Sixteen Vs, Book Four, The Young Adult Years

By Victor Cox

Immediately after moving to his last "at home" location, Victor spends the first summer away from home. Hard work leads to some hilarious and dangerous situations. His initial "puppy love" exposure to girlfriends result in failure due to misguided manipulation. Consequently, trouble follows him home temporarily. Then, he utilizes shop skills to improve his household into more modern times. Not only is schoolwork more challenging, so is school sports. His semi-success in track and basketball met with a disappointing, and surprising, football end. Assisting household animals leads to some funny and unusual educational events with a "smelly" outcome. Next, he narrowly escapes being killed and getting expelled when he is involved in a Chemistry room mishap. Only coincidence, or a "higher authority," prevented almost blowing up one end of the school. But, that was only the first deadly potential incident. Getting an apartment leads to more freedom, but came with more problems.
His next exposure to girls results in unusual starts, heartbreaks, outstanding memories, and awkward situations. After suffering through a few more life lessons and bad decisions, he meets the person he eventually marries. With such an unusual start, it's amazing they ever married. But, his success in graduating High School was dampened by several job changes before marriage. Also, the joy expected in marriage was clouded by sickness and the Vietnam War, which prompted his military draft.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Victor Cox
• Release date: Feb 20, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311389404

Victor Cox

Victor Cox is an aspiring writer. After growing up in northern Louisiana, he was drafted into Military service and chose the Air Force as a career. Married at the time, his son was born when he was in Vietnam. His son was eight months old the first day Victor saw him in person. Victor and his family moved to many stateside locations in the Air Force, including one tour in Germany. Victor retired from the Air Force after twenty eight years of service. His military service encompassed being an aircraft maintainer, a flying Crew Chief, aircraft maintenance instructor, and manager. He is a retired Chief Master Sergeant (E9). After completing a tour in Vietnam, he pursued his educational opportunities. After such a precarious start in High School, he earned three Associate of Science Degrees and a Bachelor of Science Degree. He graduated valedictorian from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. He regrets telling people he was the only one in his family to graduate High School and go to college. He has one son and three grandsons. He presently resides in Powderly, Texas.

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SIXTEEN Vs

Book Four: The Young Adult Years

By Victor Cox

Copyright 2014 Victor Cox

Smashwords Edition

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Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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This is a work of nonfiction. However, some names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents, though true, have been changed for privacy purposes. Where applicable, fictitious names are used. If the circumstances match the reader’s, it is purely coincidental. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

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Book cover: A Collection of Memories, Copyright Victor Cox

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 92. The Vickers House

Chapter 93. Summer at Big Annie's

Chapter 94. The New Ground

Chapter 95. Hauling Hay

Chapter 96. Cowboy Vic?

Chapter 97. Girlfriend Troubles

Chapter 98. Home Improvements

Chapter 99. School Sports

A. Track

B. Basketball

C. Football

Chapter 100. Feathers and Hair

A. Feathers

B. Yellow Hair

C. Black Hair

Chapter 101. Deadly Potential, A. The Explosion

Chapter 102. Deadly Potential, B. The Locker Room

Chapter 103. The Apartment

Chapter 104. My 1956 Chevrolet

Chapter 105. Bacon and Beef

Chapter 106. Meeting Gay

Chapter 107. Broken Hearts

Chapter 108. The Mono Boy

Chapter 109. Getting Trapped

Chapter 110. The Tan Buick

Chapter 111. Bad Decisions

A. Catching Frogs

B. The Boys

C. The Open Gate

D. Skinny Dipping

Chapter 112. Eddie Jane Davidson

Chapter 113. Hurricane Beulah

Chapter 114. Marie McAdams

Chapter 115. Overhauling the Pickup

Chapter 116. The Advanced Math Test

Chapter 117 The Christ Girls

Chapter 118. Life Lesson, A. The Dance Hall Fight

Chapter 119. Life Lesson, B. Transmission Problems

Chapter 120. Life Lesson, C. Elizabeth

Chapter 121. Life Lesson, D. Boxing at Mr. D's

Chapter 122. Frances Merlene Smith

Chapter 123. School Things

A. The Ring

B. School Pictures

Chapter 124. The Cadillac Incident

Chapter 125. Success! Graduation.

Chapter 126. Working, A. The Station

Chapter 127. Working, B. A Carpenter's Helper

Chapter 128. Working, C. Steel Construction

Chapter 129. Marriage

Chapter 130. Drafted

About the Author

Connect with the Author

Other Books by Victor Cox

Introduction

This is the last location I lived at home. The Vickers house. It was a big house, and old. I spent lots of time fixing things on this house. Isn't it always the case--we seem to never learn from history or the wise counsel of our elders. Reflecting back, why must we repeat the mistakes of others to learn for ourselves? Then regret our mistakes and tell ourselves we won't do that again. However, often we do because we have different circumstances and don't recognize the mistake until we make it. Such is the case of for me. Mistakes, regret, repeated mistakes. I think everyone has things in our past that we regret doing or saying. Things we wish had not happened. Things we are ashamed of. I think it is part of everyone's past. It is history. We can't change it. It happened, we regret it, we move on. We fall into the category of wise elders that attempt to warn the younger people not to make the same mistakes. There are several episodes in this book that are examples. I hope you learn from them.

Even though I spent the first summer away from this house, I returned to fix things on an emergency basis until after the summer. Shortly after moving to this different house, I went to stay the summer at my sister's house (Vennie) working with my brother-in-law (Big Annie). It was a summer like no other I had ever had. It was exciting and suspenseful with a couple frightful events thrown in. Amid the hard work was a reluctant taste of a budding cowboy. Although barely escaping the cowboy incident somewhat successful, inter-spaced throughout were floras with a couple girlfriends that weren't so successful. Those puppy-love learning events gave me the chance to make a several bad decisions and learn valuable lessons along the way.

