THE HORSE AND THE HILLBILLY
Not all Guardians of the Road stories that happened to me are humorous. Many have been very sad, indeed. At the time, I took each of them to heart, for I am a HOSP. I warn you, though, this one is not funny.
During my teen years, young people rarely had their own cars. When I was a seventeen-year-old senior in high school, my parents let me drive their old blue station wagon to school, about fifteen miles from my home. I was not as careful a driver as I should have been, but I did my best, thrilled to have the freedom to not ride on the dreaded school bus anymore.
It was the spring of my last year in high school, and I drove the station wagon to school almost every day. At the time, the two-lane road that made its way to Winfield was through a rural, sparsely developed, and sometimes rough countryside. I started noticing a horse standing in a fenced-in pasture along the road. Each day he looked worse, and I saw no water trough or hay nearby. After two days of this, the horse began to hold up one of his forelegs, and his body language was that of an ill animal. I really started to worry about that horse, and as an emerging adult Guardian of the Road, I felt compelled to try to help him if I could.
On Friday of that week, I was on my way to school and saw that the horse, whom I’d named Sad Eyes, was prone on the ground. Now horses lie prone sometimes, but not like this horse did. I turned the wagon around and drove back to the ramshackle house next to the pasture. Not really knowing the bad side of people at this point in my young HOSP life, my mission was to check on the horse and see if the owner knew Sad Eyes was ill. After several summers caring for them at Camp Carlisle, I’d had a good deal of experience with horses at this point, so I knew I was correct in my evaluation of his condition. Once I got to the house, I could see the horse better. I won’t describe him to you, but it was one of the worst animal cruelty examples I had seen. An older man greeted me at the door. His hair was unkempt, his clothes were dirty, and he smelled of cigarettes and alcohol.
I carefully told him about my concern over his horse, but he was immediately furious that I had interfered in a private matter. Unaware of his attitude, I kept at it. I tried to get some sort of commitment that the man would look after the horse and get him the attention he needed. The man got angrier by the minute and finally started shaking his fist at me in a threatening way. He demanded that I mind my own business and leave.
I did leave, but I didn’t mind my own business. Instead of going to school, I went to the County Sheriff’s Office and reported what I believed was animal cruelty. The sheriff told me that he couldn’t do anything to intervene on private property. He also said I should be in school, and that if I didn’t return, he’d call the principal. Remember, this was long ago, and sensibilities have changed dramatically regarding this issue.
I was upset, and don’t forget that HOSP are sometimes stubborn. In the courthouse was a sign that read, County Agriculture Agent. It occurred to me that this was an excellent second choice to solve the problem, so I sat in this man’s office for a time, waiting to tell him my story.
Thank goodness, the young agent seemed to be at least a PWAOS, if not a HOSP, and I am hoping he would now be an old Guardian of the Road. He took my tale seriously but said I would have to make a formal complaint. No problem, I told him, and I completed a form describing the condition of the horse and my experience with his owner. The agent said that he would need me to go with him to the man’s house to make sure he knew exactly where this sick horse was stabled. I drove the station wagon in front of his county vehicle and returned to the scene of what I believed was a crime.
Now, if the man was mad at me the first time, can you imagine his mental state when I reappeared with the County Agent by my side? The man was angry and held a shotgun in front of the door. I immediately wondered what he would’ve done if I had been alone.
The end of the story is not a happy one. Because the horse had become so ill, the agent had to have Sad Eyes put down by a local veterinarian. Thank goodness I did not have to watch it since he told me to go on home before the vet arrived. The vision of that poor animal suffering is so embedded in my memory that I could not talk about it for a long while. I was also afraid I would get in trouble at school and with my parents. To this day, I am proud of what I did, but also sorry the animal lost his life. Maybe if I had tried to help him sooner, he would’ve lived, but probably not. I vowed that, if I could help it, that would never happen again on my watch.
