Paul's Davis farm memories

I would've been 7-9 or 8-10 years old when Beanie was living at Grandpa Davis' farm. One of Grandpa Davis' kids lived "next door" and had a tung-nut orchard, and lots of kids that we played with. To get from Grandpa Davis' farm to theirs you had to follow a path that went through kind of a "hedge" and cross a little stream. I was following Mark that direction one day when he saw a snake and started chasing it. Was a water moccassin, but neither of us knew that until an adult came along and told him to stop chasing it.

It was a long ride from Wiggins to there, and it was always very dark on SH 26 when we were going to visit. The road from the highway to the house was dirt/gravel, and on one of the nights we went to visit Daddy hit a skunk that was crossing the road. He stopped the car, pulled his .22 out from under the seat, and shot the poor creature about 3 times to try to keep the smell from affecting the car. Needless to say, I remember this because that wasn't an effective technique...

I remember being there when Grandpa Davis and his son were going to butcher a hog (pig?). This was the first time Shirley told me about the time when she and her siblings fed a pig until it died of over-eating back on the Bond farm. I'd think she was making that up except she told that story many times later on...

I was spending a week there one summer. Beanie's kitchen looked out on a small back yard where the farm animals wandered and the grandchildren played. I was in that yard when a mare and new colt wandered up, and since I was used to being allowed to give sugar cubes to the horses, I walked up to pet the colt. Momma horse did not like that, and I will never forget what it's like to be standing under a horse that is standing up and flaling forelimbs in my direction...

Beanie came running out of the kitchen and her arms were at least as high as the mare's forelegs. She got the horse calmed down and sent away with the colt, and as I recall, put me to work churning butter inside where she could keep an eye on me.