First Time Away from Home 1960

Grandpa and Grandma Oomodt were going to be leaving the farm. I was four years old. My brother and sisters, and lots of cousins had all had turns staying with Grandpa and Grandma on  Beaver Ridge. I loved that name, Beaver Ridge.  I wished our farm was on a ridge named after an animal.

A very steep little road went up the bluff to Grandpa and Grandma's farm. Looking out the car window, I could see the tops of the trees below us. Way down in the narrow ravine. I liked that. There were some good stories about that steep road.

One story was about my dad courting my mom. He backed his car all the way up that steep hill to see my mom! Why? Something about the gas had to be in just the right place inside the gas tank. Driving backward did the trick. That was a fairytale story.  Just think of it...the handsome prince in his shining armor... riding backward up the mountain to rescue the beautiful princess in the tower. 

Another story was about Grandpa. He skied up and down the steep hills to help his parents on their farm. Mom said Grandpa was really good on his wooden skis. I can imagine Grandpa as a rosy-cheeked young man with frosty wire-rim glasses. Probably doing loop-de-loops and taking jumps on his skis through the woods. Wish somebody would have taken pictures.

So, it was my turn to stay with Grandpa and Grandma. There was no time to waste because right around the corner, they'd be moving to town. They weren't going to move to Caledonee even though that's where they went for groceries and stuff. (Grandpa called the town "Caledonee" instead of "Caledonia." He was funny like that.) They were going to move to a house in Spring Grove where my grandma's parents used to live. And that would be the end of visits to Grandpa and Grandma's farm on Beaver Ridge.

"Do you think you can stay a whole week by yourself?" My mom asked me that. "You've never stayed away from home before." 

"Oh, yes," I nodded my four-year-old head. On Sunday I rode home from church with Grandpa and Grandma They had a brown and cream-colored car with big fenders. I had the backseat all to myself and it was clean, too. Like nobody ever used it. So different from riding in the back of our big blue station wagon. And looking over all those heads in front of me to see where we were going.

Grandpa drove pretty slowly and he was a slow talker, too. In his deep voice, he pointed things out to me on the way to Beaver Ridge, kind of like I was a grown-up, too. Sometimes I thought he might have been making things up, but I didn't mind. I liked listening to him talk. Once in a while, he said, "Ya, ya den."  I always wondered when he said that because he might not have been talking about anything at all at the time. He just said it out of the blue, "Ya, ya, den." Just like that. And then I guess he must have gotten ready to start thinking about something else.

When we got up on top of Beaver Ridge, it was kind of like being on top of the world. Spring Grove was over one way and Caledonee was another. Grandpa stopped the car at the end of the driveway into the farmyard and got out to unhook the barbed wire gate. That was when he told Grandma that she could just as well drive the car through the gate.

"Regina. You could yust put de car in Drive and give 'er a little gas and take her right through the gate." I could see right away how that made sense. That way he wouldn't have to get out of the car, open the gate, get back in and get out again to shut the gate and back in again.

But my Grandma didn't think much of that idea. She said, "Oh, MURDER MELVIN." Now, I don't know what she meant by that, exactly, but she sure liked to say "Oh Murder, Melvin." I think she said it when she thought Grandpa had teased her just about enough. She must a' said it at least twice each day. Her eyebrows would be knit together like she was mad at Grandpa, but I don't think she was. I think that's just what they did. Grandpa teased her. Then she said, "Oh Murder, Melvin." And then his eyes twinkled.

Yup, Grandpa's eyes grinned when Grandma said that to him. He grinned at me like it was our secret joke. I think that Grandpa and Grandma had had that very same conversation about moving the car through the gate into the farmyard many times before that day. Grandpa was good at teasing her, that was for sure.

After Grandpa parked the car, Grandma probably fed us Sunday dinner. I say "probably" because I really don't remember that part. I was too excited to be staying with them on their farm. I ran outside again as soon as we got home from church. There were lots of things to see and do, and like I said, I had Grandpa and Grandma all to myself for one whole week.

For one thing, Grandpa had a huge pond right below the house down in the pasture. I could see it from the yard. At home, I had to walk a little way to get to our pond. But Grandpa's was right there! That was a big plus in my book. I ran down there to check out the pond first thing. Grandma probably said, "Be careful now, down by dat pond. It's deep. Don't go in there."

I probably told her I wouldn't, but I might a' been fibbing. I believe that I did go in the pond, just a little anyway. Along the edge. But what I remember best about the pasture below the house was the tall thistles. The tallest thistles I had ever seen! When I walked back up the hill to the house, I measured myself next to those thistles. They were taller than me! And they had pretty purple flowers on 'em. The prettiest thistles I'd ever seen.