Returning home after the summer, I spent much time working on the old house to improve our living conditions. Through several successful home improvements, a solid foundation for future attempts was built. But, at the start of school, I got involved in school sports for the first and only time. For the most part, it was enjoyable until the start of football. Some unusual events ended my high school football attempt, but not my participation.

Meanwhile, my home life was mostly homework. Although all us kids were designated care takers for all the animals around the house, I got involved with several animals creating humorous learning events.

School life for me was, no doubt, typical except for a couple dangerous episodes for me and a few classmates. Seems like I'm always involved when something explosive takes place. Then, through coincidence, I got an apartment with a good friend that introduced me to new found freedom. That, shortly followed with a car change, enhanced my girlfriend opportunities. Which consequently, lead to several cherished memories and heartbreak.

Making it through the school year lead to another summer away from home. I spent it helping my brother, Buster (Vernon) at a service station. Circumstances led to my greatest heartbreak followed by a severe sickness that I thought was going to take my life. However, after an unusual recovery and getting trapped in an unwanted triangle, it added to my collection of lifelong memories. But, typical for me, I made several bad decisions which created several suspenseful episodes in my life.

Still part of learning, I made it through several challenging life lessons before getting somewhat settled down and meeting the person I would eventually marry. Even that was certainly uncharacteristic, and hardly started before a test of our commitment to each other occurred.

Finally, I was successful in graduating. After many years of struggle I was able to make my parents proud and erase the failure stigma attached to my family. My surprise during graduation was not only what I got, but who all came to share with me such a wonderful experience.

Looking to the future after school graduation, I started and stopped several jobs before the military draft caught me. It was a bitter sweet time for me since I was approaching marriage. I remained on a roller coaster of emotions. Ecstatic one day followed by a crash soon after characterized my time between school graduation, marriage, and being drafted in the military. However, still wanting to be somewhat in control of my future, I decided to join the Air Force instead of being drafted into the Army. Since the Vietnam War was going on strong at the time, it was certain where I would go and I wanted the best alternative I could get under the circumstances. Thus, my budding marriage had barely begun before my military career started

Chapter 92. The Vickers House

The Vickers house place in Mangham, La. is the last place I lived at home. It’s the house I think of as home when someone asks where I’m from. I guess everyone thinks the last place they lived at home as their home.

I’ve thought about that many times. It’s a common question in the military—where you from? It has always been interesting to me how much emphasis people, in general, place on where you were born and raised. I think many people use it for conversation starters or trying to understand, or explain, an accent.

I’ve found that answering that question often leads to stereotyping or pigeon-holing you by association to your hometown or state. It’s ironic to me that if I say Louisiana, they think I’m Cajun, like the whole state is Cajun. In fact, that’s typically reserved for south Louisiana residents, not north, where I was born and raised. The stereotyping applies all over the U.S, it seems, a few examples will suffice. If you're from Tennessee or Kentucky, you're a hillbilly straight from a whiskey still in the woods. The Carolinas—off a tobacco farm or out of a coal mine, New York City—you're rich, rude, and self-centered. Texas—a cowboy. Oklahoma—an Indian. The Dakotas—your brain is still frozen. Whereas, from anywhere in California, you’re a beach-bum surfer, or an environmentalist.

These generalizations are not fair, usually inaccurate, and often used as a measuring stick of your intellect, personality, and personal beliefs. Just human nature, I guess. Besides, no one had any influence in where they were born and raised, of course, that was their parents decision. Regardless, I think of the Vickers house as my home when asked where I’m from, even though, I've lived in Texas longer than Louisiana. Often I tell people that I spent the first twenty years of my life in Louisiana and the next thirty years all over the world in the military.

Back in Louisiana, it was the summer of 1966 when we moved to the Vickers house. I was still seventeen, but almost eighteen. I lived there until September 1968 when I got married at twenty years old. I started the eleventh grade and finished the twelfth here.

This house was huge. It had thirteen rooms. I remember earlier when more of us kids lived at home and we needed this big house, but we really didn’t need this big house now. Vera was gone and I was the oldest kid at home. Daddy and Mama lived there longer than any place they ever lived. They were living at this house when Daddy died on 23 March 1978. Mama, Daddy, and Man (Verlon) watched everyone from me down, move out of the house. Then, when Daddy died, Mama and Verlon (we stopped calling him Man when everyone left) lived there fifteen more years before moving close to Vickie, the youngest child, in Baskin, La. That was in March 1993, primarily, but reluctantly, because of degenerating health. Mama and Verlon had lived at the Vickers house about twenty seven years total.

It seemed everyone around Mangham knew this old house as the Vickers place. It was an old, big, house. It had twelve foot ceilings and two fireplaces, but the one in the bedrooms was no longer useful. We used the one in the living room. I don’t know when it was built, but evidently the Vickers lived here for a long time. Even before we moved here, I heard of the Vickers place before in conversations at school. I don’t know if any of the Vickers family were still alive.

I was told this house was a mansion when it was built. I expect it was, but, that was a long time ago. It had a big front and back porch. The tin roof was loud during a rain and leaked everywhere, almost. There was no insulation in the roof or walls, and when it rained, we put buckets and cans under fifteen to twenty leaks, and plastic over clothes. The rain hitting the roof put you to sleep at night, if it wasn't falling on you. If it rained a long time, the boards creaking woke me up as Mama got up every so often to empty the buckets and cans. I usually got up to help her if I woke up. She tried to be quiet.

