It has been hard to write about Brenda since I lost her. Our growing up years were so good with neither of us having a care in the world. We walked to the stores in the area, Parks, Snows, and Keys with bare legs and usually bare feet. Girls didn't wear pants.
If we had a few cents, maybe even a nickel, we would sit on the porch at Keys and pour peanuts in our Coke. I didn't much like the taste of the salty peanuts messing up my coke but I wanted to be like everyone else. Often we only had enough money that one of us would buy the Coke and the other one would buy the peanuts. The Keys had built a bench of sorts on the porch. The store was high off the ground but I don't remember anyone falling off except me. Of course I wasn't the only one I suspect.
People who were not familiar with us thought we were about to kill one another all the time. We did a lot of good natured brawling which is the only word I can come up with for what we did.
But before we were old enough to walk all over the place our days were spent right there in Denning where we were raised. I lived at the end of a road where a fence and a few yards of dirt separated us from the RR track. Brenda lived down a lane or across the pasture from me. If a car came down the road we knew it was coming to one of our places. As I look across the pasture of my home now I can see a big beautiful tree that reminds me of that big old persimmon tree at the end of the lane. We sat in that tree and planned our days lots of mornings. We ate, or should I say bit in to, our first and last green persimmon there and then tricked our Brother's into the same.
Down the track a ways was a place we called The Culvert. It was under the tracks. A big culvert that we walked through and played inside. Water spilled through when it rained and formed a pool that we played in. At the time I never even thought about the trains roaring by over our heads. My Goodness it sure wouldn't appeal to me now. The pool was deep on the back end. At least it was deep for a bunch of kids. Paul pushed me in once and one of the bigger boys got me out. I remember Travis getting a leech stuck on his leg and needing to go to the Doctor to take it off. I also was told that Brenda and I slipped away from Auntie and went through the back pasture to the Culvert. When she found us Brenda was saying 'petty wata' and I was splashing around at the bank. I couldn't even talk yet, we were that young.
Across the tracks and up on the next corner was the little Methodist Church where we grew up. I met Jesus and invited him in to my heart there when I was ten years old. I will never forget that day. Also up there was the Post Office and Keys store.
We played in the nasty smelly toilet, of all places. That was a place of privacy for us. As I look back I am totally amazed that one or both of us didn't fall in. I dropped my penny in one day and Daddy took a shovel and dipped it out for me. A penny would buy lots of candy then. I washed it good and made sure I protected it after almost losing it.
We waded the ditches, crawled under the house, made mud pies,climbed trees when no one was looking,built forts, and made our own fun with plain old kid know how
Denning was my hometown and until I started school in 1950 it was our safe haven. I found out quickly that you can only go home in your memories. A tornado took away so many of my childhood hang out's. A whole hunk of my childhood ripped away in the matter of a few minutes. If not for my wonderful memories it would all have floated away in the wind. Writing it down helps me remember. I am thankful for my raising in that wonderful place. We should not be ashamed of our hometowns. That was what made you who you are.
Isaiah 40:28
Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.