When I got back to the house, guess what I found there? One of my boy cousins was there. I don't think he was invited, because it was my week to stay with Grandpa and Grandma, but nobody else seemed to mind. And anyway, I could see that my aunt and uncle weren't planning on taking him home again with them.  They'd come all the way from Austin just to bring him.

My cousin was a lot older than me; almost the size of a grown-up. What was he doin' on Beaver Ridge, anyway, I wanted to know, but I couldn't ask like that. That wouldn't have been nice.  So I wasn't going to have Grandpa and Grandma all to myself for a week after all. That didn't seem right, but I had to make the best of it. Grandpa and Grandma loved ALL of their grandkids very very much. They didn't have favorites. At least, none that I knew about. But it did seem to me like those Austin cousins got to visit Grandpa and Grandma more often than us farm cousins.

Why had my cousin come? What was all the fuss? Well, then I found out. It was FISHING! It was all about the fishing. In Beaver Creek. My boy cousins in Austin were just crazy about fishing. Their mom even said so. Those Austin cousins would fish morning, noon, and night if they could. And I think they did, too.

The best thing about fishing was that my cousin took me along with him. We walked to Beaver Creek. And since I'd never fished before, he very carefully showed me how everything was done. My job was to say, "Oh, I see," and "Yup, okay," and "I'm being quiet now." He seemed to like my encouragement. Plus I got to see something really exciting when we were in Beaver Creek. It wasn't a fish.

The exciting thing was a giant snapping turtle! My cousin put a big stick by the turtle's mouth and he snapped at it and didn't let go. I had seen different kinds of turtles before but nothing like that giant snapping turtle. If he'd have been friendlier, I'd have ridden on his back. But he wasn't being very nice, so I didn't. He was a very serious turtle.  It turned out that my cousin knew lots of interesting things about animals and he said that snapping turtles could live to be a hundred years old! I'll bet that's about how old that crabby turtle was. 

One day Grandpa helped me to climb up onto his big red tractor with him and he sat me down on the seat right in front of him. He drove the tractor out onto the gravel road and then, when we were going kind of fast, he let me drive! Maybe Grandpa helped me a little bit with the steering. And my feet didn't reach the pedals. But still! Grandpa laughed and laughed at my little hands vibrating on that steering wheel. In fact, I was vibrating everywhere. Grandpa said I was a pretty good tractor driver. He told Grandma at supper.

That night it rained hard. I slept up in the loft and my cousin did too, so I wasn't exactly alone up there when the rain was pounding on the roof. But it wasn't like being at home. I missed sleeping on my sister's arm. I lay in the bed and watched for things that might move in the dark. There wasn't much to see, but I had a good imagination.

The next morning, I followed Grandpa to the barn after breakfast. Good thing I had my red boots along with me because the barnyard was really muddy. Not to mention the cowpies. I had my little white purse with me, too. I got the idea to walk to the lower side of the barnyard and once that idea was there, I had to do it.  I carried my little white purse with me, swinging it on my arm. I took one big step after another.

When I got to the lower side of the barnyard, I turned around to go back to the barn, but one of my boots didn't want to go any further. It stayed right there, sucked into the mud. So suddenly I had one bare foot up in the air and one foot in a boot that wasn't going anywhere with me. A person might a' said that I'd had gotten myself into a pickle. But Grandpa came to get me. He picked me up and carried me out of the barnyard. No problem. My boots stayed behind in the mud. I giggled at being rescued from my pickle and I swung my little white purse around and around until it flew out of my hand and landed. Plop. Right in the mud.

Here's the kind of man my Grandpa was. He chuckled just a little and he said, "Oh, no. I'll have to pick up dat purse, too now." And he did. He carried me all the way to the house, where Grandma cleaned me up at the outside pump. 

Guess what Grandma said. "Oh MURDER, Melvin." And that's all there was to that.

I'm not sure when, but sometime later I got a funny feeling in my tummy. It might have started while I was thinking about my own bed at home. I thought about how my sisters probably missed me a lot. They'd never had me go away and leave them before. They'd probably be talking to each other in the dark that night; probably wondering what I was doing at Grandpa and Grandma's. Probably counting the days until I'd come back.

After milking was done that night, my mom came to Beaver Ridge to get me. She said to me, "Ya, I kinda wondered if you would be able to stay a whole week, Ardy. Your first time away from home and all." But she wasn't mad.

It's hard to explain things to grown-ups sometimes so I just shrugged. I'd had my turn at Grandpa and Grandma's on Beaver Ridge. And I stayed away from my own bed exactly as long as I wanted to. And no more.