Flashback Friday # 182

A Trip To Aunt Joan's

Greetings one & all. Thanks for taking a moment out of your busy day to stop by.

I've told you about how close I was to Aunt Shelly's kids because they were close proximity to us and close to my age. I had other cousins throughout the state of Ohio, but because they lived far away, or were older (therefore meaner), I didn't get close to very many of them. One such set of cousins were Aunt Joan & Uncle Robby's kids.

One of the reasons we didn't see Aunt Joan & her kids more often is because they lived 1 1/2 hours away. I can only remember being at their house twice. The first time I was only eight or so. I don't remember much about that trip. She was having a reunion at her house. We left our house around 9 AM. Back then, there were no video games or DVD players to keep kids interested. You took a book and read until you started feeling queasy. You looked out the windows the rest of the time.

When we finally got there, Aunt Joan had her girls busy in the kitchen helping out. Her boys were finishing up their chores quickly. Uncle Robby was a farmer and everyone was expected to help on the farm. His five kids were taught the ins & outs of farming from their youth. There were three boys & two girls. Gootch, Melany, Robby Jr, Pudgy & Timmy. Timmy was closest to my age.

The boys took us to the hayloft when we learned the fine art of corn warfare. Shell the feed corn, throw it like buckshot, then fling the cob like a grenade. We also were shown how to swing on the pulley that was used to get things up & down from the loft. We also mad forts out of the bales of hay. They boys liked wrestling too. Timmy tackled me and we commenced to go at it. The farm chores had the effect of making him quite strong for his age. I didn't have a chance.

Uncle Robby pulled out his tractor and took all the kids out for a hayride. Once we were done, he asked if anyone wanted to go on another tractor ride. seeing that the only tractors we ever got to ride was riding lawn mowers, we said yes. He hooked the tractor up to a wagon and told us to climb in. when we got over the side, we discovered that it was a manure spreader. He said as long as we stayed off the conveyor belt, we had nothing to worry about. I hugged the side for all I was worth.

As it was beginning to get dark, we all said our goodbyes. We tried at least once a year to have a reunion. Mostly it was in parks in Marion or Masslion. We didn't have them at our kins house very often. By the time we got home, I was asleep.