|
Post by patience on Aug 18, 2013 18:37:41 GMT -6
FROM THE BOTTOM UP
CHAPTER 1
So, for the first time in my life, I bought a nickel bag of pot. And I got caught. Dumbest thing I ever did. How was I to know the guy selling it was a cop? Then, they trumped up the charges to distribution, with two lying cops swearing on a stack of Bibles that I had said I was going to sell it, not smoke it. I was so broke at the time that I ended up with a public defender for a lawyer, and all she knew was for me to cop a plea. It was easier for her because she didn't have to prepare a court case. After a few weeks in the county jail with all the city drunks, wife beaters, and druggies, I was getting nowhere with this. They had me convinced to plead guilty to low quantity drug sales and I took the deal. That was the third dumbest thing I ever did, and cost me 5 years in the State joint.
I reserve dumb thing number two spot for marrying Joanna Potter, the prettiest girl in our small town. She's the reason I was so broke. After a couple years, her spending habits were driving me nuts, and that was the reason I had decided to smoke some pot for the first time in my life. Bad idea. Nobody to blame for it all but me, though. No matter what shortcomings I have, I take a little pride in trying to be a realist, so yep, it was all my fault, the result of my own bad decisions. I listened to the AA meetings in the jail for a pastime, hearing the men admit to being alcoholics. The thought went through my head then, "My name is Wesley Hardin Blake, and I'm a jailbird". Some shame in that, but I sure didn't plan to make a career of it like the druggies and drinking guys. I would have bet anything that as soon as they could find something to drink, they'd be right back at it. That was one problem I didn't have.
The time in the county jail was the worst of it. There was absolutely nothing to do except read the religious tracts that the do-gooder missionary sorts left there, and nothing to look forward to each day but the meals, and they were nothing to write home about. I did read a lot of those tracts, but they were all geared toward getting you to 'repent and seek God's salvation'. I had already repented. What I needed was something to look forward to. My future looked pretty sucky from where I sat. My wife filed for divorce as soon as I got arrested and I signed the papers a few weeks later. That happened a lot to guys who get arrested, according to what the guys in jail said. She ended up with our car and the household goods, including that expensive china she'd had to have. She got the car payments, too, so I guess that was alright. The last I heard, she went home to live with her parents, according to my sister.
Joanna was really an all right kid to start with, just spoiled. Her dad made a lot of money and doted on her. Back then, I was fresh out of the Army, after 4 years in the Motor Pool wrenching on trucks and Humvees. That had gotten me a good job as a mechanic at the Chevy dealership. I'd managed to get a good toolbox bought and paid for, then saved some money. It was hard work, but I enjoyed it. We had a great time for the first few months after we got married in 2001. We were both 25 years old. I just couldn't make money as fast as she could spend it. Other than that, we got along fine. We'd known each other all through school, and had always gotten along, even dated a few times.
My folks did okay, but their factory jobs didn't pay all that well, and I had no interest in going to college if they could have afforded it. I did enjoy tinkering with cars, and had a job through High School at a garage. I had started buying tools back then, looking for cheap deals and learned that good quality was worth the price, in most cases. At this point in my life, my tool box and a few clothes was all I owned in the world. My big sister, God bless her, had gotten those all from my wife and had them stored at her place for me. But I had no place to live when I got out, so I figured I'd have to take the Halfway House deal they offered, where I could work at some crap job until I got enough money ahead to live on my own. That would mean living in the worst part of Indianapolis, and it would be over 100 miles from home. That would be bad, but I'd have to do it somehow.
The penitentiary was rough, but life settled into a routine. Everybody had to have a 'job' of some sort in prison. Nobody really WORKED. They borrowed the Russian saying, "We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us". Most of them ended up in the kitchen, or doing housekeeping, mopping floors or whatever because they didn't know anything else. My mechanic's background got me a job in the General Maintenance Shop, which was some kind of salvation. At least the few men who worked there had a little something on the ball, and I could do something I enjoyed during the day. It was barely enough money to buy coffee, cigarettes if you used them, and some snacks from the prison store they called the Commissary. After work, it was back to the cell block and listening to the overgrown brats misbehaving, fighting over the TV channel, and yelling about whatever small issue they picked on, trying to give meaning to something in their life.
There are predators of many kinds in the prison system, but I didn't have any problem with most of them. I didn't drink, smoke, or gamble, nor was I homosexual, so those pitfalls were easy for me to avoid. I didn't have any big attitude about being a Macho Man or run my mouth, either, which were the other sources of trouble. I was basically a nice guy, and some of the cons did try to take advantage of that, but I dealt with that as best I could.
I learned quick that no matter what happened in there, I didn't see or hear anything. Some guys got stabbed over gambling debts, or other peeves, but you just walk your own way and if asked, you say, "There was a body on the floor? I didn't see a body". It saved all kinds of trouble, and maybe saved your neck. Ratting out another con was a fast way to die.
Most of the time, I could ignore the fence and the razor wire around the joint, the guard towers with their automatic weapons, and the nonsense of the people inside all that. After work, I could go to the library and find something to read, and my sister sent me a book now and then. I began to ask for her to send Haynes car repair manuals that she could get at the local Auto Zone store. She also subscribed me to The Mother Earth News magazine. It wasn't as good as it used to be, but it helped give me some idea about what things cost, and some ideas for cheap ways to live when I got out. May God bless my sister Gloria until the end of her days, and then take her home to heaven! Man, was I grateful. Gloria was 4 years older, and had always looked after her baby brother. I was really bummed with women after Joanna, but if I ever found one like my sister, I'd marry her in a heartbeat and do whatever it took to keep her happy.
At evening mail call, I got letters from Gloria about once a week, and one from my mother maybe every couple months, with check inside for a $100 that went into my Commissary account. That meant I could buy instant coffee, snack foods, shampoo and a few other things the prison did not provide, like thong sandals to keep from getting athlete's foot in the communal showers.
Mom and Dad just couldn't accept that one of their kids was in jail. But Mom said she felt guilty if she didn't do something for me. There was no chance of my parents ever coming to visit me, although Gloria came a few times when she could convince her husband, Bob Stowe, that there was no way he could talk her out of it. She made it a couple times a year, and that helped keep me grounded in reality about the world outside the fence. Bob never came. He wasn't a bad guy, but he always looked down on anyone that worked with their hands for a living, so he didn't think much of me to begin with. When I got locked up, I was anathema to his niche in society. Gloria gave him the blues about that, from what I could tell.
I got locked up in the spring of 2003, and had a 5 year 'bit' to do. I was focused on getting out. Unlike the professional and petty criminals around me, I had a real life to go back to, as little as it was. The men around me saw that, and pretty much left me alone, except for trying to get me do something for them. The penitentiary was not air condiditoned, and in summer the all masonry structure turned into an oven. They sold electric fans in the Commissary, but few had money to buy them. Old ones kept getting traded around as guys finished their time and got out.
I had a good side business going patching up the old fans, repairing eyeglass frames, and fixing radio headphones that had broken wires. I made not telling how many of those things to heat water for instant coffee, or instant soups they sold in the Commisary. It was just any old electric cord cut off of some junked appliance, then a couple pieces of metal with an insulating spacer between them. You just put the metal electrodes in the cup of water and then plug it in until the water was steaming. If you touched the cup or anything close to it while it was plugged in, you would be electrocuted. Nobody died from them, but a few got a lesson in electrical safety.
The cons took to calling me "MacGyver", and said I could fix anything. I got paid in coffee and snacks, and sometimes a favor, such as doing my laundry for the week, or bringing me a some fruit or a good sandwich stolen from the kitchen. The cops all knew about this sort of trade going on and generally ignored it. They couldn't stop it anyway. Their general take on it was that as long as we were messing around with this sort of thing, we weren't killing each other, or them. It meant that my Commissary account was steadily building up a balance of savings. At roughly $120 a month, my pay didn't amount to much, but I didn't spend much, either, after I bought a fan and a radio. I figured that by the time my out date rolled around, I should have at least $1,500 in there, and they paid that out to you in cash when you got out.
There were two cops who ran the General Maintenance shop. Bill Gibbons was pretty cool, for a cop. He was the senior cop there, and that was good, because the other one, Gary Pate, was a punk and aggravated everybody, especially Bill. Gary had a juvenile attitude and caused no end of grief for Bill by keeping his crew upset. He said things to deamean the inmates at every opportunity, probably to assuage his own poor ego. Bill was close enough to retirement that he didn't want anybody rocking his boat, and he had responsibilities to fulfill, so he tried to keep the peace.
Our shop took care of the kitchen equipment that kept everybody fed, a lot of the office equipment, the elevators, some stuff in the ancient steam heating system, and the vehicles. That included the 3 prison transport buses they used to shuffle inmates around between county jails for court dates, and between state prisons if they needed to break up a gang or something. They also had 4 pickup trucks, 2 of them equipped with snowplows for winter use, and there was a motor pool of cars for general staff use. By working on all these, I managed to stay somewhat up to date on mechanical knowledge. It beat the heck out of baking bread or making other food for 1200 men a day in the kitchen with a bunch of total idiots.
In the Fall of 2005, my parents were killed in an auto accident. According to witnesses, some idiot tried to pass them without enough room and took a header into an oncoming garbage truck. They died in the resulting pileup. Bob was good at administrative things, being the business manager at an investment firm. He got a law suit filed on our behalf for wrongful death against the guilty driver. His insurance finally paid off, after a long delayed court battle. To his credit, Bob had stuck with it and kept it moving. He knew that Gloria would benefit by half of it, so he was motivated. He couldn't have cared less about me.
When all was said and done, and the lawyers got their half of the settlement, the remainder did pay off the mortgage on Mom and Dad's old house, and a little left over. Gloria said the place needed some work, so they had a new roof put on it and got the plumbing fixed up. Bob didn't want to sell the house then because real estate values were going up fast. They had it rented out when the real estate bubble popped. Again, to Bob's credit, he tried his best to sell it, to no avail. It was too far out of town, it was an old ranch style built in the 70's, and there were thousands on the market when the real estate market began to run out of buyers with good credit. They kept it rented, but they had to drop the rate. Three months before I got out, they lost their renter and decided that I could live there and pay them rent at half rate, since it was half mine. It was the best thing I had going for me at the time.
I wrote to my old employer at the Chevy dealership about a job, but got turned down. I was pretty despondent over that, but Gloria convinced me to write to a private repair garage across town and that guy agreed to hire me on a straight commission basis. If I didn't produce, it was no skin off his nose, because I would be paid the "flat rate" commission based on what work I actually got done. There was no base salary and there were no fringe benefits. Whatever, it was a job.
Since I had a place to live, some money in my account, and a job lined up, I wasn't required to go to the Halfway House. I breathed a sigh of relief at that. Too many things went on in those places that got guys busted and sent right back to prison. They were full of drugs, and a lot of other things.
Eventually, my release date came around. Seemed like forever to me, but with a sense of something like disbelief, I found myself getting measured up for a pair of cheap jeans and a shirt, a pair of shoes, and a windbreaker to wear when I walked out the gate. A couple of sleepless nights later, I had one day to go.
I had never liked that Gary Pate. I knew better than to say anything to him, let alone give him what he had coming. If you are in prison and ever plan on getting out, you don't cross the cops. Still, he was a typical wannabe who never amounted to much until he got this job as a prison guard. Then he got enough money together for a down payment on that decked out pickup and mortgaged his soul to the finance company to buy it. He brought it into the prison maintenance shop to keep it tuned up and have the guys wash and wax it for him every couple weeks. After we got off work, he used the shop to change his oil and do a lube job on it. From what he said, it was a girl magnet. But he lied a lot.
His last job had been driving a bread truck and he had gotten fired when he wrecked it. Gary fancied himself a ladies man, having curly blond hair and looking a little bit like Alan Jackson, the country singer. He cultivated that look with a mustache to match, and wore cowboy duds when he was off duty. He generally made life miserable for us convicts with his attitude as a guard. Most of the guys said he wanted to be a cop, as we called the guards, because some little girl stole his lunch money in the 3rd grade and he wanted to get back at the world. "Too lazy to work and too scared to steal", was the general assessment that convicts applied to people who took a job as a prison guard.
I had one day left on my bit and I was going home. Nobody really believes that day will ever come when they are locked up, but it does, eventually. I had one more day to work in the maintenance shop, so I decided to make it count. There had been a lot of windy days that Spring, and it blew a lot of dust in from the sand pile they kept around for winter use on sidewalks and the occassional masonry repair job. We had been told to clean up the shop that day, so I swept off the window sills into a dust pan and dumped some of that gritty dust into an empty plastic oil bottle. I refilled it from the bulk barrel with 30 weight and cleaned the bottle thoroughly, then sat it back on the shelf with the full ones, in front.
Gary had me wash and wax his pride and joy one last time and ragged me about it, knowing I was getting out. I smiled at him and said, "Glad to do it one last time, for old times' sake!" The next morning, my sister picked me up at the gate at 7:00 AM in her nearly new Volvo, and off we went.
The next evening after work hours, Gary used the oil in the Maintenance Shop to do a change in his big Cummins diesel engine. I didn't know it, but Gary never made it home the next night. His 3 year old, out-of-warranty truck blew 3 connecting rods on the Interstate about 8 miles from the prison. His boss, Bill Gibbons, couldn't prove anything, but he had a pretty good idea what had happened. He chuckled to himself when Gary wasn't around. Prisons breed some hard characters, convicts and cops alike.
______________
CHAPTER 2
It was June 1st when Gloria took me home to southern Indiana. They still had the gas and electric turned on, and she had moved my clothes over to our parents' old house. She had saved their kitchen utensils, and most of their lawn and garden stuff, and a lot of junk. It was all still in the old detached garage in the back. The house had an attached garage, so they just locked up the old building and left the stuff in there, not being accessible to their past renters. All I needed was some groceries and I would be moved in. We attended to that, and she took me to the branch office to get my driver's license. I opened a checking account with $1,200 of what I'd saved in prison, which left $643 in my pocket. That went pretty fast, buying a few new clothes, a wrist watch, getting a decent haircut, and paying for the groceries. I was amazed at how much things cost now.
Being in my home town was blessing. Salem had it's warts and pimples, but it's a friendly country town, and being the county seat, it's just big enough to have most anything you might need. Retail prices are sometimes a little higher than at the Wal Mart in the city, but you can find a lot of good deals right here at home. It's not hard to get around because it's small, about 6,000 people, and that means most businesses cover several kinds of things. One hardware store has garden stuff and caters to the Amish crowd, while the other one has a big line of tools and a rental center.
