The Cattle Prod

     My brother Jack and I frequently assisted my father on his veterinary farm calls.  We were well trained - Jack would hold the cow or horse, and I would hand Dad instruments or be a gofer and run to his wagon to get medical supplies.  My first experience with the magic stick was when Jack and I accompanied Dad on a farm call to examine a gravely ill cow.  The cow was easy to find.  She was in the field next to the red barn, beneath the impatient, circling vultures.  Sadly, when we arrived to the Holstein cow in the field,  the only signs of life were the little barn kittens bouncing around and exploring the near-lifeless Gulliver of a cow. 

I  was always amazed at what a sight it was to see a  cow lying on its side.  I knew that a cow had four stomachs.  I didn’t know much about them except that one was for  fruits, and one was for vegetables, and one was for barbed wire.   It seemed as though each stomach was pushing out the side that wasn’t on the ground. The side of the cow was a mountain for the little kittens, and they were enjoying roughhousing  on the slope.  

     I was no stranger to large animals lying lifeless on the ground, and I felt the farmer’s pain.  I had a small garden in a tiny plot of land I had previously used in an attempt to dig to China.  That is where my father matter-of-factly said I would end up when he saw me digging the hole.  

At the time I was digging a hole because I had found a shovel lying on the ground.  When one is quite young and has homework to do, sometimes that is all the motivation that is needed.  For me, it was also an attempt to exploit something that I was strong enough to exploit.  For a 40-pound weakling like myself, life proved to be quite frustrating, as I had the desire to do a great many things but had the physical strength to do just a  few.  Nothing was more frustrating than not being strong enough to cock Jack’s BB gun, or tall enough to drive the bumper cars at the amusement park.  Digging a hole because “it wasn’t there” was all the motivation I needed. While digging the hole to China was not my original intention, the suggestion that it could take me somewhere renewed my drive.  Having just studied gravity in the third grade, I had some curiosity about what might happen if I jumped down a hole that exited in China....

I wasn’t sure if I would have enough momentum to make it to China, or if I would fall back and get stuck in the middle. Ending up in China presented a number of new challenges - I did not know anyone  there, and I was well aware of the language barrier. That was a bridge I would cross when I got the hole done.  

      Like most of my projects, this one turned out a bit grander than I had anticipated and was abandoned after about two weeks.  Still, with some help from Jack, our hole had become about four feet deep.  We were not sure what to do with a four-foot hole, but none of our friends had one, so it seemed like a cool thing to keep.  Jack and I decided that we would try to catch something big, like a bear, so we carefully covered it with hay and checked it every day.  

After several days, having no luck catching anything but a toad, we concluded that all of the bears must be busy.  

     Our plans to maintain a large hole in the ground, and a couple of feet from the tractor path, were admittedly ill-conceived.....and doomed as soon as Dad realized that our hole was now four feet deep.  He felt that the disappointment of losing our four-foot hole would be  offset by being given the newly filled hole to grow a garden.  Mom and Dad bought me lima beans, peas, and cucumber seeds.  I liked the cucumber plants because they were easy to pick, but the peas and lima beans were tedious and boring to pick. On top of that, Dad was the only one who even liked lima beans. 

     After picking a bag of lima beans for him, I stopped by the barnyard to see our horse Spring.  He was a tall chestnut, and while he was too strong for me to ride, he was my favorite because he was so friendly.  If I ducked under his head and put my arms around his neck, he would lean over my shoulder and grab the waistband of my jeans, pick me up, and walk around.  

It provided endless amusement for both of us.  He seemed interested in the lima beans, so I gave him a couple of pods for his trouble.  What I was unprepared for was his decision to lie down immediately after eating the beans.  Then he topped it off by putting his head down and shutting his eyes.  

