Surrounded by Memories….


Part 1

“For some reason my memories of our small town don’t seem anything like what you recall or what you write about…”

“I love what you write about our small little town…when time allows, I read your stories and they make me smile about a time that was good to me”

Two simple messages….and each a complete opposite of the other. The above are messages that I received from old friends from the town I grew up in expressing how they felt when they read my stories.

I don’t expect that everyone will see or remember the town of Mosby the way that I did. For some it was a town that trapped their dreams and hid them from fruition, and for others it was an oasis.

While I was growing up it seemed so much like the former…..and now that I have grown older (and hopefully a little wiser) I realize it truly was the latter for me.


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It was a hot summer day, the kind that drove all of us kids to eventually find the local creek or pond to swim. Back then we never thought of what was in the water, we were just glad to have a place to cool off.

When you were young and wanted to earn money there were only a few ways to get it…..have a paper route, mow yards, work in the cornfields, babysit, or go searching for pop bottles to take to Bill Due’s Bait and Tackle for a nickel a bottle. For me, I had the Daily Standard paper route that was my main source of income but occasionally I would fill in for my brother who, along with my friend Bobby would do most of the mowing in town.

On this particular day I had agreed to fill in for both Bobby and my older brother who were out of town for the week for differing reasons. This was the week I waited for during the summer because it meant a cash windfall for me, and I was already planning on marching into Bill Due’s shop to make my big purchases whether it was baseball cards, banana bike candy, Cherry Mash candy bars, or a new fishing lure to add to my newly acquired tackle box I had gotten for my birthday. I didn’t know it at the time, but that day would give me something more than money could buy, and would teach me a valuable lesson that I wouldn’t understand better till the most recent years of my life.

I got up early that morning, deciding I was going to try and get my mowing done early enough I could get an afternoon swim in the local Fishing River before having to come home and start my afternoon paper route. I grabbed my bicycle and the metal gas can and headed off to George Cox’s Garage and Filling Station to spend my .25 to get a gallon of gas. (Back then we thought that was highway robbery….little did we know)

I pulled up to the station and something was odd….the garage doors at George’s station normally were wide open, but on this day, they were still closed. I walked over to the regular door and noticed a handwritten sign that read “ I will be running late on Wednesday and the station will not open until 10 AM”. Well, so much for getting my mowing done early that day. Rather than ride back home and have to come back in another 30 minutes I decided I would walk my bike over to Bill Due’s store to sit and chat with him while further pondering what would be my purchases with the extra money I was earning that week.

Walking around Bill’s store was always fun…..you would go from the Candy/Soda/limited groceries at the front of the store to the back section which held all the fishing supplies. I had focused of course on the pop and candy when Bill made the comment that if really wanted to get the most out of my money, I should buy something that would give me more than just fleeting pleasure. For Bill that was a profound statement….rarely did he say much of higher nature as Bill was pretty much a down-to-earth type of guy with all us kids. I didn’t really think much about it at the time, but his words would be a harbinger of what that day would bring me.

I left his shop and walked my bike back over to George Cox’s station, which was open by that time. George came out from the back of his garage where he was working on a car from one of his customers in town. While George was pumping the gas into the can I regaled him with all my plans for the day and what I planned to do with my money. After filling up my can George looked up with a smile….I handed him my quarter and he said to me….”you make sure that you keep cool today, it’s going to get hot”.

Smiling back and acknowledging what he said, I took off and headed home. Once home I hopped off my bike and grabbed my lawnmower and started walking to begin my day of mowing. My first 2 yards were smaller and easy to complete without breaking much of a sweat. Both were well-shaded so the sun wasn’t beating down on me and sapping my strength yet. Between each I would stop and get a drink of water from my customer, sit and chat with them a little, then move on knowing I wanted to get my work done so I could go swimming.

I was at my last yard and it was 1:30 in the afternoon already. I had gotten so busy that I had forgotten to stop and eat my jelly sandwich I had fixed for lunch and brought along with me. So I pulled my mower up to Georgie George’s house, put it in the shade of the tree in her front yard and started to walk over and sit under the big tree in front of the church. As I started to walk thru the gate I heard a familiar voice and turned to see Mrs. George calling out to me. She asked me where I was going and when I explained she said to me…”why don’t you come on in here, eat your sandwich and cool down before you start my yard. You look like you need to get out of the sun a little while or you’re going to get burnt.” I hesitated at first, and then when she repeated her request I changed my mind and went into her house.