However, Sad Eyes would not suffer anymore, and this is the most critical task for all Guardians of the Road. GOTR can’t look aside at animal cruelty. Because of our firm and unwavering sense of right and wrong when it comes to the well-being of animals, we have to do the right thing. We also must do everything in our power to intervene in such atrocities, even if this means the creature might lose its life, God forbid, and we might get in trouble for telling.
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BECOMING AN ADULT GUARDIAN OF THE ROAD
When I was a young HOSP, I’d never heard or read stories about animals who had suffered intentionally at the hands of man. I believe during that period, editors, broadcasters, and publishers were much more sensitive about printing or showing such reprehensible acts. It seems to me that children must have a difficult time avoiding them in this new era since similar stories are presented in every form of media imaginable. I can’t fathom what it is like to be a child or a parent of one now.
One final point: Almost everyone hates seeing any living thing suffer, especially human beings. However, to learn that an animal or a child has suffered in such a despicable way turns our stomachs and wounds our souls, regardless of sensitivity levels. I will never understand a human that could do such things. There is something very wrong with them. Never forget-- Someone who cruelly and deliberately hurts an innocent animal might also be a person who could hurt a child. There is a good deal of research to back up my thesis.
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COLLEGE AND AL
Not long after the hillbilly incident, I was accepted at several in-state and out-of-state colleges, but chose Ohio University in Athens as the place where I wanted to attend. I was 17 and excited about the freedom living away from home might bring, especially the chance to study at OU’s excellent and highly competitive art school.
I had been the editor of my high school’s newspaper, had an A- average, and ranked twelve in a class of fifty-seven students, which is no big deal. However, I was no longer the pathetic victim. I had turned into quite the social butterfly on weekends, where I sometimes sang in a not-so-great local band. Even so, I was not much more than a kid in slightly better clothes, although most were hand-me-downs from my 5’6” cousin in Virginia.
Once in college, I might have seemed like a young adult, but I was still naive about all sorts of things, including, unbelievably, the facts of life. I’d had two boyfriends, not including Harry, during my last two years living in Teays Valley, but they were little more than post-childhood crushes and opportunities that allowed me a social life outside of my home. In the Valley, there were absolutely no places where teenagers could hang out then. I had never been on a date with a boy where we watched a movie in a real theatre. I had never been out to eat with one either unless you count the Shoney’s Big Boy in St. Albans with my brother Rob as qualifying. I had also never had a beer or a drink that included alcohol. I had smoked some cigarettes because many of my friends thought it looked cool, which I later learned was a big fat lie.
My mother, who attended a secretarial school before the war, encouraged me to pledge to a sorority at O.U. I think it was because she wanted to live vicariously through my college experiences that she urged me to join. I dutifully attended the open pledge sessions during the Fall Semester. I had to wear in-style clothes, have my hair fixed just so, not be clumsy and trip over my feet, and speak in the affected accents of the rich girls I’d met in my dorm. To say that I was out of place was laughable, and I despised the ordeal. I quickly bowed out but told my mother none of the sororities had selected me. The Jewish sorority wanted me to pledge, but I turned them down as politely as possible. I preferred to spend my time painting in the Art Department near my dorm. Nevertheless, my mother seemed to take it all very hard.
I met a nice-looking blond guy in my speech class, who asked me to go with him to a movie on Friday, the next evening. I agreed since I’d never done that before, either. Then, later that same evening, I went to a college bar in town that was hosting what they called a ‘tea,’ an excuse to bring college students together in a friendly setting. A boy’s dorm was sponsoring the tea and had invited girls from my dorm to Jim’s 42, a local hangout in the center of Athens. I had never been to a college bar, so I went hoping to meet people. I walked in, lit up a Salem cigarette, trying to look cool, and was going to order a soda when a cute guy walked up to me and asked if he could buy me one. He took me over to his table, where I sat down, then he left to get the beverage. I quickly put out the cigarette, feeling like it was not a good look, and sat at the table, awaiting my new companion.