In the two years we had owned him, I had never ever seen him lie down.  I immediately considered that lima beans might be poisonous to horses.  I was near panic.  Was there time for Dad to save him?  Maybe it was one of those horse facts everyone knew but me.  Had I not been listening when Dad had said “Margaux, you must never give a horse a lima bean; he will have a long painful death"?    I ran to the house and told Dad that Spring had eaten too many lima beans and was near death.  Dad gave me a strange look and asked how many lima beans he had eaten.  I said two.  He asked “Two plants?”  I replied, “No, two pods.” Dad then got a bemused look on his face and said he would come out and have a look.  When Dad arrived in the barn yard, it appeared as though Spring was still near death.  Dad leaned over and felt Spring’s chest and then rubbed his temple for a few seconds.  The healing hands must have worked because Spring stood up and began sniffing me for more lima beans.

     As for the cow with the four stomachs,  its chips were clearly down.  All signs of life, including a detectable pulse, had vanished.  Dad shook his head and said that things did not look very promising.  We all watched as he knelt beside the cow and took a long stick out of a cardboard tube from his medical bag. It reminded me of a policeman’s billy club, except it was white.  He applied it to the cow’s rear and pushed the button on the end.  

What followed was astounding.  In a split second, the cow’s tail fluttered and became still. When Dad pushed the button again, the tail fluttered and became still again - the bovine equivalent to a car engine turning over. The third time Dad pressed the button, the cow’s eyes blinked, she made a long bellow, exploded to her feet, and bolted off like a bat out of hell.  That was the last we saw of her. 

I glanced over to Jack, hoping he had not noticed, but his jaw was dropped, and he clearly had. The farmer shrugged and said, “Well, I guess you fixed her.” Dad suggested that the farmer call him when she returned to the barn.

     I asked Dad what that magic stick was and he said a “cattle prod.”  I asked him what was in the stick and he said “electricity,” but I think he meant lightning.  I suspect that the lightning stick was made possible by the research Ben Franklin conducted flying kites in electrical storms, and some other scientist had figured out a way to bottle it into a stick.  As an adult, I can reflect on Ben Franklin’s stunt and can’t help but wonder what role it played in inspiring the stars of Jack Ass.   Had he been born one hundred years later, Franklin would have gotten a Darwin award “honorable mention.”  

     I am not sure who coined the name “cattle prod,” but it certainly seemed to sell itself short.  It was a name that more likely came out of the Texas Cattle Barons than Madison Avenue, and it definitely gave new meaning to my previous understanding of the word “prod.” 

     As the three of us drove off to the next farm call, Dad explained that this farmer didn’t appreciate the value Jack and I brought to the farm examination, so we would need to stay in the car.  The good news was that he was only going to be doing a "few TB tests," so it shouldn’t take long.  As he gathered up his syringes, I noticed that he was not taking the bag with the lightning stick in it. I subtly glanced at Jack to see if he noticed this oversight, and judging by the elated look on his face, he most definitely had.  I shouted, “Dad, the cattle prod, you forgot it.”  He said “No, Margaux, I didn’t.  You don’t need it for TB tests.”  I shouted, “You never know, you should take it just in case....”  Dad replied in a stern voice that it would not be necessary and turned and walked toward the barn.  

     As soon as he rounded the corner out of sight, Jack and I dove for the cattle prod, but the result was a foregone conclusion.  Even if I had gotten to it first, which I did, I wouldn’t have the time to activate it before being over powered by my older brother.  As one might guess, we spent the next 15 minutes  playing  "veterinarian and ailing cow."   I did not land the much coveted role of the veterinarian.

I did develop a lifelong respect for the cattle prod that afternoon, and became far more selective about the farm calls I agreed to attend.

Clean-up Editor: Toni Gardner, Author of  "My Fathers" and "Walking Where the Dog Walks"

The Road Trip

When it came to my grandmother’s family, New Papa had a gift for creating situations that had very little chance of playing out, or ending well. One summer day he decided to take the youngest 10 fake grandchildren to the Lowertown Acme for his weekly trip. This expedition would arguably be a formidable challenge for someone who enjoyed the company of children. It was inconceivable for someone like New Papa who did not. Still, we all piled into the station wagon in an era unencumbered by seatbelts. When we traveled with New Papa, he was there and we were there, but there was very little conversation between us and everyone was quite content with the arrangement. When New Papa drove, his head bounced like a bobble head doll. None of us sat upfront because it was more fun sitting in the backseat and tailgate where all 10 of us would bobble our heads in unison for the duration of the trip.

