"BIG STORMS"….BOYHOOD….AND GOOD NEIGHBORS

It was a STORM, I reckon, that Old Timsrs 
     will  ADD TO their troves of
          amazing remembered 
                       stuff...

Big A.'s  television stations will say ever
    (again and again)--the NINTH
       BIGGEST SNOWSTORM
             since 1931!

Not even I can  remember
                                 that far back.

There was a SIXTEEN INCHER here in
     2006....biggest one I ever saw!

BE never saw a snowstorm that she didn't
                ASOLUTELY LOVE!
She was out in it, shoveling, BUT alas...
      It was too much. The cars were
                     covered up.

Ah, then BOYHOOD came to our rescue....
    Our neighbor's kid, a sharp,
         intelligent one, came to
              our rescue, with his 
                        buddy.

They are both about eight years.old.
     "We'll shovel your whole 
          driveway, sidewalks, 
             clean off the cars....

FOR TEN BUCKS APIECE!"

Wow! Were they two little entrepreneurs
                  or what?

I admired their spirit. Why in the forties,
    we were out there in Clovis 
             doing the 
         SAME THING!

KNOCK... KNOCK...."We'll shovel your
      property off good and proper
            for fifty cents, A WALKING
                     LIBERTY!"

This was the neighbor's same little kid,
     who, when he was five, rang
        the doorbell one Sunday
                 afternoon.

I went to the door and LO---no one 
    was there. Then I looked down
         and there was the 
               scared-est
         little boy I ever saw.

He formed his little words with great care...
     "I accidentally tossed a bag of 
          dog poop up on your house."

"My dad says I have to 'pologize so
      I'm sorry---I will get it down,
                   OKAY?"
(He had been on assignment, cleaning
      up his backyard...and somehow...
                    just "tossed.")

These two eight year olds have  good genes---
    They did quality work...even 
        cleaned out the BACK of 
            my '72 Chev pickup,
                    their idea.

As women and mothers have this marvelous
      caring trait, BE says: "I'm worried
          about the two cute little boys
             out there in the COLD...what
                if their little backs get
                           tired?"

But as we could hear their still-unchanged-
      boyish voices echoing the fun, wonder,
         and joyous excitement of being
              alive, she said: "But OH, ARE 
                  THEY EVER ENJOYING
                         THEMSELVES!"

(I suppose they should be happy---we were the
      second of three jobs...and they were 
           well on their way to accumulating
               the fees to join a VIDEO GAME 
                   CLUB! Parents said: "Okay,
                      if you earn the money!")

  After more'n an hour's work, the doorbell rang.
          BE paid 'em, and they headed
              next door, to refuel on a cup
                  of hot chocolate and a 
                        tuna sandwich!

You could hear their joyous laughing voices,
     out front, as they left the house,
        happily holding their ten dollar
                 "HAMILTONS" plus a
                    "GEORGE" apiece
I threw in for a good job.
*********************
The neighbor boy's dad flies two flags
    proudly, lit up  twenty-four hours...
         round the clock...out front
           of his house...for the
             whole world to 
                    see....

He is an Annapolis graduate, a member
    retired of the USMC.

His two flags are: OLD GLORY and the
                    USMC flag!

SEMPER FIDELIS and may GOD BLESS AMERICA!

*****************
MIL
03-01-15
Epilogue...BE (Donna) went out once early on to 
check things out...came back in and said:
"They are all over the car and trucks with brooms
and can't reach very high. Fearing SCRATCHES on
my Metallic Cinnamon Brown Buick Enclave, I
told them to skip it!."

Ah, today, Sunday... the driveway and sidewalks
are clear...

But THE LAWN, where they dumped the SNOW---looks
                              LIKE BOSTON!
****************

BULLIES AND BICYCLE STEALERS AT OLD LA CASITA

by Richard Drake

My folks moved to Clovis when I was in the middle of the 
third grade.  Next thing I knew, I was enrolled at La Casita
School!

My classroom was in the remodeled service station across
the street at the corner of Thornton and Seventh. I remember
having some difficulty in becoming acclimated.

An interesting event was the big football game later on against
Eugene Field. My friend Bob has told that story about Ned Biddix
and the Grant kid, who were our running backs. 

That game was a big deal, as I remember. We played in our street
clothes.  Three years my brother played for La Casita and they had 
complete equipment. We had played baseball on hard-packed ground,
and my brother and his teammates played on grass fields in their 
beautiful uniforms.

In the summer before the sixth grade my folks gave me a new Schwinn
bicycle for my birthday. I was proud of the bike and parked it where I 
could see it from my desk during class. One day I was called to the
chalkboard and when I went back to my desk my bicycle was gone!

Someone had stolen it. I stormed out of the class in a hurry. I didn't
ask for permission as we were supposed to do. I ran around the 
building and finally found it in the inner courtyard. I was very relieved 
until I found a big long scratch on the tank between the handlebars.