He returned, placed the drink in front of me, then took a seat in the chair to my right. He said his name was Al, and he lived at the dorm that sponsored the tea. A sophomore majoring in pre-law, Al was also pursuing a second major in history. I introduced myself, gave him the basic stats, and we sat talking for at least an hour. Al was from Cleveland and had six brothers and sisters; his father was a car salesman, and his mother worked at a pizza restaurant. He’d gotten a scholarship to OU based on his ACT/SAT test scores and super grades in high school, plus another small scholarship if he joined the Army’s ROTC program on campus, which he had done the year before as a Freshman. He had dark brown hair, blue eyes, and full lips.
Al walked me back to my dorm, which was a hike. Along the way, he asked me for a date the next evening, which was Friday. He said his plan was to take me to Frisches, a sandwich joint not unlike my beloved Shoney’s in St. Albans; then, we could walk the town and get to know each other. I explained my dilemma: I’d already made a date with the speech kid that I could not break. I wondered if we could go out on Saturday evening instead. He quickly agreed, and the date was set.
Friday night, the speech kid picked me up at my dorm, and we walked downtown to the only movie theatre in Athens. I cannot remember the movie's title, but it might have been Ben Hur. I hardly watched it for more than a few minutes because the speech kid used both hands to feel my breasts, etc. I kept shoving his hands away, but he was persistent. After thirty minutes of this, I stood up, said goodbye, and walked home in a tiff. What had I done or said that would give that kid the impression that I wanted him to squeeze my boobs or slip his hand up my skirt? It was a bad first date. Actually, it was a bad last date too. From that point on, I called him Thousand Hands but never saw him again.
On Saturday, Al called up to me using the dorm phone, and soon we were walking to Frisches on Union Street. I ordered a Slim Jim sandwich with french fries and a Coke. Al ordered a grilled cheese sandwich, and we ended up sharing the drink. If I had known how little money he had, I would not have ordered so much, but I did not know that for a while longer. He was and is a serious person, seemed honest and sweet, and said he’d had only two dates as a freshman and wanted that to change during his sophomore year. We laughed, talked non-stop, and then left to walk around the town, a common practice among students in Athens.
I learned that Al was in a work-study program, assigned to the cafeteria near his dorm. His job was to place food on the serving counters during breakfast, lunch, or dinner and then clean up once mealtime had ended. He received a free meal card that saved him a relative fortune as compensation for his work. His parents had enough on their hands with six children still at home, so he received no financial help at all from them because they did not have it to give him. He was the first person in his Hungarian family to finish high school and the first person to attend college. His family was incredibly proud of his accomplishments thus far. His grandparents were first-generation Hungarians and still spoke the language, although rarely in public. Most of his father’s many brothers and sisters worked at the same factory in downtown Cleveland.
I told him about my engineer father, stay-at-home mother, brothers, and sisters, and where we lived in West Virginia. I did not go into my past with him since I didn’t have one to brag about. Nothing noteworthy had happened to me that would impress anyone, so I just left it all unreported. We clicked immediately in all ways. From that first date forward, I never went out with anyone else, either at college or back home. It was love at first sight, and we were inseparable during my freshman and sophomore years. One thing I can say is Al was nothing at all like Peter, for which I was glad.
Al asked me to marry him before the end of my sophomore year, and I accepted. Financially, it was becoming difficult for him to stay in school. If I quit for a while and worked full time, he’d be able to finish his degree. So that is what we decided to do. He’d met my family at OU a few times, and in the early part of that summer, we planned a September wedding in my St. Albans’ church.
It was a low-key wedding, no fancy dinner or party, just a ...have a great life... send-off at the church. There was almost no money between us other than some checks we’d received as wedding gifts and a little that Al had earned during the summer. We had a one-day honeymoon, stopping in Lancaster, Ohio, at a motel for the night, then we headed for our home in Athens. Before the wedding, I’d accepted a full-time position at the Ohio University library. That way, Al would be able to finish school, and I’d be able to pay our expenses, plus we’d have health insurance, a necessity. We’d have just enough money to live on if we were frugal. My parents bought us a used 8’ by 35’ trailer home for a wedding present and had it hauled to a trailer park on the west side of Athens. We felt we’d be okay financially with no money going toward rent.