We were all aware at a very early age, that driving was not one of New Papa’s strong suits. Shortly into our journey, New Papa swerved to avoid hitting a paper cup in the road and ran over a large rock on the edge, resulting in a flat tire.

To gain access to the spare, it was necessary for all of the grandchildren, to disembark. We all waited patiently on the side of the road for a good 1 to 2 minutes. When it became apparent that this was becoming a day trip as opposed to a short outing to the store, we all started running around like loose cats. Penn and Jack used the time to go small game hunting with their sling shots. Chip and Stain went along somewhat less enthusiastically.

The rest of us stayed out of the way by trying to get lost in the cornfield. Getting lost in the cornfield was a right of passage in which Uncle Herman would blindfold and take each grandchild who had turned 10. Those of us under 10 took advantage of opportunities like these, to practice our homing skills.

It wasn’t always obvious who would win the epic battle of New Papa vs. the tire, but he did ultimately prevail. When we arrived at the Acme, New Papa made a bee-line to the produce manager who knew our fake grandfather by name. New Papa immediately zeroed in on the black bananas that were about to be pitched, and offered to pay half price for them. The grocer was pleased to accommodate him, while we watched incredulously as he procured what would soon be served to us. New Papa continued the bargaining with the perished apples in the discard bin. At this point it was becoming painful for us to watch. We all stood around awkwardly, when Stain and Chip shouted “Supermarket Sweep”. They raced to get 4 more carts. Supermarket Sweep was a popular a.m. TV game show where contestants raced down the aisles in teams of two and three trying to load the most expensive items in their cart. Our home version was a bit more “extreme”. For the youngest of us Little Sinner, it was more about “value” then expense. Little Sinner’s diet consisted of bread and jelly, nothing more, nothing less. When she found herself in a nice restaurant that did not have jelly sandwiches on the menu, she would reluctantly settle for a hot roll and mint jelly. When it came to Super Market Sweep, Jen and I soon learned that our (little Sinner's) cart would have nothing but bread and jelly in it. I knew we had no shot at winning but it was worth it watching Little Sinner selecting jelly like our parents selected wine.

The boys hung out in the beef corridor and Liz, Marigold, and Looper won easily by filling their cart with cosmetics. When New Papa finished at the checkout we all parked our loaded carts neatly in the closest aisle and were on our way.

I don’t recall New Papa ever making any effort to supervise us or even acknowledge that we were with him. I suspect he was just happy to have us preoccupied. There is no question that 10 spirited children enhanced his bargaining leverage, as the store was quite relieved when we left. New Papa subscribed to Darwin's principle of "survival of the Fittest, and thus saw little value to counting heads.  He felt that those of us who were unable to find our way back to the car at the unappointed hour, should be left to fend for themselves even if it resulted in the weakest ones being lost.  In the broader scheme of things, he was not going to miss one or two of us and his life around the farm might be more peaceful.  We, on the other hand were aware of his style of grand-parenting and self-governed.  Foiled, he begrudgingly found  that a station wagon filled with 10 children did not leave much room for 2 carts of groceries. Like water, groceries in an over loaded car "seek their own level".  Consequently, what did not fit upfront with him, spilled over the  grandchildren for the journey back to the farm, and the ten of us survived to annoy another day.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

      We grew up largely without the joys of candy and sodas - they were only for special occasions.  Our parents were health-conscious and saw little redeeming value in those things.  I believed this misconception was probably fostered by a human interest story they read in Reader’s Digest magazine. My dad got Reader’s Digest for his waiting room, but there was also some lure in their million-dollar sweepstakes.  While you didn’t have to buy to enter, no one really believed that claim.  My parents once noticed me reading it and cutting out an article. I suppose that if you have a child that hates to read, and you catch her reading something, you go out and buy a  lifetime subscription to it.  Little did they know that I was merely in my adolescent coupon-clipping phase and had spotted a coupon for Milky Way candy bars. 

