Memories from Myra

by Myra Matthews

   One thing we did when we were kids,  in the evenings, was we would go out on Ervin Mumford's milk truck with Moe Henniger when he gathered the milk cans from the farms. That took us to Georgefield, then Burntcoat and back home.

   We absolutely loved traveling in the truck with Moe. It didn't faze us one little bit that wherever we went Moe, who was famous for his tall tales, proudly told everyone, “Yes, they belong to me.”  Sure, it didn't faze us, but our mothers - that was a different story!   They were not impressed with us referring to Moe as “Dad.”

   Still not to be fazed was the Christmas Marjorie (Densmore) received a Ouija board.  Yes, I know what you’re thinking, but at the time no one knew, and certainly not her mother, that those things were evil! Well, that Ouija board went everywhere with us; it was our modern-day version of Alexis or Google.

   While most kids our age were into makeup and boys, we were conjuring up the dead. It was nothing to see us all walking down the road with the Ouija tucked underarm. Long before the 1984 horror movie “Children of the Corn” came out in theatres, we were the original children of the corn -  the corn children,  the wild ones,  the ones they couldn't control - that's a line from Waylon Jennings.

   One day the Ouija just disappeared (Ouijas do that you know). I asked Marjorie whatever happened to it and she replied she hadn't a clue.

   Everyone who knew Marjorie and Joanie Densmore knew that as sisters they were polar opposites.  I will give you an example: Not long ago our community lost a dear friend and neighbor - Rhada McCulloch. Joanie and Rhada were best friends right from the days of the one room schoolhouse in East Noel.  Joanie gave a touching eulogy to her friend and she told how most Sundays after church they would walk three miles to visit an elderly blind lady.

   Us, Marj and I, on the other hand we were not as compassionate; an example would be the time we got a hold of a couple of real chicken legs complete with claws and toenails.  We snuck over to our elderly neighbors’, Margaret and Chester's and tied the chicken legs to the windshield wipers of their car. We tucked the legs underneath the wipers so you couldn't see them.

    Can you imagine turning on your wipers and a pair of chicken legs going back and forth on the windshield  - not a common sight to see!

   Marjorie and I cannot take full credit for this brain wave  because Marcia and Lynne were involved, too.

   To sum it up the difference between Joanie and Marjorie was while Joanie and Rhada were visiting the elderly we’d have probably done that, too if we hadn’t been grounded most Sundays for things we've done and things we didn't do the night before.

  One time I made a comment to my sister-in-law, Irene Hines, that my father was a tyrant and she said you do not realize behind the scenes he gets a kick out of most of the trouble you get yourselves into. All I could say was Thank God he had a sense of humor because I was not allowed out of the house after 6:00 pm even to cross the road to go to Chester’s store and my friends were

in the same dire straits. At 13 years of age, we thought our lives were ruined.

   I couldn't write these memories and not mention the time we spent at Dalton’s canteen when we were teenagers. to say we almost drove Dalton crazy wasn't an understatement. I remember Don Reynolds from Moosebrook was there a lot; he seemed like an old man to us at the time, but he really wasn't.  We kept him entertained and he doubled over laughing at us. 

   Jed Hennigar kept us in gum. He'd buy a package, toss it to us,  and say “Chow down on that and keep quiet so I can talk to Dalton for five minutes in peace, please.” But, you know, as annoying as we were I think Dalton liked us - we could conjure a dish of French Fries out of him every now and then.

    I’ll never forget the night Marjorie and Dalton decided they would head to the dance in Noel. It was almost midnight and Dalton was inebriated. Marjorie was sitting on his knee in his wheelchair and away they went - right down the yellow line with all of us at the canteen parking lot cheering them on.