Some things had changed in 5 years. There were banks everywhere and way more restaurants than I remembered. There was a new mini mall where the handle factory used to be. The handle factory and the furniture plant had been heavily damaged in a major flood, and both had closed down. But the people were pretty much the same. There was still a crowd at the tiny diner on Main Street in the morning, mostly farmers jawing about crops and the weather. Everybody still knew a lot about everyone else's business, and probably knew your family for a couple generations back. That was good and bad. It meant there was no such thing as privacy like in a big city, but it also meant that you automatically had a network of folks to hook you up with what you needed. I grew up here and I was comfortable with all that.
Wednesday morning of the next week, Gloria drove me to town so I could report to my parole officer as required. I told him I already had a job and I had been working for two days the past week. I would have to submit to drug testing, he would check on me at my job, and come see me at my home. I'd have to tell him ahead of time if I was going to be out of town overnight. Whatever. I signed some papers and left. I knew the guy slightly, and didn't expect any trouble out of him. We were getting along, and that was good. He had read my file from the prison, and didn't expect me to be a problem for him, either. He probably knew how I got shafted on the whole deal, too.
The $1,200 got spent that day. I couldn't have my sister running me around forever, so I hunted up a ride. I saw an ad in the paper and bought a 1978 Chevy 1/2 ton pickup that barely ran for $1,000 cash. It was not pretty. There was cardboard in the seat over some busted springs, and a back fender that waved in the breeze if I got it over 30 MPH. License, 3 months liability insurance, a tag, and a tank of gas had me nearly broke.
What the heck, I thought, it was a ride, and it was mine. I did have a couple hundred left in my pocket. That was good thing, because the battery died the next day. I was amazed that it cost me nearly 100 bucks for a battery and one new cable. I did what was needed to keep it legal, because even a small traffic infraction could land a parolee back in jail. I was bug-eyed scared about that, and took to turning off into a store or something if there was a cop behind me.
Work went pretty well after the first week of mostly doing oil changes and tuneups. The boss decided to let me try some better paying, more complicated jobs and I began to make money. I went to sleep at night reading repair manuals, because I still had some catching up to do on the newer cars.
I didn't really have any friends to speak of now, most of them having married, moved, or something since I got out of high school. Being pretty fresh out of prison, I was paranoid for a while about how people would treat me. It took months before I lost the feeling that I had "convict" tattoed on my forehead, or something. The fact was, only a rare few even knew who I was, and nobody put me down about it. It still took years to gain any self confidence. Having a job, relatives, and the people I worked with helped a lot to make me feel like part of real life again. The bottom line is, it's about how you treat other people that decides how they see you.
I did run into Barry Klein, our class nerd, when I dropped into the computer store one day to look about finding a used one. He was helpful and said the thing to do was look online at Craigslist. I said I can't do that without a computer.
He said, "Oh. Yeah. Well, let me look here for a minute."
He did his tappity- tap thing and said, "Here's one. It's an Acer laptop, and it's cheap. They want $100 for it. Here's the number."
He wrote it on a scrap of paper and handed it to me.
"Can I buy you lunch or something? You didn't make anything on this."
"Nah. Come in when you want to get internet service and we'll fix you up. The boss will be happy with that."
I thanked him and left. I called the guy and when I showed him $80 cash, he took it. A week later I had some money ahead and got wireless internet service. The package came with internet based phone service, for $70 a month and included unlimited long distance calls. Sounded good to me.
The computer would crash if I tried to watch videos on it. I finally figured out it was getting hot. Four pop bottle caps under it allowed more air to get through the mini cooling fan and the problem went away. Maybe that was why I got it so cheap, or maybe it was just because it was a couple years old. Computers depreciate really fast, I had learned. I spent some time learning how it worked, and with a tip now and then from Barry, I fumbled my way through learning how to use the internet. Prison really puts you out of touch with life. _______________
Mom and Dad's house had a two car garage on it, so I used that to work on my old truck some at night. In a few weeks I had found a better seat at the junkyard and gotten the brakes fixed. Donny Whitson was the old man who owned the junkyard. He remembered me from my high school days when I bought parts from him. He treated me right on the old parts I needed. The engine burned oil, but it started and ran pretty good. I had put some cheap new spark plugs in it and new plug wires. That got it running smooth again. I wired the fender down where a brace had rusted off, then put some STP in the engine and the oil pressure came up to something near normal. If I babied this thing, it would probably run for quite a while. The front tires were pretty bald, so I found a couple off a wreck at the junk dealer's for 20 bucks apiece and got them bubble balanced for another $10. They ran smooth enough if I kept it under 50 MPH.
I gave the thing a good bath and cleaned out the cab, then went over the inside with a scrub brush and some soapy water. When I put the better seat back in and added a cheap seat cover, it began to look better. The old 350 V8 was a gas hog, but at least it was a stick shift, so I was getting better than ten MPG around town. I could live with that no more than I drove. My boss came up with some old snow tires for the back, and I saved one of the old ones for a spare. It was August now, and things were looking a little better for me. I even had almost $1,000 in my checking account again, but I had learned how fast that could disappear with the high prices now.
As soon as I could after getting settled in the job and got my truck in shape, I had used Dad's old tiller to dig up their small garden spot. I had set out some tomato plants and put in lettuce, radishes, green beans, and two short rows of sweet corn. We had grown up with his gardening, and it just didn't seem right to not have it going. I even put in two rows of late potatoes. Groceries were getting more expensive, so it made sense to me. I didn't have any idea about canning food, but I could eat cheaper all summer, then put potatoes in the basement and leftover sweet corn in the freezer.
I began to think about paying Gloria and Bob for their half of the place so I could do what I wanted to with it, but I didn't have the money and my credit was shot. I felt like I was living somewhat at their mercy, and I didn't care for that with Bob in the picture. He liked to think he was a smart money man, and I knew he had wanted to sell the place and invest the proceeds. That would be all right with me, if I had some notice, but we needed to talk about that.
I was still having to tinker with the old truck regularly to keep it going, and that took some money. Sometimes I had to walk the mile and a half to work because the truck had problems. The shifter linkage, a throwout bearing, headlights, hoses, and belts all went bad, but I was gaining on it. I put a rebuilt alternator on it, and patched up some wiring. The floorboard had a couple holes that I patched with junk sheet metal and some self tapping screws. The cancer in the truck bed was too much, so I gave $200 for a used bed from Donny, and he had the guys help me get it put on with their big front loader. I gave the whole works a coat of Wal Mart's finest dark blue spray paint, over the rust and all. At least it was all the same color now.
When my Parole Officer came by the house to check on me one afternoon, I was picking green beans.
He asked, "Did you get a different truck?"
"No, I just got a used bed and some spray paint."
"Well, it looks a lot better. You doing all right?"
"Yeah. The job is making more money. Seems like a lot of people are getting their cars fixed now, instead of trading them in. We're busy. I put in almost 60 hours last week."
"Look, the reason I came out is, I'm going to cut you loose from parole early. You are established here, and have a good job, no problem with drug tests. I feel confident you will be fine, so I put in the reccommendation. Stay out of trouble until the end of August next week, and you'll be finished. I brought the paperwork."
He handed me my copy and we shook hands. "Thanks! I guess I'm a citizen again."
"I don't need to waste time on guys like you. There are a lot of people getting released from prison early because of State budget constraints, and I have a big case load. Most of them are problem children. You aren't."
"I guess that's a compliment."
"Yes, it's a compliment. Keep up the good work."
I thanked him again as he left. He wasn't a bad guy. I suppose we had been as near to friends as you ever could be with a parole officer.
When he was gone, I thought about what had happened to me and although I liked women as much as any young man, I had no interest in getting married again. I could run my life just fine without that. And a lot of girls my age were really selfish. They were just out for what they could get. I had been listening to stories from our customers and it did not bode well for anybody dating now. So far, since I had got out of prison I hadn't dated anyone. I wasn't sure I wanted to start. _________________
I took a bread sack full of green beans and some nice ripe tomatoes over to Gloria. I knew she didn't have a garden, because Bob was NOT going to till up his acre and a half of grass. He probably spent more on that lawn than it cost me to live each month. My old truck did not complement the neighborhood very well, so I hadn't gone there often, but Gloria was my sister and I wanted to do what I could for her. She came out the back door and smiled at me, followed by her beautiful Golden Retriever. They didn't have any kids, so she mothered the dog.
"Hi Wes! How're you doing? Sandy, let him alone." Sandy, the dog, was giving me a slurpy dog kiss.
"I'm fine. I brought you some veggies."
"Come in and we'll get something to drink."
"You all doing okay?"
"We're fine. Bob's business is falling off. With all the credit problems in the banks, people are scared to invest in anything and it has cut into our income. Things are getting tight. I wish we'd never bought this big house. Bob doesn't want kids, and we don't need 4 bedrooms. But he had it bought before we got married, and now it probably isn't worth what we owe on it. He was going to flip it and make a ton of money, but that isn't going to happen now."
"Are you going to be all right?"
"I think so. If we can get Mom and Dad's house sold, it would help a lot. That would pay down some loans for us and we'd be comfortable again. He thinks he might have a prospect for it."
"I can find a place to live, so don't worry about me in the deal. I could use my half of the money, too." ___________________
CHAPTER 3
I suppose I'm not a bad looking guy. I'm in good shape, just over 6 feet tall and a little over 170 pounds, with brown hair and blue eyes, and kind of a bony face that can be a problem shaving if I'm not careful. I've usually got grease under my fingernails and grease stains on my clothes, so i don't make the impression that i'm told most girls are looking for. I do clean up okay, and I try to be clean if I'm going out shopping or to grab a meal. I got some looks from girls, but it always made me think about what happened the last time I fell for that.
I was going through the checkout at the discount grocery at near closing time when the checkout girl said, "You're Wes Blake, aren't you?"
"Yeah. Do I know you?"
"Don't remember me, I guess. I'm Ashley Kemper. We were in the same class in high school."
I finally could see the resemblance to the girl I had known slightly 8 or 10 years ago.
"Yeah! I remember you! You were the quiet math whiz that made us all look bad. You wore a pony tail back then."
"Yeah, and braces. I was so ashamed of them I wouldn't talk to anyone."
"I always thought you were nice. I should have asked you out."
"But Joanna had your eye then."
My face fell to the floor and she saw it.
"Sorry. I said something wrong, didn't I? I didn't mean to."
"That's okay. Me and Joanna didn't work out."
"That's a shame," she said and finished checking me out, handing me the change from a couple twenties.
"Over and done with now. How about you? Did you ever get married?"
"No. I came close, but glad I didn't. Me and that guy didn't work out, either. So, are you dating anybody now?"
"No, not since I've been home. You knew all about that, I suppose?"
She helped me sack up my groceries, saying, "I heard a little. The word on the street is that you got hung for dealing dope and you didn't do it."
"Oh, I bought some all right, but that was just possession. They lied and said I was going to sell it, 'cuz the cops and the prosecutor had this deal going, I was told. Nice little back-patting society they had to make each other look good. Trumped up a misdemeanor to a minor felony and I got 5 years."
She was pulling out her cash drawer as we talked, then said, "Follow me down to Taco Bell, and we can talk about old times over something to eat?"
"Yeah, I'd like that." I broke my vow to myself right there on the spot. I was afraid her looks had gotten to me, because she was really a pretty girl now. But it was what she had to say and how she said it that really got my attention.
I took my time getting my groceries put in the truck, and waited until she came out. She got into an old Ford Focus that had seen better days, and took off. I followed at a discreet distance.
She ordered a meal and had it paid for before I could say anything. "I was gonna buy," I told her.
"I invited, so I'm buying my own."
We got our food and sat in a booth away from the counter where it was quieter. The cheap food attracted a lot of teenagers, and they tended to be noisy. The noise actually gave us some privacy to talk, since nobody could hear us. I started the ball rolling.
"What have you been doing?"
"I got a scholarship for a couple years at college, but when it ran out, that was it. I wasn't going to borrow money for school, and my folks couldn't afford it. So I went to work. I'd been dating a guy for a while and we had talked about getting married, but he got mad one night and smacked my face. That was it. I haven't seen him since."
"I got no respect for a guy who would hit a girl. That just ain't right."
"I hit him back. Pretty hard, too. I sprained my wrist, but I broke his nose, too. He couldn't see to drive with his eyes all teared up, so I drove his car to my folks house and got out. I guess he drove himself home later."
I looked her over a little closer and saw that she had a sturdy build. She wasn't heavy, but she was solid. She saw the look and said, "I grew up on Dad's farm and worked like the men. I was probably stronger than he was, just not as big."
I tried to change the subject. "You been working at the store very long?"
"Just since last year. What are you doing now?"
"I'm a mechanic. I'm working at John Wilson's garage now."
"Oh, I'm glad you got a good job. Jobs are impossible to find now. I had a job at the Title and Abstract Company office until they cut back last year. Real estate slowed down to nothing. I got my old car paid off at least, but it needs some work now and I don't know if I can afford it."
"Let me figure out what's up with your car and I'll make sure you can afford it."
"Oh, I didn't mean that. I'm not asking for favors."
"I know. I'm offering. I can do it at home, not at the shop. I'm living at Mom and Dad's old place now."
"Where is that?"
"Place where I grew up, just at the edge of town past the Fairgrounds on old Highway 160."
"That's not too far from me. I'm staying with my parents, too. Just can't afford to move out."
"My folks are gone now. They died in a car crash almost 4 years ago."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
"It's okay. What I meant was, it's just up to me about working on your car at home. I rent from my sister and her husband, Gloria and Bob Stowe. They own half of it since we never did get the place sold and the estate settled. Oh, it's settled on paper, but it's a joint deed to the place. I agreed to pay half rent until we can get it sold. I needed a place to live when I got out of prison. It's working okay for now."
"You sound really mature. It's in your eyes, too. Like you see right through people."
"Huh. Well, I guess I 've been a lot of places and seen a lot of things. First the Army I went to play in the sandbox, because I couldn't find a good job right out of school. That could have been worse. I was in the motor pool keeping the vehicles running. Then I got married, I worked until she spent me broke and I got sent to prison. Kinda been to see the elephant, as they used to say."
"That makes my life seem pretty tame."