Al’s car salesman's father gave us a red ‘60s Buick Special for a wedding present. It was older, but it ran fine. As we were racing away from the church after our wedding, friends, and family followed us, honking and screaming out their car windows. Not far from the church and caught up in the excitement, Al accidentally drove the Buick too fast over some railroad tracks. We heard a nasty crack when we bounced down on the other side. Neither of us knew much about cars, so we ignored the new sounds the Buick was making and left town. Once we pulled up to our honeymoon motel in Lancaster, Al got out and looked under the car. He decided it was the universal joint and that we were now in a pickle. We had no money to fix it.
The Buick sat unused for months on a cement slab beside our trailer. Instead, we took the city bus that just happened to pass right in front of our home several times a day. Al took the bus to his classes on campus, and I used it to get to work. After about three months on the job at the library, their budget was cut, and so was I. The last hired, first fired policy meant I was suddenly out of a job, and we were in more than just a pickle; we had almost no money left and very little food. Every couple of weeks, my parents would drive the nearly three-hour trip from West Virginia to Athens with groceries we used for our food. Dad also would give us a check, for which we were grateful; it covered our bus fare and some necessities. I was devastated and embarrassed.
I applied for almost every job available at the university, even in which I had no experience, just hoping I’d get something. I had never worked before, except as a waitress at a truck stop near my home, and only for the month before our wedding. I had no secretarial experience, but during high school, my mother insisted that I take typing classes, which I did. I was a whiz at typing, and much later, I’d type Al’s master’s thesis and then his doctoral dissertation. It was a very stressful time for newlyweds who had never lived together before, didn’t really know that much about each other, and had reached the end of a proverbial rope. The tension between us was palpable, but the love was still there, and I believe that is what got us through this challenging period in our first couple of years together. If it were not for my parents, I am sure we’d have been on food stamps and maybe even welfare.
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MISTAKEN IDENTITY
As a newlywed, there were only four things I could cook reasonably well: spaghetti, hamburgers, hot dogs, and tuna dinner. Tuna dinner is made with two cans of tuna, two cans of cream of chicken soup, two cups of milk, and boiled egg noodles. I would stir the tuna, milk, and soup together in a pan over medium heat until the mixture came to a boil. Using a casserole dish, I’d start with the tuna mixture at the bottom, layer the noodles over it, and repeat that sequence until ending with the tuna on top; then, I’d bake it for 45 minutes. Al really loved it, but if I put crushed potato chips on top, he was over the moon.
By this time, we’d rescued a stray kitten we named Alice. We found her crying under our trailer one evening. I’d never had a cat because my mother and father did not like them at all. Our trailer home was tiny. When you opened the front door into the small living room, you could see the kitchen, den, bathroom, and bedroom straight down the hall. It was such a small space that little Alice seemed like the perfect pet for us. However, since he was a child, my husband disliked cats. His Hungarian grandmother kept dozens of cats in her basement. When they visited, Al and his brother were told to clean up the cat poop all over the basement floor. So, he had a reason not to like them, I guess. He did not take to Alice either. Yet a delicate peace reigned when the two of them shared the space. We had no place for the kitty litter box except in the bathroom next to the toilet, and one can imagine the conflicts over that issue. In time and after decades, Al came to like cats, and we have had many of them through the years, all precious in their own ways.
I interviewed for an entry-level secretarial position in O.U.’s physics department and actually got it. Good thing the chairman of the department didn’t ask me what my grades were in the physics classes I took in high school (C+). I started immediately, was never late, never missed work unnecessarily, never took a vacation, and thrived in the position. From that first real job, I never took for granted any position I’ve ever had, knowing the job could disappear at the stroke of a pen. The physics professors were all men, and they seemed to like me from day one, perhaps because I was a hard worker and a good typist. The only problem I had was the university held back my first check for two weeks, and Al and I were down to three days with one supper left: Tuna Dinner.