In those days I had a temper and went looking for the culprits! I had
a good idea who they were because two of the boys had been excused 
from the classroom a short time before. I was going to put a serious
amount of hurt on the boys, but the teacher would not let me.

I learned that he had sent the two out to play a trick on me. To this day
I have not forgiven that teacher.

Another story which I have mentioned before is about the school bully!

One day he decided that my turn had come. He always made his victim--
his "pick" of the day-- meet him just over the rock wall at the southwest 
corner of the playground. That morning before breakfast I told my Dad 
what was going on. His advice was simple. "Fight him and do the best 
you can. If you don't, he will haunt you forever."

On the way to school I found a nice piece of 2X4 lumber near the wall.
I leaned it up against the old rock fence and continued to class. At noon
I took off as fast as I could to the wall and jumped over it.

The bully was much larger than I, since he had been put back in grades
in two different years. I had run as fast as I could and barely beat him over.
I picked up the board just as he was making a tackling lunge at me. I 
swung as hard as I could and hit him on his arm just below the shoulder!

I felt like Babe Ruth hitting one out of Yankee Stadium. The bully started 
crying and ran off the school grounds headed for his home north of the 
school. We never did see him again. Someone said that he and his family 
had moved.

I loved La Casita but really don't have many memories.
**********************
By Richard Drake,
"BARD of CHS '53"
For MIL'S PLACE
02-27-15

CROCUSES PEEKING THROUGH THE SNOW

The lavender, yellow,

    and the white

crocuses, peeking

    thru' the snow

there by the gray 

    rock fence....

on a freezing day

    late In winter

were simply telling

    their part of

the planet---

    "IT'S SPRING

AGAIN!"

(barely)

*****************
BY MIL
02/25/15

SOMEDAY, WHEN THE EARTH…...

WHERE DID THE PEOPLE GO?
************************************

Some day, some century, some eon..
    When in this vast universe...
of billions of galaxies, planets, suns, 
    orbs...

After TIME has ended, and man's 
    intrusion into ETERNITY...
is permanent...

Maybe the old EARTH will still be
    revolving its way in its
 appointed
revolutions around the sun...
    Tho' it may be scorched and bare---
or frozen...in a new ICE AGE...

Burned up...or frozen...but cleansed
    of all evil, sin, hatefulness, murder,
disobedience to God...there it is...
    Is the SUN and is the MOON
still giving light?

Will angels and heavenly historians
                 STUDY
the EARTH, as it existed.......?

For it had a BEAUTY, who knows,
    maybe unsurpassed in the
whole COSMOS! Volumes were likely
   recorded somewhere, to tell
of its WONDERS!

The skies, the clouds, the sunsets,
    the rivers, springs, trees, mountains;
The wind...don't ever forget...the wind...
    The miracle of SEEDS providing man
with his food...

Choirs, symphony orchestras, mothers singing
    to babies, soft guitar music, singers, with 
purity of voice...celebrating life...with a 
heavenly expression---MUSIC.

The SEASONS, for variety...summer picnics,
    sports,  green lawns, dogs playing frisbee,
Winter-time, families around the fireside,
    Pancakes at Aunt Mary's. the smells
of bacon, eggs, and coffee...oh the joy
    of being!

The counting of a new baby's fingers and 
    toes...a tear comes to the eye, with 
his first little GIGGLE...

The beauty of a woman, her smile, and 
    the lilt in her voice...        

O, this EMPTY EARTH could tell stories...

Ah, where are all the people? GONE from
    this ARENA, now!

Where are all the evil ones of history?
     Who nearly ruined the beauty...?

Where are all those who knelt and said:
    "Forgive me, I need the AMAZING GRACE!"

One group is in HEAVEN with GOD...
    The other in the TRASH HEAP OF 
                   HUMANITY.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven
and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea."
Revelation 21.1

*****BY MIL*****
01-10-15

"A KICKING AND A SPANKING AT THE BLURBLY FOUNTAIN"

Bill, Mil, Art and Bobby Joe

RESPONSE TO "BURY MY HEART AT LA CASITA"
*******************************************************
by Bobby Joe Snipes

Enjoyed every word...brought back a lot of memories!
Remarkable that you can remember all that.

I got my first spanking at that old water fountain. I was
in the second grade. Ms. Norris was my teacher. We
were all lined up to get a drink and the kid in front of
me put his mouth over the water spout in order to get
a drink.

I knew this was so unhealthy and besides all that, he
had snot dripping from his nose and I was going to 
have to drink right after him.

So I told him to quit and I kneed him hard right in the
seat of the pants!

Well, Ms. Norris saw me and jerked me up and spanked 
me right there and all of the time I was telling her what
happened....I got the spanking anyway. Guess I over-
reacted.

Ms. Norris was nice lady. I would see her many times 
after I graduated. I am sure that she died in Clovis

The old rock fence brought back a lot of memories.

