for hours. She got to church a little later and popped a couple of them off playing with the other girls and wound up having to take all of them off. They weren’t going to last too long. She still sucks those two fingers. She was doing great not putting them in her mouth with her new nails, but it was only a matter of time. Nona told her when she quit sucking her fingers they could try again.
Keelin is a gardener. Nona has the training, but Keelin has the green thumb. Friday was another nice day out and we were out playing and getting some sun when she saw her gardening gloves in the garage. She put them on and immediately started digging in the planter, turning over dirt. Not really accomplishing anything, she just likes holding the dirt. Next time she comes over Nona has plants ready for them to put in the ground. She loves flowers and loves to take them to her Mommy. Any jonquil that raises its head around here is subject to be plucked and taken to her house.
Cell phones have their uses. We use them a lot around here but I think their high calling is to carry pictures of your granddaughter around so you can show everyone. They are easy to keep current too.
Next time you see my Keelin, give her a hug. She will hug you back, you will be better for the experience
Unclewesty over and out.

just a comment

This memories thread we are on brings to light several things. One, our kids think we are funny. Two, we are spread out over enough years that a couple of us had to wait until some of us were out of the house to even have memories. They fill a gap that I don’t remember a lot of because I wasn’t there.
Let’s try to get Sheri and Rob involved in this writing. I would like to hear some of the things they remember and hear from that angle. Anything you think is worth review by the participants throw out there. We have concentrated on Dad, but let’s expand to Mom and each other.
These musings are much more interesting when you read the comments that are associated with each. Is there a way to print them that would include the comments?
Westy, over and out.

I remember that!

I remember that! I remember that different! Start with the cotton pickin’. I remember it, meant to mention it earlier, put it off. I remember it being a whole gang of us and we got to pick behind the REAL cotton pickers. In other words, we were picking seconds. I don’t remember getting but a quarter and yes it was for all day. That’s one of my favorite stories “why I picked cotton by hand when I was a kid”. We couldn’t have been much over 4 ft. tall and those sacks had to be 8’long. There was no way we were getting our cotton even half way down that bag. My recollection is we made 4 cents a pound.
The GUNS! I remember this one different too. I don’t remember you being with us (doesn’t mean you weren’t) and I don’t remember cocking the gun, but it went off as we were climbing thru a fence on one of those berms. I don’t remember anything being said but I never had a gun in my hand around dad after that. Ever.
THE GUN! I don’t know if Fogged remembers this one. We were out past Maplesville at Grandmaw and Grandpa West’s house. I was small, I don’t remember how old. MawMaw and PawPaw were there with us. The men were out on the front porch talking and watching for traffic. Daddy had that old .22 for some reason. A bird, not several, a bird, landed on the telephone wire that ran in front of the house parallel to the road. It couldn’t have been 25 or 30 feet away. Guess what? Dad wanted to shoot the bird. No one objected. Bang! The telephone wire dropped to the ground. Telephones were not as common as they are now. The GUN went in the trunk and nothing else was said. The six families on the party line down the road had no idea why they had no phone.