The house had electricity, with pull chain light bulbs in the center of the rooms. The bulbs hung down on five to six foot long twisted, cloth-covered wires. Mama used a kerosene lamp most times to keep from turning a light on to empty the rain containers. The smell of the burning kerosene lingered in the rooms long after we got through. But, usually, I fell right back to sleep listening to the rain on the roof, even though the drops in the pans and buckets were annoying. Not long after we moved there, I bought Mama a flashlight, but she rarely used it saying she was,saving the batteries for an emergency.

I told her, "this is an emergency."

Yeah, but not a real one.

I guess she liked the lamp. She used one most of her life. Eventually, I convinced her to swap the lamp and flashlight uses. After the rains, we emptied and stacked the containers for he next rain and took the plastic off the clothes.

The floors weren’t level. A center hallway between the back bedrooms and living room connected the front porch to the back and made a little valley in the floor. We kept our chest freezer there and an old Schiff robe or buffet. It was an antique kind of dresser you normally put dishes or clothes in, but we had a little of everything in it. I don’t know where it came from, but Mama wanted to keep it. Other than a box or two of junk, that was all in the hallway.

I helped move things to this house in my first car, the ‘49 Hudson. I think Daddy borrowed DR’s (D. G. Orr) cotton trailer, that we loaded most everything in, and Daddy pulled it with his truck to the house. I only made a few trips with my car taking the breakable stuff and odds and ends.

The house faced north with a full length porch. There were several six inch square columns holding the roof up at the edge of the porch. The porch had several rotten boards and several broken and missing ones. The front steps were rotten so we backed the trailer right up to the porch. We fixed the boards by the front door entry to the hallway and quickly unloaded everything. The butane tank was a special trip. We pulled the trailer with a tractor and used the tractor to load and unload the tank. DR helped Daddy get the stove working again while I made some crude front steps. They didn’t look that good, but worked. Later that year I made better steps, worthy of paint, and replaced the broken boards in the porch. Several years later, after I married, I rebuilt the whole front porch and we repainted everything.

The big rooms had rotten electrical wiring and the long wires hanging down from the ceiling throughout the house was fragile. The living room and girls bedroom wire was so rotten, one day the wire broke when someone pulled on the light string and the whole light socket fell to the floor. I cut the electricity off and rewired them with the not quite so rotten remaining wire. We had to be careful from then on. Several years later, after I married, I replaced most of the wiring in the house. I was amazed the house didn’t burn down with the rotten, bare in many places, cloth-covered wire. Only God kept it from shorting out. It scared me how bad the wiring was, and to think I lived there over two years.

What we called the back porch faced east and ran the length of several bedrooms in the back part of the house. The back porch started at the south end of the center hallway which connected the living room to the bedrooms, and went to the south end of the house. There was a door from the boys bedroom to the back porch about the middle of the porch. From the very back rooms of the house, you walked through the boys and girls bedrooms, then through the connecting hallway to get to the living room.

I’m sure the high ceiling were popular in their day. But for us, in winter, they just stole the heat from the fireplace in the living room and held the heat in summer. In winter the whole house was cold. When we moved in, there was no heat at all in the bedrooms. With the high ceiling, cracks in the walls and doors, the single pane windows not fitting very tight, it was just short of being outside in the cold. At least, the walls provided wind protection. Only the living room with the fireplace was semi-warm. You roasted on the fire side and froze on the cool side just turning around and around in front of the fireplace. Us kids took turns standing in front of the fireplace to warm up.

The kitchen was semi-warm with the stove on. Mama was always cooking and that helped knock some of the real cold temperatures out. But, she wore a sweater or coat most of the time. The house was so drafty with the old wooden framed windows, it was always cold. I pictured Mama and Verlon next to the fireplace when the rest of us were in school. Verlon didn’t go to school since there was no special education class at Mangham. The second year there, we put a heater in the girls bedroom, but nothing in the boys bedroom.

You would think the things that made the house so cold in the winter helped cool it in the summer. It didn’t. With no insulation in the ceiling or walls, and so many cracks, it let the heat in the house. It didn’t matter if the windows were up or not. We had no screens anyway. It was almost as hot inside as outside. At least, we were in the shade and the high ceilings trapped more hot air. You clearly felt the different temperature near the ceiling.

We couldn’t open the windows at night because there was no screens. Of course, the mosquitoes had plenty other cracks to come in. Only the nightly Ocean Spray mosquito spray kept them at bay. Usually, you sprayed the rooms, and over the beds, before going to bed. Later, just before Mama went to bed, she came through spraying a few times again. That usually kept them knocked down until the cool of night reduced them. Most times, I was still doing homework in the back room when she came through spraying and told me I needed to go to bed. I can still smell the Ocean Spray from the hand-pump type sprayer.

The house had no running water. It had a very small bathroom for such a big house. It even had a bathtub, but no plumbing. It had a broken commode, but no septic system. We still had the outside toilet when we moved here. The house had a broken sink in the bathroom, but no plumbing. The kitchen had a sink without plumbing also. We hand-pumped the water, brought it in the house and heated what we needed in a big dish pan on the stove. One day, Daddy brought in some long black plastic pipe and I ran it from the kitchen sink drain to the ground outside a few feet from the house. At least we could use the kitchen sink then.

The water pump was just outside the back kitchen door. It was good not having to carry the water so far. Just ten to fifteen feet from the kitchen door. But first, I had to fix the steps. It was several days before Daddy brought some boards so I could fix the back kitchen steps. It was aggravating to jump three feet to the ground from the kitchen door, then pump the water and hand it up to someone in the house. I fixed the steps as quickly as I could. That helped a lot.