"I'll take a tame life if I can get it."
It was getting late, and I had to work the next day, so we headed outside. She was off work the next day. I told her where I lived and she said she'd bring her car around for me to look at tomorrow. We traded phone numbers and said goodbye. I went home feeling better than I had in a long time, and hoping that I wasn't starting something stupid. _____________
I worked a little late the next day to finish a valve job that paid me 6 hours for Remove and Replace, which meant that we had sent the machine work downtown. At $15 an hour that paid 90 bucks and I had it done in under 4 hours actual time. I would have still gotten paid $90 if it had taken me a week. Getting paid 'flat-rate' was sort of like being in business for yourself.
When I drove in at home, I called Ashley and told her I was ready for the car. She came in the drive a few minutes later. I was still grubby dirty from work and was ready to appologize for it. I was surprised to see that she was in dirty jeans and a Tee shirt, and wearing boots that had been in a barn. Her sandy colored hair was pulled back in a knot under a ball cap and she had a smudge on her chin.
"Looks like you've been working too," I told her.
She grinned and said, "Dad was moving cattle today. I live there, so I got appointed to help. Dad works for the County Road Department, and has to do the farming after work."
"What can you tell me about the car?"
"It gets crappy gas mileage and it doesn't run worth a darn. It used to do a lot better."
"Burn any oil?"
"Not that I noticed. Maybe down a little when it comes time to change it. I do that, so I check it."
"Had the oxygen sensor replaced since you had it?"
"I don't know what that is."
"It's a little thing that screws into the exhaust pipe and tells the computer how to mix the gas and air. I guess it hasn't been replaced yet. Let's listen to it a minute. Start it up."
It ran okay at idle, but most any engine would. I held my hand over the exhaust for a few seconds then smelled my hand. "Running a little rich, 'cause I can smell gas. Shut it off and I'll see if I can get the sensor out. I brought my top tool box home tonight. How does it run on the highway?"
"Okay, but it's doggy. No power to pass like it used to have. I hope I don't need an engine in this thing."
"I doubt it's that bad. C'mon in and let's get some iced tea. That's something I like, it's a lot cheaper than sodas, and I can make it easy enough."
The exhaust was hot, so we let it cool down a few minutes while we both got some cold tea out of the fridge. I looked under the hood and decided it could use a set of plugs and wires, too. It took about 10 minutes to get the sensor out, being rusty like they mostly are, and hard to get to. It had anti-sieze compound on it though, so it came out without damaging the threads.
"C'mon and get in the truck. Auto Zone is still open and they should have the part."
"I didn't bring any money. I'll have to go home and get some."
"I'll get it. You can pay me later. Besides, I get a discount."
The sensor cost $32, it was $4 each for 4 plugs, the best grade platinum tips, and $18 for the plug wires. It took less than an hour to get it all put back on and running again. I had to adjust the idle speed down a little after the tuneup.
"Take it for a drive and see if I did any good here."
I got in with her and she drove a mile down the highway, then turned off on a county road.
"Hey! This thing's got it's pep back! You did good!"
"I didn't think it was too bad off. How many miles are on it?"
"Almost 150,000 and that had me worried."
"It should run another 50K without any major trouble, since you change oil regular. Oh, it might want some hoses or a radiator, or some other smaller items, but the drive train should go a while yet."
"This is home," she said as she pulled in a lane and drove up to an old fashioned farm house. A neat set of old buildings lay beyond it. An older man was driving cattle out a corral by the barn.
"You get finished Dad?"
"Yeah. Ran 'em all through the squeeze chute and finished giving the shots. I hate buyin' shipped in calves. They always get sick." When the cattle were all out of the barn lot, he shut the pasture gate and came up to us.
"This is Wes Blake. I gotta go get money to pay him for fixing my car." She trotted off toward the house.
"I'm Joe Kemper," the man said, and stuck out his hand.
We shook hands and began to do the small town get-acquainted thing. I told him my parents' names and gave him some history. He caught on quick and said, " Yeah, I know who you are. Most folks around here think you got a raw deal. Sorry 'bout your folks. I knew your Dad a little, and always heard good about you all. What're you doin' these days?"
"I'm working for John Wilson's garage. It's flat rate, so I get paid for whatever I get done. I can do all right at that, but there's no insurance or anything, just Workman's Comp."
"When did you get home?"
"The first of June. I'm living in my folks' old place, until me an' my sister can get it sold and settle things. I'll have to find another place then, but I get half the money from the house. I'll find something."
We talked on for half an hour and got to know each other. I got a look at their farm operation. It was small by today's standards, but it was respectable. Finally Ashley came out again. She had washed up and had her hair in a ponytail and had on clean clothes.
"That's not fair! I still look like a bum," I told her.
"I decided I would cook your supper for a tip on the car work. You can clean up while I cook. You do have food in the house, right?"
"Yeah, I've got food. And that would be nice to not have to eat my own cooking for a change."
"I know the parts cost $71, or close enough, so what do you want for labor and I'll pay you now."
She had passed my little test with flying colors. I had been willing to gamble my labor and even the parts money to find out if she was going to try to get the best of me on the deal.
"Just pay me for parts and call it good. I haven't had a home cooked meal in years. That'll be enough."
"You said you get paid $15 an hour, right? So here's $90. You earned it and then some. You're honest and that is worth a lot to me."
Her Dad smiled a little and said, "Don't try to argue with her when her mind's made up. I never had any luck at it."
There were crinkles around his eyes when he said that. I decided I liked him. I rolled my eyes a little and pocketted the money. I grinned and told her, "Now let's see about that cooking thing. I'm anxious to learn about that."
"Okay, let's go do that."
We got in the car and were soon at my place. She was a good cook. I had some freshly dug potatoes that she peeled, sliced and fried in bacon grease, and she found my leftover green beans and heated them up, and had some ham slices frying in another skillet. She'd dug in the fridge and made a salad with lettuce, sliced radishes, and tomatoes. It all got to the table at the same time, as I was combing my wet hair from a shower. I had clean jeans and a Tee shirt now, so I looked more presentable. I made some instant coffee and we sat on the patio in back to drink it.
"You have a garden going."
"Not much of one, but that's where I got the green beans and potatoes and the salad. I'm not much of a farmer, but I can get a meal together if I have to."
"You are different. I haven't put it all together yet."
"No mystery about me. What you see is what you get."
"That's what's different. Most of the guys I know are full of talk about themselves and you don't say anything unless I dig it out of you, then it's the plain truth. It's nice to be able to talk to somebody who isn't playing head games."
"I've had enough head games to do me for a lifetime."
"I'll bet you have. You want to come to our house for Sunday dinner?"
"That sounds good. What are you having?"
"What do you want?"
"Peach pie. The rest is up to you."
"Call it a date." __________________
CHAPTER 4
That dinner probably sealed my fate. It was good. I met her mother Kate, and found her to be strong in many ways. Her dad and I talked shop a little, as men do, and in the process I told him I had in mind to watch for a deal on a car to fix up and sell to make a few extra dollars. He allowed as how he might know of something for me. Her mother was pleasant and friendly, but I could tell she was looking me over good.
My sister called the next day and said they had a nibble on the house. Would it be all right to show it to the people? I told here sure, come ahead. That was the beginning of a lot of trouble because the people decided to buy the place. It meant I had to find a place to rent within a couple weeks, because they wanted to get moved in before school started. Oh joy. I hate moving.
I did find a trailer to rent not far from downtown. It was cheap and it was close to work, but it had no outside space and no garage. Gloria convinced Bob to store the stuff from the garages that I wanted to keep. They had a big "workshop" building he called it, although he never did a lick of work in it. It was a place to store his toys, like the boat, his expensive zero turn mower, an ATV, and his motorcycle. Actually, when I got the stuff all stacked in the building in a corner and threw a tarp over it, he said it didn't look as bad as he thought it would. That's why I put the tarp over it all. I understood Bob's need for good appearances. It saved me renting some storage space. After I left, I remembered that the motorcycle wasn't there. I talked to Gloria on the phone later and she said he'd sold it.
Selling the place then was the best possible thing that could have happened for us, because a month later, nobody could find a mortgage loan anywhere for less than 25% down payment and nobody had that much saved. The real estate market fell on its' butt when the bank troubles were in the news in September. I got online and did some researching about that. At least the trailer park had internet service, and it was a fast wireless provider. What I found got me worried. It seemed that the banks had sent their man to Congress and told them they needed vast amounts of money to bail them out, or the whole system would crumble. They got their money, but nobody liked it much.
I had just a week of feeling very comfortable with $52,000 from the house sale in the bank, before I got really worried about whether the bank was a safe place to have it or not. I got online and found there were ratings for banks, and by dumb luck, I had picked the only 4 star bank in town. It was locally owned and that was a good thing too, but it still worried me. I had no idea how much worry it could be to have some money and not know what to do with it. I Googled like a madman and ran into financial sites, and then gold sites, and then some sites where the people called themselves "preppers". They scared the daylights out of me. The more I read, the more concerned I was. A lot of people were convinced that our money and banking system was ready to collapse in a pile. I had learned a lot, but had more questions than ever.
I tend to keep things to myself, so Ashley got to prodding me about what was on my mind. I finally told her and she said, "Let's go talk to Dad," so we did.
After hearing my concerns, he said, "Well, when I'm not sure what to do, I try not to do anything until I get it figured out."
"That makes a lot of sense to me, " I told him, "but I still need to figure out if the bank is going to be safe or not."
"Okay, in the meantime, hunt up a couple more high-rated banks and spread it around. That way, you've got a better chance if something goes wrong at one of them."
So simple. Why didn't I think of that? The old guy had a lot of common sense and it helped calm me down. We talked for most of the evening about what I wanted in the way of a place to live and how I might get there. Joe was a much better advisor than I had ever dreamed, and when he said things they were simple to understand.
He began with, "In hard times, prices come down, especially on big things that people have to borrow money to buy. You got lucky, it seems to me, getting that house sold when you did. The TV says that banks are hard up and need this bailout from the government. If that's so, then they're not going to be loaning money as easy as they have been. Most already want a big down payment they said, and nobody has any savings to speak of now. They all live hand to mouth. Looks to me like if you just hang onto your money for year or so, you'll find a lot better deal on property."
I decided he had the best idea. The next day I moved money to a total of four banks. They all paid a little interest on a passbook savings account, and I didn't want to tie up the money in anything like a CD. _________________
Joe did find me a car to fix up. Some old lady at their church had it and would be going into an assisted living home soon. She had no use for the car since she could no longer drive. It was a 1998 Chevy Malibu with a crumpled fender and 56,000 miles on it. She was asking $1,000 for it. Other than needing a tuneup, I couldn't find anything else wrong with it and paid her in cash. She signed the title and I put down on the price line what seemed fair to me, and got it licensed in my name. I called the insurance people to get immediate coverage, and duct taped the tail light back on.
I washed my old truck, wiped the tires with brake fluid to make them look younger, and put a for sale ad in the paper. I got my $1,200 for it 4 days after the paper came out. I had about gotten my money back what I'd spent on the truck, and had driven it for 3 months. It seemed that used cars and trucks were in demand. People couldn't afford new ones.
It took a couple weeks to beat the Malibu's fender into shape enough that body putty would finish it. I never claimed to be a body man, but the result looked okay after some touch up spray paint. I put a used tail light on it, and did a detail cleaning job, then a tuneup. I bought a gallon of xylol paint solvent for $10.99, which is the main ingredient in fuel injector cleaner and a lot cheaper. I added some every time I filled up with gas. After a couple tanks, it was running smooth as silk. The hoses and belts looked old and dried out, so for the sake of preventing trouble, I went ahead and replaced them all. It took a while to replace all those little vacuum hoses, but it didn't cost much and made a big difference in how it ran. When the car was as good as I could make it, I still had spent only about $300 more than what I got for the truck, license and all. This car had 100,000 less miles on it and was 20 years younger than the truck.
I wanted to be able to haul things, so I bought a trailer hitch kit and installed that in my so-called driveway. The gravelled strip was barely longer than the car. I needed more room to do anything much. There was room on the grass beyond my parking spot to park something, so that's where the little utility trailer went. I had seen it sitting in the guy's yard with a for sale sign, and we made a deal. It turned out he needed money to fix his ATV, so I took a look at that and did the work as part of the trailer price. We were both happy. It was a 4' x 7', one of the smallest, but suitable for me. They sold at the farm stores for around $500 but this one had a little rust and was a little banged up. All told, I gave him $250 in cash and did a couple hours work for it. It wanted some new treated floor boards and a coat of paint, and it looked like new.
There were a lot of late nights for me on the computer, researching everything I could find about money, investments, and real estate prices. I desperately wanted to own a place to live, and what I was reading said I needed enough ground to raise some food, too. My thinking was, I needed a place to work on cars, or whatever else might come along. What I read about money said that the value of a dollar was going down. I knew prices on groceries and other things had gone up, but from what I saw, real estate was going down, so I decided to wait on buying anything.
I was making more than enough money to live on. The trailer rent was $200 a month. Water and sewage were included, but I had to pay for electricity and natural gas for cooking, hot water and heating. The utilities cost me about $90 to $100 a month. My take home pay had been running between $450 and $630 a week. I had been spending less than $400 a month for a gasoline, food, and eating out with Ashley. That even included some 'new' clothes at the Goodwill and Salvation Army stores. I had anywhere from $1000 to $1800 a month left over and it was going into cash savings, like, stuffed in the mattress cash. The natural gas cost more when the weather began to get cold, but only went to $130 a month at most. By Thanksgiving, I felt a little flush with cash for the first time in my life with over $4000 in my cash stash.
I was not a trusting soul, so I had loosened a piece of the interior panelling and removed some insulation from the bedroom wall. The old trailer was a little beat up so it didn't show, and I kept a dresser sitting in front of it. There were bundles of twenties in there, and a few fifties. I didn't want many big bills. I had mentally weighed the dangers of fire in the trailer, vs my car getting stolen if I kept money in there. I wanted a more secure spot, but that was the best I could do then.
My rented trailer had two bedrooms, and I only used the small one. The back bedroom was larger and had vinyl floor covering. I took the bed apart and set it up against the wall so I had more floor space for storage. I began to spend more on the tools of my trade, because the prices were going up. I learned long ago that those tool trucks that come around to mechanic's shops are a rip off. I could buy good imported tools with a guarantee at Auto Zone for far less money. If I broke it, they replaced it, just like Sears, but for half the price. A lot of my new tools got stored at home in the trailer, since I had what I needed at work. I was buying bigger stuff for working on farm equipment and trucks in case I could get a better job doing that.
