Remember When

Let's get one thing straight – the fact I grew up in simpler time doesn't mean I'm simple-minded and reject progress.

We've come a long way baby, from plowing with mules, to walking on the moon.

Alas, behold the multi-colored, multi-functional cellular telephone.

Now, when I was a lad, telephones came in one color, black, which was OK by Mr. Henry Ford, who was a genius in the manufacturing of black automobiles. The only exception was the white version of the telephone, which only showed up in Hollywood movies and in the hands of paper doll cut-outs.

I don't know if it was tradition or custom, but a couple weeks before "Big Thursday" or Thanksgiving Day, my daddy and I journeyed down to Tradesville to pick up our big ole gobbler.

There was a man my daddy knew who raised turkeys just for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Of course, they didn't come all plucked, dressed and oven-ready. These were honest-to-goodness strutters that looked right at you and lowered their wing feathers until they touched the ground. The toms, or male turkeys, were proud fellas and couldn't resist showing you just how important they were.

The Christmas of 1941, was just awful. Pearl Harbor got bombed.

Just when folks were beginning to see a little daylight with the Depression winding down, we were jolted into the cold reality of war.

All the work I did trying to get that new J.C.Higgins' Roadmaster bicycle was wiped out by a single letter from Sears, Roebuck and Company in Greensboro, N.C.

"Your recent order has been canceled due to the war effort," it read.

More than 60 years later, I still vividly remember Sunday, Dec. 7, 1941.

Momma shouted the news to me while I was playing outside.

Our first six weeks of school were drawing to a close and a whole lot of stuff was winding down.

The morning sun was coming up later and there was a slight chill in the air as we walked to school.

The line of maple trees in Mrs. Bell's yard were painted in hues of red and orange. When school left out in the afternoon, they would gently shed a few brightly colored leaves for us to gather and take home for our mothers to enjoy. Momma always took her gift of autumn leaves and placed them in a tray as a simple welcoming of a new season and sort of a farewell to summer.