The south facing side of the house had two parts. One was the length of the kitchen going east and west, until it met the back porch going further south. The second part was the south end of what we called the add on rooms which were south of the boys bedroom. One add on room was another bedroom that we didn’t normally use, but was fixed up for company, or visitors. Then, another very small room with a small exit door to the outside, or south end, where we kept our canned stuff, mostly in fruit jars. The back porch had steps to the ground, but they were in bad shape too, and we rarely used them.

The second year we lived there, Daddy brought home a large water tank one day. I don’t know where he got it. It held probably three to four thousand gallons of water. It was about seven to eight feet in diameter and about six to seven feet tall. He wanted to put it at the corner of the kitchen and back porch. We put it next to the house eve to catch rain water. The roof had a valley at that point and a lot of rain poured to the ground. After working a couple days building a platform, we put the big tank in position, with great effort. I cut a hole in the top and used tar to hold some screen over the hole. I ran some bent tin from the roof valley to the hole in the tank. Next, I put a spigot on the side of the tank at the bottom. It worked great. We had rain water most any time we wanted it. I never saw the tank fill up. The most I ever saw in it was about half full. It was amazing how much water it caught and how long we used water from it. I saw it go dry a couple times, but never fill up. We used the water for most everything except drinking. We still had the hand pump for drinking water.

The whole west side of the house was windows and wood from the bedrooms to the not-used fireplace in the girls bedroom. The east side of the house was half kitchen and half screened-in porch. The porch had doors from the kitchen and living room and one to the front yard. It had a two-step concrete step out the door to the ground going north. I fixed the porch floor boards several times. Daddy had his rocking chair on that porch. The screen was bad and we fixed many holes and replaced some of the screen to make it livable. We all liked that porch and had several wooden chairs on it.

The house sat about fifty yards off the highway. It was different for us not being on a gravel road. We liked to play on the smooth pavement. We were only just over a mile from the school. That made us the last ones on the bus and the first off. That was a real change for us.

There were trees all around the house. The house faced north and right in front of the house, out the screen porch, was a big cedar tree. In front of the house close to the highway were several crepe myrtle bushes. They were always pretty when they bloomed red and white. To the left of them several yards was a big Holly tree close to the road also. There was a big stump towards the west end of the front yard about halfway to the house from the road. It was obviously a big tree at one time, being about five feet in diameter. The stump was about three feet high and semi rotten. The absence of this huge tree left a big open space at the north west corner of the house. The first fall there, I got a pine sapling about five feet tall and planted it closer to the highway in line with the Holly tree. I saw the pine tree grow each year even after I left home. Over forty years later, it’s still there and quite large.

Closer to the house on the east side about thirty feet from the screen porch was another huge oak tree. It was five to six feet in diameter. We put a rope swing on one of it’s huge branches while I was at home. The huge tree limbs expanded to hang over the house a little.

There was an open garage-type wooden building with three sides about fifteen feet to the southeast of the big oak tree. It was completely covered by the tree branches. The huge tree provided shade for several family get-togethers and many kids soft ball games. Probably, about 1982, the winds from a hurricane blew the huge tree over. It fell southeast away from the house, thankfully. It crushed the garage shed. Fortunately, there was no vehicle inside it at the time. It completely destroyed the wooden structure.

Buster (Vernon) helped Verlon (Man) saw the huge tree up. There was a big bee hive in the center of the tree about eighteen feet high. That created a big problem for Buster and Man. They spent maybe two weeks sawing the top limbs. As they worked their way to the big trunk, they kept seeing a few bees around and as they got close to the opening more bees came out. They got a local bee keeper to get the queen and nearly all the other bees out. There were several that hung around for some reason, and they eventually had to spray poison around it to work. They sawed off a big chunk and removed a lot of honey and beeswax. I still have a picture of Mama, Verlon, and Buster at the stump of that tree.

To the east of the big tree about twenty feet was a fence that extended from the garage building almost to the highway. Over that fence was the start of the cotton field. However, we used about the first thirty yards to plant sweet potatoes with the rows running parallel with the fence. Behind the garage shed, southeast of the house was the hog pen. It was about fifty yards square. There was an old pole barn toward the eastern end about in the middle of the big pen. We didn’t use it for anything but playing. It had a little junk in it and we hunted rats there and kept the wast (wasp) nests and dirt daubers busy rebuilding.

Violet and Kathy Nation, 1969, with hog pen and pole barn behind

Not long after we moved here we got a big hog for the pen. The west end of the hog pen was close to the water pump and about twenty feet from the rear of the house. There was a big china berry tree close to the pump, south of the kitchen. South of the house was another big china berry tree and several big fig trees. Just beyond the fig trees was another fifty square yard area for our garden. It was semi-fenced off with the west side fence tied up so we could take it down for a tractor and disc to break up the garden.

West of the house about the middle of the bedrooms was the chicken house. We put a little fence around it and an area about fifty by sixty feet for the chickens. That area started about fifteen feet west of the house and ran almost the full length of the house. There were large pecan trees further west of the house. One was in the chicken pen. The others, about nine, were scattered west of the house about seventy five yards and went north to near the highway.

The big trees provided lots of shade all around the house. We played lots of softball under the pecan trees. They were spaced apart about thirty to forty yards forming a large rectangle. We played soft ball in a big square between the trees. There was a light pole, but no light, on the north end of the square near the road about in the center of that end. Our home plate was near it. Later, we put a basketball goal on a plywood sheet and nailed it to the light pole. We had the grass wore off the ground in a big half circle near the pole.

