Arkie John
Active member
I recall a story Mother told about me, down through the years and Linda has asked that I share it. I told it to her this week and she was delighted, laughing out loud, said she'd never heard it before. So here goes.
A little background: Daddy was a plain spoken man, prone to mild-to-intermediate profanity--whenever the situation warranted it. He never used really vulgar language such as the "F" word, but he would, on occasion speak of one's ancestry if they pulled out in front of him or something really annoyed him about the actions of man or beast. You can imagine, right?
Well, here was JohnnyBoy, an impressionable 4-year-old, assisting Mother with the weekly chore of wash day. She had just run another load of clothes through the ringer washer and loaded the big dishpan with rung-out clothes and proceeded to the clothes line (what's a dryer, back then???)
She began to hang the clothes one by one as I clung to her skirt tail. It didn't matter about me. She was the most patient, even when I was under her feet continuously for 15 minutes as she maneuvered about the clothes line. All was well, until I got a little competition.
Here came our old tom cat. He pranced right up to Mother's other leg and started with the rubbing her leg, first on one side then the other. I watched and grabbed his tail from time to time, clutching Momma's other leg.
Here Momma was, attempting to get the wash on the line to dry and she is impeded, times TWO. Finally, though a patient mother, she was not so patient when it came to that tom cat. She kept pushing it back with her foot, only to have him come back, pressing into her leg and getting right in the way of her each and every step.
Finally, after many pushes from Mother to discourage ole tom, he got in the way once too often and caused her to stumble over me, with both of us almost piling up, with wet, dirty/clean clothes littered all over. IMMEDIATELY her ire flared. Instantaneously she gave a prepatory back swing with her right leg and foot and, I'm tellin' you, that cat went flyin' like one of Tom Dempsey's field goal footballs! He probably was airborne for twenty feet.
As soon as the ole cat hit the ground he took off like lightnin' for the next county. Without warning I shouted, "...and take that you son of a bitch!" ...every bit of four years old, I'm here to tell ya.
When Daddy got in from work that day, she recounted the incident and asked, "Now Gene, just where do you think Johnny heard THAT phrase?"
I'm quite sure they had an in-depth conversation about Daddy's language around their parroting baby boy, donchaknow!!
Hope you enjoyed the story. I get a kick out of it every time I think about it! <><
Blessings.
AJ
A little background: Daddy was a plain spoken man, prone to mild-to-intermediate profanity--whenever the situation warranted it. He never used really vulgar language such as the "F" word, but he would, on occasion speak of one's ancestry if they pulled out in front of him or something really annoyed him about the actions of man or beast. You can imagine, right?
Well, here was JohnnyBoy, an impressionable 4-year-old, assisting Mother with the weekly chore of wash day. She had just run another load of clothes through the ringer washer and loaded the big dishpan with rung-out clothes and proceeded to the clothes line (what's a dryer, back then???)
She began to hang the clothes one by one as I clung to her skirt tail. It didn't matter about me. She was the most patient, even when I was under her feet continuously for 15 minutes as she maneuvered about the clothes line. All was well, until I got a little competition.
Here came our old tom cat. He pranced right up to Mother's other leg and started with the rubbing her leg, first on one side then the other. I watched and grabbed his tail from time to time, clutching Momma's other leg.
Here Momma was, attempting to get the wash on the line to dry and she is impeded, times TWO. Finally, though a patient mother, she was not so patient when it came to that tom cat. She kept pushing it back with her foot, only to have him come back, pressing into her leg and getting right in the way of her each and every step.
Finally, after many pushes from Mother to discourage ole tom, he got in the way once too often and caused her to stumble over me, with both of us almost piling up, with wet, dirty/clean clothes littered all over. IMMEDIATELY her ire flared. Instantaneously she gave a prepatory back swing with her right leg and foot and, I'm tellin' you, that cat went flyin' like one of Tom Dempsey's field goal footballs! He probably was airborne for twenty feet.
As soon as the ole cat hit the ground he took off like lightnin' for the next county. Without warning I shouted, "...and take that you son of a bitch!" ...every bit of four years old, I'm here to tell ya.
When Daddy got in from work that day, she recounted the incident and asked, "Now Gene, just where do you think Johnny heard THAT phrase?"
I'm quite sure they had an in-depth conversation about Daddy's language around their parroting baby boy, donchaknow!!
Hope you enjoyed the story. I get a kick out of it every time I think about it! <><
Blessings.
AJ
Great story!
