Curtis, part fourteen

For Sunday worship, Curtis took her to a small country church that was attended by forty or so adults and a handful of children that were corralled out the door for Sunday School by a surly and corpulent gentleman with a round red nose and stained shirt. Leta winced when he snapped at a little girl who was not moving at the speed he required.

The service, she felt, was unremarkable and sadly devoid of music—even a Capella singing—and the minister somewhat bitter for reasons she could need grasp. He seemed to be encouraging his congregation to join him in his animosity toward individuals who did not strictly agree with his ideology, focusing his fifty-minute sermon on his own needs and dignity under the guise of how God only blesses certain people and why.

Having attended one church or other her entire life, Leta was at least comfortable in any house of God, and after the service, as Curtis introduced her to several of the churchgoers, she found them polite and pleasant, if unremarkable.

But she would focus the rest of her day on housework. Before she did anything, she decided on the drive back to the house, she needed to clean up the kitchen. She would clean the cabinets and then do all the dishes. Having only been in her new husband’s house one day, she had just been cleaning what she needed to use as she went along. However, as he had been living alone, a widower for many months with a poor grasp of housekeeping, the kitchen and even the living room were cluttered with a great number of dishes, utensils, pots and pans that had been used and discarded over a long period of time. She would scrub the walls, the floors, the counters—everything. A person, she believed, was defined by where and how she ate.

Then she would tackle the bedroom, which, she realized during the drive, she had yet to see in the daylight. All she could remember was that it smelled like her husband. While she did not object to his scent on his person, she did not want to have it linger in their shared living space or carry his smell on her own person.

Monday, the following day, she would do the laundry.

Her own plans, however, remained only intentions, for Curtis wanted potatoes for lunch, which meant that he would have to show her the root cellar before they could even eat. They entered from near the back of the house through a cracked door with a rusted hinge that stuck. Curtis had to use some force to open it, and she wondered how she would be able to go in and out on her own.

While he was doing this, she held the lantern. He took a couple of steps down and reached out his hand, which she didn’t notice. Then he snapped his fingers and opened his palm. She looked quizzically. He turned and grabbed the lantern roughly, trapping one of her fingers in his tight grip.

“My hand!” she gasped.

“You should have given me the lamp when I told you to,” he snapped and continued down the stairs, the light guiding his way.

She shook out her own stinging hand and followed.

The stench of rotting produce nearly made her vomit.

“It smells pretty bad in here, don’t it?” he inquired.

“Yes,” she said, using as little breath as possible.

Leta could barely see, but from the light and shadows, she deduced that the cellar, carved into the dirt and clay, was about eight feet square. There were some bare shelving units, a few drying hooks hanging from the low ceiling—also the floor of the kitchen and about a dozen of bushel and peck baskets, as well as three large milk canisters.

“The ‘taters are closest to the door, ‘cause they’re my favorites,” Curtis said. He reached toward the basket.

“Just bring up the entire basket,” she said.

“But we only need a few, Mrs. Curtis,” he protested.

“I know,” she answered, “but I need to see what’s here, and the only way I can do that is by hauling everything out into the light.”

To be continued.

Curtis, part thirteen

Leta could not recall the last time she rose so early in the morning. It was pitch black in the house that her husband Curtis brought her to two nights ago. In fact, she wasn’t even sure where she was at first. After all, this was only her second night in her new home, and her first night was somewhat of a blur. They had married, celebrated with dinner and then continued their celebration at the bar of the Stony Ridge Inn until the place closed. She could barely remember falling into bed the first night.

But she did remember waking up to learn that her new husband lived in a dilapidated shack of a house that had not been cleaned in months, at least since his previous wife passed away. She remembered that she spent almost her entire day cleaning, cooking and taking care of livestock. And he vaguely remembered Curtis remarking that milking the cows was now her responsibility. And then she remembered arguing with him at the market, where she compelled him to take her for much needed groceries and a third milking pail. She returned with the groceries, but in the ruckus had forgotten to purchase the pail.

“Leta,” her husband’s voice said sternly, “I’m not going to tell you again.”

“Yes, of course,” Leta said, her throat raspy, “I’m up.”

An hour later, she was in the kitchen with the milk separated and water boiling on the old wood stove. The coffee was perking, and she was scrambling eggs. Her husband sauntered in from the living room.

“Where’s my breakfast?” he asked.

She jumped in surprise. She had thought he was outside with his chickens.

“Curtis,” she gasped, “you startled me. I thought you--”

“I’m hungry.”

“Almost ready,” she answered cheerily.

She had already set the table and gestured for him to sit down.

“What’s on the agenda for the day?” she asked as she poured the egg mixture into the frying pan.

“It’s a farm, Mrs. Curtis,” he answered. “Our agenda is to take care of the animals and our crops.”