The large pecan trees produced many good pecans. Estes Lowry was the farmer that leased the property and cotton patches around the house to farm. We picked up the pecans on halves for Mr. Lowry. We ate all we wanted and sold the rest of our half. Mama had us all picking up the pecans. We kept the squirrels and most of the birds out of the trees. Some crops were better than others.

We had many good softball games under the pecan trees. Daddy usually pitched for both sides. The trees always made it interesting trying to knock a home run, which was south beyond the last trees. The tree limbs prevented anything but line-drive home runs. Bill Nation and, sometimes, I could hit the ball low enough and far enough to clear the south pecan trees without hitting the limbs. That wasn’t very often, however. Most times, the ball went into the tree limbs and it was a guessing game where it landed. It was fun trying to catch the ball in the air after bouncing around in the limbs. Family get-togethers were always fun, playing under the trees.

All the land west, south, and east was planted in cotton. North, across the highway, was a pasture for Mrs. Parham’s house, which was west of our house about 300 yards down the highway. Then, more cotton fields looking east and west from their property.

One summer, the girls took sticks and boards and formed a house layout on the ground under one of the pecan trees. They made it complete with inside walls and doors. Us boys had some old tires that we put dirt from the cotton fields in and ran around the house and trees crop dusting everything. We ran over their sticks and boards messing up their house and a fight broke out with them hitting us with some sticks. There was crying on both sides and Mama, wisely, figured it was a tie and didn’t whip any of us, but made us boys fix their house. Of course, it wasn’t as good as what they had, but we complied to avoid a whipping. Fifteen minutes later, we were all doing the same things again, but we didn’t run through their house. We did make sure it was dusted good.

Down the highway, about 300 yards, going west from Mangham and our house, you went past Mrs. Parham’s house. She was a Mangham Elementary school teacher. They were real nice folks and had a big, pretty, brick house. They paid us sometimes to mow their yard and pick up sticks. About another quarter mile on our side of the highway was a black lady’s house. She was nice to us and always smiling and waiving at us when we were near her house, either in the cotton patch, or on the highway.

Most times, if we were on the highway we were walking to Mr. and Mrs. Bill Heath’s house. They were an older couple with no kids at home and used us to help them do things all the time. They lived about a half mile from us. Mr. Heath worked in Mangham somewhere, but seemed to be home a lot. Mrs. Heath sold cosmetics, even to Mama. Although, Mama mostly bought salves, ointments, and creams, they enjoyed the visit with each other even if Mama didn’t buy anything. Mama sold eggs to different people for a little money which she spent, frugally, between Mrs. Heath, and the Community Coffee man. Both came around once a month and Mama talked to them for thirty minutes to an hour. She may, or may not, buy something.

The insurance man came each month also, usually to collect money. They never talked very long. Only occasionally, did Mama get him to drink some coffee. She almost always did with Mrs. Heath.

Another half mile down the road was Mike Bell’s house. The whole time we lived at the DR house place, I never knew where he lived. Now, we were down at his house frequently helping him with his bunch of pecan trees, picking up limbs and pecans, or helping him cut his grass or working around the house. He either quit working the store, sold out, or retired about the time we moved to the Vickers house. He was home a lot and used us a lot for different things. Even after I left home, these neighbors used Don (Venton) and Man (Verlon) for help. Finally, when Don left home, they still used Verlon. Still further down the road another three quarter mile was the Lone Cherry Baptist Church where I later got married.

Going east up the road from the house about half a mile, was a ‘T’ intersection. Going right, or south, from the T, you went to New Light and Liddieville. Going left, or north, you went toward the Mangham School. It was about another three quarter mile to the intersection next to the school. Going toward the school, you passed George Lebrano’s house, a game warden. Closer to town, was Mrs. McConnell’s house, my Algebra teacher. Then, Carry Sharbano’s house, the school lead janitor, before arriving at the school intersection and Thames’ service station on the left of the four way intersection. I learned where a lot of people’s houses were now that I was driving.

We liked most everything about the location of our house, but the house was old and seems like we were always doing something to it. Especially, me. Mama had a quilting frame in the living room. It was a challenge to hang it from the high ceiling. In the winter time, I saw Mama quilting on it several times. It was a big frame, maybe eight feet square, and, really, in the way when it was down. On weekends, we had to crawl on the floor under it to go from the bedrooms to the kitchen. Most times, we just went out of the house and back in the kitchen porch except at night. Mama had it low enough to work on a quilt sitting in a chair. She put it up at night usually. It seemed such a hassle to remove and replace the quilt on the frame each time. It had to be removed so the light, hanging from an electric cord, could light up the room. She never complained and neither did any of us.

I don’t know Boy’s (Velton) status with the Army, but he stayed with us a while in that house. I know he was in the Army Reserve for a while. I remember when Boy came home once from the Army at the DR house. I still have a picture of me and him in the front yard. He was in his uniform. He didn’t stay long before he went back. He had a black arm band on his left arm that had MP on it near a shoulder patch. I learned that meant Military Police, but later learned he didn’t actually perform as an MP. He was a cook for an MP company in the Army. I guess that made it legal for him to wear the armband. He told me many things about his Army life but I couldn’t believe very much of it. Maybe it was true, I don’t really know.

What I did believe was what I saw! That was him drinking a lot. I think he had already become what I called an alcoholic. At the DR place once, he drank a whole case of beer one night. That was twenty four cans! I watched him drink half of it by midnight when I told him I had to go to sleep. The next morning, it was all gone and he went to bed when everyone was getting up. He told me the Army made him run a mile every morning before most people got up. I admit, he seemed to be in better shape, but that was something else I doubted about him at the time.

