HerStory

Sometimes I feel completely at odds with myself, I just can't seem to get my thoughts to go along with the way I feel. I want to do something outside, or I want to be completely alone in the house.  I feel very reminiscent about some of my childhood experiences, so maybe I will write some of them down on paper and that will help me to see why I feel so very lonesome and blue. I remember one day in the heat of a very hot August in the hills of West Virginia where we lived when I was a child.  Our house was always either on the very top of a mountain or at the head of a dark and green holler.  My Father was a farmer when I was very small, but when I started to school, he left the farm and went away to work on the C & O railroad.  This left Mommie and six or seven of us kids at home to do what work that needed to be done. One holler I remember well was also after you climbed up a very steep hill, then you had to go around the side of the mountain and then almost hol...

 As close as I can get in my memory, I was about seven years old when my first tragedy came.  It was also the same year that some good angel gave me my beautiful baby sister, who became my very own idol and comfort for many years.  She gave me a reason to live for many years. We lived on the very almost top of this little mountain.  A little further up on the mountain there was a very small cemetery.  On the other side of the small mountain was a big, big rock that was almost like a carpet.  It seemed to me to be as big as the earth and it had caves in it with lots of moss and the best of all thing for us kids.  It had lots and lots of "mountain tea".  Mountain tea is a mint like plant that tastes liike peppermint.  It has a very pretty blossom too.  The other things that little mountain had was lots of mean old snakes, but we had a dear friend who would always look around and clear out the snakes and who gave his life for us because of ...

There were times when I would dream of another world.  I do not remember where I got the though because we never had a newspaper or magazine.   I was the oldest of the last four children in my family and for some reason I became    almost the sole caretaker of my two small brothers and later a little sister and brother.  I guess the good Lord showed me how to do the things that I had to do because there was only one bad accident to one of my little brothers and he survived that to live many years.   On this little mountain where we lived we had some neighbors living down in the valley.  This family whose father worked for the county, I think.  Anyway they had a real nice house with curtains on the windows and rugs on the floor.  And most of all, they always had fruit and good things to eat and pretty clothes.  One of these children was a little girl close to my age.  She had beautiful red hair and very blue eyes.  I l...

That was a very happy time in my life, but I am not sure what happened or why my Daddy decided to leave the farm, but I can remember my Mama crying a lot and one day she told us we were going to leave our farm.  She said my Daddy was going to work on the railroad where he would be paid real money and we would have a nice house and better clothes.  I do not remember the move, but I do remember the house and place we moved to. I was in luck-down the hill an on the main road to town lived a family with three children.  There were two girls and one boy.  Their house was wonderful.  They had a real front room with chairs and lamps and a rug on the floor.  Their kitchen had a big oven to cook on and a real oven to bake in.  Their Mama made wonderful cakes and cookies.  She woul give me and her youngest girl, Mary Lou, treats to picnic on and we had such good times with my little brothers that I still had to care for. We had a very small creek that ran d...

After we left the little farm, we most always had an old cow. Mama woud call her Old Cherry.  She was always red and very gentle.  I learned to milk her real easy while still very small. Sometimes Old Cherry would pass on.  I never understood where she passed on to, but aways there was another Old Cherry. I was I think about eleven years old when I was trying to milk this special Old Cherry.  For some reason she was unhappy and didn't want to be milked.  I was almost finished when Wham! A big old hard hoof that was attached to a big leg came up and splashed my whole bucket of milk on me and the ground. I was so angry at Old Cherry I just sat there and cried.  Now no milk for several days. Whatever will we do?  This is a real guilt trip for me.  I suffered for weeks because I lied to my Mama.  I told her a big old skunk had run in front of Old Cherry and scared her so that she kicked the bucket over and spilled the milk.  Mama was upset a...

Memories are sometimes very sad.  Memories are sometimes very helpful when you have to make choices.  I have some memories that I like to keep hidden, but I would not give up even the very ones that hurt the most.  I think my memories are the very substance that helped me to move from the backwoods of my first years to a moderately normal existence.  My first memories give me a glimpse of a small child peering through the bushes of a yard when a stranger approached.  We sometimes would go weeks or months without seeing anyone other than our family.  Us children when young seldom went to the store.  We never went to a church until we were old enough to go alone.  When we got old enough to go to school, we would go there and back and then the only other people we saw was the school teacher and the other children at school.  There was one old man who would come to our house about once a year.  I can't remember his name, but I do remember th...

I am going to try to capture my childhood memories as best I can. And now is a good time to tell you that my Mother moved around a lot.  Sometimes she move twice a year-I can't remember why she moved, not can I remember the moves-I just remember being at a new place or back to the old place where we had lived before.  I cannot explain why this is so.  Before I get into the real background of my life, I will give you all some of this history as best I can remember. As I have told you, I was born in the hills and small mountains of West Virginia, near the gas wells and coal mines and among the hills and valleys.  Not far away were the coal mines and the train yards that my Poppy later worked for.  It was the coal mining country.  We always lived in a little valley or on the top of a small mountain or at the head of a holler.  A holler is a very large gully with trees and most always a small creek.  They are very pretty places and many small animals ...