“Of course.”

“And I need to take the eggs of the last two days to Rogers.”

“Rogers?”

She poured his coffee.

“He buys my eggs and distributes them.”

“Of course.”

She filled his plate with eggs, then her own, put the frying pan onto the counter and then sat down.

“And we better get a move on,” he concluded. “We have church at ten.”

To be continued.

Curtis, part twelve

Leta could have argued. She wanted to argue. Nearly every word that her husband Curtis had just snarled at her felt like a jab into her soul. Her natural and well-practiced inclination was to respond in kind. However, they were in a public place—a grocery store—and although he attempted to be subtle, his comments were noticeably overheard by the other patrons.

They were early in their marriage, one day to be exact, and she had dedicated herself to making this situation work. She had selected Curtis because he was different than many of the men she dated and even her several husbands over her long adult life. Many of these men were softened by sloth or hardened by drink. Their relationships were boisterous and tumultuous, and sometimes vicious. She wanted a gentler, quieter life. After all, she was nearly 50 years old.

“Certainly, darling,” she said as calmly and agreeably as she could. She heard him tell her that the icebox would not keep the ice cream she wanted cold and that he was concerned about the number of purchases she was making without having really evaluated everything he already had at his farm, her new home. Then she smiled.

“And as for that pork roast,” he continued.

“Oh, Curtis,” she interrupted gently, “won’t you let me make you my breaded pepper pork specialty tonight? This is, after all, our first day as a married couple, and I want the first supper I make for you as your wife to be something I know will be marvelous. And then you will have your berry pie.”

She touched him gently on his arm.

“Well,” he stammered and then, as she anticipated, acquiesced, “Of course, that sounds delicious.”

A few minutes later, they were loading the groceries into the car and chatting about their future. Leta felt flattered by the energy her presence drew out of her new husband. And they enjoyed the rest of the afternoon and evening together. They gathered berries, enough for three pies, and Leta made a mental note to add making jam to her list of her immediate tasks. She cleaned several more pots, pans and dishes while preparing supper and then milked the cows again. Curtis checked on the chicken wire they had repaired that morning and removed a dead cat from the barn.

After they feasted on their supper, they relaxed in the living room while the sun slowly set. Having no electricity, the room grew dark rather quickly, and Curtis lit one of three oil lamps.

Both were fairly drained, partly from their busy day and partly because they were still recovering from their prior long evening of dining and celebrating their marriage at a bar. In the dim light, Leta could see her husband’s head droop, and she finally suggested that they retire.

“Yes, absolutely,” he agreed. “Tomorrow morning is going to come awful early.”

He led her back to the bedroom, where her suitcase and boxes of clothes and personal items were exactly where she left it, and she remembered that the rest of her things were still in the trunk of the car. She sighed; unpacking, cleaning and then rearranging the bedroom were added to her task list. They went right to sleep.

At five in the morning, Curtis nudged her.

“Time to get up sleepyhead,” he said, his voice dry and cracking. “Them cows ain’t gonna milk themselves.”

To be continued.

Curtis, part eleven

If she had known that her first day of marriage to Curtis would be a portent of what was to come, Leta might have reconsidered before she said, “I do.” She had started her day in a house she had never seen with a hangover from a night of celebrating. The kitchen was filthy, and all they had to eat were eggs from his hens and some peas they had gathered from a weed-filled garden. Everything he showed her or she saw for herself was neglected or terribly worn, including the livestock—200 chickens and two undermilked cows.

From morning until mid-afternoon, Curtis showed her the farm, shared his dreams, and they worked. But then she engineered a slight change of pace by insisting that he take her to the market for several necessities she had not seen in the kitchen. So he drove her to the market in Genoa.

Leta disliked Genoa. Once she had a dalliance with a fellow who ended up being the married mayor of the village and a deacon in the Baptist Church there. She learned this shortly after their two days together when they were formally introduced at a church picnic that she attended with her sister-in-law Florence. The mayor was with his four children and very pregnant wife. While Leta had a policy never to consort with married men, she never asked. But this particular fellow, upon their unplanned meeting, instead of ignoring their prior connection, made several particularly insulting statements about her, as if to covertly inform her that he would retaliate against any hint by her of their prior liaison. Then he seemed to pass the word about her reputation, because she heard whisperings and recognized judgmental glances. This made the rest of the afternoon very uncomfortable for her.

With Curtis hovering over her like a pesky fly, Leta quickly made her purchases at the market. She had a slight craving for ice cream and also purchased a quart of the treat.

“You don’t want that,” her husband stated.

“But I like ice cream, don’t you?”

“It’s extravagant, don’t you think?”

“It’s just ice cream. We’ve worked hard today. It will go well with the pie.”

“I don’t think you should get it.”

“I like ice cream.”

“And I said ‘No.’ I’m not made of money.”

