Go On Up To The House...

​    A night when me getting a        little too creative during my      free time, while helping Dad    with the evening barn              chores, turned into a little        more than I bargained for.

     Life on the Crystal Springs Farm was a continuous search for ways to amuse myself and as a four year old without very many years of wisdom to help me decide whether my choices would possibly lead me to undesirable consequences, well let's just say that now and then I found myself doing something that I thought was a good idea, but indeed the end result would change my mind.

     My Mother often referred to me as a "trial" through the years and I never really knew what she meant by that until recent years of reflection of my past has lead me to understand all to well.  I think that what she meant was that I "tried" her patience on a pretty routine basis.

     Let me give you just one example by telling you of a night on the Crystal Springs Farm when I probably pushed my Mom and Dad's patience right to the limit...

     One of the interesting things about the Crystal Springs Farm was that it had the State Road Route 13 running right down the middle of it. I never really thought about it because it had always been there, it was part of the Farm, and therefore, part of my life. It separated one side of the Farm from another but it was never really an obstacle for me, rather, it was just another source of entertainment.

     The big Farmhouse was on the upper side of the road and the barn was on the lower side. The barn had a large driveway that was wide at the top near the road and narrowed as it went down to the big wide barn doors at the bottom. These doors lead into the barn where Dad would drive the tractor and manure spreader through when he cleaned the barn each morning. Before Mr. Garcia installed our new EZ-Go automatic barn cleaner a few years later, I remember watching Dad drive the Allis-Chalmers tractor and manure spreader down the center of the barn floor and use a pitch fork to clean out the "drop" behind the cows and throw the manure up into the spreader. Dad would say it used to worry him because the "Alice" would backfire sometimes and he was afraid that it might start a fire if a spark landed on some hay. Just a few years earlier, before he got his first tractor, the "Alice", Dad had used a team of horses to pull the manure spreader. My Mom tells that this was an interesting task as one of the team was full of mischief and they sometimes had minds of their own, so having them stand still in the middle of the barn floor while he loaded the spreader must have been a challenging task for my Dad.

     Next to the large barn doors at the bottom of the driveway was a large cement stoop in front of the milkhouse, where we placed the full milk cans each morning to be picked up by RC Woodford, our milkman. RC would load the cans onto his truck and take them to the local "milk plant" for processing. Sometimes Dad would take the milk cans to the plant himself with his blue 1950 Chevy truck, and I would get to go with him. This was quite an adventure for me because after Dad unloaded the cans off the truck, while we waited for them to be emptied and washed, I would wander around the plant and watch the men work in their long white coats and tall back rubber boots. I remember seeing my Dad talk to some of the men while we waited and I always wondered how he knew them, after all, they weren't part of our world at the Farm.

     When I was four years old the nightly routine on the Farm began with my Dad going to the pasture to get the cows in the late afternoon and drive them back to the barn for the evening milking. We would let them in the barn, then feed them grain before we went up to the house for supper. My Dad would fill the large wheelbarrow from sacks of grain from the "grainery", a corner of the barn where we kept the bags of grain stacked when they were delivered by the big truck from the local GLF store in Truxton. Every month we would receive a visit from Smitty, a very nice salesman from the store, with his GLF hat on, and he would take our order for how much feed and supplies we needed. He would stay and visit with my Dad about the crops and the weather for quite a while... then a couple of days later we would see the big truck come with our sacks of feed for the cows, and any other supplies that my Dad had ordered.

     Well my Dad would fill up the wheelbarrow with grain and wheel it in front of the cows and stop at each one. He would let me use the large metal scoop to dish out to each cow her particular portion of feed. My Dad would tell me exactly how much to give each cow and it always amazed me how he could remember how much each one was to receive, I was sure I could never remember all those different portions for each cow if my Dad were not there to tell me.

     Then we would go back up to the house for supper around 5:00 and my Mom would have a nice supper already out on the table waiting for us. We would have a real nice "meat and potatoes" meal every night with meat from the freezer, vegetables from our large garden, and milk from our own cows, and Mom always had a nice dessert to finish off the meal.

