Jeri

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elderjane
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Jeri
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Oklahoma City, OK
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Southwestern Woman

Life & Events > Those Yesterdays
 

Those Yesterdays

Growing up in rural Oklahoma during the depression was no fun at all. Child labor was the norm in my family. My mother and grandmother would gather up all the cousins, force the girls to put cream (edible cream from cow) on their faces and to wear a sun bonnet and long sleeves and join them in the field hoeing cotton or the garden or corn.
A suntan was considered low class and your pretty fair skin had to be preserved at the cost of sweaty misery and the smell of cream souring on your face.

Many years later, I was laughing about this and my dermatologist said I should be thanking my grandmother for protecting us from skin cancer. I found many of the things we did during that time laughable. My cousins and I caught 4 large catfish with our bare hands and carried them a quarter of a mile home with them finning us all the way. It was supper!

It wasn't until the forties that my parents were able to be financially stable. FDR was a savior for the rural poor and his farm -Tenant loan enabled my parents to buy their own home. That bit of help enabled them to pay more than their share of taxes later. I really wonder at people who can't see the connection between a bit of a boost and it being paid back later.

Be that as it may, I wouldn't trade that time away. We worked for the good of our family. My mother and her two sister and their families all moved in with my grandmother and grandad. We were grounded in reality.
It was wonderful having aunts and cousins available at all times. We learned the value of money and that it required effort to get some.

posted on May 28, 2018 8:03 AM ()

Comments:

My mother had 4 sisters and 4 brothers, and they all helped out with the farming and fruit orchards at the family trading post in the Four Corners. As adults, some of them didn't speak to others of them, but some of it was the youngest ones said they didn't feel like they knew the older ones very well. And of course the older ones thought the younger ones were spoiled rotten.
comment by traveltales on May 30, 2018 7:53 AM ()
Of course the older ones felt that way. My cousin resents that my sister who was five years younger didn't have to work like we did.
reply by elderjane on June 17, 2018 6:39 AM ()
I like hearing stories about childhood life like this. So much more interesting than the suburbs with a crazy father. I had a friend long ago who wrote all her memories up for some magazine, can't remember the name. But our writing group really loved reading it. She was a depression kid too.
comment by drmaus on May 29, 2018 5:27 PM ()
It would make a good book I think. The route my parents took was hard work and endless striving towards a goal. My sister and I have a much easier life because of it.
reply by elderjane on June 17, 2018 6:42 AM ()
This may be why we have such a strong bond with extended family Those of us who are left still get together at least twice a year and the nieces and nephews now have grandchildren of their own. It is such a miracle to me when my middle aged nephews hug me and tell me they love me. It warms my heart. P. S. are you in the eye of the storm?
comment by elderjane on May 28, 2018 2:47 PM ()
We were poor, but my sis and I did not have to endure the hardships you did. We just didn't have luxuries and mom robbed my piggy bank once to help pay the rent. However, I never felt poor, unless it was to wonder how come I didn't get to ride horses like the kids I saw in Lincoln Park. I am not talking 5 cents for the escorted pony rides around a small ring, but big horses on park trails. And I was never hungry. I look back on my childhood with love.
comment by tealstar on May 28, 2018 8:31 AM ()

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