Tulia

My Home Town is and will always be Tulia, Texas. I’m not sure why, I wasn’t born there, I didn’t live there all that long and I doubt I will ever live there again but it was my childhood home and the place I think of when someone asks me where I’m from.

It was the first place I remember always feeling safe. Where I knew if I got hurt there would be people around to save me. Where I learned to skate, ride a bike, drive a tractor and a truck. It’s where I learned how to stack 50lb. bales of hay 6 high on the back of a moving flat bed truck and where I learned how to throw those bales from the ground to the top of that stack. Where I had my first girl friend and got my first kiss. It’s where I lost my virginity. It’s where I learned the value of a dollar and the value of friendship. I learned that it is good to have 20 cousins around when you want to play baseball and where to be when Aunt Betty was baking pies. In Tulia I learned that you really can gain knowledge by listening to old people talk and some of what you learn is what not to do.

We first went to Tulia the summer I was 5 and that fall I was to young to go to school so my younger brother and I stayed home. Mom worked, so we were cared for by an older black lady named Lina who lived just down the walk about 50 feet. She got us lunch and fixed our scrapes and scratches until my sisters got home from school. She was a good part of the reason I felt safe in Tulia. I remember that it bothered me even then when my cousins made derogatory remarks about her because of her race.

Over the years Tulia has picked up a national reputation for being a place where racism is not just tolerated, but accepted. I don’t remember it that way when I was growing up there, but when I visit with some of those cousins now, I do notice they still use words that embarrass me. These are basically very good people who do some bad things. Is it possible to get a good moral education from bigots?

And Now I live in Alabama, The Heart of the South and hardly ever hear an embarrassing word.

Uncle Dave

Bambi

It was late August 1962 and the family was having a rough time of it. We were living on, and operating, a dairy farm in northern Arkansas and we were just scraping by. It wasn’t that we weren’t making money, in fact we could have lived just fine with a little judicious budgeting. The problem was that J.T. (my stepfather) was an alcoholic and he was losing the battle with the bottle. The upshot was that though there was always money for booze, sometimes there wasn’t any money for food.

I was feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders. It wasn’t my load to bear but I didn’t see anyone else stepping up so I took it on myself to feel responsible for feeding the nine hungry kids. I didn’t think any of us could face another macaroni and cheese dinner.

This particular afternoon fate stepped up to bat in the form of an eight point buck wandering across the rocky meadow in front of the house. Under normal circumstance that buck would have been pretty safe as deer season was still a ways off, but these were not normal circumstances. My first thought was to get J.T. to shoot the deer but when I ran into the living room he was passed out on the couch in no condition to operate a dangerous weapon.

I froze just for a second then went for the gun myself. It was a Winchester model 94, 30-30 rifle. I had never shot it but I had shot my 22 enough to know how it was done. I went back out on the back porch and pulled a folding chair up to the railing. I checked to make sure the gun was loaded and the safety was off, I steadied it against the rail and took aim at the grazing buck. My mind went through all the things taught me about shooting by the drunk in the living room and I carefully squeezed off a shot. The deer jumped took two running steps and fell over dead.

In less than an hour we were listening to the sounds and smelling the smells of dear meat frying on the stove. It was probably a good thing too as we were out of macaroni and cheese.

Uncle Dave (at 12)

Again

Well, while wandering the countryside of North-East Alabama today I found a few more Strange Alabama Animals for your amazement and amusement.

First there is the Amazing Alabama Oreo Pig and then a family of Amazing Alabama Armadillos and finally a Weir Goat.

When I have more time I’ll give you the rundown on their peculiarities and idiosyncrasies.

Easter

I missed the 16th. It just slipped right past me without my writing a thing. It's not like I had something else to do, I never left the house. I just forgot to write. When I looked outside I saw those roving bands of wild children searching the lawns for eggs and never even considered going out there. They were just to scary to contimplate going out amoungst them. Kinda makes J. Edgar's phobia make sense.


I also suspect the Egg Seeking Kids might have had something to do with what I found in the fridg.


Oh well, I'll try to come up with something else later today to make up for missing yesterday. Maybe I'll go out and look for some more strange animal life like the "Oreo Cows."

Later,

Uncle Dave