An auction provided a bucketful of top quality 1" drive sockets. I found a 1" drive impact wrench at the dump that somebody had thrown away, the kind they use to change big truck tires. It had a 1/4" air fitting on the inlet, so I knew why they thought it was no good. It couldn't get nearly enough air through that. I took it apart and gave all the pieces a bath in gasoline with a brass wire brush, dumped the gas on some grass in the driveway, and put it back together with plenty of oil. I ordered some 1/2"air fittings from an industrial supplier, and 1/2" air hose from Harbor Freight online. When I took it to work and tried it out, I had only spent about $200 on the pile and had a good, made in the USA, Chicago Pneumatic impact wrench that would twist off a truck axle. I didn't need it at work, so it got stashed at home. Retail, it would have cost me over $1,000 for the sockets and impact wrench.
The county landfill provided me with a very rusty old floor jack that turned out to be a Blackhawk 1 1/2 ton unit. It was stuck, full of water, and wanted a few repairs. I got it unstuck and got the water out of the cylinder, refilled it with oil and patiently worked it up and down dozens of times until it worked freely. I knew a guy who did sandblasting on the side, and had the jack and a whole pile of other tools cleaned down to the bare metal. I spent evenings getting it all a fresh coat of paint when the weather allowed.
The junkyard had a chain hoist that had a crack in the housing. I bought that and some junk log chains for $18 and gave them the wash and and clean routine, then sprayed them with aluminum paint to prevent more rust. The hoist I got fixed at the local welding shop, and when it was repainted, it looked like a new one. Harbor Freight had a sale going where I found a trolley for the chain hoist that fit an I-beam, and I brought it home. I dreamed of the day when I would have a place of my own to set it all up. __________________
CHAPTER 5
Ashley and I had talked about this and she had been bugging me to set up shop at her Dad's place. She thought that would kill a whole flock of birds with one stone. Her Dad's stuff needed some work, for which he would provide space in his machine shed. I needed a place to put my stuff, and a place to work on vehicles to buy and sell. I hated to be beholden to my girlfriend's parents, but I finally decided it would be a good thing for now and made the move.
She was spending more and more time at my place, and her parents were surely aware of what was in store. We spent some afternoons together and more than a few nights. The times when I woke up from a nightmare ready to fight, she helped get me awake and then settled down enough to sleep again. It was less often now, but I still dreamed about war and prison every night, it seemed like. Although I didn't always remember the dreams, I knew the after effects well. I had never had a shoulder to cry on before. It made me feel an inch high to have her see me terrified and crying, but she made it go away. I knew I had found the woman I wanted. I couldn't understand what she saw in me, but if she was happy, I was in heaven. We made our plans to get married later in the Spring. _________________
Joe's combine was old and needed work before next wheat season, so I spent many hours on it, under it and inside of it that winter. We had cobbled up a wood stove out of a barrel and got some heat in the drafty old machine shed. When we cut some firewood, Joe taught me how to use chainsaws without hurting myself, and I taught him how to keep them running. He was a steady old guy, never working fast, but always moving and making something happen. We got comfortable working together that winter. He got his machinery in good shape for the next season, and I made some money on a couple cars that I put through the shop.
Back in the Fall, I had read some things that made silver coins look like a good investment. I was brand new at investing of any kind, but I figured that I had to do some gambling at this point. What money I had wasn't enough to get me a place to live without a mortgage, and I had learned enough to know I didn't want to go in debt. My life had been a series of disasters, and I just couldn't see getting into anything like a 20 or 30 year mortgage with things as shaky as they looked to me. So, if I could make some money with something like silver or gold, I would stand a chance of having my dream. Still, I wasn't fool enough to jump in the deep water without testing it. I left the money from the house sale in the banks.
The last week of October I took the money out of the wall in the trailer and counted it up. I had just over $5,000 with that month's savings. I had talked to several people on some financial and homesteading forums about this, and got a reccomendation to buy old US silver coins, made before 1964 when they still had 90% silver content. I took my pile of cash to an old established coin shop in Louisville, and found that a little over $4,000 would get me two bags of silver, each with $250 face value of coins. The 'spot' price of silver then was $9.12 an ounce.
The bags were pretty heavy, and too bulky to fit nicely in the trailer wall, so I talked to Joe and we found a place to hide it in the machine shed. The bags fit into a couple old gallon paint buckets that we sat on the shelf with the grease and oil and filters. The next three months I made enough on the cars I fixed up and sold to get another $250 bag, but the spot price had gone up to $11 an ounce, so that cost me $2450. That meant my original 2 bags were now worth $4900, so that was okay with me. I kept watching the price of real estate on the Multiple Listing Service online and it was steadily trending down. Silver was going up, so it made sense to me to keep up what I was doing.
CHAPTER 6
Ashley had money sense, there was no doubt of that, so she really shocked me when she said she wanted a nice engagement and wedding ring set. I was shocked beyond speech until she called me over to the computer and showed me what she wanted. It looked like a million bucks, but it was a 1/2 carat Zirconia stone in a beautiful white gold ring setting she found on eBay for $62, with shipping. My confidence was restored.
I said, "That was rotten to do that to me."
She replied, "Yes, I know, but I hoped it would make you more secure about me when you figured it out. I didn't let you hang for more than a minute. I'm sorry if it really bothered you."
"Well, I wouldn't say it really bothered me THAT much, but I thought I was having a flashback for a minute there."
She got up from the desk and put her arms around me and said, "Let me make it up to you, okay?"
I had no problem with that.
We got married at the Courthouse in the Clerk's Office with the cheapest wedding I had ever heard about. She had things to do and so did I, so we did it on my lunch hour when she had a day off. Her parents came with us and John Wilson came to act as a witness. Joe and Kate took us out for a really nice dinner that evening at a fine restaurant and that was the extent of our celebration. Well, that's all that we were willing to talk about. ________________
It wasn't all work and no play for us newlyweds, although we spent 3 or 4 evenings a week at her folks place while I worked on whatever project I had going then. We made a trip to the city every two weeks, shopping for our needs and digging for bargains at the Goodwill and the big flea market in Clarksville. There was always a golden oldie movie on Hulu, and we picked up one now and then from the Wal Mart discount bin. We both liked popcorn made in a pan on the stove with real butter. Neither of us smoked, and what alcohol we drank didn't amount to anything. We bought a 24 pack of canned beer at the grocery when it was on sale, and it took us a month or more to drink it, but it went well with popcorn and a movie. Both of us hated crowds, so we never went to a theater. Worse than the crowds were the prices.
In February of 2009, the TV stations all went to the new digital signal, so our $5 set from Goodwill wouldn't work until we got a converter box a few months later when they went on sale. We seldom watched TV anyway. There was too much for us to do. In summer, there were the various small town festivals, the county fair, and holiday events. It all happened within a mile or less of our trailer, so we walked to most of them. It was less trouble than finding a place to park. We did each have a Tracphone, literally the cheapest cellphone around. They got used only when we needed to change plans or something like that. We just didn't have much need for a phone, not being into the social side of them. We spent something like $8 each a month to keep that going.
I had told Ashley that her money was hers and mine was too, and we opened a joint checking account as soon as we had gotten married. I never thought I'd ever trust a woman that much again, but she earned it. I told her that I'd never have married her if I had not been able to trust her with my money. She spent money on a few clothes at the Goodwill, mostly, and a little at Wal Mart, always from her own check. I had to nudge her to spend on anything beyond what she earned.
Her big interest for a while had been cast iron cookware, so she was delighted when I brought home some crusty-rusty skillets and a Dutch oven from the junkyard. They cost me an average of $2 each. She found a pair of old pots at a flea market in town, and got an old handsaw, a carpenter's square, 2 hammers and a wood plane at the same time. The guy must have needed the money, because he sold the whole pile for 20 bucks. We tried several things to get the stuff cleaned up, but I finally took it all to my sandblaster buddy and he did it all for $30. All we had to do was polish the stuff with sandpaper and put a finish on it. The carpenter tools got paste wax to prevent rust, and the wood handles got sanded and varnished. The cast iron cookware got bacon grease and an hour in the oven at low temperature, repeated until she was happy with it.
College had been a disappointment for Ashley. She had expected to learn something new and enlightening, but found she was bored by the content covered in the first two years. It hadn't done a thing for her job prospects, either. The internet was an entirely different thing, though. She spent hours in the mornings digging around and learning new things. She let me check the financial sites before I went to work at 7:00 AM, then it was hers until she had to go to work at 10:00. We read the world news together over supper, and then if we weren't going to work at the farm, we took turns reading the homesteader sites. Ashley really got into those sites after I showed her a few I'd found. That gave both of us the urge to get a place out of town. The trailer park was very confining at times, even though we could go to her parents' farm in 15 minutes.
Springtime brought the threat of tornadoes in south Indiana, and that made us very insecure. If there was bad weather predicted, we went to the farm and if there was a storm warning, we all went to their basement. Ashley and I talked about the shelves full of home canned food in their basement, and how nice it would be to have that. It got us thinking about property until it had become almost an obsession. I had kept adding to the silver collection whenever I had the extra money. Ashley contributed some to the savings sometimes. We thought it would take forever to save enough to buy a place. Then we discovered foreclosed properties. ______________
CHAPTER 7
The online Multiple Listing Service had a search feature that could be refined to look at foreclosures only. It didn't take long to find some properties that we could afford, but none of them looked like what we wanted. Cities and towns had too many restrictions for me to start doing car repair at home. We needed something out in the county that was zoned for agriculture. In our lax county, that left the door open for almost anything within reason.
Nothing struck us as being close to what we wanted, so we bided our time. Real estate prices were still dropping. By the end of March, I had added another sack of silver to our collection. Spot price had gone up to $13 or more an ounce, so this $250 bag cost me $2,900. That made an even $1,000 in coins we had, that had cost me $9,350. It was worth $10,600 now. So far, this was beating the socks off bank interest rates on savings. I was scared to death the price would fall, but the investment sites were all saying it would keep going up because of all the money being printed and given to banks. I decided to hold onto it for a while. That cheap computer had been worth a lot, for what I had been learning with it.
Ashley saw a place she liked in the regular for sale listings and wanted to go look at it. It had 5 acres and a nice metal building behind a 3 bedroom ranch style home. They were asking $148,000 for it all, and I thought that was stupid expensive, but I agreed to go look at it. We rode out to see it with the agent and listened to her tell about how wonderful the place was, with the beautiful lawn in front. When I saw it, it looked like it would take all day to mow it. I thought maybe you could put a couple beef calves out there to eat some of that grass, but there wasn't a fence anywhere on the place.
After we'd toured the place, we asked the lady if she had anything that was nearer to being a hobby farm than a residence? Something with a less expensive home and some farm buildings? She thought a minute and said, well there's a fixer-upper out this way, but it's not all that nice. She drove about 5 miles from Cambellsburg across the flat farmland until we came to the long hill leading down to Cave River Valley. That hill is steep. It would be a pain to get out of there in snowy weather.
We looked at it and liked it. The house was old, a pretty standard old 6 room farmhouse, 4 rooms downstairs plus an added bathroom, and 2 bedrooms upstairs with the old sloped ceilings. There was a small barn, but it was in rough shape.
Several sheds dotted the hillside behind it where the trees started. There was a total of 24 acres, mostly hilly woods, but there was a field in by the creek out front of maybe 5 or 6 acres. There were signs that the field had flooded lately on one corner, but the house was on much higher ground so it looked to be safe enough. The driveway had a huge culvert where the little creek ran through along the county road. We walked over the place and saw the garden spot behind the house, obviously having been used for generations. A young couple owned it, apparently, because we saw some kid toys in the yard. There was no farm machinery around, but the field had last year's corn stubble in it, so they must be renting the ground to somebody.
They wanted $128,500 for the place. It had been on the market for a while, the agent said and hinted that the price was negotiable. I nodded and said we would have to talk to the bank and see if we could afford it, but I doubted it. The agent looked disappointed and wasn't nearly so friendly going back to town.
I did some research on the computer. The realty ad had a Google Maps birdseye view of the place, and it showed a lot when I looked over the area. There were only a couple houses anywhere close. Mostly, it was farmland in the creek bottom, with steeply wooded hillsides at the edges of the valley. I couldn't expect it to be a business location, because nobody could find the place, but it would be just fine for my hobby of repairing and selling cars. Nobody would compain out there. And there might be some farmer business for a mechanic. But, we simply could not afford it. We were both a little bummed about that. ______________
I was more bummed after I got to work the next Monday. John Wilson said he just didn't have enough work to keep me busy, and I knew it was the truth. I was the last man hired, so of course, I was the one to be laid off. At least I was off parole, so I didn't have to deal with the PO telling me I HAD to have a job. The truth was, I had enough money in the bank that if I didn't have a job for a long time I wouldn't go hungry, but that was savings that I meant to keep for buying a house. That day, I was really glad we hadn't taken out a mortgage and bought a house.
I went back home and hitched up the utility trailer. Some of the guys at the shop helped me load my toolboxes in it, and wished me good luck finding work. I took the toolboxes straight out to Joe's machine shed with my stay-at-home tools and told him what happened, and said that I was headed out to look for a job.
All the mechanic's shops were pretty dead these days, but I asked around anyway that morning. No luck that day, so I figured I'd do the unemployment thing ASAP. I didn't really expect to get hired anytime soon, so I wanted to keep working on my own for now. I had seen a pickup at Steve Young's junkyard out in the country. It didn't look too bad, except it didn't have an engine in it. It was another old Chevy, this one an early 80's model. It was a 3/4 ton, and still had the big 4 speed in it, and lots of springs in the back. The body was pretty good and the cab interior looked really good. I dropped by our trailer and picked up what cash I had there, then drove out of town the 5 miles to ask about the truck. Steve must have been slack on business too, because he sold it cheap enough. For $500 he even agreed to take it out to Joe and Kate's with his wrecker for the price and had it there well before supper time.