“It’s my money.”

“Well, we’ll talk about that later,” he snapped, “but for now, no ice cream.”

“I can’t believe we’re arguing about this,” she protested. “It’s just ice cream.”

“Leta, how are you going to keep it frozen?”

“In the icebox, of course.”

As they started drawing attention to themselves, Curtis pulled her to a corner of the store, but whispered so loudly and ferociously that everyone could still hear him.

“That old icebox isn’t worth a damn!” he hissed. “Instead of ice cream, you’re going to have cream soup. And I don’t appreciate your contradicting me in public like this. I work hard taking care of all that I have, and for you to flaunt that you have your own money in front of the people I live and work with, just ain’t right, Leta. So I’m telling you that I don’t want to hear any more about ice cream or how you’re paying for the rest of this.”

To be continued.

Curtis, part ten

Frankly, all Leta wanted to do was lie down. Over the past twenty-four hours, she had gotten married, enjoyed a celebration dinner with her new husband followed by an evening of imbibing, collapsed into her marriage bed in a house she had never seen, wakened to a disaster of filth and deterioration, done more farm chores than she had in years, and scrubbed dishes with her favorite lace handkerchief. Now her husband was telling her that if she wanted meat for supper she would have to kill and clean one of the 200 laying hens he kept in a dilapidated coop out back.

Throughout the morning, she had been making a list of necessary items they would need to purchase at the market, including soap, ammonia, toilet tissue, sugar, coffee, bread and a pork steak or some other meat. She had eggs for breakfast and lunch and wasn’t about to eat them again for supper.

Her husband Curtis had other ideas to occupy the rest of their afternoon, however, and he strongly objected to traveling to the market.

“Leta, there is so much to do around here this afternoon,” Curtis said. “Besides, we have plenty to eat right here on the farm—eggs, milk, more peas, some turnips and carrots ready for the picking, and I can give you a hen for supper.”

“But Curtis, that’s not all we need around here,” she protested. “I couldn’t even find soap.”

“Soap? Really?” he questioned. “It’s right there near the sink.”

“Where?” she asked, as she rose from the table and shuffled some of the dirty dishes in and around the kitchen sink.

“Lordy,” he grumbled, getting up himself and joining her. He moved a few soup bowls and flipped over a serving bowl to reveal a glob of dirty goop. “Right here! Soap.”

The stench nearly made Leta heave, and she stepped back. Then she glared at her husband. She was not going to use the semi-congealed puddle of slime to clean anything.

“Problem solved,” he continued. “Soap, chicken, veggies in the garden. No need to go to the store.”

If she could drive, she would have gone herself, but she needed him to take her.

“Now while you do up these dishes, I’m going to check on the fields and fetch you a chicken. Unless you want to pick the berries first.”

“Wait a minute,” Leta instructed. She was flustered and stalling. Her head was pounding and a rage was building inside her. At first, all she heard was “chicken,” but as she caught up to her husband’s words, she had an idea. “All I’m saying is that if you want that berry pie, I’m going to need flour and lard.”

“Woman,” he said definitively, as if his assertion of her gender would halt all further communication. In this instance, however, it was a call of defeat. He had been tense, but softened. “All right,” he agreed. “For pie.” But in order to remind her of the seriousness of this decision, he added, “But I’m telling you, yesterday about broke me. I only have a couple of dollars… for flour and lard.”

“I’ll pay,” she said.

To be continued.

Men's Work/Women's Work

My stepfather Jerry Snider grew up on a farm in Central Ohio. He was the eighth child of ten (nine surviving) children born to Oscar Snider and Nellie Butler. In birth order, these children were Charles Robert (called Dutch), Oscar, Jr. (who passed away as a small child), Mary Jean, Donald Richard (called Bud), Doyle Vern, Helen Lucille, Peggy Lou, Jerry Lee (ironically, the same first and middle name as me), Danny Ray and Barry Joe. While Jerry has no nieces or nephews older than he, he has two that are approximately the same age.

The farm had cash crops, of course, such as corn, wheat, alfalfa and oats. Several of these crops were also important in feeding and keeping the livestock. On the Snider farm, the animals included chickens, milk cows, hogs and steer. The family also maintained an extensive garden. Much of the food went to feed the family, and throughout the year, Nellie was responsible for preserving, canning and cooking all of the food the family needed throughout the year.

This was women’s work. On a farm, the duties were strictly divided.

Oscar was responsible for the fields, steer, hogs, cows and all facilities upkeep and repairs. He was also responsible for making sure that there was enough wood in the house to feed the stove, which provided all of the heat in the house and where all of their food was prepared. He also held a paid job. The boys assisted him on the farm, and were assigned various chores, particularly in the feeding and care of the livestock. While the butchering was performed as men’s work, the women were right there with them. The smoking and canning of the meat was the responsibility of Nellie with the assistance of the girls.