Now, at the Vickers house, he came home and stayed a while. Maybe a month or so, in fact. He told us he got out. That seemed strange to me since he was supposed to stay four years and it had only been about three. I think he was on a long leave or something. While he was home, he drank up all the money he could get, to buy beer. He had no car and neither me, nor Daddy loaned him our vehicles. He didn’t need them. He walked to town at night and stayed in the bars until they closed at 2 AM. Then, he either caught a ride, or walked home. Usually, he talked someone into bringing him home.

Sometimes, I was still up doing homework or just recently gone to bed. It was always funny to hear him stumble into things telling the item to be quiet as he made his way through the dark house. Most times, he came in the door on the front porch hallway. We didn’t have any doors on the house with locks, so he could come in any of them. He would fall down and run into walls, cussing usually, and most times, wake up everyone in the house if they weren’t already awake from the dogs barking. I heard him call the dogs to get them to be quiet. When that didn’t work, he cussed them and threw a handful of rocks at them. I heard the rocks hitting the house and other things. He cussed the dogs and told them to be quiet. If they didn’t shut up, he threw another handful of rocks cussing more.

By then, he tripped on the steps and fell down on the porch. I’m sure everyone in the house laughed at him grunting when he hit the porch. He cussed a little and got up. Then, fumbled with the door a little and stumbled into the house. Next, he ran into the buffet, fell onto the chest freezer, then ran into the wall by the boxes in the hallway. Next, he opened the doorway leading to the back porch. Then, ran into more boxes or the chair on the back porch, cuss some more, and make it to the back door leading into the boys bedroom. Usually, by then, everyone was awake, but no one said anything. There was another bed in the ‘add on’ rooms just behind our ‘boys’ bedroom where he normally went. The boys bedroom had my bed and Man and Don’s bed. They slept together. Boy usually turned left inside our bedroom going into the spare bedroom where he usually slept. I don’t know where he got the money, but that happened two to three times each week. I guess it was residual Army money. By the afternoon, when we got in from school, he was sober and we all complained to him about the noise. It never did any good.

It was just such a time once when he came home on a Thursday night. I had recently finished my homework and went to bed. I wasn’t asleep yet. I never minded the weekends since I was usually gone, working with Daddy at night on the weekends at the Billups Service Station in Monroe. Boy was normally asleep when Daddy and I got home in the morning and went to bed on the weekends. This particular Thursday night, I heard a vehicle let Boy out at front of the house. Then the dogs, then the rocks, then the cussing, then he came in the screen porch door next to the kitchen. He must be really drunk now, I thought. He had to go through the living room where Mama and Daddy’s bed was. When he wasn’t so drunk, he thought about the back door steps on the back porch. That was the quickest way into the house without causing too much noise. After you got the dogs quiet, you go up the back steps, through the screen door, across the porch, to the boys bedroom door. Nothing to stumble into if he could make it up the steps okay. He did that on occasion. Not this night! Not even through the front porch hallway.

He came through the screened front porch, across the living room, where Daddy and Mama's bed was, fumbled with the hallway door, banged it relatively loud to shut it. Schussed it, and told it to be quiet, ran into the wall in the hallway, fell back against the boxes, cussed everything, then opened the door to the back porch. Next, he ran into a chair and fell to the floor with a grunt. Cussed the chair, got up and came into the boys bedroom shutting the door, unusually, quietly. I heard the floor creaking as he made his way toward my bed. I felt him sit on the side of my bed. I pushed his back and said, go get in your bed.

What are you doing in my bed?

Go to the other room, this is my bed,I said still pushing him.

Go get in your own bed, while he was laying down in my bed.

I tried to push him out of the bed but he turned toward me and rolled my direction pulling the sheet on him.

Get up and get in your bed, still pushing on him, but now he was tangled up in the sheet.

I couldn’t push him out of the bed unless I got off the sheet. I worked my way off the sheet, but he was snoring already. I started to get up and get in his bed, but knew it smelled bad. I just turned over facing the wall and got back under the sheet. His snoring kept me awake for a while, but soon, I was so sleepy, I finally went to sleep—mad at him.

I didn’t hear Man and Don get up. Breakfast was ready and Man came to get me up for school. He stopped in the doorway of the girls bedroom leading to our bedroom to tell me to get up and that breakfast was ready. I woke up and said, Okay.

Boy is in your bed, like I didn’t know already. I already told Mama, then he left.

As I sat up in bed trying to wake up a little. Boy stank. I smelled the alcohol and a strange scent. I never smelled that scent on him before and didn’t know what it was.

I threw the sheet off me and wiped my face with my hands. Then, I saw some red on my arm. What’s this? I thought. It looked a little like paint. It smeared, when I wiped it.

What in the world? Did you get into some paint? I asked Boy, still sleeping.

I threw the sheet off me to see a big red area on the sheet. Boy was laying in a big red spot. I got up to turn on the light. I had red on my legs and side where I touched the big red spot Boy was laying on. I wiped it again and it smeared.

This ain't paint, it’s blood!

I jerked the sheet off Boy to see him white as a sheet with a big bloody circle on the sheet under him. I turned him over to see a big gash inside his left arm shaped like an X with blood still oozing out of it. I shook him pretty hard to wake him up, but couldn’t. He looked real pale. At first I panicked a little and thought he was dead. I felt of his arm. It was warm. I felt of his pulse, it was slow and seemed weak. I jerked my pants on and ran to get Mama.

Mama, Boy has a big cut on his left arm and the sheets and mattress are soaked in blood.

