Ghost

I live in a town that is as infested with ghosts as it is cockroaches. We are famous for our ghosts and tourists come to town just to visit the haunts. I believe every native in this town has a good ghost story or two. I have a bunch. 

I had made arrangements with a friend of mine to meet at her house one evening. She told me if her car wasn't in the driveway to wait and she would soon follow. As it turned out, she was not home when I arrived, so I waited. She lived in a neighborhood I had once lived so I began to recall events that occurred when I lived in the house across from my friend. Pretty typical for a person to do this. A few minutes passed by and my friend drove up into her driveway. In the front seat of her station wagon was her daughter. In the back of the station wagon was a little girl with her face pressed up against the window. I waved as I got out of my car and greeted my friend. The little girl jumped out of the back and started running between my friend's house and another. I asked my friend, "Who's that little girl?" She looked at her daughter and said, "You know R, this is R!" I said, "No, who was that little girl in the back of your car?" She said, "There was no little girl in the car, just R & me." I laughed and pressed on, because I knew I had seen a little girl in the car get out of the car run away. "You are messin' with me. You had a little girl in your car. She had bangs with short light colored hair and she was wearing a dress. She got out of your car and ran between the houses!" My friend countered with, "You may have seen that, but there was no girl in the car." It was then I knew I had seen a ghost. I tried to find out who it was by discussing the incident with my friend and my family, but to no avail.

No Cussing Please

My father's mother was the embodiment of southern gentility. She was a good Christian woman, founder of her church, selfless, talented and modest. My father's father was a good man who drank, smoked and cussed. He was an excellent carpenter and painter. Rarely did he go to church. This disparity went unnoticed by myself until I grew up.

Grandmother did not allow liquor or cussing in her house. "Darn" was strong according to her. I once asked her why my grandfather could drink beer and cuss. She told me that beer was not liquor and that she corrected him when he did cuss.

By the time I was in college I was cussing. Just damn, hell and shit. Still in the early 70's that was pushing it for a southern sorority chick. By the time I was working and living on my own I became inured to the f-word but used it sparingly. Due to the respect I had for my grandmother I controlled my language around her.

One summer, the whole family was in town, visiting the grands and me. We gathered at grandmother's house for a meal. I decided to bake a loaf of braided bread for the meal. My grown mischievous brothers were in the kitchen with me and my grandmother. We were talking, joking and laughing while I was preparing the bread. I wanted this loaf of bread to look like the bread that came from Gottlieb's, so my concentration became intense as I braided the dough.

Well, I had a small problem when I finished the braid, the end began to unravel. I pinched it back together, it unraveled again. "Shit!" I exclaimed. Dead silence behind me. I turned around slowly. J was to my right covering his mouth looking down at his lap. S was standing right behind my grandmother gawking at me; pointing the shame finger at me. I burst out laughing while my grandmother said, "That's nothing for you to laugh at young lady. I am appalled at your language. You know better than that. Why would you want to say a word like that." As my brother mimicked her body language I continued to laugh.

My poor grandmother was astonished by my lack of shame and called me on it. I pointed to my brother behind her. She turned around and in frustration said "S, oooh you!". We all dissolved into laughter after that. She couldn't fuss at all of us!

The Last Spanking

I was raised during a time when spanking was the main form of discipline for children. Although my parents also employed alternate methods of discipline like going to bed without supper, going to the room and sit without doing anything, withholding play or going outside and the ultimate -NO TV! they still continued to spank us well into our early teens. My parents believed in discipline fitting the "crime" so to speak. So a spanking was the worst punishment we could receive for doing the worst deed-lying. Not only were we spanked for lying, but the punishment was compounded with some sort of restriction, depending on our age.

Both parents spanked. My mother, when I was two years old, spanked me with a brush, which bruised my fanny. She was mortified by this and discontinued using an instrument on me and only used her hand. Though it took some time, she was able to persuade my father to spank me with his hand as well. Unfortunately, my brothers didn't bruise as easily as I did, so their spanking was with a belt or brush.

My mother was a short slight woman, weighing 90 pounds at the best of times. I suspect that is why she felt the need to use a brush. My father was a fit service man, the belt was more a symbol. I learned early that taking my lumps without whimpering would make the punishment short. Daddy's spanking always hurt. Ma's not so much.

My brothers were a different story. It didn't matter who was spanking them, they would scream, yell, cover their butts. Oh, it was horrible. I would go in my room, shut the door and scream in my brain, "STOOOOP!" I hated it more when they were spanked than when I was.