 I was planning to make a modest withdrawal from one of my three bandaid boxes full of quarters to accompany the coupon on my next trip to a store.  I had accumulated this savings by asking my dad for a quarter every night after dinner, when he was dozing through the NBC - Texaco Huntley Brinkley Report.  Chet Huntley and David Brinkley were among television’s early news anchors. In my quest to optimize my payoff, I had learned that asking for a  dollar would wake him up, as he would need  to inquire why I needed a dollar, but if I just asked for a quarter, he would reach into his pocket and deliver.  

After doing this most nights for a year, I had accumulated close to $100 - $90 and 25 cents to be precise. While we had allowances, it was a  poorly run system, and I frequently forgot to collect my monthly $2; then it just seemed unprincipled to collect the $2 when I was getting 25 cents a day.

      Our unheeded pleas for candy were not helped by the fact that our country well water had no fluoride, and cavities were relatively common.  To our dismay, when having his cavities filled, our father preferred drilling pain over the lingering fat-lip sensation that accompanied a novocaine injection. That fact, on top of having a professional exchange with our dentist, meant that novocaine was not a part of our cavity remediation experience. Still, our dentist was a very kind man, who always assured us that the drilling “might not hurt.”  

I learned early on that those assurances should not be given much stock. I knew the dentist’s basset hound, Bubbles, from his visits to my father, and Bubbles was most definitely not awake during his “procedure” to prevent him from lusting after the female dogs in his neighborhood.  

I also know he had received novocaine when he got his ear stitched following a dispute with the dog next door.  

For whatever reason, when we went to the little shop of horrors, what we received for our trouble was a lot of character and a little roll of floss in a molar-shaped plastic box. 

      Growing up on a farm was good for a great many things. Halloween was just not one of them. The day after, at school, was torture. Kids would come in with wonderful stories and huge grocery bags full of candy from their haul the previous night.  So much that they would gladly give away large quantities. 

I, on the other hand, felt like a little Amish kid.  The dream of walking house to house with my friends in the city, hauling a bag so full of candy it was dragging on the ground, and passing all of the other scary beggars,  just couldn’t be matched on the farm.   And if you stayed out late enough, the older, bad kids would be there to set paper bags of dog scat on fire on people’s doorsteps so that the father would come out and have to step on the mini-inferno to extinguish it, resulting in predictable collateral scat on his shoe. To young developing minds, that prank just never got old.

      Being driven around by your parents to far-flung neighboring farms just sucked the life out of the whole Halloween experience, and everyone tired of it after a couple of houses.  There was no illusion on either side; Halloween in the country was lame.  You could tell that the few houses we stopped at knew exactly how many goblins to expect because, instead of huge bowls of candy, they would have a small saucer with three or four pieces  of candy....or popcorn balls.  Who the heck wanted a popcorn ball?  Halloween was a time to get name brand candy into the house.

      My most memorable Halloween occurred when I  was ten.  Actually it was my only memorable Halloween.  I had reason to believe that that year’s Halloween might be different - my parents believed I was old enough to navigate the pastures with my older brother, Jack, and his friends, if they would allow me to tag along.  After days of negotiations, Jack relented, and I learned that he meant  “following” in the strictest sense of the word, i.e., never closer than ten yards. Quite honestly, it didn’t really matter; anything was better than suffering the humiliation of being driven from house to house by a parent. It was a different story for Liz.  All of her stars lined up, and she was able to land a much-coveted invitation to a friend’s house in the city that year.   

I was excited to follow Jack - we traveled over hill and dale and had our best haul ever - we visited seven houses, and five of them had candy!  

Early on, Jack and his friends tried their darndest to lose me, but I wasn’t going to let anything spoil this night, and I was proud of my ability to keep up. After a while they forgot about me, and by the third house, I was actually walking with them.  When we began our journey home, I fell behind, largely because of the need to count my five pieces of candy over and over.  I took great care planning how I was going to stretch out the moment by consuming only one piece a week.  That would take me past Thanksgiving, when I could restock with solid chocolate pilgrims from the kids table.

      After a while I realized that the boys were no longer in sight.  In a moment of weakness, I  hollered out Jack’s name, but they were so far ahead that I could not be heard. Fortunately, we were in our own pasture, and I had no bulls to fear, only our friendly horses and cows.    