Everyone followed me and Mama into the bedroom. Mama was saying something, but I didn’t make out what she said. Everyone said they heard Boy making his way through the house last night. Mama shook Boy and called to him. She couldn’t wake him, either.

Ya'll get away from him and go watch for the school bus. I'll get a pan and some rags.

About that time, Daddy got home from working that night at the Billups Station. Mama was cleaning Boy’s arm when Daddy walked in the room.

Boy had a pretty bad cut on his arm and Mama poured alcohol on it. The pain woke Boy up and he jerked his arm away from Mama.

Damn, what did you do that for?

Your arm is cut bad and it’s a wonder you didn’t bleed to death.

He cussed again and started to sit up. As he sat up, he fainted and fell back on the bed.

What I figured, he's lost so much blood he should be dead. We got to get him up and to the doctor.

Mama got a rag and tied it tight on his arm to pull the skin back over the cut. It started bleeding some.

Daddy and I got Boy up and dragged him to the living room. The bus came and all the kids but me and Man got on the bus. Mama cleaned Boy’s arm, changed his shirt and was afraid he may die. The mattress was soaked with blood.

Man take that mattress outside and build a wood fire on it to burn it up. I'll never get the blood out of it. Pump some water for the black pot and put the sheets in it to soak. Maybe I can save them.

Man left. Mama wrapped a bigger rag around Boy’s arm. Get him to the doctor to get some stitches in the cut. He may need some blood to live. I don’t know. Victor, you need to clean up and eat breakfast, there's no need for you to miss school.

I helped drag Boy to Daddy’s El Camino and we got him inside with a lot of work. Boy was big and heavy. His body was dead weight. I guess he didn’t have enough blood to stay awake. Daddy left saying, someone at the doctor’s office can help get him out.

I cleaned up, grabbed a biscuit and left for school. When I got home, Mama had removed a mattress from the spare bed for me. I had clean sheets on my bed. Boy got several pints of blood at the doctor’s office and several stitches in his cut. The doctor said he should have died because he lost so much blood. It was a miracle he lived. When I got home, Boy was asleep on his bed from pain medication. The doctor was worried about infection and had him on antibiotics, also.

They said Boy became conscious enough to remember he got in a fight at the bar and someone cut him with a beer bottle. He didn’t remember who it was, nor did he remember getting home. Man burned the mattress and one of the sheets. Mama saved one, but it had a big red stain. Boy said he didn’t remember much about the fight and nothing afterwards. Daddy and Mama jumped on him pretty good. Mama told me to push him away and not let him get in my bed again even if he slept on the floor.

Boy stayed sober around the house the next few weeks while he healed. Then, one day, he was gone again and came back drunk. This time he came to the back door. I guess he wasn’t so drunk this time. Several days later, he left for the Army again. Somehow, after he served some time in the jail, they let him reenlist in the regular Army for four years. He got more training as a cook and did good enough to stay out of jail, I guess. I don’t know how, because he still drank a lot. He never came back to the Vickers house while I was there.

As a coincidence, Boy came back on leave about a year later and stayed at Louise’s (Virginia's) house. Don told me later that Boy was walking on the street going back to Louise’s house just after midnight one time and some blacks jumped him. They beat him up pretty bad and, unbelievably, cut another X inside his right arm, somehow. Police said it looked like a knife cut. The police found him on the street and took him to the hospital. He doesn’t remember anything about that fight either.

Something else unusual that happened at this house. We started having trouble with Vinnie (Marie) at school and at home. I stayed busy with homework, working on the house, working at Billups on the weekends, and helping the other kids with homework. For some reason, Vinnie started disliking school and didn’t do her homework. She talked about quitting a lot. I talked to her a lot, but she never told me what was wrong and I couldn’t keep her motivated to stay in school. It was later that year she ran away from home, twice. The second time, Aunt Flossie drove Mama somewhere in south Louisiana to get her. They found her on crutches. Later, Vada said she went riding with a boy on a motorcycle and they crashed and she hurt her leg.

It so happened that I stayed at Big Annie and Vennie’s house helping Big Annie work the first summer we moved to the Vickers house. Both other summers, I lived in Monroe and worked at the Billups Service Station. So, I wasn’t around in the summer very much to motivate Vinnie.

I don’t know what the problem was with Vinnie. She went back to school only to start failing. One day, she was gone. A couple weeks later, I heard she was staying with Vennie and Big Annie. I lost track of her for a long time. Later, she married John Guynn who had been seeing her at Big Annie’s house. (Note: they married on 20 September 1968, only six days after I married. I don’t know if anyone at home knew, or even heard, about her getting married. To my knowledge, she didn’t invite anyone from the house.)

Chapter 93. Summer At Big Annie’s

Big Annie and Vennie came to visit us every so often since they got married in 1957. We all liked Big Annie. He was ten plus years older than Vennie and they got along great. He was a happy man. He was always laughing and joking about something. It was the summer of 1966. I was just fixing to turn eighteen and recently finished my tenth grade. Even before school was out, Big Annie wanted me to help him work on Charles Caples’ new ground.

He knew I worked last summer at the Billups Service Station with Daddy in Monroe and Billups expected me be back this summer. I worked weekends and holidays with Billups during the school year. I was torn in allegiance to work for both of them during the summer. I sort-of wanted to work at Billups to help Daddy out. He worked there full time now at nights and we worked together every weekend. The service station work was a lot easier than farming. I was glad I didn't have to pick cotton anymore. But, I liked Big Annie and he made it sound exciting working in the new ground, even though it was going to be hard work. He knew I was a hard worker and never complained, besides, he really needed help. The new ground was a major project and he needed a hard worker.