I thought I'd seen a wrecked Chevy truck with a 6 cylinder in it at Whitson's yard in town, so I went to investigate, still pulling the trailer. The wreck had been T-boned and was pretty well a goner. It took some fancy torch work, but they got the engine out, complete with the motor mounts and a chunk of frame on both sides. We set it on the trailer with his big loader that handled junk cars, and I was on the way for $200. No guarantee on the engine, because it could have suffered in the wreck, he said. I had looked at the odometer and saw 88,000 miles on it. It was a nice looking truck, so I thought the engine had probably been properly serviced. I got the clutch and pressure plate, too, so it should be drop-in job.
What I did not have was an engine stand, nor an engine hoist. I was afraid to lift a heavy engine with my chain hoist using the trusses in the machine shed. They just didn't look strong enough. When I unhooked from the trailer at Joe's, Steve's man had delivered the old truck, and Joe had directed him into the open bay I was using, which saved us a lot of trouble moving a dead truck around.
Ashley was working until 9:00 PM that night, so I made a trip to Harbor Freight in Jeffersonville and bought their better model engine hoist, the kind with a hydraulic jack that lifts an arm. By the time Ashley got off work, I had the project off to a good start. I figured I could have the truck on the road again in a week or two at the most, and ready for sale. _______________
I was reading the giveaway newspaper over breakfast and told Ashley, "Here's a maintenance job at that printing place in Scottsburg. I should go apply for that."
"I thought you didn't like factory work."
"I don't, but this isn't standing in one place all day doing the same thing over and over. This is fixing their machinery. I'll clean up and go over there today."
"I'm off today. Why don't I go with you and we can get some shopping done at the Wal Mart over there?"
"You'll be stuck sitting in the car while I fill out an application."
"That's okay, it can't take very long."
"Okay, let's do that, and go see their Goodwill store, too. It's right there by the Wal Mart. I should buy some engine oil and gear oil for that truck project. How about lunch at the Waffle House?"
"Good. I'll get ready." ________________
"They offered me the job, second shift and start tomorrow night. I turned it down. Not enough money."
Ashley asked, "What did they offer to pay you?"
"They said they start maintenance at $9.20 an hour, and after you're there for a year you get automatic raises up to their top pay of $10.55 an hour. You have to join some lame Union and pay them dues, too. I told him I made $15 as a mechanic and I was low man in the place. He said, 'I can get a warm body for this job for less than $9.00 an hour.' I told him, 'Yep, I bet you can. But if you want brains to go with it, it will cost you $15 and up.' I left and he looked unhappy. Too bad for him. "
"Jobs are hard to get, so I guess they think people will take less money now."
"I know. But I can make a lot better than that working on old stuff to buy and sell. I just hate that I have to impose on your folks for a place to work."
"Dad loves having you around, and Mom likes you, too."
"I like them, too, but it just isn't right to use his shop building without paying for it."
"But you have been paying for it. Dad said you saved him thousands of dollars doing the work on the combine and baler. That is worth real money, and he knows it better than anybody. Everybody thinks this is a great deal, except you."
"Well, I'm used to paying my own way."
"You are, so get that through your thick head. Oh. And Mom said she wanted you to look at her washing machine. It's making a new noise. Dad said he doesn't know anything about washers, and she refuses to take it to that guy downtown."
The washing machine just needed the feet readjusted so it sat flat on the floor, because one of the rubber footpad things was missing. I had glued a piece of rubber cut from an old inner tube on the metal foot, and that kept it from vibrating. Kate heard it run quietly again and gave us a cherry pie to take home. I finally began to see that they really appreciated having some help around the place, and felt a little less guilty about using the shop. _________________
CHAPTER 8
Our trip to Wal Mart had cost a lot more than I expected. Groceries and everything else were still going up. It was beginning to worry me about how much money I could make, compared to the higher prices. The boxes of food kept getting smaller, too. I was wishing I had room for a garden, but the trailer lot had no place for it. Gas was going up again. It had hit $4.12 a gallon in the summer of 2008, but then it dropped like a rock so that a year later, this summer it was under 2 bucks for a short time. Now it was inching up again and was around $2.66 where we lived. Everyone was afraid to buy anything big, especially a new car, thinking gas could go up again and it would be hard to make ends meet.
I looked at real estate ads for something to do, but I was discouraged about buying our own place now that I was out of a regular job. The TV had been saying that housing prces were falling, but I didn't see it in the ads for our county. Ashley didn't seem to be worried about it, but I was tired of living in the trailer park with no room to do much of anything I wanted to do.
On July 1st, 2009, the government started the "Cash for Clunkers" program. That threw a big wrench in my fixer-upper business, because within a couple months, almost 700,000 cars, SUV's and pickups had been destroyed to get the government rebate for buying a new car. What followed was a big price increase in the used car market, because not everybody could afford a new car, even with a four thousand dollar rebate. So many old vehicles were scrapped that it got to be hard to find one suitable for me to repair and resell. And they destroyed the engines in the ones the took in on the program. They had the junkers drain the oil, put in some silicate stuff and run the engine until it seized up. Couldn't even get those apart, let alone rebuild one.
I had just gotten the 1982 Chevy truck running when this made the news. I thought about it and the next day I talked to Donny Whitson at the junkyard. He said he had scrapped a hundred or more old cars under that program, and didn't have a rebuildable wreck in his yard. That bothered me a lot, so I talked to Joe about fixing farm equipment for his neighbors.
"Well, they's plenty of that to do, but it's mostly welding and such. Can you weld?"
"I did some in prison, but it wasn't real pretty."
"I got that old Lincoln buzz box welder you can practice with if you want to. Might have to go get some more welding rods."
"I'll do that, and I'll study up on welding, too." ______________
Ashley was working more hours per week, because they had laid off one of the checkout clerks at the grocery. She came home tired because they had to restock shelves when they weren't busy at the checkouts, but it meant that we had about enough money to live with her check alone. I was determined to make my share of the money, if I had to invent my own job. There sure weren't any jobs around town.
The '82 pickup I'd bought was up and running now, and it was a pretty good old truck. I put an ad in the paper to sell it, but got no response at all. I had put a couple new tires on the front, and the back ones weren't too bad. I'd also had to have new exhaust put on it, then with the title transfer fee, sales tax, license, and insurance, I had about $1,400 in it. I was asking $1,950 for it, and I thought that was cheap, but I didn't even get any lookers, so Joe and I began to use the truck around the farm. I couldn't afford to drop the price any more, so I thought we just as well get some use out of it. The old truck had a heavy receiver hitch, so we could pull wagons around the farm, or my utility trailer with it.
I wanted to get some money coming in, so I got busy learning to be a better welder. I bought some cheap welding gloves and a 9" angle grinder with grinding wheels and a wire brush for it at Harbor Freight. I got several boxes of welding rods at the welding supply place in Jeffersonville along with some new lens filters for the helmet. Ashley found a leather jacket at the Salvation Army store to protect me from sparks. I wore it backwards so the collar protected my neck and the back was open so it was cooler to wear. I picked up some scrap iron at the junkyards to use for patching materials. Even as cheap as I could do it, I spent about $400, but by the end of another week, I could do a respectable job of welding on most things, and I was learning more about it on the internet.
We didn't really want to make a formal business out of this, with all the licenses, taxes, insurance, and other costs, so Joe just put the word out that I needed to make a few bucks and could probably fix most of what a farmer would need done. The first thing that showed up was his neighbor's combine. He had managed to run one corner of the corn head into a post and wadded up the sheet metal. I got it apart and made a lot of noise beating the dents and wrinkles out of it. Some of the internal bracing cracked in the process, so I welded that back together and got him going again so he'd be ready for corn season.
I spent a hard day at it, and part of the next morning. I remembered a line from an old novel I'd read, where the hero commented that clean cars seem to run better, so I went downtown and found some spray paint that matched the faded red on the combine and put a coat on the repaired part. When the man came over to pick it up, he was delighted to pay me $150 in cash for what I judged to be about 10 hours work on it. He said new parts to fix it would have cost over $600. I only had a few jobs like that before my unemployment checks ran out, but it helped.
Billy James saw me in the auto parts store one day and said hello. We had worked together at John Wilson's, and he told me Wilson was barely keeping him and one other man busy, instead of the 6 he once had working. Times were tough all over. He asked if I'd applied for Food Stamps, and I told him no, I could feed myself just fine. I thought it was okay to get unemployment, since it was an insurance thing, the same as insurance on a car or a house. But Food Stamps I thought was charity like Welfare, and I wasn't going to do that. Billy allowed as how he would be first in line to get Food Stamps if he was out of work, but he was glad I was getting by without it. ________________
It was getting on toward time to start picking corn when Joe had severe chest pains and Kate rushed him to the hospital. He was in Floyd County Hospital in New Albany for a couple weeks before they did a catherization and then later, double bypass surgery. He came out of it pretty well, and was up and walking around by the first of October, but we all knew he had no business driving heavy equipment for the County Highway Department, nor doing the farming.
I had taken over feeding the cattle, hogs, and chickens while he was in the hospital so that Ashley could spend all the time she wanted to with him. I didn't have a lot else to do, except for an occassional welding job, and I even began to get acquainted with Kate's kitchen so I could have something ready for the women to eat when they got home from seeing Joe. For over a month, Ashley and I hardly saw each other except in passing on her way to work or the hospital. I did the laundry, and generally made like a housewife and farmer to keep things going.
At least Joe and Kate had pretty good insurance from his job for the County, but his paycheck had stopped, Kate hadn't had a job in years, and although the County gave him early retirement, that check didn't amount to nearly what he had been making. Joe had 40 acres of corn standing in the field, and the doctor had ordered him not to pick up anything heavy from now on. They had done what they could for him, and he could live a long time, but not doing any heavy work. Kate was worried sick. She had dark circles under her eyes and had lost some weight.
Ashley told me she had to do whatever they needed, since she was an only child and there just wasn't anyone else to do it. I agreed and told her I'd do whatever I could for them. They had treated me as well as my own parents, and besides, I liked them a lot. We all talked it over and decided it was foolish for us to keep paying rent on the trailer when we spent most of our time at the farm and the farmhouse was huge. We moved. Should have done it when I got laid off, I suppose, but it just didn't feel right at the time.
Moving didn't take long. All my tools were already at the farm, except for the pliers and screwdriver in the kitchen drawer. All we had there was our clothes, a few groceries and the household stuff. It all sort of disappeared into the collection in the farmhouse. We had the entire upstairs for ourselves, 3 bedrooms and a smaller room that had probably been the nursery when the place was built. We put the computer in there on a cheap computer desk we'd found at Goodwill. It had some chips off the corners where you could see the particle board under the plastic fake wood veneer, but it was sturdy enough, and it gave us a place to park our important papers too. _______________
The next few weeks flew by me. When I wasn't on the combine, I was feeding livestock, or cutting firewood. Joe had a good stack of wood already cut and dried for the outdoor wood furnace, but they had not been heating the upstairs, so with us in residence, it would take more fuel. I cut wood like a madman. Joe had a hydraulic wood splitter, so that took a lot of drudgery out of the job, but it was still a workout. By Thanksgiving, we thought we had it under control. With Joe's careful guidance, I had learned a lot about farming in a very short time. I could see that there was much more to know about it, though.
Gloria called the second week of November and said I needed to come get the stuff I had stored in Bob's workshop. On the phone, I didn't ask why, but just apologized for leaving it there for so long. I took my old Chevy pickup across town to the exclusive subdivision on the hillside. I thought about it and decided that I didn't much care what the neighbor's thought about my old truck. This one looked a lot better than that first one, but it had barnyard mud on the tires and looked like a farm truck.
I hadn't seen my sister in several weeks, and was shocked at how strained she looked. Not wanting to pry in her affairs, I said, "Hi Sis. What's up?"
"We lost the house, that's what."
"You WHAT?"
"You heard right. Our house is in foreclosure. Bob's company first laid off most of the sales people, then he was told they would close the office this month. His pay had been mostly commissions on what investments his people sold, and it had just dried up to nothing. He's been losing money driving to work for the past 4 months."
"How come I never heard anything about this? Can i help some way? What can I do?"
"Not much, unless you've got $360,000 laying around you don't need. That's what we owe on the house and the car. Bob sold the boat at a loss to get rid of the payments, and he let the lawn mower go back to the bank. He thought he had his Mercedes sold, but it didn't pan out. He's trying to trade it in for something cheap to drive, but not having any luck at that. We sold my Volvo two months ago, but we've been living on that money. It's bad."
She cried on my shoulder for a while and all I could do was hug her and let her cry. I didn't know what to say. Her dog Sandy was worried about her and was leaning on her leg. It took a while for Sis to get calmed down. I was thinking furiously while she was letting out all the stored up grief and worry. It all depended on what Bob was able to do. So, I asked her about that.
"What's Bob up to now?" Gloria got a decorator print paper towel from the kitchen and blew her nose, then said with a stuffy nose, "I don't know. He went out this morning with his Mercedes to try to trade it off, or sell it someplace. I don't even know where he went. He said something about a dealer in Louisville that bought cars. Let's hope he can get it done. He doesn't talk to me much now."
"Let's go get my stuff out of the workshop, and think about this," I told her.
"Okay. Yeah, I need to get some fresh air." She reached down and petted Sandy on the head, then told the dog, "Come on girl. Let's go outside."
The dog beat her to the door, smiling and wagging her tail. We followed her across the back yard to the workshop building and went inside. The place was pretty bare. Bob's toys were gone. There was a cheap riding mower in there, but that was about it, beyond the rake and shovel sort of things. I hit the button by the garage door and the opener kicked in. I went out the big door and backed my truck inside to load up. It didn't take all that long until I had the tarp over the load and was ready to go. I'd been thinking while I worked.
I asked, "What happened to the money from selling our parents' house? You got $52,000 out of that."
"I paid off the Volvo, and Bob invested the rest in something, but he's already sold that to keep up the payments on his car. He lost a lot on the investments, some kind of foreign bonds, so there wasn't enough left to pay off the Mercedes."
"So it's all gone."
"You were talking about buying silver coins back then. It sounded good to me, so I bought a bag of quarters at that place in Louisville you told me about. It cost me about $2,500 and something then. I didn't tell Bob about that, for some reason. I put the bag in my cedar chest under my wedding dress. I suppose it is still there, if Bob hasn't found it."
"Good. Silver is up now. It's worth twice what you paid for it, so you're not flat broke."
