Stories

The unusual thunderstorms and constant rains we are having here this summer bring a torrent of memories flooding back to me, remembrances of another time and another place, deluged with rainwater. We were in the midst of our summer vacation, camping on the Frio River. It was a time my parents, eight brothers and sisters and I looked forward to all year. The trip began like any other, full of fun and excitement and we were enjoying the clear blue waters of this friendly river, when things changed dramatically. This trip was to be a once in a lifetime experience that brought our family closer together and gave us something to reminisce about for seasons to come.

We children frolicked all day in the icy cold waters until our toes turned blue and the sun baked our skin a golden brown. We floated lazily along the river, dreaming of happy lives to come. Our parents relaxed at camp and each evening we had a wonderful barbecued meal (thanks to Dad). At night we built bonfires, gazed at the stars in the unbelievably clear skies, talked of life on Mars, and wondered about the secrets of the universe. When bedtime came, as reluctant as we were to let go of the incredibly wonderful day we had had, we drifted off to sleep with the rhythm of the night sounds humming in our ears. We did not miss our soft beds at home. The security of the darkness and the cool hill country night air made our sleep especially peaceful.
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Memories Flooding BackRead More »

Although Dad never made a big deal out of it, I know he was disappointed that his oldest son didn’t go to work for Southwestern Bell Telephone Company. I know that he really wanted me to, but it just didn’t suit me. I might as well have worked for them though, since most of my childhood memories and many of my adult memories involve the phone company one way or the other. It really is kind of amazing how the phone company influenced my life.
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Growing Up With Ma BellRead More »

Marion Polka was not only Dad’s favorite uncle and his surrogate father/big brother, but he’s the one who gave Dad his nickname. Dad’s mom and most of his relatives called him Sonny, but almost everyone else called him Rip. Marion named him after Rip Van Winkle because Dad always liked to sleep and in his younger days, he was hard to get out of bed.

As conscientious and hard working as Dad was, he was hard to wake up, at least on work days. On Saturdays or holidays, he had no problem getting up early to go fishing or hunting or to kill a lamb before it got too hot. But on days that he had to go to work, it was another story. Mom would get all of us kids up and dressed for school, start breakfast and then try to wake up Dad. After a while, she got smart and began to take advantage of her load mouthed kids. She would send us in there to wake him up. We started out saying “Time to wake up Dad. It’s getting late”, but that quickly evolved into our favorite, which was “Time to wake up Dad. You better hurry up or you’re gonna get fired”. That usually worked. Two or three times of hearing that screamed in your ear by a bunch of load mouthed kids and you’d get up too.

My brothers keep writing stories about their hunting and fishing trips with Dad. They are very heartwarming stories, and well told. I guess, maybe the five girls in the family are a little jealous that they don’t have these types of stories to tell. Well, I have stories to tell as well.

Maybe my story explains the differences between boys and girls. I went hunting once with my Dad and the boys. At that time, I wanted to be a boy. Boys had all the fun!! Girls just stayed in the house and played with dolls. How exciting!

I was six or seven years old and I somehow talked Dad into taking me hunting with him and the boys.

I think my Dad knew that this would be my last hunting trip, but he humored me.

We went to Granny Jacob’s farm bird-hunting. I remember it to be cold and drizzly. We hunted all day. I, being the only girl was not afforded any special accommodations. Meaning, no one ever asked if I might need to use the restroom (which, of course there was not one, only an outhouse). For some reason, we were never near the outhouse and as the day wore on I needed to use the facilities.

Of, course none of the very sensitive and compassionate boys in our family ever suggested that I might have that need. I was very shy and determined to be tough and strong like the boys. Unknown to me, I am sure they had all availed themselves of the nearest bush or tree while I was not looking.

Eventually, I peed my pants, went home, hid my wet pants and never told anyone what happened, until recently. Mother says, Dad really didn’t plan it that way. He was just a man.

I still think he didn’t want me to be a tomboy and he taught me an important lesson. I was a girl, like it or not.

