In our little, old, rural town, north of Kansas City, we have several locations with baseball diamonds and with room to play football. I’ve never seen local kids pull together a group to play baseball or football, or, I guess, anything else. Even in these times, when they can’t be in school. I know they’re hanging out together, without masks, because I see them sitting around our parks with their phones out.
As I grow older, I am more and more aware of how lucky I was to grow up when I did, and to have the family with which I was blessed. My mom and dad both worked all the years we were growing up, sometimes having two jobs, but never once complained. When I was born, they moved us into town, into a tiny frame house, in what could best be described as a very low end neighborhood in Bushnell. They may have worked up into the lower end of middle class while I was a kid, but we never were aware of being “poor”.
Our parents were relatively young and very active in our lives. We were one of those blessed homes where everyone’s kids felt welcome and knew something was going to be happening at our house. Our family did a lot of fishing and camping, and most often enjoyed being accompanied by one or more of our friends, and my dad loved having them along. Some kids (I won’t name any of them, because not everyone still wants to be associated with me...I still love them, anyway) were at our house much of the time and became like family. Still are, so far as I’m concerned.
Summer times we often threw an ancient canvas tent up in the backyard, and left it up, sleeping out many nights, never knowing which of our buddies might show up to spend the night. It was common for us to be out running around in the middle of the night, playing one game or another. When it rained, we grabbed flashlights and ran down to West Side Park where we could pick up gallons of giant nightcrawlers, hoping to sell them later. We had long wiffle ball games and “home run” tournaments, and my dad was one of the best players. He was able to outrun even the fastest of us for many years. I remember he bet Denny Wilson, easily our fastest guy, that dad could outrun Denny down to the end of the block and he would do it “on one leg.” They ran the block, dad running normally and beating Denny. Denny griped “you said you would only use one leg.” Dad laughed at him and declared “I did...I only used one leg at a time.”
Evenings we had large groups of kids, boys and girls alike, show up to play “capture the flag,” using the dirt alley between our house and Ray Paddocks’s house, on the other side of the block, as a line of demarcation. Some of the players, as I recall, were, almost always a couple of the Wilson boys (Denny and Jim, whom we called J-Willie) and one Wilson girl (Judy, one of Jana’s best friends), Modie Williamson and Mike Porter, of course, Dave and Anne Paddock (big brother Steve on occasion), Verne (Thumper) Tudeen, the Geeves kids, the Webb kids, various McCances, certainly the Elam kids, Mike Fayhee, and many others. I think Jim N. showed up at times, a little older, and I remember he knocked me on my ass one evening in my own backyard. Probably had very good reason, and likely made me a better person.
Our back yard was a giant bare spot where the basketball pole stood, and had bare strips where the wiffle ball base lines were laid out. If you slept out in the tent with us, or played basketball, football, wiffle ball or capture the flag with us, or helped crank the homemade ice cream, please drop me a line. Some of those most dear to me are gone now, and I regret we had so little time together later in life. My mom and dad loved some of these kids pretty much the same way they loved us, which was a really good way, and I thank them for providing a home for us which turned out to be a good place for a lot of other kids to be, as well. The old days were better.