"I'm going to keep it, too. Bob has lost everything we had and all the rest of what I inherited from the house. He won't get a chance at it from here on. I think I've had about enough of him. He's hard to get along with and treats me like dirt since things started going bad. Sometimes I don't care if he comes home or not." _________________
CHAPTER 9
I heard later that Bob came home that night, and he had traded off the Mercedes for a much older VW Jetta, free and clear. He wasn't happy, though. He started ranting and raving about how Gloria had to have this fine house and that had been his ruination. Actually, she had tried to talk him out of buying it before they got married, but he had convinced her it was a great investment. She told him that, and I guess they had quite a fight. He made the mistake of slapping Gloria's face, and that did the job, right there. She picked up a big stainless steel skillet and smacked him right upside the head with it. Knocked him colder'n a wedge. Gloria never did take any sass from anybody. She called me and said she thought she'd killed him.
I drove over there faster than the law allowed, and found him sitting up on the kitchen floor, still groggy. One side of his head was swelling up and his eye was swelling shut. She must have slung that skillet for all she was worth. But he was alive. She had a couple bruises starting to show on her face, too, but she looked a lot better than he did right then.
Bob asked what the hell was I doing there, and started to get up. Gloria told him to stay where he was, or she'd knock him back down. She had the skillet in hand, and he thought better of it. I told her to get her stuff and put it in my truck, because she didn't have to put up with the likes of him. Our Dad had made her cedar chest, so I helped her carry it and the contents out to my truck. She got some trash bags and emptied her closet into them. Next, she cleaned out the kitchen of cookware, including her big skillet and all the silverware, then went to work on her bathroom. She double bagged that stuff, because it was heavy. There was her nice laptop computer that went into a suitcase with all her backup discs, and I lost track of what was in the rest. The truck bed was pretty full when she went in the kitchen the last time.
Bob was sitting at the breakfast bar on a stool and had ice wrapped in a towel on the side of his head. Gloria was in fine form by then. She walked over to him and said, "That's it. We're finished. You get to pay the bill for the divorce because you took all my money. I don't want to hear anything out of you, ever again. At least the house is in YOUR name, so you enjoy it. You make any complaints about your little accident of falling down the back steps, and I'll see you in court for spousal abuse. Don't forget, I have Wes for a witness to you hitting me, then falling out the back door when I ran away. You got all that straight now?"
He nodded slowly, his eyes looked a little dilated to me like he had a concussion. Remind me to never make my Sis really mad. Not a good idea. She'd thumped me pretty good when we were kids and I needed it. Sis and I got in my truck and left him sitting there. I told her we had a room for her, and we were going home, so just relax now. Bob knew I would swear to whatever was necessary to take care of Sis, so I didn't expect any trouble out of him.
It was pretty late, but the lights were all on when we drove in to the farm. Joe and Kate knew Gloria fairly well from a few visits, so they were pretty upset when they saw her face. It was beginning to color up a little by then. Kate and Ashley fussed over her and gave her the first real sympathy she'd had in a long time. Joe and I went off to ourselves in his den. I told him what really happened and he got a good laugh out of it. He'd met Bob a time or two, and said he was pretty stuck up.
"He had that coming. He better not try to give that girl any grief about it, either, or he'll find himself in a worse pickle than he ever dreamed about. Gloria is smart. She'll fix his wagon if he doesn't leave her alone."
I agreed. "Yep. He best let it lay." I changed the subject. "I hate to bring my family trouble to your house tonight, but I didn't have anywhere else to go with her. I'll find her someplace...."
Joe interrupted me. "You'll do no sucha thing. I like that young woman and she's family now, same as you are, so you just don't go rockin' the boat, you hear?"
"Uhh. Yessir. I hear just fine."
'You've been a lifesaver for us Wes, and don't think we aren't grateful. You just do whatever makes sense for Gloria and that'll be fine." _________________
Gloria had some ideas of her own on that score. She and Ashley used makeup to cover the bruising where Bob had slapped her. When they came to breakfast, Gloria looked pretty good. Kate bustled about the kitchen and got a meal on the table. While we ate, Gloria told what was on her mind.
"Wes, I need a ride to Louisville to sell those coins, because I need a car of some kind. I'm hoping you can help me find something I can afford."
I nodded while I chewed bacon and eggs, then said, "Yep. I can do that. Here."
I handed her the keys to my Malibu. "You can have the Malibu. I don't drive it now. I'm here all day and if I need to go somewhere, I drive the truck because I'm always hauling something."
Gloria started to protest and I cut her off. "You've been taking care of me all my life. My turn now, so just keep quiet and deal with it."
"I never expected that Wes. I'm not asking for you to..."
"I know, but I'm doing it, so that'll be that. What else do you need to do today?"
Gloria had to think about it for a minute. She said, "I need a job. I haven't worked since right after Bob and I got married. He thought if I worked, it made him look bad. But I am still an LPN, and there are jobs around for nurses. If I have a car to drive, I'll be going to look for a job as soon as I get back from Louisville. I can rent an apartment in a day or two and not have to impose on you kind people."
Kate said, "It's not imposing. You're family, just like Wes. We're glad to help."
"I appreciate it a lot, but I'll get on my own as fast as I can. If I get a job here in town, I should live close to it, and there are places I'll be able to afford."
Joe told her, "I can see you think like Wes, but you are welcome here as long as you want to stay. Okay?"
Gloria gave him that gorgeous smile of hers and said, "Okay." ___________________
CHAPTER 10
Shortly after Thanksgiving, we had butchering to do. I had never butchered anything bigger than a rabbit when Dad took me hunting as a kid, so I was some concerned about doing this. I shouldn't have wasted any worry over it, because with Joe guiding things, it went smooth as could be. Gloria even turned out to help cut up and package meat. She was just trying to pay back their favors to her, but they insisted that she take home some beef tenderloin and a couple huge round steaks for her help. No more than she ate, she made a dozen freezer packages out of it.
I had scrounged an I-beam with help from Billy James, who had found some work for a big construction company in the city. I cut a couple small trees and made support posts out of them, spiked to the bottom of trusses in the machinery shed. The I -beam went on top of the posts in the machinery shed where we had the shop. I hung my trolley and chain hoist on it and used it working on farm equipment.
I should say that the machinery shed was big. It was called a shed only because of the shed-type roof that sloped mostly one way, but it was big enough to house the tractor, combine, baler, Joe and Kate's pickup, and still have room for a double bay for me to work on things. I think Joe said it is 32 feet by 120 feet long. That much space was impossible to heat with a stove, and only 4 of the bays had doors and a concrete floor anyway. That section with doors was walled off from the rest of it that was open on one side. The open part had a gravel floor. It was a big metal building. Most farms didn't have enough shed room for their equipment, but Joe did. There were a couple older wood sheds that housed the smaller equipment.
For butchering, it made a fine place to hang a beef. Joe's tractor had a front loader on it, so that made it easy to dispose of the waste products. That means the guts, for those who haven't done this. They got buried on the back of the farm in a washout where it was easy to cave some dirt over it. We didn't want to attract any coyotes or stray dogs. The back of the farm was 3/4 of a mile away, and sloped downhill that direction. It got steeper as you went toward the back, ending in the woods where it was too steep to clear off and farm. Somewhere down in that valley below was a year-around creek where a lot of deer and other wildlife got water.
As fast as we got the beef in the freezer, Joe and Kate wanted to kill a couple hogs. They would go mostly in the smoke house, so freezer room wasn't an issue. After a dry salt and sugar cure packed in wood boxes, the hams, shoulders, bacon, and jowls all got hung up and smoked over a red oak fire for 2 weeks. They would all keep until hot weather, I was assured. By then, we would have some room in the freezers so what pork was left could be frozen.
Joe said that his grandparents had no electricity until the 1950's, so they used the pork up before it spoiled and ate mostly fresh chicken or canned beef in the summer. He said there was the remains of their old springhouse down over the hill to the west. It was a hike from the house, but not all that far, so they had kept milk and butter and such there before refrigeration. That man never opened his mouth without teaching me something.
Sis had helped again, learning to cut meat now. She had a nice apartment in the residential area of town that was close enough to her job in a nursing home that she could walk the 6 blocks if she wanted to. When the streets were slick in winter, she was walking to work. She had always been sensible with money. Her only extravagance now was a paying a little more for the apartment because they allowed her to keep her dog, where cheaper places would not. Gloria seemed to be happier now than when she was married, although I could tell she was lonely and came out to the farm fairly regularly to visit.
The old farmhouse had a good sized cellar under it that we had filled with canned goods on shelves and potatoes in wood boxes. The shelves were pretty full. Joe and Kate had never gone in for the convenience food thing. They both were farm raised and still did most things like their grandparents had taught them. They hadn't had a milk cow for many years, but when Ashley and I moved in, Joe suggested that we teach one of his Angus to be milked when her calf came. We only milked her in the morning, after penning her calf away overnight in the stall next to her. She wasn't a dairy cow, and didn't give all that much milk, but it was more than we needed. Kate made some cottage cheese, and showed us how to skim off cream and how to make butter with her old cranked churn. The grocery bill for the 4 of us didn't amount to much.
The farm had once had dairy cows and the stalls were still in the barn, used for storage now. That part had a concrete floor with a manure trench behind where the cows had stood to be milked. That barn is huge. It had been built with enough loft space for storing loose hay, back before balers were invented. There were actually 3 stories to the barn, the loft, the main floor where feed and equipment was kept, and the basement for livestock. The basement was open on the back side, since it was built on a hillside. On the front side, the main floor was level with the ground on the uphill side, so you could drive a wagon load of hay in there to unload in the hayloft above it. The old hook affair for unloading loose hay off a wagon was still hanging way up it the top on it's roller track.
They had a well up by the house, and a septic system, so there were no water or sewage bills. The well was one of those old hand dug jobs with limestone blocks laid to line it. It was big enough inside to let a bucket down on a rope and get water. They had the top covered with a metal plate where a hand pump sat. Kate had me pull that pump out one day when she couldn't get water out fast enough to suit her. She said the cylinder needed new "leathers", whatever that was. I found out when I got the pump cylinder out of the well. It was a leather cup that worked as a piston inside a cast iron cylinder to do the pumping. I was amazed that the hardware store in town still had new leather parts for the pump. While we had it out, Joe had me get some new pipe and hone the inside of the brass-lined iron cylinder. I gave the pump a fresh coat of John Deere green paint, and Kate was delighted.
When it went back together, the water came out with no difficulty, and surprisingly fast. About two dozen strokes on the handle filled the 3 gallon bucket they kept there. There was even one of those speckled enamelware tin cups for getting a drink. Had its' own hook right on the pump. There was an electric pump, too, down inthe cellar, but the hand pump was great when you were thirsty from hoeing in the garden, or all sweaty and itchy from haymaking.
Kate dried clothes on the line outside even when it was cold out. If it got really cold, she put up lines in the kitchen and dining room area. Those rooms had been joined long ago by removing a wall. We hung our clothes upstairs in a spare bedroom. It didn't seem like any real trouble, and there was no need for a clothes dryer. Those things run up an electric bill fast.
There was no heat bill, either. I cut a lot of firewood, but not an unreasonable amount for such a big house. It had good storm windows and doors, and they had insulation blown in the walls and attic years ago. All I had to do was keep the chainsaws running and make some firewood. We might spend $50 to $100 a year to maintain the woodcutting operation, but that was cheap for heat.
Electricity was the biggest monthly bill, except for insurance. Joe had applied for Social Security Disability, but it was still in process, with a lawyer getting paid to make that happen. When it did, he would be elegible for Medicaid, but for now they had to pay their own health insurance and it was expensive. There were deductibles and Joe had to see his heart doctor regularly, and also pay a fair amount for medications. Kate was healthy as a horse, but they had her covered, too. They were both 59 years old, so it would be another 3 years before she could start Social Security and Medicare.
Those expenses made a big dent in their income, but we had done well on the farm this year because Joe had contracted most of his corn at $4.08 a bushel. The price of corn always fell a dollar or more at harvest time, so he hedged that with futures contracts like most farmers. His 60 acres of corn had done pretty well this year, and yielded about 160 bushels per acre, which was very good for this end of the state. The corn made a gross income of $39,000 this year, but he had a lot of expenses to come out of that for seed, fertilizer, chemicals, diesel fuel, and equipment maintenance. That ate up half of his gross income, and he did better than most keeping the costs down. I was learning more about the business side of farming. There was a lot more to it than just throwing out some seed and watching it turn into money.
Joe had also sold some feeder calves back in the summer when prices were high, so all we had to feed through the winter was his bull and 22 brood cows. It meant handling a lot of hay. He still used the small square baler so that meant a lot of handling. We had talked about getting a round baler to save labor, and since his heart attack, it was almost a necessity. He could drive the tractor just fine, but not for long hot days making hay. We had to do something about the hay situation before next season. ______________________
Nobody had heard a word about Bob Stowe since he and Gloria's divorce was final. He didn't seem to be around town any more, but nobody missed him. Gloria joined us for Christmas and brought her dog. Sandy was such a polite creature that we all fell in love with her. I hadn't had a dog since we were kids, and it made me want to get another. Joe and Kate had a great stock dog that had died of old age a few years ago, but they hadn't got another one. Joe began to get interested, though, after spending the day around Sandy. We had all become a pretty close family now, and Bob wasn't even mentioned. We got together for New Year's Eve, too. Kate always grew some popcorn in the garden, and they had a nice orchard, so the women made candy apples and popcorn balls, while Joe and I got into a little of Kate's dandelion wine. The doctor wouldn't let him drink much, but said that a little in the evening was probably a good thing.
January of 2010 was cold, as usual. I spent more time in the shop with the barrel stove going where Joe and I figured out what needed worked on and what was on its' last legs. We needed a grain truck and we needed a round baler. I had no idea where to find a grain truck, but the consignment auction was the place to start looking for a baler. We planned to go look at the next auction near the end of the month.
When the free newspaper came one day, Kate saw a dog she liked, advertised for adoption from the Animal Shelter. It was a Collie/Shepherd mix that lived up to her picture. Kate did all the paperwork, took her to the vet for neutering and shots, then picked her up the next day. The old lady turned out to be at least as good as Joe for training a dog. Kate wanted a dog that could stay in the house if she felt it was needed. She had heard too much lately on the TV news about home invasions and robberies. Kate was familiar with the pump shotgun that sat beside the kitchen door, but she wanted "something with better eyes and ears than I have". Joe agreed with her.
