Cousins

We went to the house where the four siblings often gather: two of them come from Omaha, one from Oak Grove, which is only 15 miles away from where Cliff and I live, and one far south of Salina, Kansas.  

There was a nice big pickup in the driveway, hitched up to a long trailer; nothing else.  Cliff said, "I'll bet they're here.  They probably put the cars in the garage."

We found out later that truck belonged to Royce.

I went to the door, rang the doorbell, then knocked.  Then Carolyn came to the door, looking flabbergasted when she saw me.  She invited us in, and we sat in the living room visiting for awhile.  Betty had a summer cold she didn't want to share with her siblings, so she stayed home this time.

I told them about the graveyard we couldn't find, and how disappointed I was that I couldn't even direct Cliff to the farm where their parents lived all my life.  Carolyn spoke up and said, "I'll take you; we were just at that cemetery yesterday."

The youngest daughter has a little trouble getting around and opted to stay behind, but Carolyn, her brother, and the two of us got in Carolyn's Ford Platinum and away we went.  Anybody who reads my blog knows that Cliff is tractor-crazy; well, he met his match with my cousin Royce.  He's strictly an Allis Chalmers guy, and has a picture of every one on his phone  They talked tractors nonstop in the back seat all the way to our destination; meanwhile, Carolyn and I were trying to hear one another and converse in the front seat.  What a racket we all made!  

We went first to that other graveyard, Logsdon Cemetery, but that will be my next entry.  Then we went to see Uncle Leo's farm.  It was sort of sad-looking, simply because there's no life there with nobody living there.  I took some pictures of the place; it was in easy walking distance of Grandma's house when I stayed with her for a week in the summer.  Uncle Leo milked cows in the 1950's, and had sows and baby pigs.  They had hens to lay eggs, and they bought chicks in spring every year to raise for meat.  There were always kittens in the barn, it seemed.  I loved that place.

The family of six carried water in a bucket from this well into the house until the late 1950s.  I recall Uncle Leo coming up from the field on hot days at noon and wetting down his whole head at the pump to cool off.  The building Cliff is standing by led to the cellar where Aunt Mary's canned goods were kept, as well as big cans of lard.  There was room in there to house the separator that took the cream from the milk, and there was always a little bit of milky smell in there.  Once, on somebody's birthday, the kids took turns hiding in there turning the crank on the ice cream freezer as a surprise for whoever's birthday it was.   

As a kid, I was awed by the size of Uncle Leo's propane tank.  I liked to climb on it and pretend I was riding an elephant.  Ha!

Cliff, looking toward the road 

There is a very long, graveled lane leading up to the house from the road.  Once when I was there, Uncle Leo took us kids to pick up a Go-Kart.  If I remember right, Royce had worked around the farm to get the money to pay for it.  The kids took turns riding up and down the lane on that noisy thing, but I refused to try it, just as I have always rejected driving anything with an engine. 

So many memories.   

Coming up, another graveyard.