Another Ancient memory!

Middy (Mildred) and I had the unique opportunity last Saturday to visit with a distant cousin we had never met before, and whose existence we had just learned of a few months ago. Her name is Beverly, and her great-grandmother, Sarah, was a sister of our grandfather (my father's father), James. After our meeting & conversation with her, we started talking about some things from our past - naturally, many of these came up during the conversation. The specific incident we were discussing once again involved me as a very small child, maybe as young as 2, and big brother Paul. Since Paul is our half-brother - from my mother's first husband - he is no relation to Beverly.

OK, this incident took place when Paul (perhaps as young as 11 then) built a little dam on the "run" that ran through our property, in order to fish (we never saw any fish of any size there). Once again, I personally remember very little, but Middy was there, and she remembered more of it. I remembered Paul scolding me for making too much noise, and scaring away the fish (Middy said I was stomping around!) I had always thought that Paul had deliberately "ducked" me, because he kept threatening to, because I was scaring all the fish away, but Middy says he accidentally knocked me in the water. He made her give me her panties, and made Laurie give me her dress, "because I was soaking wet, and I was little." The other piece that I remember was when I arrived at the house crying, and told my mother, "Mom, Paul drownded me!"

(Originally posted April 4, 2007)