The new dog was fairly young, and very smart, but she had a lot to learn about the farm. She set to work doing that, and followed us outside everywhere we went. Joe began to teach her voice commands, using simple words. She caught on pretty fast. Kate was schooling her, too, about house manners and what a dog had better leave alone in there. Kate named her Pat, a nice short name that was easy for the dog to understand. Pat had been given a blanket to lay on in a corner between the kitchen and the old dining room, where part of the old dividing wall remained.
We all talked to the dog, and it wasn't long before she knew us all by name and knew where we were, if Kate told her find us. Her coat was pretty heavy, showing the Collie in her, so she preferred to lay on the side porch by the kitchen door unless it got really cold out. She figured out how the door worked, too, and if it wasn't latched solidly, she could get it open and nose the storm door latch in a heartbeat. Pat would obey any of us, but she made it plain that she was Kate's dog. ___________________
Auction day was cold and had a steady wind blowing from the North that chilled everybody to the bone. The coffee and food stand did a good business, but bidding was not as well attended as usual. The junk stuff sold cheap and the farm equipment prices were mixed. Used equipment had been selliing high, Joe said, because nobody could afford new stuff. He paid a good price, $7,650 for a New Holland 664 round baler, but it wasn't worn out yet by a long ways. It had a hydraulic leak on one of the long hoses that went to the rear bale door, but hoses didn't cost all that much. The tires were good, and the belts looked like they would run for quite a while yet. It looked like it had been kept inside and well maintained. I felt the slack in the drive gear box, but it wasn't excessive. I didn't see anything that showed damage or really bad wear. I dragged it home the next day behind my pickup, taking it slow on the county roads. It took a big part of the day to get there.
Joe didn't want to part with his old square baler yet. It made more sense to use it for baling straw, and that was a necessary part of a cattle operation. I spent some time in February going over both balers to assure they were ready to go when spring came. We ordered some minor parts and several new bearings for the old baler then I put them on whenever UPS delivered them. In between working on the farm machinery, I did enough for several neighbors that I had some pocket money. When Spring came, we were ready for it, but a lot of farmers were not, so I worked long days and a lot of nights doing both our tillage and planting, and fixing machinery for other people. I was learning a lot more about farming than I had ever expected to know.
I picked up some junk farm machinery at the junkyards for patch materials, and had a useful junk pile behind the machinery shed. There had been enough shop business last year that I had bought an acetylene torch setup. This year I bought some extra tanks so I didn't get caught running out of gas in the middle of a job and have to go to town. The shop was getting to look like a professional operation now. There were a lot of things I would have liked to buy, but it had to pay its' own way.
I had learned the hard way that farm equipment work deserves to have a hydraulic press around. I had paid for having bearings and other things pressed in and out too many times downtown, so I looked over what they had real well. I had used jack presses a lot, and they weren't that complicated. During a lull after planting time, I bought some scrap metal and went to work building me a press. The State Highway Department had junked some guardrail posts that looked about right. They were 6" H-beams, 6 feet long. I bought them and some wide, rusty steel channel pieces for the frame and bed, and went to work. Northern Hydraulics sold a 50 ton hydraulic jack, and I salvaged some hood springs off an old Ford Galaxie to pull that big stiff jack back up after you pressed something down with it. I slapped a coat of paint on it and it looked almost like a real one. It worked really well, too.
Joe already had an ancient drill press that worked very well, and would drill a big hole in steel, and he had a good sized old grinder that worked fine. I did happen onto a junk power hacksaw that got thrown out by the local factory. It took some TLC to get it going again, but not much money. I wanted a metal lathe in the worst way, but I couldn't justify it, or I didn't think so. I had only used one briefly in prison and had a lot to learn about them. That would have to wait. _______________
CHAPTER 11
According to what i read on the internet, unemployment was a lot higher than what the TV news said. The private data websites said the government had changed how they figured it, and when done the right way, it had gone from about 12% in 2009 to 22% a year later. Everybody I talked to was crying about it. If there was any kind of a decent paying job around, it was already filled. I stayed busier than ever fixing farm equipment, and had kept track of it for tax purposes. I averaged making over $15 an hour, and by mid-summer, I'd already made over $10,000, and that was farming pretty well full time along with it. Ashley made more than enough for our expenses, so what I made was what we used to pay the insurance, and get whatever bigger items we wanted. I didn't really have what most people call a job, but we were making it, and living pretty well. I had even begun to save a little money again.
Saving money bothered me, because while I felt like we had to have some laid back, the longer I kept it, the more prices went up and the less the money would buy. The price of silver showed this, too. It had been staying around $18 an ounce for several months, with a dip now and then. But in July it started up and kept going. By early October it was above $23 an ounce and still going. I felt like it was a little late to buy more silver then, but I didn't know what else to do with our nest egg, and the longer I waited, the less it would be worth. I needed to put that money to work, but the banks weren't paying squat for interest.
I did some more reading on the internet. I watched some videos that told how the big banks were doing their best to steal all the money in the country by causing inflation. I had some ideas that I needed to ask Joe about, but I didn't have a lot of hope in it. _________________
Gloria looked at the prices of onions and potatoes and decided against buying any. She would wait until she went out to visit Wes and Ashley tomorrow. They kept offering her things, but she felt like she hadn't helped that much with the garden and had been refusing. The prices were beginning to bite into her budget, though, so it had begun to look a lot more appealing to take what they offered. She took the few items in her cart to the checkout and noticed that other carts in line weren't very full, either.
Her next stop was at the all-things-a-dollar store, a local independent retailer who carried some cosmetics and hygiene items she liked. After that, she stopped at the newspaper office and gave a dollar for a big stack of notepads they made from their printing leftovers. Then it was off to Goodwill to look for clothing. It was Sunday, when Goodwill did the weekly start of their 'color of the week' tag sale at half off. You had to get there early, because there were a lot of people that pounced on the sale.
The parking lot was crowded, but she found a spot some distance from the door. Walking across the lot, she noticed quite a few expensive cars and SUV's, and a nearly new pickup. Many of the shoppers inside were better dressed than what she had seen there before, and had nice hairdo's and makeup. It occurred to her that a lot more people were feeling the pinch of higher prices now.
Sunday was also the sale day on used books, 3 paperbacks for 99 cents, or 3 hardbacks for $1.49. Gloria did her clothes shopping first, and found a couple good blouses and one nice dress she had spotted on Friday. When she was sure she had all the clothing she wanted that was marked down, she went to the other end of the store and browsed the housewares and books. She chose 3 paperbacks by an author she liked, then found some decorative pillar candles for 50 cents each and bought several. The power had already gone off a few times during winter storms and she wanted some emergency lighting. They picked up a couple packages from a display of cheap batteries, too, and a China-made flashlight.
In her haste to leave the night of the fight with her husband, she had cleaned out the kitchen and bathroom, but had forgotten to get anything from the garage, or workshop building. Gloria was frustrated by having far more pots and pans than she would ever use living alone, but lacking a number of other things. She had not spent much on herself for months before her life came apart, trying to help stay afloat financially. Now, she needed some new underwear and a heavy winter coat. Goodwill had came through on the coat, and it was even pretty nice. She attributed that to her petite figure, because there were a lot of overweight women digging through the coats, but saw only a few her size in the store.
Shoes had been another problem. She couldn't afford to have problems with her feet. Goodwill didn't have anything suitable for a nurse to walk in 8 to 10 hours a day. Good shoes were expensive, and after she put aside her savings amount, her check didn't go very far. She had solved that the best she could, ordering from an online shoe store and got some professional white nurses' shoes at a $30 savings over retail price.
Dollar General Store was busy when she got there, too. She found 3 bras on the rack that she thought were pretty good and the price was better than Wal Mart's. The clerk assured her she could return them if they didn't fit. They had a sale on Tracphones, so she bought one with camera capability for $20, and it came with some minutes. She'd let her old phone contract lapse a month before she left Bob, and had used a landline phone in the apartment until now, but this was cheaper. There were coupon deals online to get minutes really cheap.
Gloria needed to change oil in her car. She had asked Wes about it, and he said he'd do it, but she was determined to learn how to do that herself. Even the cheap place in town wanted $15.99 for an oil change, and she was sure she could do it cheaper. Wes said Wal Mart had the best deal on oil, in the 5 quart plastic jugs, unless somebody ran a big sale, and he said that Auto Zone was the place to buy oil filters. Since she was close, she bought a filter there, and headed home to her apartment. ___________________
Joe was busy on his computer when I found him in his den. I sat down next to him in a big upholstered chair and asked, "Have you got time to help me with a money problem?"
"Sure. I'm pretty tired of working on farm books. The farm did pretty well last year, but it is going to be harder to do that this year with me being out of the game."
"You're not out of the game, Joe. All you have to do is point me in the right direction and I"ll take over the work. I just need you to keep me doing the right things at the right time."
"I wanted to talk to you about that. I need you and Ashley to make this place work, or we'd have to sell it, and this is the worst possible time to sell. Kate and I have talked about this. We are changing our retirement plans."
"How's that?"
"We had planned to work the farm until we were full retirement age before starting Social Security. Then, we planned to sell the farm, move to town, put the money in some safe investments, and live off the interest. No way is that going to work now. There's no such thing as a safe investment now; not the paper kind anyway. The price of land is way down, Kate's not old enough for SS, and it's going to take a while to get my disability going. Worse than all that, I could drop dead anytime."
"But I thought the doctor said you were good to go for a long time now!"
"Yeah, maybe. What he said was maybe, if all goes well and I take real good care of myself. Or, it might not last. Kate knows this. We just take it one day at a time."
"I had a real different take on this. I was planning on you being around a long time, and learning how to farm from you. Mechanics aren't in high demand these days. I wanted to ask you about what to do with the money I have in the bank from selling my folks' house. It isn't making me any money in the bank, and I don't know of a good thing to do with it. We wanted to buy a place of our own, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen now, as bad as things are."
"Listen to what I've got to say, and then we'll talk about that. Like I said, Kate and I have talked this over, and here's what we've done. We put the farm in a "Living Trust". It's a simple legal paper we filed at the courthouse. It says that the farm is owned by the trust, with Kate and I as Joint First Trustees, and you and Ashley as Joint Second Trustees."
"I'm not sure what that means."
"It's better than just a Will, it means that there is no need for the farm to go through Probate Court when we die. It will already belong to you and Ashley as Second Trustees. This is just a way of making it smoother for you two, and it should assure you that you will for certain, inherit the farm."
"Uh, I don't know what to say. I never thought about that."
"Ashley is an only child, and we always told her she gets the place when we die. Now that she's married, this is the way to do it."
"It sounds to me like you just gave me half of her farm. You sure you want to do that? What if Ashley and I had problems... I don't want to think about that. But you..."
" We're not giving you the farm, we're telling you that you will inherit it. It was a judgement call, yes. But the benefits outweigh the risks for us, and for Ashley. It's not a great risk for her, even if you got divorced, because she would probably get awarded the farm in that case anyway. I talked to Ashley about this a little while ago, and she understands. She wanted me to bring you up to speed on it, so I could explain what we have in mind."
"Okay..." It started to sink in finally, but I needed to know more.
Joe went on. "We could have made you a partner, but that wouldn't be nearly as good from a tax standpoint. It will work out better for all parties if you are both employees now, and paid from the farm income. It helps keep the tax man out of our pockets. We need to talk about your pay, and how we do that."
"I don't need any pay. You're letting us LIVE here, for cripes sake! You're mostly feeding us, too!"
"Here's how we saw this working. If you and Ashley know for certain that you are inheriting the farm, then you have a vested interest to do what is right for the long term. And that is the only way that farming can really work. You have to be committed to it, or you make short-term decisions that are bad in the long term."
"I can see that. Yeah, makes sense to me."
"Now, about your money. If you have a vested interest in the farm, you might want to put some of that money to work here. You get the proceeds from that, of course. Say if you bought a piece of equipment, you would own it, and we would lease it from you. That has a lot of tax advantages, too. I'm not asking you to do anything right now, just giving you food for thought. Let this lay for a while. You and Ashley talk about it. You don't have to put any money into the farm unless you want to, but the opportunity is there."
"I don't get what's in this for you, Joe?"
"Kate's almost surely going to outlive me. I need to do the best I can to see that she's provided for, and this is the best way I could come up with to do that."
"We planned on taking care of both of you, as best we can. We don't have much, but we could help out. I thought you'd know that?"
"Ashley said the same thing. This is a way to make it work out, we think. Let it sit in your head for a few days and we'll talk again, when you've had time to get used to the idea." ____________________
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 18, 2013 18:39:29 GMT -6
CHAPTER 12
"Ashley, It makes me look like I married you for the farm! That's not true, but that's what everyone is going to think!"
"Calm down. No, it isn't what most people will think, at least not the farm folks. They all do something like this. Didn't you know that?"
"No, I'm not sure that's right."
"Quit being so prideful! Nobody's going to think less of you! The farm families around here already assumed this. That's just how it is. Oh, there's several ways they do things, but it all amounts to the same thing--the kids get the farm, period. At least, they do if they want it and they aren't total screw-ups."
I let it sink in for a minute. Then it occurred to me that she knew this before we got married. I said as much, to hear what she had to say about it.
"Sure I knew it. That's what Mom and Dad and me have talked about since I was little kid. It's one of the ways that you get taught about life, and looking ahead, when you grow up farming."
"I gotta think about this."
Ashley smiled a little and said, "You really didn't know about this, did you? I mean, maybe you did, a little bit, but you hadn't really THOUGHT about it, right?"
"NO! Of course I hadn't thought about it! That would be rotten, to think about marrying a girl because she's going to inherit a farm! Anyway, I expected your parents to live for ages."
"Mom might live for a long time, but Dad, well, I don't want to think about that. I love him so much, and..."
She teared up and I tried to comfort her. She pulled away after a minute, and said, "But I have to think about it. It means he could go any time, and I don't know enough to run the place."
That scared me. "You grew up here! I don't know much of anything about it, and I'm supposed to be the one who knows!"
Ashley smiled a little and said, "Oh, get off that male-role thing, would you? Farms don't work like that. It takes the whole family to make it work. You've heard Mom say her piece when Dad talks about his plans, and he listens, too. That's how it goes. They talk things over, and do the best they can come up with. It's a partnership. WE can do it together."
I looked at her with a whole new idea of how great this could be. I had gotten really lucky to find this young woman. I told her so.