Being on the short side, I always had to use a chair to reach the cupboard where I stored the canned goods. I did not get the chair this time because the ingredients were right at the edge, and there was almost nothing left in the cupboard. I took down the four remaining cans and the noodles to make our last supper before my first check would arrive in two more days. The tuna cans had lost their wrappers, but I began to make the casserole. It was the prettiest and pure white tuna I have ever seen. As it baked, I suddenly remembered that I did not have any tuna left. This time, I got the chair and searched the cupboard until I found the wrappers. Cat tuna, that’s right, I had made the tuna dinner with cat food. Not long before this, I had seen a story on television that claimed cat tuna (at that time) included all kinds of awful things mixed together. According to the story, cat tuna contained bones of other fish, old tuna that was not safe enough for people to eat, and leftover ‘things’ from the sea. My heart sank, and I was sick to my stomach.
I looked over at my husband, who was waiting patiently for supper. While I sat at the table mortified, I watched through the glass in the oven door as the casserole baked. An honest person would have told him it was cat food, but it was all we had. I looked on as Al ate it, and my stomach turned again; there was no way I was going to eat cat food, and there was no way I could tell him what he was actually eating. After he finished, Al declared that it was the best tuna dinner I had ever made. I waited years to tell him the truth, but I have never had tuna dinner again. He still loves it, and I still serve it... but fix me scrambled eggs instead.
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THE GIFT
Next to us in the trailer park lived another newlywed couple. They were both Italians, students like us, and I often smelled the scent of pasta sauce through the small kitchen window in their trailer. The following day, I relayed the cat food story to the husband because it was funny after the fact. That evening, this dear man brought us a gift because he felt terrible we had nothing to eat except left-over cat tuna dinner. At our trailer door, he proudly handed me a clear plastic bag with a twist tie around the top. Inside were two squirrels that he had shot the day before, sitting side by side. They were dead, of course, and frozen rock solid. While he was telling me how to prepare squirrel stew for supper, I could not look at the frozen creatures in the bag.
Again I wanted to be sick. However, this man had been so kind and considerate that I thanked him profusely and put the frozen squirrels in my freezer. I saw these two critters looking back at me whenever I opened the freezer door. They’d been skinned but were sitting upright in the bag, naked as jaybirds, arms bent, and paws together. To me, they resembled pets without hair. And even though they were in the freezer, the squirrels appeared alive and begging for peanuts; only their heads were... missing.
Because I could not throw them away, the two squirrels sat in the freezer for a time. It seemed to me like their lives had been lost without a purpose. If I tossed them out like trash, I reasoned, the fact that they’d lost their lives for nothing would be my fault. When asked by my husband whether I was going to get rid of them, the above reason would always be my answer. I could not cook them, hated opening the freezer door, and rarely did. Finally, one day, Al must have taken charge and disposed of the bodies because they disappeared.
Another trait of highly sensitive people who are Guardians of the Road: We can’t eat dead things that look like pets.
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THE HUNT FOR GOOD SPOONBREAD
Since riding the city bus was an everyday activity for both of us, we got to know the driver, Vernon. Tall and thin, Vernon was about twenty-five and what some might call a hillbilly. I grew up knowing many people like Vernon, and they were good folks. Al and I really liked him, and we all became good friends. He lived up in the hollers way out of Athens with his 18-year-old second wife, Jan. Vernon took a fancy to the Buick sitting beside our trailer. He offered us what we thought was a real bargain. Vernon said he’d trade us a rebuilt TR-2 (a red sports car) for our Buick with a busted U-Joint, and, most likely other problems. He invited us to come out to his house. First, we could trade cars, and second, Jan could serve us her famous navy bean soup and spoonbread. He also mentioned that we all might go on a coon hunt with his good friend Dave.
I objected immediately but with care, explaining that Al and I were not hunters and that I had a huge problem killing just about anything. Vernon assured us that no animal would be killed on the hunt; it was just an excuse to drink a lot of beer and then go back to his house and have bean soup and spoonbread. Al thought it sounded like a hoot, and I was not so sure, but went along for the ride, so to speak. I did like beer in those days, so that was an incentive. As you know, I was a country girl who had camped most of my life, but Al was a city boy who had never seen a raccoon in person, much less hunted one. It sounded like great fun, so we went on our first outdoor adventure together.