My brother at 14 had grown into muscular strapping lad like his father. Daddy was overseas, in Viet Nam. My mother had decided to spank my brother for lying. As she spanked him, she noticed he was not screaming and yelling as typical of his behaviour. She did notice that his shoulders were heaving, so after a few swaks she decided enough, he was sufficiently punished. When she stopped she told him to turn around and he wouldn't. Thinking he was ashamed she began to comfort him. She became concerned because he couldn't talk and his shoulders were heaving still. She finally got him to turn around and as she did, she saw that he was laughing so hard he could not stop.

My mother looked at my brother and started laughing too, she said, "You didn't even feel that did you?" Still laughing my brother shook his head no. That was his last spanking.

Granny's Revenge

My grandmother was a great story teller. Every time I went to visit her I would coax her into telling stories about her life. She was born and raised in times where women's rights were unheard of. We would always give her a hard time about being subservient to my grandfather, she would tell us that she was raised to do what the "man" said to do. Usually a story would follow. This is one.

My great-grandmother, Granny, supported her husband and children by opening their house to boarders and taking in laundry. My grandmother was the only girl in a family of 6 children. All the cooking, cleaning, laundering, gardening, butchering, etc fell onto Granny and my Grandmother. Each meal was a production, breakfast was started well before the men got up, dinner(lunch) was started after breakfast and supper after dinner. Each meal had to be on time, or there would be hell to pay. On each occasion the men & guests were fed first, with the master of the house, my great-grandfather, selecting his favorites first. The women ate what was left over. The same procedure was followed for family gatherings.

I remember asking my grandmother why and didn't she miss having the whole family together at the meals. She told me that was just how things were done. I pressed her by asking her if she thought that custom was demeaning. She indicated that there wasn't much that could be done about it. I expressed to her that I didn't think it was nice or fun. She said agreed but then added more.

One of the benefits of eating after the men was that the women's conversation was uncensored. They, of course, could not introduce a subject if the table seated mixed company. They could take their time to eat without worrying if their men had everything they wanted. In other words, it was their time to relax and enjoy their meal in fellowship. The second benefit was they had control over what went on the table. Men didn't come in the kitchen and check the grocery situation out-that was woman's work! Of course, during poorer times the women's meal might have been left over biscuits and gravy, with the men getting the meat and greens. In better times, Granny would hold back enough for the women to eat as the men did. Best of all, was if she were mad with my great-grandfather she would keep his favorite cut for herself.

Toad Strangler

I live in an area that experiences several tropical storms a summer. Of course, they vary in strength. Most of the time we are deluged with several inches of rain, rarely areas will flood.

Several years ago, I purchased my first house and was recuperating from surgery during a mild tropical storm. It had stalled, or become stationary causing constant rain for days. The last day of this storm the rains became quite heavy. We were receiving flood warnings for the city. My back yard had turned into a shallow pond. I had thoughts of building a boat. I began to watch the Weather Channel hoping a miracle would occur to make the rain stop.

I starting pacing. I went to the living room, kitchen, bedroom, check out the Weather Channel. Every time I peeked outside the living room window, I could see the water advancing, up to the street curb, half-way up the driveway. The story was the same from the kitchen window's view of the back yard. Slowly the water was inching up to the door steps of my house.

I panicked and ran around the house moving furniture to higher levels and to the garage moving concrete and electrical equipment out of harm's way. After that all I could do was to watch and wait.

So, I fixed some tea, got my smokes and sat on the front stoop, daring the water to invade my house. By this time, neighbors who were sent home from work were trying to reach their houses, most unable to drive through without a boat or big truck. One of my neighbors used his truck to ferry people to their houses. Kids were playing in the water having a good time as children will during times such as these, the adults yelling at each other across the divide of water.

The frogs were the only ones happy during this flood. The din of their singing was deafening. They were floating, swimming and croaking, slaves to currents of the flooding waters. My neighbor waded across the street to come and talk to me. I was watching the frogs swirl in the current flowing by my steps. He looked down at the frogs and said "Look! I thought frogs could swim, that one is riding on the other's back!" I looked up at him and he exclaimed, "Look! All of them are riding piggy back, can't they swim?" I said, "C that's not what they are doing." He became indignant saying, "What are they doing?" I scratched my head and squinched up my face and told him that they were mating. This 47 year old man turned purple and waded back across the street without another word.