We called him Big Annie which was odd for a man. His name was James Wesley Oliveaux (pronounced Olivo, additionally, it was several years later that I learned his last name wasn't spelled Olivo). I heard a few other people, I didn’t know, call him J.W. He had a brother everyone called W. T. More of his friends called him Big Annie, like us. The whole Oliveaux family had a few odd names. Big Boy Godino married May Oliveaux, Shot Oliveaux married Shirley, Lionel married Ruby Copeland, Polly Oliveaux married Sarah May Howard. All the men seemed to have odd names. His sisters, Sis married Ed, Rosie married Buster McIntosh, Dorothy married Johnny Sanders and May, above, were his sisters, they were normal names. The guys; Lionel, Big Annie, Shot, W.T., and Polly seemed odd to me. He told me he got the name Big Annie as a kid. He was a big baby, a big boy, and a big man. It all started when he was a baby. Everyone always said, He’s big, ain’t he? It was a short step from big, ain’t he? to Big Annie. So, everyone called him Big Annie. He didn’t care. He heard it all his life.

Big Annie and Vennie, 1970

Anyway, he told Charles Caples about me and said they ought to hire me to help him with the new ground. Charles Caples was a bank vice president in Monroe. To me, he had a lot of money and always tried to impress people. He had a modest little brick house down Kincaid Road in Monroe. Kincaid road was known for it’s new drag strip a few miles south of Monroe. They raced dragsters and every other type of car and motorcycle you wanted to race. The drag strip was one mile long and Mr. Caples lived at the end of the strip. The curve at the end of the track was in front of his house across the highway.

Mr. Caples bought about 200 acres of land and timber behind the race track. In fact, we had to use the race track entry gate to go to the new ground. Mr. Caples had the timber cut, and hired a bull dozier to push all the stumps and limbs in big piles. Big Annie had been burning the big piles for over a month. After burning the piles the first time, the dozier spread everything out and pushed the smaller burnt remains in another pile to be burned again. Mr. Caples wanted to plant wheat, soybeans, and corn on the cleared ground, eventually. First, it had to be cleaned up. That’s were I came in.

I guess Big Annie played me up bigger than he should have, but Mr. Caples said hire me. Big Annie told him I was supposed to work at Billups that summer, but Mr. Caples told Big Annie, I don't care, get him. If you say he is a good worker, that's good enough for me. Get him!

Big Annie told me Mr. Caples wanted me to work with him. I said, well, I'm sort-of committed to Billups. You know I worked for them last summer.

Big Annie said, I was told to get you, what every it takes. I can offer you fifty cents more per hour than Billups.

I don’t remember how much Billups was paying me, but that was a lot more. Billups knew I was a good worker also and Daddy told them they couldn’t get a replacement as good as I was. So, Billups matched the fifty cents, but the next day, Caples said seventy five cents. Billups didn’t try to match money with Mr. Caples. Mr. Joe Gilbert at Billups knew Caples and knew that when he wanted something in Monroe, he got it. So, they all understood I couldn’t turn down that much of an increase per hour. They all told me to go work for Caples.

Big Annie had the big smile he was known for when he heard that. So, as soon as I got out of school, he wanted me with him as quickly as possible. But, we had to move to the Vickers house from the DR house first. It only took us less than a week to get everything moved and I spent another week after school getting a lot of emergency things fixed around the Vickers house. Big Annie checked on me every other day to see if I was ready. After a couple weeks, things were settled down enough for me to go live with Big Annie and Vennie for the summer. On most weekends, I came back home doing other emergency things. That went on for most of the summer.

Arriving at Vennie’s, they were all glad to see me. Vennie still used a wood stove, so I immediately picked up that old chore. Big Annie’s parents, Mr. Charlie and Mrs. Oliveaux, lived with them. He was a short, small, hardworking old man. Mrs. Oliveaux was quiet, but saw everything. Having someone my age around seemed to liven everyone up. They constantly laughed at me about something I said, or did. I liked to wind them up about something and get them all talking. Mr. Charlie said Schaah a lot when he talked about the new ways kids had or if he was going to say something. He complained that kids had it too easy, and most didn’t know what hard work was. He still got most of the stove wood split and carried into the house. Vennie said she helped him sometimes. I told them he didn’t have to cut stove wood as long as I was there. He said, Schaah! We’ll see how long that lasts.

That whole summer I got all the stove wood in. I told him he could help if he wanted to and he did, some. Over the summer, he realized I wasn’t like many kids and worked hard.

He was always doing something. He didn’t know how to relax. I jumped on him to take it easy sometimes. He usually said 'Schaah!,' and walked away. We got to be good friends. I liked to get him talking about his younger days and how he worked. Usually, we talked while I split wood blocks and he had the hatchet splitting stove wood sticks off the split blocks. We worked and talked. Even when we took a break, and Vennie brought us a glass of water, he sat on a block and pulled a file out of his back pocket to sharpen the hatchet while we drank our water. It was rare to see him doing nothing. He was in pretty good health for his age despite the fact he dipped snuff most of his life.

I liked him and he always picked at me about girls. To hear him talk, I had girlfriends waiting in line. He made up stories about me doing something or going somewhere with girls. I had him laughing and shaahing as I joined him in the fantasy and made up more things. He said, Schaah, you lying!

I kept telling the yarn and he just laughed, shook his head, and said Schaah. Sometimes, he carried the fantasy in the house and I had everyone laughing as I stretched the lie beyond belief.

I split more stove wood every evening when I came in, usually. I praised Mr. Oliveaux for having a little pile split up. I kidded him about taking my job from