musins

Mother had courage, but even it was complex. As my brother Dwight has said, "Mother could leap on the back of a rattlesnake and beat it senseless with a teaspoon, but let a mouse tip toe out of its hole, and she would be hanging from the chandelier." We didn't have a chandelier, but the description applies.

Of course, knowing this psychotic reaction to mice and also having been brought up in a rather rough and tumble, teasing family, there were times I could not resist pushing that sensitive button.

On the farm, there was a building next to the windmill where the separating of milk was done. It had once been a 'smoke house' where people put their own hams to cure. We used it more as a storage unit. There were two gigantic packing crates where some of Daddy's old toys and other little treasures were stored. Rarely were the boxes opened for any reason, and when they were, my sister Myrna and I were on hand to handle the old toys or gape curiously at what was inside.

The boxes were of thin wood, bound with one by two framing, and they were getting pretty brittle. I had found a sliver about three feet long on the floor, and I had it in my hand. Mother and Daddy had taken off the lid and put it down. Mother was bent over the top of the box, her chubby little legs on tip toe as she reached in for items. I eyed those chubby little legs, and I fondled the wood sliver.

Daddy caught my eye. "Now, Margaret Lou," he said severely. He knew deviltry when he saw it. I looked at Daddy, and grinned. He made no move to take the sliver away. What is a poor girl to do? I took the sliver and lightly started it up from mother's ankle traveling up the back of her leg.
Mother became suspended in mid-air, miraculously balancing on the edge of the box, her legs kicking wildly. "Riley," she screamed. "Oh, Riley."

Riley was no help to her. Tears were streaming down his face as he watched in helpless laughter. Mother came off that box in a tornadic storm headed straight for me, but Daddy wouldn't let her touch me. Then she started laughing too, mostly from relief. It hadn't really been a mouse. She went back to the box.

I still had the sliver, and I was alive and pondering a second go. One look at Daddy's face suggested other activities. He wouldn't be able to protect me a second time. I was eleven then and only acquiring the wisdom necessary for survival, and after all, once was enough.

Labels: Mother's Curious Courage