Originally posted by kevcvs57Bohemian? Guess you are not familiar with children born on farms in the old, old. days. Childhoods during the Great Depression meant sleeping in one's underwear in unheated bedrooms. One pair of overalls hung on a nail overnight. One pair of work boots scaped off as soon as you entered the porch after milking the cows for the second time in 24 hours. Bare feet were the norm all summer and in the house 12 months out of the year. He missed one year of school because he had grown so much that summer that he had no shoes. Smoking jacket!!??? This man has never owned a bathrobe for the same reason he has never owned slippers. Never had one in the past, and can see no reason to buy one now! Country bumpkin? Oh yes, and one who answered his nation's call to duty in World War 2 in the Army Air Force. His familiarity with a rifle while shooting rabbits, pheasants, and geese to put food in their stomachs in the lean times, earned him the Top Ace rating in his battalion in boot camp. Smoking jackets and slippers might appeal to fops and dandies, but not to a man's man like mr. ale. And I am proud of him.
You must have known He was a Bohemian when you married Him, He must look damn silly in His smoking jacket 'n' no slippers.
Originally posted by ale1552Are you pretending not to know that I was joking in order to justify a self righteous rant?
Bohemian? Guess you are not familiar with children born on farms in the old, old. days. Childhoods during the Great Depression meant sleeping in one's underwear in unheated bedrooms. One pair of overalls hung on a nail overnight. One pair of work boots scaped off as soon as you entered the porch after milking the cows for the second time in 24 hours. Bar ...[text shortened]... ight appeal to fops and dandies, but not to a man's man like mr. ale. And I am proud of him.
One Raspberry Ornament (Chapter Six, New Babies)
Growing up we certainly weren’t better than other children
on either side of the tracks or any worse. Maybe better off,
except when we had to trudge up to visit Dentist Martin
or deal with Dr. Crowley’s most dreadful nurse, Witch Goff.
Speaking of things medical, now and then we were told
a new baby would be coming as if by some stroke of fate.
Eventually we learned to handicap these joyous events.
Dad worked longer hours. Got raises. Mom put on weight.
After awhile new light began to dawn. Our dear parents
were shopping for a girl. All buttons. No bows. No dolls
in the toy box. Only erector sets, magician stuff, soldiers,
sharp objects, sling shots, helmets, gloves, bats and balls.
Mom and Dad ordered a daughter. Year after year they dialed.
One part on the side. One down the middle. K-- with curls.
No sugar and spice and everything nice. Always the same ole.
Batting 1,000 plus with towhead dudes. Striking out on girls!
(continued)
.
One Raspberry Ornament (Chapter Six, Continued)
Finally prayers were answered. A daughter in all her glory
was born. If Robert had been born a flicka, meek and mild,
instead of the first gender disappointment but not the last,
Jan-- R--- the eldest well might have been an only child.
Little boys are okay but little girls are so very much better.
So they dialed in an order again and asked the stork to save
a sweet little sister for baby Jan and to round out the family.
So guess what? Still backordered. We got Little Big Dave.
And so the future became the present and then the present
became the past. All of the fruitful work was finally done.
W----- and D------'s baby factory closed down. Decision
was simple. Couldn’t take the chance with a ratio of 4 to 1.
.
One Raspberry Ornament (Chapter Seven, Garbage Galore)
In the supreme high court of her frontal lobes, Grandma could
not fathom how or why the babies kept coming like rabbits.
On more than one occasion she would greet Dad at the door,
“Vooren, vat you have done now” handing him the 'gabbitz.'
😞
One Raspberry Ornament
We only achieved a brood of five, yet Grandma complained.
Truth be known, for her, five were probably five too many.
So Chicken Little was right and the diapered sky was falling.
Wonder if her Mom would have been happier without any.
The P~~~ni Family lived near the tracks. I can’t quite recall
whether it was on Sugar Beet Street or Burnt Swamp Road.
Mrs. P was a rotund, cheerful sort of a lady who wore tents.
Tally was at 19 after she dropped twins in her final load.
The D~~~er Family was freckled. Their skin seemed pale.
All had red hair. Smiles perched on the lips of every one.
Town census takers finally determined Mrs. D, a husky
but compact full figured woman, contributed a total of 21.
Imagine being part of Christmas in a household so large.
Even better, imagine Grandma present at the gathering.
So many faces to feed. So many dishes. Oy, the garbage.
Good luck. God bless the poor soul who did the fathering.
(to be continued)
One Raspberry Ornament (Chapter Eight, North Pole)
May have taken the long way around to reach the North Pole
but the shortest route to the moist earth where seeds took root.
In childhood trust and believing come easily, even belief in
a jolly old gentleman sporting a white beard and a red suit.
Later on we would discover Santa Claus was one of our earliest
object lessons of note. Less fiction than fact. Quite shocking
that a boy who messes up many times, in many ways all year
may yet receive a cornucopia of gifts in his Christmas stocking.
Sure didn’t earn them or deserve them. Our parents sacrificed
to provide them anyway without conditions, any strings or fuss.
The gifts in those stockings and beneath the tree were a small
symbol of all they were free to do because of their love for us.
We didn’t grasp much at the time but it didn’t depend on us.
Students without portfolio were being given a privileged place
to sit down, on invisible chairs in a school without walls,
while Santa helped them tutor us in the classroom of grace.
Does it still make any sense to subscribe to the fanciful myth?
Wouldn’t be the first to say it doesn’t or the last to say it does.
In the man though there's a boy for whom the unseen is as real
as what can be seen, in the world as it is and as it once was...
Yes, I still hear distant sleigh bells at the festive season
when evergreens wear tinsel and bayberry candles glow,
and still glimpse the long signature of thin runner tracks
inscribed again, by moonlight, upon the glistening snow.
Christmas, 2008, Boston Lad
(to be continued)