Miss Laura Mae’s kids were long gone. I loved tagging along with Mother to visit her since she always took time to talk to me a little before offering me a buttered biscuit and glass of milk. I loved the biscuit, but refused the milk, repulsed by the thick layer of cream atop the fresh cow’s milk in the glass jar in her refrigerator. I thought the thick cream looked like snot as she carefully spooned it into her coffee. Most of Mother’s friends had a houseful of kids and shooed us out before pouring coffee. “The kids are out back.” Sometimes I got a hint of gossip, though Mother always shooed me out as soon as I got my biscuit. “Now, stay on the steps and don’t let that ol’ hound dog git your biscuit!” Miss Laura Mae always reminded me as I closed the screen door behind me. I knew from experience that if I didn’t stand on the top step and hold my biscuit out of his reach, Ol’ Boots would help himself.
From my vantage point, I listened in as Miss Laura Mae launched into her story. “Floyd was pretty good to me, but he never did hold a job long. I don’t know what we’d a done if we hadn’t lived in that old house on his Mama’s place. He always did plow and put a good garden in or we’d a’gone hungry. He’d work a little pretty good for a while, but then he’d go off on a toot and get fired. The only thing he was good at was knocking me up. I had six youngun’s in eight years. Seem’s like I got another one ever’ time he hung his pants on the bed post. Times was just gittin’ harder and harder, and Floyd got mad the last couple of times I told him I was that way. You’d a’thought them babies was all my doing, but Lord knows more babies was the last thing on my mind when I couldn’t hardly feed the ones I already had. We couldn’t even keep ‘em in shoe leather. I had Berry in 1941 just before World War II started and nursed her long as I could, hoping I wouldn’t get pregnant, but sure enough, when she was about eight months old, my milk dried up an’ I felt a baby kicking under my apron. I kept hopin’ it was just gas, but then I started blowin’ up and I knew it was another youngun’ on the way.
I dreaded tellin’ Floyd, knowin’ he was gonna git mad. Sure enough, soon as I told him, he lit out a drinkin’. That was on a Monday night. I waited till then on purpose. He got paid on Fridays and I didn’t want him to go off a’drinkin’ before I got my groceries on Saturday. Sure enough, he got mad, just like l was a’plottin against him and took straight off. I didn’t see him again till Wednesday evenin’ and was feelin’ purty low about the fix I was in, a man that didn’t work steady, six kids and another one on the way, stuck livin’ in a shack on his mama’s place. When he came draggin’ in, he looked kind’a hangdog and I figured he’d got fired again while he was layin’ out drunk.”
“Well, Laura Mae, I got something I got to tell you I know you ain’t gonna like,” he started, looking down at his raggedy boots.
“It don’t take no genius to see you got fired,” I told him.
“No, that ain’t it.” He went on. “I was a’ drinkin’ with some fellers and they was on their way to enlist in the army. I wasn’t thinkin’ straight and I went right along and enlisted with ‘em. I just got time to get my stuff.”
Miss Laura Mae paused a moment, saying more to herself than to Mother, “Turned out that was the best piece of luck I ever had. The army was the first steady pay Floyd ever made. He was put in the paratroopers. Right off I was gittin’ a regular check. Paratrooper was extra pay, and he got extra for the young’uns. The first month, I got shoes for all the kids. The next month, I paid down on a stove. The one in his mama’s house didn’t have but two burners. Inside of a year, I had saved enough to pay down on this house. This is the first place I ever had a’ my own. Floyd didn’t get home for four years. I mean to tell you, it was good not to be pregnant all the time. I must ‘a been going through the change, ‘cause I didn’t have but one more after he got home, and I was ready for another one by then. Things was better with Floyd workin’ more regular after that. Seems like having a home kind’a gave him a lift. You’d a’thought he done it all hisself.”
Reblogged this on Br Andrew's Muses and commented:
Another good little story – I must categorize all of these
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This will probably end up as a book. I wondered if I was going on too long.
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A Book – then if I gather all the parts I had better buy it. I am not sure, whether you have gone on too long, it may find its own finale – would you believe this is the first time it caught my I and I settled in for a read and thought – oK this is something. So I have captured the first episode. I have three other authors with Stories in Series on my Blog and I think I need a page with an index for them – just so I can find them.
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I will stop when people lose interest.
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ok
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Miss Laura was a jewel of a person. Her husband and children were very fortunate. 🙂 — Suzanne
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Everyone who knew her was.
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Thanks so much.
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Those southern sayings! My great-aunt always said that my grandmother got pregnant every time my grandfather hung his pants on her bedpost. I also remember buy shoes for kids as “keeping them in shoe leather”. Again, I love these stories.
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I try to tell them just as I remember. I love people stories.
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That was beautifully written … with the accent and spelling! Please take a bow!! 🙂
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So glad you enjoyed. Her country speech was fascinating and endearing!
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Nice one
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Thanks for reading.
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My pleasure👍
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Real life is always so extraordinary. We don’t realise how easy we have it today.
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I have often thought that. When I was a key d, my mother was always first up and last to bed. She often went to sleep rocking the baby.
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Thanks so many ch!
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I always hate for your stories to end. I do believe I would have liked her! And I so remember the cream and milk separation…we got all of our milk from a dairy right up the road. The first store-bought milk I saw, I thought something was terribly wrong with it! Lol!
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She was so warm and always had a minute for me. Will write more about her.
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Great story…another survivor. ☺
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There are a lot out there!
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I got lost in that story, Linda! I was almost disappointed when I reached the end. You wrote that wonderfully! I can see his frustrated and her excited face when he told her about him enlisted.
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Wouldn’t you have loved to visit Miss Laura Mae.
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Only because I loved the story doesn’t mean I would have loved being part ot it…. lol!!!
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Didn’t anyone teach him that hanging his breeches on the bed post meant many more babies? Ha! Good thing his missus got resourceful and thank the good Lord for the army. Enjoyed reading this
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Maybe a little time in the army helped with that.
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Thankfully it worked for her. My goodness, what times!
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I like your storytelling. Makes me want more.
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Thanks for the encouragement.
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What a lovely story… Women really are the strong ones aren’t they? God bless miss Laura Mae. She sounds like some woman 😉
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She knew an opportunity when she had one.
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what a story, simple clear and direct.
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So glad you enjoyed.
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What a great story, Linda. It was very good luck indeed that Floyd joined up! 🙂
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Yes it was.
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