Unfortunately, I had never been deep in the pasture by myself at night.  The full moon reflected off the stream and ponds, creating some very spooky special effects.  It looked nothing like the pasture during the day.   Suddenly, over the noise of my pounding heart, I heard a bell tolling in our pasture, and it wasn’t far away.  There was no church nearby, and the only things missing to complete the horror scene were zombies and  Vincent Price’s ghoulish laugh.  Feeling very  uneasy, I began to pick up the pace. 

The bell was closing in on me quickly, as though it was tolling for me......and it was, but my fear gave way to relief as I realized it was Jack’s cow, Molly, and her Swiss cowbell.  

      Molly was a Brown Swiss with a wonderful disposition, so she got to wear the bell.  I am not sure how much of an honor it was for Molly to listen to a loud bell around her neck, but she didn’t seem to mind.  Under normal circumstances I would not have been concerned about Molly running over to me - I knew she  wouldn’t hurt me - but this night I was dressed as a headless horseman.  Along with being inherently slow, I was wearing a heavy papier-mache pumpkin head with blood dripping out of the mouth and tiny eyeholes, and a cape that got snagged on every bush.  This was a hand-me-down costume, and every aspect of it was too big.  

      I quickly assessed the situation and dismissed the notion of standing firm and greeting Molly, as I just wasn’t confident she would recognize me.  Consequently, I felt my only chance to cheat death was to head for the bushes…oblivious briefly, to their thorny stock.  I started to run, and as I picked up speed, the pumpkin head slipped down over my shoulders and chest so I could no longer see out of the eye holes or move my arms. 

The celestial odd makers were betting heavily on Molly.  The bushes, consisting mainly of briars, welcomed me.   

      When I eventually emerged, I was scratched and torn, but alive.  With my cape in shreds  I prepared to finish the journey home.  There on the other side of the thicket, waiting to greet me, was Molly. 

And at that moment I realized, to my horror, that somewhere in the struggle for my life, my candy was lost....all five pieces.  I stood there stunned while Molly exchanged bovine pleasantries, licking me and nudging me with her head.  We walked for a while along the fence  toward the barn and then, torn and

defeated, I climbed up the fence rails and slipped onto her back, where she kindly delivered me home, announcing our arrival with the clanging of her bell. 

Clean-up Editor: Toni Gardner, Author of  "My Fathers" and "Walking Where the Dog Walks"

The 1947 Ford Tractor

         Part of New Papa’s finite charm was that he was hard of hearing.  Our grandmother  would mention that the television in the living room was broken.  New Papa would respond with “yes dear,  we can get another year out of those blistered bald tires on the tractor that the grandchildren use.”  The  1947 tractor was an extremely reliable piece of farm equipment in the 60’s.  Like most tractors in that era, we would be hard pressed to identify any inherent safety features but that was of little relevance, as the manner in which the oldest boys (pre-16)  drove it would have negated any benefits.

        My older siblings and cousins were always kind and patient when explaining the realities of the world, without the “Disney” spin our parents put on everything. Penn, was careful to point out all of the dead animals found  on the farm.  Whether it was a dead mouse the cat brought in or a smelly carcass found in the road, he let us know that the creature’s cause of death was really  from a mosquito sucking all of its blood.  

 The older boys ran regular patrols of the farm using the old Ford tractor, pulling the rusty trailer full of younger cousins, with Stain and Chip riding shotgun, armed with bb guns.   The point of the bb guns was to shoot dead things, mosquitoes, black birds, crows, and stuff at the farm dump.

         Our grandmother and aunts and uncles often watched us load up, beaming with pride when they saw the older boys help us in the wagon.   

While one of the boys would hand out stale vanilla wafers for the ride, another would explain to us where we were going and what vegetation and livestock we would see along the way.  The adults would smile and wave while we safely drove away at a snails pace, taking several minutes before we turned the corner and disappeared from sight.  As reliable as that old tractor was, it also had a very dark side.  Without fail, within seconds of  driving out of the adult line of vision,  the tractor slipped into 4^th gear and the magic teacup ride became a white knuckle run away train without a track.  We would speed down the farm’s dirt roads with the driver managing to skillfully hit every pothole.  There was one regrettable instance when Looper flew out the back but she really had only herself to blame…it was quite avoidable  had she not let go with her second hand, in order to get a bug out of her eye. 

