Author Archives: oncealittlegirl

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The Wet Pants and the Diaper

Untitled clippingI was born in charge.  That’s what Mom told me once after I was all grown up.

Maybe.

For sure, I can remember always being responsible for someone else.  I always, always, took care of the Little Kids, and even when it was just Bonita and me, I was in charge, and I made sure she was safe and I took care of her.  Even though she was only one and a half years younger than me, somehow she never seemed to catch up to me in responsibility.  I rescued her from the 4-H Fair when Black-Eyes dragged her in the dirt.

I took care of other people’s kids from the time I was 10 years old.  I got paid for it too, which was proof-positive I was responsible and in charge.  Once I overheard Mrs. B say to Mom, “Look how she plays with the kids.  She hasn’t forgotten what it’s like to be a kid herself. “

I loved taking care of kids, and I vowed I would never, ever forget what it was like to be a child.  How could I?

Of course, I made a lot of mistakes.  I was really a kid myself.  Still learning.  Still sorta inside myself, and full of myself, and looking at the world from one perspective: mine.

My Pal, Frankie, the Little Kid I was most responsible for, remembers some of my mistakes.  The biggest one:  The Wet Pants and the Diaper. Continue reading →

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Stuck in the Mud Santa

This Christmas season, I am rushing around to get everything done.  What I couldn’t shop local or make, Amazon delivered.  The Prime membership is well worth the price, for Christmas assurance alone.  That said, my best-friend-down-under, Sharni at Sharnanigans and a late-in-the-season snowstorm brought back a Christmas that mortified Mom, and planted a wonderful memory for me.

For my loyal readers, yes, this is a repeat story.  But wait, isn’t that true of all the best Christmas stories?

Just like any little girl, I could hardly wait for Christmas.  I studied the Sears & Roebuck and Montgomery Wards catalogs daily and made up my list for Santa.  The things I wanted could fill Santa’s sleigh up all by itself, so I knew only some of the gifts I asked for would arrive.   I marked a star by the most important ones:  A cowboy hat and a derringer just like Bat Masterson’s on Have Gun Will Travel.

I prayed for snow, ’cause how was Santa going to get to my house without snow?  The grey clouds only spilled down raindrops and the heavy frost in the morning would never do.  I knew, ’cause when I took my sled out on the frost, Mom yelled at me, “That’s going to dull the blades.  Take your sled back in the garage.”  I dragged my sled back over the grass and down the little sidewalk to the garage.

“Good Lord, that sets my teeth on edge,” Mom said covering up her ears.  How could a sound hurt her teeth? I thought, Guess that’s what happens when you get old.

I was probably selfish praying for snow, ’cause I just wanted Santa to come.  Anyways, it didn’t snow; it just got warmer, until not even frost was on the ground.  Mud was everywhere.

“When I was a little girl, Grandpa told me Santa came to houses alphabetically, and our house was last because our last name was Zyber,” Mom told me.  “That’s why some years there were just a couple of toys left in Santa’s bag.”

Holy Makerel!  At least my last name started with C.  There I was being selfish again.  All that selfishness might land me on the naughty list.

In bed at night, I heard Mom’s sewing machine whirring away like mad.  In the morning, everything was closed up tight, the sewing machine tucked down into the cabinet and not a thread in sight.  Hmm… that was super-strange.

Christmas Eve, Deanna, Bonita, and I got the biggest knee-high stocking we could find out of the odd-sock bag and hung them over a chair.  Santa came in the keyhole at our house, ’cause we didn’t have a fireplace and the chimney landed Santa in the furnace with no way out.  Mom wanted a fireplace like nobody’s business, ’cause she said our house was the draftiest thing she ever lived in and when she died she was gonna be cremated ’cause then, at last, she would be warm.

Just like always, I got down on my knees and said my prayers out loud so Mom could check me.   I was memorizing the Our Father ’cause I had to know that for First Confession along with all my sins;  Our Fathers got assigned for penance after Confession scrubbed my soul clean.  Catholics only said memorized prayers; we never made up prayers on our own, like they did over at my friend Betty’s house.

Up the stairs to bed, we went, ‘Slap the Bear’, just like always on the way up.  That’s where somebody yells “slap the bear, everybody included,” and starts slapping the hind-end of the person in front of her.  Only the first person in line had a slim chance of getting away, and of course, the last person who had nobody to slap at.  Mom probably invented that game to get us up the stairs faster than blue-blazes.

We brushed our teeth, and climbed into bed.  It was Bonita’s turn to sleep on the cot, so I cuddled up tight to Deanna to keep warm.  “Get your hair out of my face,” she said.  She hated my hair, so she drew a line down the middle of the bed with her hand, and told me to stay on my side.

“We forgot the cookies and milk,” Bonita sprung up like a jack-in-the-box, looked out the window, just in case Santa was out there on the lawn, like in that poem. Continue reading →

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Manger Stories

 Lucky for Mom, she has so many kids to get all the work done.  We had a regular chore rotation: Wash dishes, dry dishes, set and clear the table and sweep the floor, and do barn chores.  We could trade with each other; Deanna always traded out of doing barn chores.  She hated the barn.  Bonita and I would rather be outside anyways.

istockbarnEven in the freezing cold of winter.  Still and all, I felt sorry for Baby Jesus in the manger.  A mangers no place for a baby, that’s for darned sure.

For a long time, part of winter barn chores was cracking the ice Continue reading →

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Advent: Waiting and Hoping

iStock_000018275760MediumWhen I was a little girl, Advent was a solemn time.  A time to anticipate and remember.  A time of contemplation and of prayer.  What better time to turn inward and learn the value of delayed gratification, than the dark days of winter?  Advent was like another Lent, except the ending was the birth of a baby in a manger, not the pain and suffering of death.  Christmas and Advent was a time of hope and longing and waiting.  And Santa Claus. Continue reading →

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Mrs. Brown, Can’t Get Me Down

When I was a little girl it was important to be nice. Captain Kangaroo told me the magic words: “Abracadabra, Please and Thank you.” If I forgot, Mom or Dad reminded me, “Now what are the magic words?”

DSC00428In Kindergarten, I had a bunch of teachers, one at a time, most of the names I forgot, but I remember Mrs. Brown. She was mean.

Deanna had Mrs. Markley, she was just like a grandma, so nice. For some reason Mrs. Markley was out of school when I got to Kindergarten, I never figured out why; I thought maybe she died, ’cause teachers lived in the school, so if she wasn’t there, she must have died. But the next year, Mrs. Markley was back; all the rest of the kids in my family had Mrs. Markley. Maybe she just went on a long vacation the year I was in Kindergarten.

The new teacher, Mrs. Brown was not nice. She was nothing like a grandma.  Mrs. Brown was mean.

Mrs. Brown told me I had to drink white milk, no chocolate milk, even if that’s what Mom wrote down for me to order. “We don’t need to bother Mr. Rex with all these special orders.” Mrs. Brown told the class. Mr Rex always smiled when he delivered the milk. He was Continue reading →