Mr. Warren, our ruddy-faced janitor...a good-natured
man--lived just across the street south of the school.
Sometimes at recess he would sit out on that rock 
fence and tell us boys stories about when he was a 
boy.

He said that he and his brother, on their old farm, 
plowed the field walking behind two big mules.
He said one day they were plowing and this ole
mule passed gas and it stank to high heaven and
they whipped the mule that did it.

He said they did not tell their father about it at the
end of the day.

But he said that the next day his dad was plowing 
and every time the mules would pass gas, they 
would break and run.

Well, that evening at the supper table, their dad
simply said: "Which one of you boys whipped the
mules when they f-----d?" 

Mr. Warren said they both got a spanking! Aren't 
parents wise?

Bobby Joe, far right

*********************************
By "Country Boy" Bob
FOR MIL'S PLACE
2-14-15

THAT HALLOWED GROUND

THAT HALLOWED GROUND
********************************
Today, when a boy from the forties drives around
Reid, Thornton, Edwards....by Todd's House up
on Fourteenth.... by the old lake bed (now a Park!)
at the end of Fourteenth Street....by  the site of
Pleasant Inn, across from the hospital---drives
around that neighborhood...he feels a deep 
feeling of time-passed, precious childhood times,
long gone.

Who ever thought---we'd get this old?

Rolling balls of all kinds were just part--a big part---
of our fun, during each grand, eternal summer.
I doubt there's a foot of ground around there
that balls didn't roll on.

We built a baseball backstop at the corner of Reid
and Tenth. We built it---AND THEY CAME, from all
over town...a backstop! Bruce and Cecil came..
and Cameron McTavish (CHS 50), with that awful,
scary curve ball of his...

Art and Bob had a croquet set for their front lawn---
only croquet I ever played.

Bob had a nice wooden basketball goal on the
back alley, near Eleventh Street. It was murder
on a basketball, with the dry, dusty, dirty, rock
and nail-filled soil...socks got dirty--quick.

We rolled tennis balls over our roof tops
and made a game of it.

We played catch and "grounders" on our lawns.

Most of us boys had a valuable (to us) little
box with six or seven black friction-tape-
covered-baseballs which had seen their best
years...at some previous time.

Who amongst us in those wonderful, frugal times,
could afford $1.25 for a real Major League
WHITE STITCHES-SHOWING BASEBALL?!

Our generation of boys remembers that our
marvelous childhoods were bought and paid
for by men who went off to fight WWII for us...
dying at Pearl Harbor, The Death March, 
Tarawa, Guadalxanal, on the USS Quincy,  
Pointe du Hoc, D-Day, Battle of the Bulge, 
Bastogne, over Germany in B-17's, the 
Doolittle Raiders, and yes, even The Flying 
Tigers.

The same old SUN that was shining down on
us boys seventy years ago, is still shining down,
bright as ever it seems, as I parked my car 
recently, facing west there on Eleventh, right
by Art's house.

I could see our old beloved home, on the corner
of Reid and Eleventh...where we grew up, 
measles, mumps, chicken pox...there we  listened
to Fibber and Molly...and Bob Hope...and Red
Skelton...

...And played all these ball games and countless 
other great and glorious activities, which
only little American boys could dream up!

*******BY MIL*******
01-30-15

ANYONE FOR "AMERICA"?

SUMMERTIME IN THE FORTIES,,,,
        LASTED....FOREVER!
**************************************
Clovis, New Mexico, 1943......

You  really needed six for a good game of 
"AMERICA."

It would not have been surprising for a little
kid,  along about 1943, living in a nice, new
small two bedroom house, over there on Reid 
St, near the new MEMORIAL HOSPITAL---to
hear a knock on the front door...open it and---
there on the first day after school was out at
old La Casita, would be three or four neighbor-
hood kids, all dressed for play---one juggling
the most worn, beat-up football you ever saw.

It was Art and Bob, Charles, and James.

"Wanna PLAY AMERICA?" "Sure," let me 
finish my corn flakes." (This was before the
the days of the sinful Fruit Loops.")

Soon we had six out in the middle of Reid 
Street, between Eleventh and Twelfth Streets.
Reid was nicely paved by then.

"AMERICA" was not a contact game---it was 
a pass or kick game. Goals were set up a
block apart...anything you could find marked 
a goal.

Your side kicked and a caught kick was three
points for the opposition. A caught pass was two
points. If they missed,  your side got the points.

(I'm setting this down--FOR  HISTORY!) When
a team amassed eight or ten points, a star
player would take eight or ten GIANT STEPS...
and kick or throw the ball far over the heads
of the opposition, thus winning the game--if they
couldn't catch it.

I wonder if, today, kids take a break from their Tweeting
at all and maybe say: "Hey, how 'bout a game of
NEW WORLD ORDER?"

Oh, oh! Did I mention: our football was probably...
UNDER-INFLATED?!

-----30-----
MIL'S PLACE
2/15/15