While she did not make all their clothes, Nellie made sure that they lasted as long as they could through mends and patches. She made their soap and bread, maintained the house (assisted by the girls), did all of the cooking and dishes, made the family’s large intake of bread (multiple loaves were consumed at every meal), was responsible for the large garden (with the assistance of all of the children in various ways) and milked the cows twice a day (early in the morning and in the early evening).

In fact, everyone had morning chores before breakfast. Oscar and Nellie rose early, and while he stoked the wood stove, Nellie milked the cows. Nellie was also responsible for the chickens—feeding, raising and gathering the eggs. Depending on the situation, either she or the boys would kill the chickens that the family ate. She made all the family’s bread, several dozen loaves per week, using yeast that they purchased in large cakes, and portioning out the required amount for the dough. She and the girls also made butter and used the leftover liquid buttermilk (combined with oats) to slop—feed—the hogs. The milk the family didn’t need was kept in large metal canisters as cool as they could until the collector from the dairy arrived, and these were emptied into his large truck. Butter, eggs and cream were taken into town and sold.

Doing laundry required boiling gallons of water and scrubbing each item on a wood and metal washboard. During fair weather, this all-day task took place outside, and the wash was hung to dry on clotheslines. During the winter months, the wash was still hung outside and freeze-dried.

They worked from sun-up to sundown. This was necessary for survival. It was hard, physical labor.

“Basically, she was a slave,” my stepfather remarked.

Curtis, part nine

Before Leta could fully grasp how the time had passed, she was in the kitchen mid-Saturday afternoon, frying eggs and boiling peas. As she and her new husband ate scrambled eggs for breakfast, she had hoped for something different for lunch, but this was all they had. For supper, she decided, they would have something different. Cleaning the filthy, food encrusted skittle had been a chore, but she managed. And they had fresh butter that she had churned from the milk they had retrieved from Curtis’s two cows first thing that morning.

This was not how she anticipated spending the first full day of her marriage to Curtis, but he was a chicken farmer, and working with livestock was a twenty-four-hour-a-day responsibility. After celebrating their marriage long into the night at a nearby bar, she was still not at her best. The morning coffee helped, and as she thought about it, the exertion she and her husband had done all morning, probably helped, also. But she was fairly tired and hungry.

That’s why she didn’t object to having eggs for lunch as well as breakfast. After all, Curtis raised chickens, and they had not been to the market yet. And they had gathered nearly 150 eggs that morning. This and a dozen other farm chores occupied their entire morning and early afternoon. Not only did they milk the cows, gather eggs and feed the 200 hens, but also while they were feeding the hens, the rooster escaped and it took them nearly an hour together to corner the bird and get it back. Curtis had received several scratches and bites on his arm that Leta washed at the outdoor well and dressed with the cleanest pillow case she could find in the linen closet. They also separated the cream from the milk and churned a batch of butter.

There was such a paternal quality in how he showed her how to milk the cows and operate the butter churn that Leta didn’t have the heart to tell him that she was experienced in such activities. After all, she had grown up with several uncles as farmers and a very handy mother. He seemed impressed that she learned the chores so quickly.

Much of their time was spent repairing a section of the wire around the coop. Leta handed him tools and held parts in place while secured them. During this hard work, he talked about his dreams for the farm, now that he had her, how they would build another coop to double their number of hens, add another cow and sell their milk and butter, perhaps add a few goats and then make cheese. He liked cheese. By the end of the summer, he was certain he could have electricity installed in the house.

If Leta had any say, however, they would have electricity by the end of the month followed by indoor plumbing. She had no intention of fighting the elements several times a day to use the outhouse. Living rustically was fine for a single man, but not a woman as elegant as she was. Besides, she wanted to bring her grandchildren for a visit, and neither Don nor his cousin Connie would be comfortable in such a coarse environment.

The sun was high in the sky when they finished with the fence, and Curtis announced that he was famished.

“How’s about some eggs and peas?” he asked.

“Peas?”

“They’re about ready to be picked, and my Madeline used to cook ‘em with fresh buttermilk. Delicious.”

So there she was, cooking their lunch while Curtis rested on the back stoop with a large glass of water.

Once their lunch was ready, she called him to the table, and he joined her.

At first there was silence. Both were quite hungry after their morning exertion, and just as she was about to speak, Curtis shared his plans for the afternoon:

“I figured that I could show you were some of the wild berry bushes were, and you could get us some berries and make a pie for supper,” he said. “While you were doing that, I’d lay out the plot for the new coop. A’ course the garden needs some tending, and as you could see yerself, there’s more peas ready to be picked, as well as carrots and turnips.”

“But, Curtis,” she said, “first, we need to go to the market.”

To be continued.