For the most part the boys were pros at pushing the ride to the limit, occasionally slamming on the brakes to make sure an airborne cousin landed in the trailer.

During their time at the farm the boys were devoted  amateur entomological vivisectionists with a particular interest in the study of the Doma Diptera,  which a lesser scholar would know as the house fly. Penn and Chip were the most knowledgeable but Stain and Jack also made some solid contributions.   Their primary work was to determine what role (if any) the fly's wings played  in their  ability to fly.  They would capture flies and tie a long hair  around the fly's neck or waist and proudly watch them try to fly  on the tether with various combinations of wings and partial wings.  Chip was intensely loyal and apologetic to his flies and could be faulted for getting too attached to his subjects.  He did not feel the same compassion when painfully procuring a long hair from an unsuspecting female cousin.  Other experiments included shaking the flies mercilessly in their hands several times and throwing them  on the floor so that they could watch them stagger around before they stepped on them.  When our harrowing tractor rides were over,  we would stumble out of the trailer, the cousin version of the disoriented flies.    

 

 Unlike the flies, we lived to volunteer for another ride.

The Spank Heard Round the World - excerpt from "War and Peas"

         One of New Papas  annoying little quirks was locking the refrigerator and freezer when there were grandchildren on the grounds.    He maintained a large keyboard on the wall in the kitchen with more than a 150 keys hanging on it...  all types of keys that had accumulated over the decades.   There in lied the brilliance of his strategy:  little fake grandchildren high on the sugar from his Donald Duck limeade  would not have the  focus to search the keyboard for the freezer key. The sad reality was that he had us hooked on Donald Duck limeade and stale vanilla wafers from the second we walked in the door.   We were as helpless as a wino on Mad Dog 20/20.

 

Our first major “Farm” transgression occurred on a hot sleepless July night, when Toad, our 3^rd oldest cousin, had planned an after hours “field trip” to the kitchen for ice cream.  It was an endeavor that would never have crossed our minds if the freezer had not been locked.    The fact that it was locked, presented some interesting challenges which could not be ignored and in the end, we were no match for the call of the forbidden.  Although Toad was accustomed to working alone on these clandestine operations, he gave in against his better judgment and agreed to take along his ten younger cousins. Among the instructions Toad gave us was the order not to have any Donald Duck Limeade after dinner.   Toad assembled us at the appointed hour; the “first” strike of 11.  The o’clock hours were always loud events because the house had several grandfather clocks that were never quite in sync. Toad had determined that it would take all of the clocks 94 seconds to complete their eleven o’clock chimes.  This would  muffle the unavoidable  noise  the eleven of us would make, and allow ample time to get to the kitchen undetected.  We would have time to find our key to the freezer, eat our ice cream, leave a sink full of dishes, and return under the noise of the mid-night clocks.  He gave us each a job, which for most of us was to form a firemen’s line from the keyboard to the freezer.  The keyboard was located near the dining room doorway.  The kitchen at night was no exception to the day - the marmalade cats were asleep on the 2 shelves beneath the counter and the silver pitcher was at its station with water and fresh ice…a disregarded omen. 

Before being dispatched to our appointed positions, Toad delivered the most emotionally charged and inspiring speech I had heard to date in my short life. Little did I know, every coach I would  subsequently have,  would plagiarize his famous speech. He talked  about a chain being only as strong as its weakest link.  We all silently thought that our weakest link was “Little Sinner” who at age five, was the youngest. We did not consider that Little Sinner came with battle experience.  She routinely stayed up late Saturday nights watching the “Double Chiller” horror show with her older sister Looper  and brother Stain.  It would take a lot more than Freddy Krueger to scare Little Sinner.

         Penn  and my brother Jack,  seemingly the bravest, (although in retrospect that too was elusive) were the lookouts at the doorways on each side of the kitchen.  Most of us were clearly uncomfortable working in the pitch black but Toad had warned us ahead of time that the mission’s success was absolutely dependent on working under the cloak of darkness.   If that bothered any of us, Penn and Jack suggested that perhaps we were too worthless to be there.  Being the tenth of thirteen grandchildren, I was no stranger to  motivation through fear and intimidation.  At that moment I knew it would be better to risk death on “Operation Ice Cream” then remain in the bedroom alone and risk a visit from the ghost of Mrs. Cleaver who haunted the house.  I had never seen her but I had heard her many times.  The danger was real.

