Hodgepodge

By ME – MYSELF - I

I never knew my family had dark secrets. Other people live in glass houses and have ghosts in their closets. I found out something and got the ball rolling, the windows shattered, and the ghost out of the closets, only to find demoralizing and devasting answers that left me horrified.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9781662433702

Book preview

cover.jpg

Hodgepodge

ME – MYSELF - I

Copyright © 2021 Me—Myself—I

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2021

ISBN 978-1-6624-3369-6 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-6624-3564-5 (hc)

ISBN 978-1-6624-3370-2 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Arriving in the World

Growing Up

Family and Rag Curls

School and Schools

Love and Heartbreak

Disappointments

Marriage

Devastation

Poems

Life After

I dedicate this book to my daughter and our two sons and, of course, my husband, four grandchildren, and one great-granddaughter.

Introduction

This story is a true story of my life—the struggles of being very poor and the courage to prove if you really want to do something, you can become a better person and change the course of your life, and never stop dreaming, because dreams do come true.

There will not be any names in this book, but I will be able to stay with the story and not offend anyone. If you think you have a part in it, so be it. Be glad I haven’t forgotten you.

Chapter 1

Arriving in the World

This is my story, so I’m telling it the way it started, from the beginning, the day I was born and ventured out into this amazing world. Even on that day, I wasn’t alone. I had a twin coming out with me, so even then, I never had my space. I had to share the womb with a sister, and that day, March 8, 1944, I was never alone.

I don’t remember much of my childhood (but who does), but as time went on, I learned I had (already) ten brothers and sisters. My poor mother had, so far, a baby a year.

Back in those days, everyone was so poor they grew everything in the garden—raised chickens for eggs and meat, raised pigs, canned vegetables for winter, picked all kinds of berries to make jellies and jams and pies. Everyone could grow tobacco only so much the government would only buy a certain amount so everyone could have money.

Then they got a break—a big company had sent letters that they needed workers to help with their crops. They had three choices to move to—Pennsylvania, Florida, or California. They would move them and their families, give them a place to live and a job.

So my dad—I wasn’t born yet—signed up for Pennsylvania. They were put on a train and came to Pennsylvania. At that time, my sister was born in Kentucky. Watch out Pennsylvania, here they come. There were seventeen families that came to Pennsylvania. One reason was it was the closer way to go back home if they didn’t like it here.

They put ten children and two adults in a two-bedroom row house. I can just see the walls going into the neighbors’ houses. Just trying to get settled in, and lo and behold, Mom was having another baby. No, make that two—hey, it’s us, the twins. We were born in that house with the walls bulging into the neighbors,’ although they all became the best of friends. Mom named us after them. Now the house is too small, so they’re moving out in the country. Apple orchards are around us, a big house, two stairways, and four bedrooms! wow, only six kids to a room—lots more room—and now we can raise lots of vegetables and cows, pigs, and chickens.

Guess what, Mom—yes, lo and behold, another baby. Only one, and it’s a boy. That’s six boys and six girls. Mom had every baby at home and went right back to doing whatever she was doing—cleaning, cooking, canning, etc. The doctor said to her, No more babies. (I think he should have told Daddy.)

Time goes on, everybody was busy. Next thing we knew, the doctor came in with a big black bag. We asked what was in the bag, and he said, Your baby sister or brother.

We want to see it.

Oh no, Mommy must see it first, she waited a long time.

We never heard a sound, and all of a sudden, such loud screaming! Well, it was our baby sister over eleven pounds. When Mom said okay, we could see her.

Mom was having babies and Dad had spent time at Penn State learning about trees and caring for them. Also learned how to graft different trees together. It was amazing to watch him do this. I think he really loved his job; he seemed to be so content. He had a good job—could plant gardens; raise his chickens, pigs, and cows; and kept us fed. We were all happy ’cause when Mom cooked, every meal was a buffet; not everyone liked all the same food. Everyone loved the pot pie, pies, cakes, cookies, puddings, everything. As they say, when made from scratch, there’s so much to choose from. Even now that I really enjoy eating at buffets, none could match my mom’s.

With the good comes the bad. Us girls had to do all the dishes and clean up. The boys did whatever, and all got along. So out of the seventeen families, my dad and mom were the only ones who stayed here. You know there were enough of us to make seventeen families.

Every morning, us girls had to get up early to help Mom with laundry (Monday), and let me tell you, it was a lot of wash—enough for an army. Oh yes, we had washtubs, a washboard, and a washer with rollers on the top to rinse the water out. Our mom told us never put your hands in the roller. It could pull our arm right in and probably rip it out of our shoulder. Okay. My sister must not have been a believer, because as soon as Mom went into the other part of the basement, that quick, my sister puts her hand in the roller and couldn’t stop it. Her arm was being pulled in, and I started yelling. I was so scared. Mom, to the rescue, stopped the machine and put it into reverse, and her arm was released intact. Well, I’ll say—she never did that again!

Finally we had to get ready for school. By then, we already had a day in. Going to school to us was rest time, end of day. We get home, only to help with supper, clean up, do dishes, go outside before dark and hoe the garden, get a bath, try to get homework done, and to bed, up early, to do it all over again.

Back then, we had no air-conditioning, no fans—it was too hot to sleep. So four of us would climb out the window, sit on the roof of the first floor, and hope for a little cool air. No railing, so we had to be careful. Then we got laughing, and then we hear get to sleep, and finally we came in (the thing was he didn’t know we were out on the porch). So we got in bed and yelled all at once, Good night, Daddy. Good night, Mama, and started to giggle. (We thought we were the Waltons; there were enough of us.)

Time to get up and start a new day. Oh, before bed, we had to do our homework. Life was hard. We were very poor, but very rich with love and having a family, a place to belong.

Mom made our dresses out of pretty chicken feed bags. The bags had prints on them or different colored flowers, and she also told Daddy to make sure he got two of the same print—two pinks and two blues so she could make the dresses for the twins. So my twin was always pink, and I was always blue. And we still didn’t look alike.

Kids weren’t nice, would tease us about wearing feed bags, made a lot of fun of us. Years later, Dolly Parton wrote a song about the coat of many colors, and that’s how I felt, but like her, our mom put a lot of love and work into those dresses. I always had my head held high and walked very proudly. Mom put a lot of time and love into making them. Buy one, get one free.

Back then, you could order little peeps by mail. Every year, Mom would order one hundred chickens, and they were delivered by mail by our regular mailman (bet that made his day). We always lost a few ’cause of the heat. We fed them, raised them, got her eggs from them and then killed them, de-feather them, cut the inners out and cut them up, and packed them for later use. That chicken was so good the way Mom made it, of course Southern fried in lard (we made from the pigs). Of course, this was not fun to do, but we know it as survival. We were always busy looking for raspberries, cherries, strawberries to make jelly and jams. We worked all summer getting our supply ready for winter. Most of it was gone by the end of winter, and we had to start all over.

Sometimes we did something called stupid and get caught. I like to do things my way. Not a believer that nothing can go wrong.

So one day, I was helping my mom. She said I could mash the potatoes, so out came the mixer, and I started to mash the potatoes. I became mesmerized watching the beaters going round and round. I thought to myself, Will the beater stop if I put my fingers in the beater? Well, let me tell you, yes. Ouch! It does stop, I couldn’t get my finger out! She said to me, I’ll have to cut the finger off. No. Finally, he got my finger loose, and I said, I’ll never do that again! I became a big