Rabies and Fearful Times -- the Finale

Uncle Dewey came before supper with bad news: a neighbor had killed a mad fox. "You know," he said, "that cow may be mad." So Daddy called a veterinarian to come look at her. "The only way to be sure is to kill her and send off her head to be tested," he said. "I can't afford to kill my cow!" exclaimed Daddy. "Maybe she ate some poison weeds or something. She could be alright in a few days." But the vet told Daddy he should kill the cow for the safety of the family. Mama expressed her concerns about having used the cow's milk, but he told her, "No the milk was alright to use. The disease is passed through the saliva of the animal." And then he asked if the girls played around the barn and she told him they played in the sand close to the barn. "Then it's possible they could have picked up the germs from the sand if they had a cut or scrape."

So Daddy went to the house for his gun while some other men got the cow back inside the barn. This time the door was fastened with a chain. The cow went wild inside the stall, hitting the walls, pawing the ground and snorting. She put her head under the sill of the barn, trying to get out; her head stuck and she couldn't get up. Uncle Dewey put the barrel of the gun close to the cow's head and pulled the trigger; a single shot rang out, and the cow slumped to the ground.

The cow's head was cut off and put into a container with ice packed all around and the vet took it into town and shipped it to the State Health Department. Daddy and Uncle Dewey hooked chains onto the cow's legs and pulled her out of the barn, then took her to a brush pile and lit a fire underneath. Quickly the air was filled with the stench of burning hair and flesh.

The long anxious days of waiting for an answer from the tests were difficult, and when the report came, it said the cow had rabies. Mama, Daddy, Wanda, Charlotte and Uncle Dewey would have to take the rabies vaccinations. The doctor explained the series of shots to them: each person would receive fourteen shots, one each day, in the large muscles of the arms, legs and hips, and since Charlotte was so small, her shots would be put in her tummy.

By the end of the first week of shots, Charlotte was bruised and sore; hard swollen lumps were on her tummy and she felt feverish and didn't play much. "She's so little to have this much pain; she was just beginning to gain a little weight after her bout with scarlet fever, and now this had to happen." Mama buried her head in her hands and cried.

The soreness slowly left their muscles. At first, every headache and every pain was thought to be a symptom of rabies, but the fear lessened with the passing of time.

Rabies and Fearful Times -- continued

"Don't move or say anything!"said Daddy in a frightened whisper and he kept the beam of light from the flashlight on the fox as it walked around the feet of Daddy, Mama, and Wanda. They stood motionless as the fox sniffed Daddy's shoes, then ignored them and ambled off into the darkness. "Get in the house!" Daddy ordered. "Something was wrong with that fox! I'll bet it was mad," he said.

During the night the old dog came to the porch, licking himself, and Daddy said is was a sign that he might have been bitten. So the dog was chained up until enough time had passed to see if he would take rabies. The girls were told to stay away from him. It was hard for Charlotte to stay away from Pudge; while Wanda was at school he made a good companion, but she knew Mama and Daddy meant what they said, so she squatted down on the back doorstep and talked to him. "Are you mad about something, Pudge?" The quarantine time passed and the dog showed none of the signs of rabies and so Daddy turned him loose.

One day the milk cow bawled from morning until evening and when Mama tried to get her in the barn she wouldn't go inside to her calf. Charlotte could hear the cow bawling before she went to sleep and when morning came the cow was very restless, circling the barn, bawling. Daddy went with Mama to the barn and when he opened the door to let her inside with her calf, she ran up to the stall and stopped, then went inside. She snorted, pawed the ground, slung her head at Daddy, and kicked at the calf. She turned to the door and Daddy quickly put the calf in another stall and went outside. "I've never seen a cow act like this before. Let's leave her in here today and maybe she'll calm down." All day she bawled and thumped against the walls of the barn; by mid-afternoon the thumping had stopped, but the cow hadn't calmed down. She had broken the latch on the door and was outside the barn. She still bawled.

...to be continued

Rabies and Fearful Times

After a cold winter, spring had finally come. Tender garden vegetables grew rapidly, strawberries put on their red berries, a new calf was in the barn and twenty four new baby chicks tottered about in the yard.

One day Daddy came home and told Mama a neighbor's dog had been bitten by a fox and now it had gone mad. "What's he mad about?" Charlotte had asked. Mama explained that the dog wasn't angry, but that he had rabies, a bad disease that makes an animal act crazy: it slobbers at the mouth and runs in circles like it's having a fit and would probably growl and bark a lot. Daddy had vaccinated his hunting dog, ol' Pudge, so maybe he wouldn't get the disease, but he warned us girls to get in the house quickly if we saw a fox or a dog acting strangely.

For the next few days Mama and Daddy worked in the fields, always cautious, and when nothing unusual happened, they returned to a more normal routine; the girls played in the yard again and the family walked to church at night with less fear. About two weeks later, while at church on Sunday night, we heard a distant, mournful cry. The preacher talked and the cry interrupted now and then, and after church services a man told Daddy the sound seemed to be coming from our house. "It may be a lost pup," someone said as we left church and started walking home by the light of a flashlight. The Sears family walked with us as far as the gate. The pitiful cry interrupted their conversation several times as they talked and then the men said the sound was coming from the house. Daddy carried me and Mama held Wanda's hand; Daddy used the flashlight to brighten the path, and when we reached the steps, a fox came from the shadows under the porch. It was coming toward us.

