No one but a Texan – About Growing Up in Dublin, Texas
No one but a Texan can truly understand what it means to grow up in Texas.
Of all the States in the United States there are three, maybe four that people outside the United States think of and two, maybe three that don’t count. Well I probably don’t have to mention others here, but they deserve some credit by just being in the good ol’ US of A, and they are : California, New York and maybe Alaska or Florida. Although I might get some flack from members of these other states, I believe they along with the rest are just states. In my eyes anyway.
Of course my memory is not what it use to be, the gears are slipping and I have to double clutch my mind from time to time, there are things I remember quite clearly and others are vague or just stories told to me, about me. When told sometimes it awakes the memory traces, and I can almost here the synapses popping, heck if I had my eyes close it might be a regular light show.
Anyhow, my first memories are those which took place while we lived in the house at 502 Thomas Street, Dublin, Texas. The times I had as a kid and the fun I had with my Brothers and Sisters. I blogged out each of these memories, as they came to my mind, hope, maybe, i can keep you all amused a bit longer.
To sit the environment one has to picture where I am coming from. My Family consisted of a Dad, and Mom, and two older Brothers, Kenneth Charles, and George Ralph, and two younger Sisters, Barbara Sue and Silvia Ann. My Dad was at the time a Ford Tractor and Equipment Mechanic, later Salesman and my Mom was a Nurse. Of course Dad would work days and Mom the three shifts days swings and midnight. We lived in a Three bedroom house one for us boys, one for the Girls and one for my parents. There was a living room and dining room whcih became the living-Dinning Room once Dad knocked the wall in between them out. and a kitchen. It wasn’t that big of a house but a good one as the really only thing we used it for was to eat and sleep, the rest of the time we were outside doing something. So although there was supervision, in the form as who ever was the oldest and there was in Charge, we kids pretty much could run wild during the summer time and otherwise after school.
As most Texan’s know, and it almost goes without saying that it is HOT in Texas, the only cooling one got was from the early spring and fall rains, which come each year when the cold air of the north meets the warm humid air from the Gulf of Mexico. I guess that is where my love of Thunder Storms comes from. So most of the time it, the dress code of the day was just, cut-offs.
Sometimes during the summer months we would hookup the water sprinkler and turn it on and just run back and forth through it, now that is a way to cool off. When I think back on those days, it was hot, but the heat didn’t seem to bother us kids at all, we would just go about our days, playing and doing our chores, as required.
By the way the supervision was lackadaisical except when the supervisor felt obliged to follow Mom or Dad’s instructions to the T.
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Hope you enjoyed my ramblings and that it brought back few memories of you childhood days, no matter what state you hail from.
© Texas Tortilla Factory 2006 – Mike Vauthier