I Remember My Firsts…: A Collection of Remembrances, Letters, Poems, Plays & Stories

By Don Hill

Eighty-eight-year-old Don Hill has lived many experiences during his lifetime. He enjoys recalling many of them. In his first book, Ramblin’s & Recollections, he brings back memories of growing up on the farm during WWII and his experiences in Korea. Now he collects his creative writings into I Remember My Firsts...

You will go back with him as he recalls some of his firsts (not all of them), as well as his letters to the editor; his one-act plays, poetry, letters, and many other writings. The scope covers many subjects as he enjoys “the newfound thing”—word processing. He says it works better than the quill.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 31, 2018
• ISBN: 9781532061639

Don Hill

Eighty-eight year old Don Hill has lived many experiences during his lifetime. He enjoys recalling many of them. In his first book Ramblin’s & Recollections he brings back memories of growing up on the farm during WWII and his experiences in Korea. Now he collects his creative writings into I Remember My First. You will go back with him as he recalls some of his FIRSTS (Not all of them), as well as his letters to the editor; his one act plays; poetry, letters and many other writings. The scope covers many subjects as he enjoys “the new found thing,” word processing. He says it works better than the quill.

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Copyright © 2018 Don Hill.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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ISBN: 978-1-5320-6162-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5320-6163-9 (e)

iUniverse rev. date:  10/30/2018

CONTENTS

From The Author

Introduction

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

All The News That Isn’t News

Now For The Weather

It’s All About Money

Gluten, Lard, Oh My!!!

Comparative Shopping

A Study On Coffee

Remembering Photos

A Study On Doors

Easy Open Dilemma

Black Sheep In Families

Bikes Make Friends

Horn Blowers

Robocalls

The By-Gone Porch

More On The Front Porch

More By-Gone Things

Don’t Forget

Peanut Butter, Pumpkin Pie & Yams

Political Signs

The Lost Dining Room

Volunteering Is The Spice Of Life

Over 80 … Oh, Oh!

Expiration Date

Changes Are Coming

Vote! No Matter What

Yesterday’s Phone Calls

Years Slipping By

Facts Are Facts

Memories Of Jacsy

Time Is Fleeting

V-J Day

A Tribute To A Sign Painter

A Tribute To A Janitor

Becoming An Adult

THE PLAYS

The Tornado

Playing Marbles

I Want To Report A Stolen Car!!

Shhh….

Painting Horse’s Heads

STORIES, POEMS & STUFF

Tom And Huck And ‘The Fish’n Party’

Mary C. Brown – I’m Glad You Were

Old Fort Branch High

Grandpa And Electronics

My Best Come Back Ever

Rikki The Littlest Giraffe

The Turtle And The Whale

The Bermuda Palms Apts.

A Korean Christmas

A Korean Thanksgiving

They Remember

Dad’s Bench

Doing Andy Griffith

My Churches

Shelb Was My Buddy

The Foot Race

There Will Be Things Yet To Be Invented

Washington D.c. Fling

Mellencamp’s Wild Night Video Shoot

Base Operations Dispatcher

Korean Night Flight Postscript

Judging Books By Their Cover

Class Reunion Roast

Our Morning Walk On The Beach

To Leslie

To Susanne

What Does The American Flag Mean To You?

Veteran’s Remembrance Month

Keeping Your Eye On The Ball

Signing Off

About The Author

Dedicated to my

Wife, Mary

Daughters, Leslie & Suzi

Son-in-Law Shane

Grand Daughters, Shelby & Sadie

And to all the friends I’ve known

through these eighty-eight years.

Years are

But Moments

To those who

Remember.

- Don Hill

FROM THE AUTHOR

Dear Readers,

I’m amazed when some people whom I meet say, I never met an author before. And I think, who me? Sometimes I amaze myself. I’m not really a real author, author. You know the ones who write novels and mysteries, etc. That would take some thinking. My friend John is one of those and I certainly wouldn’t put myself in his bracket. No, I just start typing and whatever happens, happens.

I didn’t start writing until the Mac came out and the term word processing emerged. I wasn’t a very good typist when writers pounded the typewriter. If you are old enough to remember; Error, stopping, advancing the platen, white out, drying time, backspace, strike over. It certainly slowed you down, especially if you typed like I did. Like magic, the Mac would simply backspace, and the error was gone and ready for the correction.

With this new found wonder and time on my hands after retirement I started writing stuff. How do you start? Many writers say to write about what you know. So, I did. In my first little so called self-published book, (that is, printed pages bound together with a cover), Slices of Life, was just for family and friends. After that I got the courage to actually get a book published.

Ramblin’s & Recollections was a matter of letting the fog lift and jot down little memories of things I remembered growing up on the farm. Simple things that most people wouldn’t even put in their memory bank, however, I found that people did remember those things, they just didn’t think they were important enough to remember. They thanked me for bringing them to the surface because it made happy memories.

So now, this is my second published book. It really wasn’t written, it was just collected. My computer was full of stories that I had written over the years and I felt it was time to put them all together. Here they are; no rhyme or rhythm. Hope you find some that you like.

