It's Peepaw's birthday and he's 50 years old today!
I think he would say he's had a good day...I fixed one of his favorite breakfasts of steak and eggs and for supper, we're having roast chicken, twice baked potatoes, and corn on the cob. I got him a chainsaw (which is a necessity here) and he's anxious to use it. I imagine the first order of business will be to cut up the old bird tree that fell a few weeks ago. It will make great firewood. I also got him some safety goggles because I sure don't want a stray hunk of wood hitting him in the eye/face. I think chainsaws can be intimidating to use but I know Peeps will be very careful.
While we were driving home from church today, we started asking each other if we remembered certain foods from our childhood. We love doing that because we almost always know what the other one is talking about. Food is such a common bond for families and some of my strongest memories revolve around food or meals. I have always loved to read and one of my favorite things to do was to read the entire box while eating a bowl of cereal every morning. One of my favorites was a cereal that my mother liked...it was Skinner's brand Raisin Bran. The box was cardboard, of course, but it was covered in a wax paper. This was my favorite box because on the back, there was an ad for birthstone rings and it had every month with its coordinating stone underneath it. I would stare and stare at those stones the whole time I was eating. I was always glad that my birthstone was pink.
We also talked about 7-up at great length. When I was a little girl, you could take a 6 pack of empty soda bottles to the grocery store and turn them in for a cash redemption...you had to pay a little extra when buying soft drinks as a deposit for the glass bottles. Anyway, after Mother and I turned the used bottles back in, we would head for the soft drink aisle. (actually, we just referred to all soft drinks as Coke.....(pretend you are visiting someone)...your hostess would say, "Come in, can I get you a Coke? We have Coca Cola, Dr. Pepper, Nehi, root beer, Orange Crush, etc." I digress ...we would head back to pick out our "cokes" and back then, you could just get an empty carton and pick and choose whatever you wanted. We always got 7-up in case one of us got sick and they were so good. The bottles were heavy and dark green and I would always want to pour it over ice, like on t.v. It was so fizzy that it would tickle my nose when I drank it and it was MUCH better than Sprite...not as sweet. Peeps remembers them the same exact way. He, too, read the cereal boxes when he ate his cereal. There were also toys in many of the cereals back then and I was always wishing for a whistle. I used to want a whistle from wherever we went, sort of like you boys wanted a new comic book or baseball cards. Oscar Meyer used to put a red whistle in their packages of hot dogs once in a while - now that was a huge deal to me and I would beg my mother to let me have one. And this wasn't your ordinary whistle...it had a neat shape and a very shrill whistle. After much pleading, she did let me have one - I wish I had kept it.
It's very, very cold at Possum Cough. I think it was about 9 degrees this morning. We're leaving a tiny stream of water running from the faucets at night so we don't have burst pipes. I have to say I do sleep better when it's cold because then I can pile on the covers and be toasty and warm.
Please say a prayer for our pastor, John. His father may only have a few days left to live. He has a multitude of health problems and he's in kidney failure and unresponsive to anyone at this time. John lost his mother around 8-10 years ago so he's understandably having a hard time. He said the worst part is that his dad is so far away in Missouri and he can't be there with him. They did go for a visit at Thanksgiving and his dad was able to communicate at that time so that does give him some comfort.
I will go see about Peepaw's birthday supper. I love you all very much and hope you have a wonderful, safe week.
Mom
Mom