...to be continued

Beautiful or Bothersome ?

If you were traveling the rural roads of our area, you would see fields covered with these yellow flowers. We have had tourists stop at the community store and ask about them. Farmers call them buttercups; I don't know their scientific name. They have a glossy sheen and are about the size of a nickel. To us who raise cattle, they are a nusiance, choking out the grass until they have made seed and die back. Usually we will spray with a herbicide which would be most effective while the plant is small, but weather conditions aren't always suitable at that time so they can quickly get ahead of the grass. Before pastures here were fertilized with chicken litter we didn't have this weed; perhaps the litter changed the nutrients in the soil. They make a very dense root system and can't be pulled easily if they get started in the garden. So what is beautiful to some is a real bother to us.

Our Little Girls

My husband and I were blessed with three little girls; when the last one was born and I asked, "Are you sure it's not a boy?" I was secretly pleased to have another girl.

This picture, of the first two, has always been precious to me; she looks as though she's saying, "Now baby, it's like this ..." She did pull the infant seat to the edge of the table once, but I caught it before the baby could fall. They were only fourteen months and nine days apart, and became best of friends ...

and then, along came another sister, premature, weighing only three pounds, fourteen ounces, in a hurry to get here and on the go ever since.

They loved her but sometimes she made them a little unhappy, like pulling hair and pestering. I think they still love her though.

Dark Ride Home -- continued

--- and now for "the rest of the story"...

"I brought my lantern," said Mama. Emily said we had to try it and that she would drive slowly and that we could help watch in case something was in the road. Mama fumbled inside her pocket for some matches, and by starlight she struck a match and ignited the lantern's wick. The weak flame soon strengthened and burned steadily. "If you will hold it out the window I think I can see the edge of the road," said Emily. Mama put her arm out the window and held the lantern up so Emily could see and Wanda stared past the little circle of dim light, watching for something in the road. "Here comes a car!" said Wanda and Emily pulled her car to the edge of the road and stopped, waiting until the other car had passed.

When they came to the end of the pavement, Emily had only the weeds to use as a guide for the edge of the road. Wanda knew they had only come about halfway. Her eyes were tired and she began to wish she had never asked to go to the program. She peered out into the darkness as they came to the cemetery. She thought she saw something but she knew it had to be a shadow, but she shivered anyway. The tall gravestones glistened in the starlight. They stood scattered among the graves like soldiers on guard. Wanda blinked and rubbed her eyes. Had she seen something white jump up between the graves? No, just because this was a cemetery didn't mean there were real ghosts here. Then there was no mistake about it; something big and white had jumped up and was coming straight toward the car! She gripped the seat and tried to tell Mama they were being chased by a ghost, but her voice wouldn't work! She could hear the ghost breathing as it got closer to them. Soon it was right beside the car!

"Ruff! Ruff! Ruff-ruff!" Wanda jumped from fright and covered her head with the tail of her skirt. "Oh my goodness!" exclaimed Mama. "That old dog scared me so bad I almost dropped the lantern!" The dog ran behind the car for a while, then turned and trotted back to the shadows of the cemetery to wait for another car to chase.

When Emily turned the car off the main road, trees blocked the starlight and the darkness seemed to close in around them even more. "Well, at least we are close enough to home now that we can walk the rest of the way if we have to," said Mama. Everyone was tired; it was way past bedtime. "Wanda, you'll have to carry the lantern home; my arm is too numb to carry it and Charlotte."

As they walked from Emily's house, Wanda said to Mama, "Thank you for finding a way for me to be in the program. I hope Daddy can get a car of his own soon."

(Please understand that parts of these stories may not have actually happened; for instance I don't know if a dog chased us or not. However, the main theme of the stories did happen.)

Dark Ride Home

Wanda had finished her first four years at the country school and when fall came she started classes in school at town. There were more things to do at the new school and she made new friends. One day she brought home a note from her teacher inviting Mama and Daddy to a program at the school. Wanda had practiced with her class, not knowing whether she would get to come. Daddy still didn't have a car of his own and he didn't think Grandma liked for him to drive Uncle Dewey's car, so he told Wanda, "I'm not going to ask!"

Charlotte was afraid of Daddy's stern looks and his harsh words, but Wanda had a stronger personality and she sometimes challenged his authority, but this time, no amount of begging could change his mind. "I'll find a way to get us there," Mama had told Wanda that night, and when morning came she had a solution: she'd ask the young neighbor lady to take them. So she swallowed her pride and got up the courage to ask Emily, who agreed happily to give them a ride to the program.

All went well with the songs and after the program Wanda felt like she really belonged in this class. "It sure is dark tonight, isn't it," said Mama when they got into the car and started home. There was no moonlight and the stars seemed even brighter than usual. About two miles out of town Emily thought she saw a flicker of lightning, but Mama said surely it wasn't since there were no clouds in the sky. Then Mama thought she saw a flicker too, just before everything went black. Emily couldn't see the road! She stomped the brake peddle, pitching Wanda forward in the seat and Mama threw out her hand to catch hold of the dashboard. "What happened?" asked Mama, and then it was bright again. Emily told her the car's lights had gone out for a minute; she barely had the words out of her mouth before the lights went out again, and this time they didn't come back on. "Now what will we do?" she asked. "I don't know anything about fixing car lights!"

They sat in the blackness, trying to decide what to do. All was quiet except for the chirping of crickets.

to be continued ...