When I was 14 years old, I would spend some time (a couple of weeks or as long as I could stand it) with my first cousin Sue (she’s three years older than me) and her husband, Bascom, in Kentucky. I could only stand to stay two or three weeks and then I would make them bring me home. If they didn’t, I would threaten to walk from Kentucky to West Virginia and they knew I would. So when I was ready to come home, they always brought me home. Then I stayed at home for a week (which was about all I could stand) and then I either found a ride or hitchhiked to my Aunt Wanda’s in Logan or in one of Aunt Hannah’s apartments in Man.
Sue would pay me $5.00 a week to help her with her housework. Bascom also had a set of three-year-old twins by his first wife who died in childbirth. She had been my third cousin. I was only suppose to help Sue but I ended up doing all the work. I had been with them about two weeks when they left me home to take care of the twins and a tax man came around to the house to write down what you own and how much it cost so they could charge your taxes (this is a personal property tax). Well, I was very helpful. Sue was always bragging to me how much she paid for her furniture, in the end, she paid for it. I told the tax man double what she really paid.
The next time when I came to stay with Sue, they had moved to Kentucky. Bascom said they had to move there because I had cost them too much money when I told the taxman how much they had paid for furniture. I never told them I had lied. Sue just had a baby and she wanted my help for the summer; if I would stay that long. They lived on top of a mountain and it was the only house up there. It was about half a mile off the main road. One day, Bascom told Sue and I to kill and cut up 10 chickens a day (five for her and five for me) as we were preparing meat for the winter. We were to kill and cut up the chickens each day until there was none left. On our first day, neither of us could kill the chickens. So before Bascom left for work (he was a coal miner) he would kill the 10 chickens for us. Our first couple of days we did just like Bascom said, but soon we got tired of cutting up the chickens. Sue wanted me to do her chickens but I refused. She got so disgusted with me and the chickens, she said that if I wasn't going to cut them up to just throw them down the mountain side and that’s exactly what I did. I took the pan with her five chickens in it and toss them over the mountain side. When she seen what I did, she yelled at me (she couldn’t believe I actually did what she said). Sue and I got into a fist fight and went rolling down the mountain after the chickens. We quite fighting when we realized if we didn't find the chickens Bascom would paddle both of our behinds. It took us a long time to find the chickens in the weeds, bushes, and trees.
Another time I stayed with them, Bascom got sick and Sue had to take him to the hospital to see the doctor there. I was to stay home to watch the twins and their baby who was about five-month old. Before Bascom left, he showed me how to load, shoot, and put the safety on a 22 rifle. Just in case I needed to shoot someone who came messing around the house and intends to do us harm or if an animal came in from the top of the mountain. They were only going to be gone that day and be back before nightfall. I could probably have handled the day but, as it turns out, while Sue was at the hospital she told the doctor about this little bit of pain she had in her chest. She was having a heart attack and they put her in the hospital and instead of Bascom coming back home he decided to stay at the hospital with Sue. That left me up on a mountain by myself with four-year-old twins and a 5-month-old baby. They were gone for a week.
No comments:
Post a Comment