For some reason that day there seemed to be something different about her house as I walked in. I had been the paperboy for our small little town for several years and had been inside her house many times. During the winter she would always leave the door unlocked so I could bring the paper into her, just like I would with all my customers who allowed me to. But today…it seemed so different, from the arrangement of the living room, to the smell of her home. I looked around and hesitated, almost as if I was paralyzed because things had changed. I’m pretty sure that she sensed that I was a bit startled; as I’m sure the look on my face told the story. She looked back and said “come on in here to the kitchen table and I’ll fix you a glass of lemonade and some Ritz crackers to go along with that sandwich you have there.”

I walked thru the living room and into her kitchen, looking around at how some things had changed and how clean and neat everything was. Not that her home wasn’t that way normally, but for some reason today everything seemed a bit polished and new. As I sat at her table and took my sandwich out of the baggie she said…

“So you noticed I’ve been doing a little cleaning and re-arranging today Mark?”

“Yes Ma’am”, I answered.

She said... “Well it seemed like a good day to clean, and since it was so hot outside that made it even a better reason”. As she walked over with a plate of Ritz crackers covered with peanut butter and a glass of lemonade I spotted a box in the corner of the room. Inside were some items I had recognized that had filled her cabinets and shelves before.

Being ever the inquisitive young man I asked, “whatcha gonna do with all those things?”

She replied… “I’m going to put those up in storage with all my other memories”

“But won’t you forget about them if you put them in storage?” I asked.

“Oh, I won’t forget about them” she replied. “I just think it’s time to put those in with the other great memories I’ve kept and let them talk to each other. Right now about all they are doing is getting dusty on my shelves and I don’t seem to have the time or strength to clean them as well as I should”

I was completely puzzled by what she had just said, and once again I was pretty sure my face belied my state because she had a bit of a smile on her face. She walked over and grabbed a small memento from the box and walked back over. It was a small piece of wood that had a picture of Mount Rushmore on the front that had been lacquered over. To a teenager it would just have seemed like another of those useless items that adults picked up while on vacation that we could never figure out. We wouldn’t have touched one, much less spent our money on it. But to her…it held memories and not just of Mount Rushmore.

For the next few minutes she would regale me of the memories of that trip. And while she talked about all the little details that were coming back to her, I could see a small glimmer in her eye. It was like she was transported back some 20 or 30 years before and I was being offered the honor of sitting in the back seat of her memory as she relived it with a smile. After she finished that memory she walked back over to the box and picked up yet another item and imparted the memories that it brought to her.

For the next hour I sat there completely engaged in her stories as she took each item out and told me the significance of it and what memory returned. Some of her memories were a bit wistful but most were accompanied by a smile and a look in her eye that told me they were precious.

The bell of the clock brought me back to reality as it chimed 3 times and reminded me that it was now 3PM and that I needed to finish her lawn quickly so I could get back home so that I could start my paper route when the papers arrived at 4 PM. As I excused myself and took my plate to the sink I told her I needed to hurry and finish her lawn so I could make sure and get my paper route started on time. She said….”It’s not going to hurt my lawn to wait one more day. Why don’t you come back here tomorrow morning and mow then? I know all you boys like to go swimming over there on the creek bank about this time each day.”

I smiled and thanked her….and headed off home to grab my shorts hoping to catch about 20 or 30 minutes of swimming. But when I arrived home I was a bit surprised to find that the papers had actually arrived a little early. I was a little disappointed but knew that my obligations to my customers came first so I sat down to fold the papers and put rubber bands around them.

Oddly enough as I delivered my papers to each of my customers I couldn’t seem to get my mind off the conversation I had earlier in the day while sitting with Mrs. George. I was thinking about the memories I already had in growing up in Mosby and would I look back as fondly as she did on her memories. I was pretty sure at that age I wanted to escape this small town and never look back and that the only good memories would be the ones that I would make once I escaped.

Little did I know how wrong I would be…..