The sun had gone down and the last of the day”s light was slipping away. The white Ford pickup truck left the creek bed and headed up the small hill toward the deer camp. Standing on the top of the hill, about 50 yards to the right of the truck, were two big doe’s, quietly grazing on what little green grass there was. The deer glanced our way, but paid little attention to us, even though the radio was tuned to KTRH and Dad and I were talking about the day”s events. Dad stopped the truck, looked at me and said, “Shoot one of them”. I grabbed my rifle and started to open the truck door. “No, don”t get out, shoot him through the window”, Dad said. No way, I have to draw the line somewhere; I”m just not going to shoot a high-powered, semi-automatic deer rifle while setting in the front seat of a pickup truck. But Dad was adamant and said, “Shoot her quick, before it gets too dark to see”.

As I set there trying to decide what to do, I thought about the events that led up to this predicament. One Friday morning in early January, my dad called me on the phone and said that we still had two doe permits left and with the deer season just about over, he didn”t want to waste them. I agreed to go to the deer lease with him and he said he would come by my house in Hockley to pick me up. At that time, Dad and I were hunting on a lease just north of Madisonville and east of Normangee.
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Pickup Truck HuntingRead More »

When I was young, Dad made sure that we had plenty of domestic animals around including dogs, chickens, ducks, peacocks, quail and sheep, to name a few. But, we never had a horse. I was around horses from time to time and learned to ride, but it would have been nice to have one of our own. When I was almost grown, Dad finally broke down and bought a horse for his kids.

Dad bought Homer from the feed store on Hempstead Highway and it always fascinated me that this horse was the only creature I ever met that was as stubborn or maybe even more stubborn than my dad. Homer was a middle aged, retired cutting horse that was certainly used to being ridden, so he seemed like a good choice for Dad’s large family.

However, it seems that Homer had a different view of the situation. If I could sum up Homer’s philosophy of life, it would go something like this; “Hey, I spent more than 15 years of my life carrying a cowboy around and cutting cattle. I’ve done my share of work, now I’d just like to take it easy and graze out in the pasture. However, if you really want to ride, lets go, but you better hold on, because I still remember a trick or two”.
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Homer Takes The BitRead More »

My first trip to the Frio River will never be able to be retrieved from the depths of my psyche, being that I was only 1 year old. Yet it may have started even at that tender age. I was the youngest of 8 and can only image my older two brothers dangling a wiggly little orange perch in front of my wide eyes as my 5 older sisters jumped about to see my reaction. That would have been typical of my brother Joe and my sister Julie & Susan for sure. There was always some hush hush mischief going on behind mom & dad’s backs. My father adhered to the big bait-big fish theory. We used heavy salt water tackle with big redfish hooks and setting trout lines with that wonderful smelling blood bait was a must. I still love the smell of that stuff; it conjures up a flood of memories and feelings of times when just dad and I would go out at day break to bait the lines and retrieve the cats from the night before.
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Sun Perch On The FrioRead More »

When I was young, Dad loved to hunt and fish. On weekends in the fall, when the redfish were running through the bays, he would frequently take me fishing at Christmas Bay, near Surfside. When he was old enough, my younger brother Joe usually came along. Sometimes Uncle Marion or Uncle Adam would meet us there, other times it was just Dad and the boys. Dad wasn’t one to do things halfway and fishing was no exception. We would usually load up the station wagon on Friday night and leave for Surfside before dawn on Saturday. Dad’s favorite spot to fish was on the last of three oyster bars that jutted out into the bay. I think he liked that one because it was the hardest to get to and the least likely to be visited by other humans. In those days, it wasn’t unusual for us to fish for two or three days and never see another person.

Unfortunately for us boys, you usually couldn’t drive the station wagon close to the first oyster bar, never mind the third. Dad would get as close as he could and pick a high spot of sand to camp on. There was a good reason for this; I can remember a few times when the high tide came in and we were high and dry, but surrounded by water. If the high spot Dad liked was overgrown with salt grass and brush, he would check the wind, light a match and burn us off a spot to camp on. It wasn’t unusual to see large rattlesnakes scurrying across the sand fleeing from the smoke and fire. After the fire was out, Dad would drive the station wagon up on the high spot and we would either pitch a tent or put up a tarp for shade.
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Serious FishingRead More »