A show off and a snake-bite

Early interesting Cars:

   This '53 Packard was new when I got snake bit.
Now:
My dad was assigned a pastorate in Valdese, NC, a small mountain town in the South Mountains. The church was full of working folk, mountain farmers and mill workers. I remember the Garland Page family. Both parents worked. There was Jim & Bub, about my age and a sweet younger girl. 

They also farmed the side of a big hill. A barn was built into the side of the hill and they had a Pinto Pony called Frank. Frank could pull a plow and was also the boy’s riding pony. I loved the place and that family.

Many evenings Garland would take his guitar to the porch. He would pick and sing. He had such a soft sweet voice. Sons Bub and Jim could harmonize and sounded like the Everly Brothers. Before bed time I would jump on my bike and head home.

I rode Frank (after he threw me off once) and we had many adventures climbing the mountains, including High Peak. 

They also taught me to gig frogs.  One day I spotted a nice cottonmouth about 3’ long and pretty fat. I was going to show off.

(While seining for perch the year before, I saw BIL Dick grab a moccasin by the tail and ‘pop’ his head off like a whip.)

So I decided to show Bub and Jim a trick. I stuck the gig over the snakes head and called out, watch this! I had the tail in my hand and the gig holding its head. I pulled the gig, and like a coiled spring the rascal bit me. I guess I thought he was going to lay there and let me use him like a whip. I threw it down and stomped it to death. 

Then took my pocket Knife, cut x’s in the teeth bites like I had been taught, sucked blood and spit it out.  Evidently the cottonmouth had not bit deep, I don’t think any poison got in me. We went on gigging, but I never tried that again. I was still cool, being bit by a cotton mouth and lived. LOL

Nite Shipslog

An indoor heated pool

An American Truck

And now:
A little history. Sherry & I have been a team. I bounced around a lot from job to job. She supported us at times working in the mill, as I reached for the next dream.

Our first real house had payments of $203 a month. We owed $20k. We try to live debt free, debt bothers us. On one of our ‘thinking walks’ she asked the question that changed our lives, “Honey, could we build  a house and get out of debt?”

Imma positive kind of guy, “Sure!” In my mind, a General Contractor was born. I studied, tested and got my license while working for other contractors.

2nd forever home she and I built ourselves, she even helped roof it..

We never had a pool but wanted one. I volunteered a few years to open and close Sherry’s sister’s  pool. I vowed never to have an outside pool. I couldn’t believe the expense of the chemicals just to open and close. Plus trees around made cleaning a big problem

           Corey and Ben in Elmer and Lennie's pool.

My surveyor, Preston called one day. “Want a lot on S. Main Street Belmont?” My wife had always wanted to be back in her hometown. My answer “YES!”

 This is my style of home, no fancy roof lines, an unassuming home.

And so on our 3^rd ‘last’ home (I have said too many times, this is our last home) I simply took a single level, ‘L-shaped 3BR house plan and Filled in the L to make it the footprint mostly square. 

The pool was small, a concrete 16x28, the 2 outside walls were sliding glass doors with vertical blinds. The walls & ceiling were raw Canadian cedar with no coating to handle the moisture.  It cost $1 a day to heat and about $4 a month for chemicals. If someone would keep that for 15 years they could pay for the pool in saved chemical and maintenance.

Sister Shirley visited our new home while looking at the indoor heated pool said, “Jackie I have never envied anything you and Sherry have had, but now…….!” I knew she was joking.

(Sherry caught a picture of me hanging the cedar.) Below is a shot at day and night.

 By the time I welcomed Sherry to her new home I was already losing my hair. LOL

It was nice and we had many compliments. Being a builder it was fairly simple.

Nite Shipslog
PS: I mentioned the pool here years ago and someone asked  about the pool. They still read,so there you have it.I would caution anyone, finding an honest good pool man is sorta like looking for an honest politician. LOL
 
 Front garage featured a Police & fire station with a two story playhouse for the Grands. (Son Mark's car not mine)

Wreaths

  Early interesting Cars:

Now today:
Christmas is a season of joy and celebration. We of the Christian faith hold this season and the coming season of Spring, Easter, as sacred. Since it is Christmas we decorate. I guess Sherry has even hung a ‘wreath’ at our door at times.

BUT as I grew up wreaths meant sadness.  During my youth when someone died the body was taken to a funeral home. There the family met to choose a coffin from a few on display. At that time a mortician was embalming and dressing the body of the deceased & preparing the body for burial. A member of the funeral home staff would go to the home of the deceased and hang a dark wreath at the door signifying there had been a death in this home. Later that day the body would be brought home in the casket. It would remain over night during the wake. The next day the deceased would be taken to a church for service, then buried. That is how I knew wreaths, as a sign of death.

Singing in our churches was very important. At times Mama and daddy sang as a duet in church. The words of an ‘ancient’ song went something like this:

….There will be no crapes (wreaths) on the door knobs,

No hearses in the sky,

No graves on the hills of glory,

 For there we will never die.

I’ll pay no rent for my mansion,

My tax will never come due.

And my clothes will never be thread bare,

But fadeless and new.

Etc…

The song was very ‘old timey’ tent meeting singing. Sung to listening hard working farmers and mill workers. Who prayed, hoping, dreaming and seeking a better life.

I am glad that wreaths are now a sign of life and joy. Wreaths are still sent to the graveside of loved ones, but they are also hung at many doors to signify the Birth of the Heart of our Christian nation. Like it or not, this is a nation founded on Christian beliefs. The USA accepts people of all faiths. This is Christmas, The CHRISTIAN HOLY DAY we care not if it is everyone’s belief but it is our HOLY time of remembrance; AND especially in this country, we think it should be respected.

Nite Shipslog

PS: Tomorrow I will answer a question asked a long time ago here on the blog about our ‘indoor swimming pool’.