Wednesday's Words on a Friday.

 

The original Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and eventually taken over by a moveable feast of participants when Delores had computer troubles. Sadly, Delores has now closed her blog forever due to other problems.

The aim of the words is to encourage us to write. A story, a poem, whatever comes to mind.

If you are posting an entry on your own blog, please let us know so we can come along to read it and add a few encouraging words.

This month the words/prompts are supplied by Hilary Melton-Butcher and can be found here

This week's words/prompts are: 

1. sonorous 

2. trenchant 

3. cackling 

4. hurley-burley 

5. confined 

6. semolina 

and/or: 

1. nourished 

2. grid 

3. blue 

4. atmosphere 

5. notepad 

6. porridge

Here is my story: ( a bit on the long side, I got carried away, and it isn't finished yet)

I sat with my notepad ready and recorder switched on as the withered old man began to speak. “It was a hurley-burley life, out on the farm,” he began. “Always something going on, never much time to just sit and daydream under that big blue sky. We had a small farm, only ten acres, and we didn’t grow commercial crops like those big farmers do now.” He paused to sip at the water tube, then continued. “No hundreds of acres with nothing but wheat or corn. We had five fields laid out in grids, each section of the grid grew a certain vegetable or a few fruit trees. One grid in each field was given over to a chicken house, this was always on what grandpa called skids, so it could be moved across the ground just by pulling on the chain with the plough horse. Every time a grid was harvested, the chickens were moved across to scratch and peck.” 

Another sip at the water tube brought a sigh of satisfaction. “Each grid section was confined within a fence so the chickens couldn’t leave that area and in the late afternoons one of the girls was tasked with making sure every chook was back in the hen house and locked in to keep them safe from the foxes. During the days, the middle boys, that would be myself, I was about ten, John was a year older, then Charles, he was eight, we had to drag the big hoes across the empty section where the chooks had been and make sure it was ready for the digging." 

"The oldest brothers did that part, the digging, after they had finished their other field work, they managed the cows in the top three acres and the horses in the two acres next to that. Mostly making sure they had food and water, then collecting the cow pats and horse droppings and shifting them to the big manure pile behind the barn.” 

I interrupted to ask,” What was the purpose of collecting all the manure?  Why couldn’t it just stay in the fields?” Samuel replied with a small chuckle,” the fields had to be kept clean, no one wanted to be walking through a couple of acres of cow muck every day, so it was all collected and the pile behind the shed was spread and turned every couple of days so it would dry, gotta tell you, the atmosphere behind the barn could get a bit thick when dad and the uncles were turning the fresh stuff to mix in with the old.” 

“And what was the purpose of the manure?” I asked him. “Whenever a field had been completely harvested, the grid fences came down and the manure was trucked out to it and spread from one end to the other. Then a couple of days later, Uncle Robert would hitch up the old plough and get that field turned over good and proper. Then it was left for the winter and gridded out again in the spring.” 

He looked towards the door then, wondering aloud if it might be time for the morning snack trays to be coming around. I decided we could take a break and turned off the recorder, telling Samuel I’d be back in ten minutes and walked outside to stretch my legs. There were things I wanted to ask about, schooling and trips to town, things like that, but it was going to have to wait. I had to let Samuel tell the story his way. 

I phoned my boss and told him I would need an extension, this wasn’t going to be a one or two day assignment. He wasn’t happy about it, but he gave me a week. I hoped Samuel would last a week. He’d been found in the old homestead kitchen, skin and bone and not too clean, having stumbled and broken an ankle. He couldn’t remember how long he’d lain there, all alone, until a group of school kids playing hooky had found him. They’d thought the old home was deserted. Samuel claimed to be 100 years old, he certainly looked as if he could be, but perhaps he was just mal-nourished. 

I went back inside to se him finishing a small dish of semolina and pureed peaches. The nurse wiped off his chin and whisked away the tray. I asked Samuel was he ready to continue or would he like a nap first? “Let’s keep going, Zack, I’m not sleepy. Where was we up to? Wait I remember, Uncle Robert ploughing the empty field.” 

"The other Uncles, Ted and Bill, I don’t rightly remember exactly what they did around the farm. They didn’t live there, all the uncles had their own house and a bit of land, but they came to do the heavy work that Dad couldn’t do since he’d fell off the horse and got his legs cut to ribbons by the plough. He’d sit on the porch and shout directions to everyone, we didn’t need them but it made him feel like he was doing something important still, so we’d all run around doing what he said until he fell asleep. Soon as we heard that sonorous snoring we’d all ease off a bit and have some fun in between. 

Every morning the chickens would be let out from the roost in each field, they’d be cackling and scratching, Susannah would bring the kitchen scraps for them and Margaret and Caroline would collect the eggs, there was always plenty of eggs from five roosts, we ate our share and Mum would do a lot of baking, but still sometimes there were eggs left over and Mum would trade them with the neighbour over the hill. They kept pigs and Mum would give them eggs every week in return for bacon once a month and a ham at Christmas. 

Every year, just before winter set in, a teacher would come out from town in a big old truck filled with books for learnin’ from. Some had lists of words that we was supposed to learn how to spell, some had sums and other stuff with numbers so we could learn what the teacher called Mathematics. Other books too, but I can’t remember now what they were. We all knew how to read and write anyway, Mum taught us that, but apparently the schoolin’ was something we had to do according to the law, so every winter we’d be in the big room off the kitchen, adding sums, writing essays and such, but always after the cows were milked and the chickens fed. Mum would stoke up the fire in that room so we’d be comfortable enough and once the lessons were done she’d bring out the games boards and story books and the history books she’d learned from when she went to school. 

Dad would be brought in and the Uncles too sometimes, if they had work that could be done inside. Uncle William liked to carve wood and taught Charles how to do that, Uncle Robert taught John and me how to take apart engines and clocks and get all the bits cleaned and oiled and put back together. Mum showed the girls how to knit and mend, but the best days were when she took the girls back into the kitchen and taught them a new cake recipe or something and we could smell the baking, the fire would be crackling and warm and we were all together and happy.” 

I could see Samuel getting tired and told him I needed another break, so he might as well have a nap while I walked around outside and did a bit of shopping for my dinner. Half an hour later I walked back in to find him fast asleep. 

I went to the nurses station and said I’d be back to talk some more with Samuel at two o’clock. I wanted to know how this idyllic life had all fallen apart, how was he the only one left to tell the tale.