Don

INTRODUCTION

If my title misled you and you thought this was a tell-all book, I’m sorry. It is however, a collection of memories, letters to the Editor, plays, prose and a selection of some of my writings over the years.

*     *     *

In the first section I have cleared away the fog and recalled some simple firsts in my life. Life was much simpler, and discoveries excited us more then. This was back when some thought that everything that could be invented, had been invented.

*     *     *

The second section is a collection of Letters to the Editor. I read letters from others who mainly complained about something or promoted their political party. I started putting a little history and humor in our way of life and people seemed to enjoy the change. This collection covers several years of being published in our local newspaper, the Seymour Tribune, Seymour, Indiana.

*     *     *

I never considered myself a playwright. Neither has anyone else. However, I came up with five little ditty’s that people could relate to. The plays have never been performed at this writing, however, they are available in case you are a Broadway producer.

*     *     *

Finally, I have included some of the stories that I have written over the years. I found some on the computer that I had forgotten about. They may not interest you but I had to fill up space somehow.

I Remember

My First…

A collection of Remembrances

I REMEMBER MY FIRST…

It would have been in the 1930’s when I was playing at my cousin’s house. He told me he had something weird to show me. We went out to his shed and he produced a pocket comb. Nothing weird about that, we had pocket combs, but they were black hard rubber, this one was green.

He produced a match and lit a candle then held the pocket comb over the flame. Slowly it began to melt. Long stringy green slime oozed down. Nothing I had ever seen before. What is that stuff? I asked. It’s called plastic. Wow! I wondered what else they could make out of that plastic stuff. Little did I know. Anyway, that was one of my FIRSTS.

I REMEMBER MY FIRST…

During the ‘30 my Dad would go to the garage that was a couple of blocks from home to loaf around with the mechanics and other local men. On one occasion I went with him. They had just gotten in something new that amazed me. It was bright red and stood outside in front of the garage. The mechanics were talking about the fact that they didn’t have to fool with selling cokes anymore. They had a machine that would do it for them.

All the men were wanting to know how it worked. Well, if you have a nickel try it out, was the answer. One of the men produced the nickel and put it in the slot, pushed a button and out popped a bottle of ice cold coke. No one had to wait on him behind a counter or anything. Wow! That was something. To my surprise the man handed me the coke and said, Here, you try the first coke from a machine. Little did I know then that a coke out of a machine would cost a dollar or more. Anyway, it was one of my FIRSTS.

I REMEMBER MY FIRST…

During the ‘30 our family would always go to Princeton on Saturday night. It’s what everybody did. Not so much for shopping but just to see people. Everybody would park on the courthouse square and just sit or stand around and talk to friends and neighbors that they hadn’t seen all week.

When leaving for home Dad would pull up to a little shop and order us all a nickel hamburger. He didn’t even have to get out of the car to do it. We just drove up and ordered out of the car window. Our order would be handed out of a window. Wow! That was something. Of course, it was known as a drive-thru. Just think, eating a hamburger in the car and not going in a restaurant. Anyway, it was one of my FIRSTS.

I REMEMBER MY FIRST…

No doubt the best thing that my parents added to the house was the indoor plumbing, especially the flush toilet. I don’t remember how old I was but old enough to remember Dad installing it. Before, of course, we had the outdoor privy. A two-holer that was about 20 or 30 yards out the back door. Dad had built a grape arbor enclosing the path and Mom kept flowers planted around the outhouse. It was just a method of trying to keep it as pleasant the best they could.

Now with the new bathtub we didn’t have to take a bath in a washtub in the middle of the kitchen. This wasn’t a pleasant occasion. Hot water was poured in right off the kitchen stove and if it was winter, the oven door was opened to keep us warm. Now the new sink was great as it replaced the wash basin on the back porch. The porch was closed in, but it still got cold in the winter.

The best thing of all was the toilet. Dad wouldn’t use it for a long time because he didn’t accept newfangled things very fast. Besides toilet paper cost money. Anyway, it was one of my FIRSTS.

I REMEMBER MY FIRST…

Dad had fixed it, so we had hot water during the winter but not in the summer. We had a coal furnace and Dad had run our water line inside and through the fire box, so it kept the water heated. But what about the summer when the furnace wasn’t operating? Mom always kept a pot of water on the kitchen stove and there was a water reservoir on the side of the stove that always had warm water in it.

I remember when Dad bought a small stove apparatus that was made especially for heating water. It was simply a small wood burning stove that had a thick outside casing. Water would be piped into the casing and would be heated when you built a fire in the stove. So now in the summer and you wanted to take a warm bath, you had to go in the basement and build a kindling fire in this little stove and wait forever for it to heat enough water for a bath. My grandkids are missing so much fun. Anyway, it was one of my FIRSTS.

I REMEMBER MY FIRST…

When I came home from school one day I walked in the kitchen to find a most wonderful thing. It was shinny white with coils of wire mounted on the top. A refrigerator!!! Wow! Of course, we had always had an ice box. It was just an insulated box on legs. Each day the ice man would bring a block of ice to put in the ice compartmental of the ice box. He would chip off a block and hook his ice tongs to it and bring it in the kitchen for Mom. Us kids would scoop up