Hard Work Never Hurt
Working when I grew up was just something you did. There was no excessive sitting in the house watching TV or listening to the Radio if there were things to do and there was always work to do. We picked rocks, we picked weeds. I picked a weed called cheat grass out of our fields by the gunny sack full. I hoed weeds in the garden and pulled more weeds affectionately called “Fire Weeds.” For two summers I hoed and pulled weeds on newly planted rows of trees, which totaled 7 miles. These are called “Wind Rows.” I remember calling them many other names. We butchered pigs,...
read moreRock Piles
One of the monuments on the Prairie has always been Rock Piles. They are sadly disappearing because farmers don’t like to farm around them anymore. They take a bull dozer, dig a pit next to the Rock Pile and shove them in to bury the rocks. Very sad. These Rock Piles are tributes to hard, hard work done by hand by many people on the Prairie. My parents were some of these hard working people, they knew how to work hard. I grew up watching them work. When I look at these old Rock Piles I think back to how they were built. Most Rock Piles years and years ago were put there one rock at a...
read moreDarn stinkin Sheep
Growing up on the farm I had all kinds of animals. I had rabbits, ducks, chickens, cows and calves, horses, dogs, cats, pigeons, and sadly sheep. I never liked sheep. I didn’t want them around and I hated the day my Dad decided he would bring sheep home to the farm. His favorite saying was, All day you smell their stinkin hides and at night you hear ’em bleat. Yep that about sums it up, still don’t understand why he brought them home. For those never around these smelly creatures here are a few facts learned a long time ago. First of all they have no gumption. When a ewe...
read moreRattlesnake Tales..
One of the constant things in Northern Montana where I was raised was snakes. Rattlesnakes. They are the Pits. We had a whole jelly jar full of Rattles we cut off the snakes when we killed them. A trophy jar so to speak. My mom always killed them with a sharp shovel, cutting their heads off. She said my Grandpa Light killed them with a whip snapping their heads off, he did the same with chickens. No gun ever for Grandpa. My sister tells about shooting one near the wooden garage when babysitting me and my cousin Bobby G. The story got more telling as the years went along and people were...
read moreUnique Good Montana Folk
My Aunt Achsah was there when I was born at home. She was my mom’s closest neighbor and between the two of them they had more than a passel of kids. So I suppose she was the midwife at my delivery. We lived just north of my Aunt Achsah and my Uncle Fred’s house at that time in a little grey house. They could holler at each other in the yards, we were that close. My mom’s first husband Hollis was my Uncle Fred’s brother so technically they weren’t my Aunt and Uncle but my sisters. This made no difference to me growing up they were my Aunt and Uncle. My Dad, Bill...
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