<TITLE>11. Par 35-37</TITLE>L-35 And I remember we went up to the old blackboard. Did you ever go to country school? How many went to country school where they had eight grades...?... And I stood by the blackboard like this, to work the problem, you know. And I had that legging on that side, and I stood like this and worked sideways, like this. See everybody look at that one legging. All the kids got to laughing at me, and I got to crying; teacher made me go home. Ha-ha. Oh, it was a hard struggle back there.
I remember one day around Christmas, Mama popped some corn. That was really a rarity. We couldn't, brother and I couldn't take our lunch like other kiddies; their mothers would bake that old oven bread, and oh, my, it was dandy. But we... They had sandwiches, make sandwiches. Or what we had, we had a little molasses bucket about this high, and on one side would be a little jar full of greens, maybe the other side, a little jar full of beans, a piece of bread, of each sticking between it, and a spoon. We were ashamed to eat before the other children, because they could have sandwiches, and cakes, and cookies, and things. And we'd go over the hill from the school and set down there. And we set these little jars between us. And God bless his heart, he's in glory today. But we would set and eat one with another, like that.

L-36 And I remember Mama popped some corn to go on a Christmas tree. We'd get an old cedar tree and wrap popcorn around it. She had enough left, till she give us little bucket, little extra bucket full of popcorn. We took it to school that day. And I begin to wonder just how good that would taste about ten o'clock. So I raised up my hand, and the teacher asked me, and I said, "May I be excused?"
She said, "Yes."
And as I went out through the cloak room, I took the lid off and got a great big handful of that corn. I went out and stood back behind the old chimney, and I eat that popcorn, my, it was good. When--when it's dinner time, why, I knew he was going to miss that. So, we got over on the hillside and set down. We want to eat the popcorn first, you know how kids would be. So we opened it up and about half of it was gone, that handful I got. My brother said, "Say, something happened to that, didn't it?"
I said, "Sure did."

L-37 Not long ago when I was coming from Texas in a revival, one of the meetings. I remember, we got away from the house, and some people, and there. As soon as we could get free, we went riding up the road, and I had the baby, my wife. We stopped by the old schoolhouse, and they were picking violets, my wife and baby. And I wanted a drink from that old pump again. I was drinking, and I will tell you, this country may have beautiful scenery from Florida and Arizona, but we've got the water around here, haven't we? Yes sir, there's no better water in the world than what we have right here in central part of America, that limestone quarry. Drinking, I was drinking that water; I leaned against the fence like this, I looked up across where the old schoolhouse used to stand; it was gone.
And I remember in time of the war when all of us kiddies would stand there, and her... What socks we have on, maybe be down, our toes sticking out of our shoes like turtle heads, and our hands on one another, shoulders like that, and the teacher with that big stick, you know, lining us up, you know, tramping like that, going in.


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