     After supper Dad and I would head back down to the barn for the evening milking. My Dad would scrape the barn floor clean with a large flat shovel, a job that latter would be mine when I got older, and then I would go behind him and spread a layer of powdery white calcium to make the floor clean and easier to walk on as we did our chores. I would fill a little pail with the gritty white powder and carry it down the floor behind my Dad. I would reach in and grab a fist full and spread it out on the floor as if I was spreading grass seed. My Dad had instructed me that it should be spread out evenly over the floor, leaving no clumps, and I remember being quite proud of the floor and the way it looked when we were done, like a big white clean sheet.

     My Dad would then bring out the miking machines and milk pails from the milkhouse and start milking the cows. In later years I became old enough to carry the pails of milk to the milkhouse for my Dad as he milked each cow and poured the warm milk from the milking machines into the pails. The pails would then need to be carried to the milkhouse and be emptied into the large milk cans for storage. For now, as I was too young to do much else while my Dad did the milking, I was left to play and find ways to amuse myself. Other than taking some of the warm milk from one of the pails and giving it to the kittys, my chores were done for the night, so I would play for a while until my Dad would say later on "it's time to go up to the house", and then I'd go up the driveway, cross the road, and go up to the house for the night.

     I have to tell you about feeding the kittys because that was an event all in itself, and for a little guy like me, it was one of the highlights of my day. I would take the kitty's milk dish, which was really one of my Mom's old pie tins, and place it next to the rim of one of the full milk pails and push against the pail until it poured some milk into the dish. When the dish was full as I could get it, without spilling any more than I could help, I would then carry the prize back to the spot where the kittys ate and gently put the dish down.

     Now you have to understand that the cats on a dairy farm are not just a few, they were a very large family! There was a couple of Mom kittys and a very large family of little kittys from both Moms, making it quite a lot of hungry little mouths that had to share this dish of milk! Well, there were always a few kittys right around close by waiting for me to place the dish down and they would dive right in, but most of the little guys were off in other parts of the barn doing whatever it is that little kittys do, and it would be up to me to call them to supper. Well this was the best part for me. I would call out in my special "calling the kittys" voice... "Here kitty, kitty, kitty! Here kitty, kitty, kitty!" and little kittens would come running from every direction and head straight for that dish of milk and they would dive right in face first and drink like they were starving. It was so much fun to watch them all nudged up together in a circle around the dish, and as I watched I felt like they were my very own little responsibility and that it was becasue of me that they had thier warm meal of milk that made them grow. After they ate and started wandering away from the dish I would pick them up one by one and play with them, an added bonus of this special time of my day.

     Well, after feeding the kittys and sometime before the sun started going down, my Dad would say to me "it's time to go up to the house" and I would make the trek up to and across the road to the house for the evening. The time between feeding the kittys, and the time my Dad told me to head on up to the house, was mine to fill in any creative way I could and I would usually play with the kittys or go visit the calves in thier pen for a while. On this one night I found myself out playing in the barn driveway and I wandered up next to the road to watch the cars go by. Now I'll never be able to tell you why I did what I did next, I guess it just seemed like a good idea at the time and like many other things I would decide to do to amuse myself, I was wrong about this one. I saw a car coming from the left, which meant it was on my side of the road and would pass right next to me on it's way to Cuyler. For some unknown reason, that I cannot imagine today, as I watched the car coming I reached down and grabbed a fist full of sand and small pebbles from the side of the road and threw it at the door of the car as it drove by! I could hear the sound of the sand hitting the side of the car as it passed by next to me and I guess I must have thought that was pretty neat.

     I don't know if I expected the car to stop, or if I was surprised when it didn't even slow down, but I do know that when I saw another car coming down the road towards me, I decided to do it again! This time it was a little two seater convertible sports car with it's top down and two guys inside. Maybe if I had realized just how low that car was, I might have decided that throwing sand at it might not be a good idea but by the time the car was next to me and I had already thrown the sand at it, it was too late. I remember looking right at the guys in the car as I literally threw sand at them as they went by. Well, I cant' tell you for sure but I think I knew what was going to happen next. I think I might already have been turning towards the barn when I heard the squeal of the tires, but I remember looking back and seeing the car stopped and then starting to come towards me in reverse! I turned back towards the barn and started running down the driveway as fast as I could. I rounded the corner of the big doorway and caught out of the corner of my eye, the little car turning off the road into the driveway and following behind me down towards the barn. I ran into the grainery and hid on the stacks of feed bags wondering what would happen next. Well, the guys had pulled right down next to the big barn doors at the bottom of the driveway, and as the doors were all the way open, I guess it didn't take my Dad long to see the little car sitting there, because the next thing I knew he was walking right down the barn floor towards them. I often wondered what Dad was thinking when he looked out there and saw that little car with those fellas sitting in it... it must have been a strange sight to see as we didn't usually have visitors when we were doing chores. They must have seemed pretty out of place at the time.

