Tales from WannaBea Farm

Joyce Stark Growing up in a semirural area of Houston, I was always dragging home stray animals, one spring day I even found a dead ‘possum with live babies clinging to her. That was a real find, but I was on my way to school when I found her. Now I couldn’t just leave her for some other kid to find so what was I to do? Finally I picked her up and ran home just a fast as I could go and left her in the shade, on the cement blocks that were stacked up for steps, then turned and ran for school just as fast as I could go. Arriving at school, out of breath and panting for air, the teacher sent me to the principal. Again! As I opened his door he took one look at me and just pointed down the hallway to my room. I could never understand why the teacher was always sending me to see him as he never, ever said a word to me, just pointed, and I always went back to my classroom. The other kids were terrified of him and he was always spanking them, but not me. It was a real mystery to me. Only after I was grown did I learn that HE was afraid of my mother! I can understand that as I was afraid of her too.

After school the weather had warmed up and I dawdled along on my way home, playing a game of hopscotch with some other kids, chasing one of the boys and trying to hit him because he had ran up and kissed me on the cheek. Yeeuck, nasty kid! I stopped to talk to one of the gardeners working on the flower beds at a business building and talked him out of some plants to take home to my mother as a peace offering since I realized that I was going to be late getting home and Mama would be pretty mad.

Alas, going in the back door and yelling, “Mama, come see what I got for you”, my pretty plants went unnoticed as Mama, as soon as she saw me, went into a white rage the likes of which I had seldom seen. She was so mad that she couldn’t even talk and was just sputtering at me. Finally I understood the word, “’possum” and knew I was in real trouble.

“But Mama”, I wailed, “It has little babies”. She didn’t care, she wanted it gone. Opening the front door, I was greeted with a horrific smell. After leaving the ‘possum on the steps the sun had gradually moved around and cooked mama and baby ‘possums and they were really ripe, smelling like I had stumbled into a group of skunks having a “Who can make the worst smell contest”.

Seems like after I had left for school, Mama had decided to have one of those, “Kids are gone, house is clean and I’m going to pamper myself, days”. It was her and Daddy’s anniversary and she wanted to be pretty for him. She filled the old wash tub with hot water, a bucket at a time, climbed in the tub and soaked for a while before fixing her hair and putting on her best dress. She then headed next door to visit with the next door neighbor that I would be spending the night with while her and daddy went out to celebrate.

But as she opened the front door she was overwhelmed with the smell and as she stepped out to investigate (without looking down) she stepped on something soft and squishy. Startled she stepped back, lost her balance and fell into her newly planted and muddy flower bed. Wallowing around, trying to get up she somehow pulled old mama ‘possum and babies down on her head. The neighbors reported later that she really went ballistic then, screaming and clawing at her muddy face and hair. When she finally calmed down and went to clean up she had to bathe in dirty water as she wasn’t strong enough to empty the washtub. That was Daddy’s job and when he came home she was wearing an old dress and her hair was still wet and she was looking as she said, “Like a drowned rat”. I was hiding out at the neighbors, glad they were going out and hoping Mama would cool off before I had to go home. But Daddy said she was beautiful just the way she was and they must have had a good time that night as she was happy and laughing the next day.