Vernon’s home was like ours, a trailer, but it was so far out of Athens he had to give us a detailed map. The Buick ran fine but was noisy, and we feared it might not make it to our destination. We got lost twice, which was not a good sign. I did learn something about my new husband that day; he sometimes has difficulty with directions and gets mad when he gets lost. The sports car looked sweet, it started right away, and we were quite pleased with the trade...at the time. Vernon’s wife, Jan, was a shy little thing and expecting a baby... very soon. Jan decided, wisely, not to go with us coon hunting. She promised to have a hearty supper ready when we returned.
Vernon had a hound dog he called Old Jim and a hillbilly friend named Dave. The four of us and the dog climbed in one of Vernon’s old junkers. The two men had shotguns, but we didn’t notice that until later. Vernon was at the wheel, and his friend was in the front passenger seat. Al was in the back seat behind the driver; I was on the other side with Old Jim sitting between us. It seemed to us that Vernon drove for a long while; we crossed dirt roads that passed over streams, rocks, and logs. But with beer being passed back and forth, we didn’t mind at all. The two men in front laughed up a storm, probably because they were taking two city-slickers on a joy ride into the wilderness. Old Jim started howling out of the blue and then wouldn’t stop. Vernon turned to look at the dog. Unfortunately, he also turned the wheel, and we slid off the road. The two wheels on the driver’s side were on the ground, but the two wheels on the passenger side were spinning in thin air. I was sitting on that side and looked out my window. I quickly realized we were perched on the edge of a steep ravine. That’s when I got worried because if anything moved... the car would surely tip over and tumble down that hill.
Vernon and Dave didn’t look worried at all and scooted out of the car. At the last minute, Dave grabbed a sack full of beer that was on the front seat and tossed it on the ground. Vernon reached in and took out two shotguns mounted above the dashboard. Al and Old Jim had no trouble and soon stood beside the two men. The car began to shift, so Vernon reached into the back seat, grabbed my arm, and yanked me out. That’s when the car slid down the ravine. Vernon said not to worry; he had an old tow truck and could pull it out in the morning.
All wasn’t lost because Old Jim suddenly went on point, perhaps having scented the coon. He took off howling, with Vernon and Dave running after him, the sack of beer slung awkwardly over Dave’s shoulder. Al stayed with me, and we tried to keep up, but soon we were lost in the wilds of Hocking County. Once in a while, we heard Old Jim howl and the sound of a gunshot, but we were over our heads and gave up the search. The coon hunt reminded me of the Snipe hunt I went on at Camp Cliffside, a hoax played on gullible kids. Al is a great guy but admitted he was lost, so being a country girl, I led the way out. Somehow we found the road to Vernon’s house and hiked back.
Jan met us at the door, and once inside, we were quite surprised to see Vernon, Dave, and Old Jim. They did not tree a coon, Vernon admitted with a chuckle, and probably never will. The two grinning men were eating spoonbread and navy bean soup. Even Old Jim had some in a bowl on the floor. Although he’d never had spoonbread before, Al loved it, so I asked Jan for the recipe. She said her great-grandmother had made the same spoonbread in an old homestead near their property. Al didn’t get to see a coon that night, and we never went coon hunting again, but we did hunt down some darn good spoonbread, ate our share, and then some.
*
Three days later, while driving the TR-2 down a hill in Athens, we realized the sports car didn’t have brakes or the brakes were going south fast. I realized the only way I could stop the vehicle was to crash it into a stone wall at the bottom. Obviously we are still alive, but I think it could have been a miracle. The TR-2 was towed to a gas station and sat there for a few days. We could not afford to pay for the tow or the daily storage charge. Vernon kindly offered to pay for it all, and with no other choice, we agreed. He towed the TR-2 back to his property, and we never saw it again. We all stayed friends; nothing was lost there. But maybe Al and I learned a lesson, or maybe not.
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Loved it! Learned a lot