     Well, after what seemed like a very long time, my Dad came back into the barn and looked up my way. He didn't even have to say a word as I climbed down off the sacks of grain and started heading his way. I knew he had something to say and that he didn't expect he should have to come to me to say it. Well, what I expected was a real good talking to at the very least and I was very surprised when all he said was... "there's someone out there who wants to talk to you". To me, that was the worst thing he could have said, because when I looked out towards the big open doors at the end of the barn, to my surprise, there sat that little car with those two fella's still sitting in it, looking right at me. It seemed like a very long walk to that car I can tell you, and I was pretty scared, as these guys were strangers, and I had no idea what they were going to say to me. I guess I wasn't too scared that they'd hurt me 'cuase my Dad was right there in the barn, but he had made it clear by the tone in his voice that I was on my own with this one, I had made the mistake and I was going to pay the consequence of having to talk to these two guys.

     I was expecting the worst for sure and as I remember those two fellas didn't let me off the hook. They were very stern and they gave me a good talking to and they asked me questions like did I realize that someone could have gotten hurt. I don't remember what I said when I answered them but I remember hanging my head a lot and feeling pretty bad about the whole thing, and being real sorry that I had ever gotten near the road that night.

     Well, about the time they were done talking to me, my Dad came over and asked me if I had something to say to these fellows, and I knew very well what he meant. I told them that I was sorry and they said OK, told my Father goodbye and then backed around and drove up the driveway, onto the road and off into the sunset.

     You have to understand that my Dad was a man of very few words, and when he looked at me and said nothing more than "go on up to the house now", that I knew right then and there that the matter was over. I had made my mistake, and paid the price, and I figure, thinking back on it, that he must have felt like we were pretty lucky I hadn't caused an accident, and that the whole incident hadn't been much worse than it was.

   You see, my Dad hadn't said "it's time to go up to the house now", as he always did. The subtle change to "go on up to the house now" and the tone in his voice, told me all I needed to know. My Dad and I spent a lot of time together when I was young, and as I mentioned, he was a man of few words, so as a result I was very good at reading the tone of his voice, and I new that night just exactly what he meant.

     Well, I headed up to the house feeling pretty bad about it all and when I got there I went about getting ready for bed in my normal fashion without saying a word to my Mom about what had happened, pretty much I imagine because what she thought of me meant a lot to me and I knew she wasn't going to be very proud of me when she found out about this, and I didn't want to be the one to tell her about it.

     Well, I was in bed by the time my Dad got back to the house after the evening chores but I'm sure he must have told my Mom about it as soon as he came in that night because before long I heard my Mom coming up the stairs to my bedroom and then she came in and knelt down next to my bed. I remember in a mixture of loving and caring but very stern words, in a manner all her own, she asked me about what happened and we talked about it for a while. She was really pretty easy on me considering what I had done and I realize now, as she was talking about how Mom and Dad just barely made enough money to buy groceries and that I should think before I do foolish things, that she was trying to appeal to me with reason instead of what I expected, and that was a stern scolding.

     I remember those days of my childhood on the Crystal Springs Farm very well, and I know that I was always doing foolish things without thinking and getting into trouble over it, and I know I was very well deserving of my Mom calling me a "trial". I remember getting a lot of scoldings from both my Mom and Dad as a result, but I'll never forget, as I look back on a night that my Mom and Dad must have decided to take a different approach, and let a little guy face the music for his actions like a man... to show him the error of his ways with reason instead of scolding, in hopes that it would lead someday to him being a better person for it.

     That's the kind of Love that surrounded me on the Farm. My Mom, my Dad and my Farm kept me safe and sound, and taught me the lessons of life that I needed to learn.

     I'd like to think my Folks made the right decision in the way they treated me that night, as I have never forgotten it and I tried to use what I learned from the lesson they taught me that night in my approach to raising my own two girls many, many years later.