“Operation Ice Cream” worked in flawless harmony as we tried the first 40 -50 keys.  After that, we were never quite sure what went wrong.... it could have been the increasing sense of frustration that grew as we tested the second 50 keys without a fit and the resulting boredom that caused Penn and Jack to let their vigilance stray.  Or perhaps it was the screech the cat let out when Chip stepped on his tail.  Finally, at key #103 it appeared as though Toad struck ice cream.  The noise in the room stopped with the click of the freezer lock, and was replaced by the din of eleven hearts pounding.... Time stood still.  After what seemed like an eternity of savoring the moment, Toad lifted the freezer door and the light inside exploded out blinding us like  a car’s headlights. 

I’m not quite sure what happened next but one thing was certain…. It was not Toad’s cousins’ finest hour.  As Toad reached for the carton of coffee ice cream, it was clearly a  moment  where “the odd got even” -   We saw New Papa materialize out of nowhere and wallop Toad on the rear, on what was the spank heard round the world.  From that moment on,  Toad was alone because principles and camaraderie succumbed to the most basic instincts for survival.  The remaining ten of us didn’t wait to see if Toad would cheat death.  We scattered like ghetto rats, never looking back. 

As we regrouped in the girl’s wing,  trembling in bed, I remember Looper asking if we thought Toad would take us on another mission again.  Marigold wondered out loud if we would ever  see Toad again.  Every trip to the farm passed the Ferris School for Wayward boys.  Jen pointed out that wayward boys started by pinching ice cream. 

The next morning the 8 am breakfast buzzer went off as it had every other morning.  We cautiously headed to the dining porch.  We were going to be embarrassed if Toad was there, and terrified if he wasn’t.  As we cautiously took our places at the table, Toad’s chair was conspicuous by his absence. We glanced around at each other all thinking the same thing….at least his chair was still there. New Papa was at the head of the table and started serving plates of toast and eggs. Then without warning the kitchen door flew open and Toad strutted in asking who wanted to join him with some coffee.  There were cheers and giant sighs of relief.

The incident was not mentioned by New Papa, but we all regrouped at the hammock after breakfast.  In retrospect, that was what was so amazing about Toad.  He never reprimanded us for desertion.  Instead, he took all of the blame, telling us that he had not adequately trained us for the mission and he promised that there would be more covert operations that summer…..He was working on plans to haul ice to the murky swimming pool to slow down the metabolism of the resident  snapping turtle. Toad said adding ice to the pool might keep him from claiming a grandchild.  He had also created some blue prints to build a ghost trap to catch Mrs. Cleaver.   Life was good and it would be a busy summer.

Farm Staff Hall Of Fame

     Bom Bom had many employees over the years.  They were, for the most part, kind and dedicated individuals. I don’t recall any of the employees ever speaking harshly to us.  I am sure we got a bit of a pass being the boss’s grandchildren, but we were also as polite as we were spirited and very dutiful about shutting gates and stalls and not disrupting the farm activities.
    Some employees stood out for their special skills or unique personalities.  This account highlights four of them.

