When I was a kid growing up we chopped weeds. Billions of them! We walked many a row of cotton and some were half a mile long.
They say for every 5 miles a day that you walk, you can add 7 years to your life. So by that analogy I ought to live about as long as Methuselah who walked 969 years on this earth, according to the Bible. But after being a farmer for over 30 years, and dealing with the stress of agribusiness, it may have trimmed that number back down considerably.
But enough of that.
There were several of us boys that chopped cotton. We started at daylight and worked till noon. We would stop to eat lunch and then head to one of the many ponds to swim a while. Then we’d head back to work till we gave out, or given a time to be in for supper, it all depended on where we were at and who we were working for.
Now, some of those ponds were equipped with cable swings hung from tree limbs to drop from and some had homemade diving boards built to bounce from.
We slung mud and moss at each other. We played keep away with just about anything
we could find handy to irritate one another… shoes, undershorts, or ball caps. Sometimes we would play hide and seek in the cattails.
We also had contests to see who could swim the farthest and who could hold their breath the longest.
We passed a lot of time away on those hot summer afternoons.
and afterwards we’d lay shivering with blue lips quivering from our time spent in the cold water on the side of the tank bank in that warm red dirt with nothing but our shorts on, drying our grey, prune wrinkled fingers and toes out in the warm summer sun while we talked about our dreams. Of who we’d become. And what all we’d do if we ever grew up.
I think of those days often, and I long for their return. Reminds me of the Merle Haggard song… Are the good times really over for good?
I sure hope not. There are young folks that need help making their own memories to someday reminisce about. I sure hope they are as good as the times I had to remember… I’m doubtful, though.