Uncle Owl
     Uncle Owl was a kind black gentleman who ran our grandmother’s sheep farm across the road and was the only one trusted by New Papa to work in his garden.  Standing around while my parents talked to Uncle Owl was one of my earliest memories of my grandmother’s farm. Being too young to have much of a grasp of sanctioned names, and not realizing that “Al” was a name, I stuck with words I knew and just assumed  his name was Owl.     While Uncle Owl was a hard worker, he, like the other help, did not much like working for New Papa.  Uncle Owl liked to harvest vegetables in their prime;  New Papa demanded that they be kept on the vine a week or two longer so that they could get as big as possible. His asparagus  always had stalks in excess of an inch thick, and the peas and lima beans were always starchy and tough.  Toad said that Bom Bom once broke her tooth on one of his peas.  Uncle Owl was a very pleasant and easygoing guy who easily won the hearts of all the grandchildren.  We judged most adults by how tolerant they were of our antics.  Uncle Owl always had a quick smile, and he didn’t care if we built hay castles in the sheep barn or if we  ran around like banshees.  He also knew how to get along with New Papa – a skill mastered by few.  It was a well-known fact that when Uncle Owl knew that a long day in the garden lay ahead, he would go down to the barn and hide in the workshop.  It was a pass our parents compassionately gave him.
    Uncle Owl came to work on the farm in the late 1930s.  At that time, he was responsible for driving Dad and his siblings to and from their grade school, twenty-five miles away from the farm.  Several years later, in an isolated incident of poor judgement, Uncle Owl was pulled over for driving erratically after being over-served at the local watering hole.  The arresting officer determined that he had never held a driver’s license.
    Later on, lonely for a wife, he found a newspaper ad for a woman in New Rochelle, NY, looking for a husband.  What really caught his eye was that this woman came with a refrigerator. He sent for her; she arrived on a bus with all of her belongings, including the refrigerator, and they lived a long and happy life together.  

Charlie Forhectare
    Charlie was a  farmhand in his mid-thirties.  Attempting to teach a young Uncle Herman a lesson for leaving his .22 rifle lying around, Charlie took it home to see how long it would take Uncle Herman to miss it.  Unfortunately, Charlie’s wife noticed it first and shot Charlie with it during a domestic quarrel.

The injury was overcome, although the only lesson learned was by Charlie.
   
Hans VanderTease
    My father was fond of telling us, after we had done something ill-conceived, like dropping rotten apples into his newly drilled water well, that we were Uphams and that made us smarter than 97% of the people in the world.  I found this curious because all of the  people I was surrounded by seemed to be in the other 3%. 
    That was until I met Hans VanderTease.  Hans VanderTease was a Dutch hillbilly who worked on our grandmother’s farm.  What I remember most about the VanderTease family was their colorful language and toothless grins.  When I was very small, I thought they spoke Dutch.  It didn’t take me long to realize that they merely had a skillful command of all of the words I wasn’t allowed to use, words that even made my dad wince.  Still, I was mesmerized when they spoke. They used these words interchangeably as nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs.    They lived in one of the farmhouses on the property and always yelled at us to shut the screen door that didn’t catch, in order to keep the bugs out.  Under normal circumstances that would be a reasonable request, except that their dog had ripped the screen off the  length of the door months ago.  Their dog looked very “mad” and mangey, and I was never sure if he wanted to lick me or bite me, so I always made sure I hid behind my dad.  I knew a lot about "mad dogs" having just cried through the Disney film "Ole Yeller" a few days earlier.

     My father and Uncle Herman always let the VanderTease hunt on the farm. While they had never discussed hunting protocol, they were under the impression that the VanderTease had  procured licenses and hunted lawfully. As it was, nothing could be further from the truth.  One November day when Uncle Herman was complaining to Hans about an unsuccessful morning spent duck hunting, Hans told him that he didn’t know why he bothered hunting in the fall.  He always had the best luck in the spring and summer, when the animals were young and more vulnerable, and the game wardens weren’t in the way.


Candy 
     Candy was a flirtatious, full-figured wench who worked in the kennel.  She frequently drove Bom Bom on her errands. She also drove Aunt Amory crazy with the company she kept.  Aunt Amory referred to the seedy Port William male interests that came looking for Candy on the farm as “river rats.”  Being amenable to profitable romance, Candy once offered to help entertain Uncle Herman’s hunting guests.  He politely declined her offer.  Still, she had a “can do” attitude and was very eager to please. While Candy was intellectually celibate, she took a great interest in “rural community service” and ushered the farm foreman’s grandsons into manhood.  These sessions generally occurred in the spring and summer, in one of the duck blinds that the VanderTease were not using.

Her other interests included demolition derbies, as both spectator and participant. As long as there wasn’t a peroxide embargo, she didn’t have a worry in the world.

Clean-up Editor: Toni Gardner, Author of  Walking Where The Dog Walks