She laughed and said, "No you didn't. I found YOU!" ___________________
Creekview Care Facility was small by big city standards, which was why Gloria liked working there. She could have made a lot more money if she was willing to drive 40+ miles to Louisville to work, but most of that would have been offset by the cost of driving. Living in Louisville would cost a lot more than here, so it came out about even to live and work in her hometown. Gloria's salary was $29,500 a year, well above average income for a woman in a backwater Indiana town. Her take home pay was a lot less, after all the deductions, from $400 to $480 a week, depending on whether she worked a little overtime, or not, but overtime was rare.
She kept her living costs as low as possible, and was saving money as fast as she could. Her job did provide some insurance, a Major Medical insurance policy, but the coverage wasn't very good, basically an 80/20 plan for hospitalization. There was also a term life insurance available cheap, but she only bought enough to pay for her burial, because she didn't want to be a burden on Wes if something happened to her.
The job wasn't the best she could have found, but she liked the slower pace of it, compared to a big hospital. She had worked in one when she got out of nurses training, and she didn't want to go back to the chronic understaffing, and high pressure pace of the trauma center. The residents in the nursing home were mostly pretty nice, too. There were a few stinkers, but the good ones made up for it. She particularly liked a couple of the old men who were always cheerful and had old stories to tell while she worked.
Her time with each patient was limited, but as the weeks went by she learned a lot of their backgrounds. She knew some of their relatives because small towns are like that. Robert Little was her favorite, a history buff. He was 93 years old and could remember things from when they happened back 80+ years ago. He told of living through the Great Depression of the 1930's, often funny stories, but with a hard edge of realism about the life he'd lived. Gloria spent more than a few of her breaks listening to his tales. He was a tough old survivor whose body was giving out on him, but his mind was sharp as could be.
One day he asked, "Girly, do you keep yer money in the bank?"
"Yes, I have a checking account, and I'm trying to save some money."
"Well, you better git it outa there, I'm tellin' ya. I watch the news, and there is crooked stuff goin' on in them banks now. Ya can't trust a banker. None of 'em! They're no good. They'll steal yer money in a heartbeat, they will, an' run off with it. Happened to a lot of folks I knew."
"Where could I keep money if I didn't have it in the bank? I worry about getting robbed, you know, with crime going up now."
"Bury it somewhere's, er put it in the bottom of the flour sack, er stuff it in the mattress, but don't leave it in the bank, cuz the first time the bank gits hard up, they'll steal it an' you'll never see it again."
"They don't pay hardly any interest on savings now, so it wouldn't be much loss that way."
"I do hope you'll pay attention to me. Most folks think us old people don't know nothin', but we've done a sight more livin' and seen a lotta things. You're really good to me an' I really like you, an' I don't want to see anythin' bad happen to ya. Promise me now, that you'll at least think about that."
"Yes, I will. I've already had some bad things happen to me. Yes, I'll sure think about it. You get some rest now. It's time for me to get back to work."
Gloria left Robert's room and went back out to the nurses' station where she found the meal cart coming in from the kitchen. It was almost time for supper, and feeding time was hectic. There were some patients who had relatives that showed up to feed them, or just to make sure they ate like they should.
One man was reliable as a clock about that, Mrs. Barnes son Larry. He drove a concrete truck for the Ready-Mix plant in town, and always stopped to feed his mother before going home each night. Mrs. Barnes had been partially paralyzed by a stroke, and had early onset Alzheimers'. She could barely manage to drink when someone held a cup for her, but she was grateful for the help. It was heartbreaking to see him when she didn't recognize him some days. He seemed to take it pretty well , but Gloria could see that he felt the loss of his mother as a person.
She knew that his father had been killed in a logging accident some years ago. She didn't know if he had any brothers or sisters, but he was the only one who ever came to see the old lady. Gloria felt somewhat attracted to him, although he was not a handsome man, by any means. On this evening, her shift ended after the evening meal, and she found herself walking out with Gary Barnes.
"We all appreciate you coming every day to help with your mother. She needs more time to eat than what we can give her sometimes. I hate to say that , but there just isn't enough help here to do it all the time, if anything else is going on."
Larry nodded, "I know that. The big city places are worse. You women do all you can. I got no complaints. Mom is always clean and doesn't have any bedsores, and somebody takes the time to brush her hair, and all. I'm just paying her back, for all she's done for me, and it gets lonesome at home, so I like to stop and see her."
He said goodbye and got in his pickup. Gloria decided she'd like to learn some more about him. Her apartment was lonely too, even with Sandy there. His work uniform proved he was back to work, with warmer early Spring weather and construction was starting up again. Why hadn't she picked somebody like that, instead of Bob's nice face and snappy clothes? She mentally kicked herself and resolved it wouldn't happen again like that.
Larry drove out of town and turned on the county road, taking it slow. He was still thinking about that pretty nurse. He was amazed that she spoke to him. Pretty women didn't usually talk to him, and she was a real looker. Light brown hair and green eyes that sparkled. Larry tried hard to get her off his mind, but it wasn't easy. _________________
CHAPTER 13
Bob Stowe had finally landed a job, when his brother was ready to kick him out. He was a clerk at the Kocolene gas station in Seymour. At least nobody knew him here. He just couldn't face people back in Salem, since he'd lost everything. He couldn't admit to himself that he'd been pretty arrogant back before his divorce. He didn't even try to think about investments now. It made his head hurt. He still had the Jetta, still titled in his brother's name to keep it out of the bankruptcy. Then he'd lived at the YMCA for a couple months until he could find a room to rent with kitchen privileges. He didn't make much, but he had a lead on a job at the new bank branch opening in town, and he'd kept his good clothes, so with some luck, he'd get some of his own back before long. He had lived well before, and he knew he deserved to live well. _______________
Donny Whitson waved the driver back to the rolloff container and signalled when he got close enough. This would be the last load until more scrap came in. He had worked his 2 men hard to get the yard cleaned out, and get it all crushed and sold. Now he had a little financial cushion for the first time since '08 when everything went sky high. He'd gotten a piece of that action, and cleaned the yard out then before it fell like a rock over the next two months. Now, it was headed up again and should go higher he thought, but he needed the money. He had that wrecker loan to pay off, and scrap wasn't coming in like it had been. There didn't seem to be much out there now.
He had found ways to make more money off what he got, though. That one fellow that was always buying steel fence posts and used metal roofing had given him the idea. Donny used to stick things in the crusher as fast as it came in, then hold the compacted cubes for sale, waiting for the best price. But he found he could get 2 or 3 times the money by reselling some things just as they came in, and not only car parts. Besides the posts and roofing, now he had stacks of angle iron, pipe, lawn and garden tractors, bicycles, and a big area of salvageable things like pots and pans, kitchen sinks, and some antique items. It was making him money, so he got the real junk crushed as fast as he could to keep some room for his new "retail line". It was getting to be more popular than car parts, and all he had to do was have his men sort it out. He made more money on a pallet of boxed rusty nails than he could have imagined. They had been in a flood and were a mess, but people bought them at $20 for a 50 pound box. ______________
In April, 2011, the world was greening up and looked more cheerful, but on the way into Clarksville, Ashley and I noticed a depressing number of empty houses along the highway. We only came to the city for a big shopping trip about once a season, so we noticed some changes. The yards had tall weeds and grass already, and there was the white paper stuck to a bare window, a foreclosure notice. Clarksville showed the signs of hard times worse than I'd ever seen. There were a lot of empty stores now. I paid attention to what kind of stores had closed. The sporting goods places were empty, lots of hair and nail salons had closed, a few restaurants, a big appliance store, and one car dealership were gone.
The Dollar General Stores were booming, and had even built two new stores in nearby small towns. There was a new second hand clothing shop on the main drag in Clarksville, and the Goodwill and Salvation Army stores had lots of cars in their lots. They didn't appear to be getting as many donations now, because they had a lot of new Chinese junk, the wicker baskets, coffee mugs, and cheap batteries.
"OOF! That was quite a pothole, for being in a parking lot!"
Ashley said, "There's grass growing in the lot back there at that big Mall that was supposed to be so great. Not many stores left there now."
"Makes me think, I'd like to stop at Bass Pro and look about some traps, and maybe some fishing stuff." I turned into their huge parking lot.
"You might want to buy a good rifle, too. There's too many stray dogs running around home."
"I'm not allowed to own a gun because of that dope charge. Ex-felons can't own a gun."
"Well, I can, and what other people don't know won't hurt them. Maybe I'll buy one. Let's go look."
I expected the prices to be high in the monster sporting goods store, but they were very competitive with what I'd seen elsewhere. We bought a load of stuff. Ashley wanted a vacuum sealing thing to keep dry beans in canning jars, and one of the heat sealing vacuum things that used plastic bags on a roll. I found a really nice sausage grinder with a stuffer spout, too.
We wandered around the store, looking at the displays of stuffed animals, and live fish in the almost real looking pools. I passed on buying steel traps there, since I had seen them cheaper at Rural King, but the fishing gear was priced better than Wal Mart, and the variety was endless. I bought some hooks, a few of the styrofoam bobbers, and a spool of the new Spiderwire brand line that wasn't supposed to take a "set" on a reel. I had found a handful of cheap fishing rods with Zebco 202 reels on them at the flea market back in the winter and bought the lot of them for 10 bucks. They came with a dirty old plastic tackle box that I cleaned up. Out of 11 rigs, there were now 4 that seemed to work pretty well after some tinkering. We were in the fishing business pretty cheap, and there were a lot of flood control lakes around that were full of panfish. I splurged and bought a fishing license, too.
Ashley asked what kind of rifle she should buy to kill coyotes, and I told her to look for a Remington bolt action in .223 caliber, preferrably with a 4X scope on it. Any more magnification was a waste around home where there was so much cover that you would almost never see anything over a 150 yard shot. There were a lot of suitable calibers, but .223 would shoot flat for that range and was the cheapest to shoot, since the military used it and there were gazillions of them made every year.
I didn't say much while she talked to the sales guy. He was very helpful, answered her questions, showed her a couple, but in the end she said she would wait on it. We paid for our load of stuff and when we got outside, I asked why she hadn't bought one?
"I remembered the gun store that man has by the lake. He has a lot of used stuff in there that should be cheaper, so I want to look there."
That's part of why I married this girl. She'll find the best deal around.
We drove over to Rural King, and I was surprised to find a good stock of sporting goods even though it was located in the city. I bought steel traps, and Ashley bought ingredients for homemade laundry soap, borax, washing soda, and several bars of Fels Naptha soap. There wasn't much else they had that we needed, so we took off for Sam's Club. Last winter, I'd found a deal on a camper top for my truck and put a padlock hasp and a good lock on the door. It was dandy for these shopping trips, so we could stash whatever in the truck and lock it up while we shopped at other stores.
Sam's Club had a few things that made it worth the membership cost. We got peanut butter in some quantity, some pecans, a couple bags of rice, canned olives, and big boxes of teabags. They had a good deal on flashlight batteries, so I stocked up, and we looked at the electronics, but thought we should look at Wal Mart next door before we bought that sort of thing. It was good we did. Wal Mart was a little cheaper on "thumb drives" as Ashley called them, and she wanted to download a bunch of books. She got the ones with the most capacity that were cheaper per Gigabyte of memory. _________________
CHAPTER 14
It felt great to get dressed in a suit to go to work, Bob thought, even if he did have to shave with a cheap razor and nicked himself doing it. He had started his career working in a bank, and it was good that he had all that on his resume'. It wasn't the kind of money he had been accustomed to making, but it wasn't an entry level job, either, so he could afford to upgrade his life soon. Bob would be starting as a teller, but he would have a small office, too, and set up accounts for new customers. He was confident that he would soon progress to bigger and better things. He had a spring in his step on the way into the bank, for the first time in a long while. He knew that Robert L. Stowe deserved a better place in society. _____________
When Gloria returned to her apartment, she heard Sandy scratch at the door and whine, so she let her out for a walk. Sandy negoiated the long stairs easily, and barely made it into the yard before she squatted. Gloria felt a little bad about having her inside so much, but she didn't want the dog to wear out the grass in her landlord's back yard. She always followed the dog around and cleaned up her messes, and the old couple thanked her for that. They liked Sandy a lot. She was a lovable sort, and made friends wherever she went.
Sandy rode along on most shopping trips, unless the stops were going to be too long. Gloria hated to see pets cooped up in cars for long periods. When the weather was hot, it was cruel to overheat an animal in a hot car. But Sandy loved to go with her to the bank to cash her paycheck. The drive-thru teller always had a doggy treat for her and got a big grin from Sandy. On longer trips, Sandy got put in the back seat where she could bed down and relax.
After getting her groceries put away, Gloria let Sandy back in. The dog did her greeting thing and settled down beside Gloria at her desk while she read the news on her computer. There was another story about a home invasion in Louisville that made her cringe. The world was not a nice place anymore. Gloria wondered if Sandy was worth anything as a guard dog. She was a very good watchdog and let Gloria know if anyone was near, usually by whining and looking toward what she heard and was willing to go investigate. Whether she would actually protect her master or not, Gloria doubted because of her gentle nature.
Gloria decided she wanted a gun. She had left her Dad's old shotgun at the farm over Wes' protests. He said it would get him in trouble if anyone knew about it, because he was an ex-felon now, but Ashley had put it away in a closet and ended the discussion. She decided to ask for it when she went out there this weekend. The apartment door with its' old fashioned lock bothered her, too. It was time to get a good deadbolt lock. The next day she bought one, and installed it with her landlord's help. He was old and slow, but he was good at that sort of thing. He liked the idea and later got the same locks for his own doors downstairs. _________________
The corn was planted and the first cutting of hay wasn't ready yet, so we turned our attention to the garden. I had added a lot of cow manure to a bigger garden plot for this year. I had plowed and disked it along with the other field work, so the weeds and grass was starting to come up again. I made several rounds over it with the disc, and that took care of the problem. The soil moisture was just right, so it crumbled up into a good seed bed. I was getting the hang of some things like that about farming.
At breakfast I said something about going to town for garden seeds, prompting Kate to ask what I needed? I said, "Oh, just the usual stuff, sweet corn, green beans, cabbage plants, lettuce, tomato plants, and some seed potatoes."
"Let's look at what I have saved before you go to town," Kate said. "They want a small fortune for seeds and plants. There's some sprouty potatoes left in the cellar, too. You go get them and us girls will sit on the porch and cut them up for seed."
I didn't have to go to town after all. She had everything we wanted, carefully saved from last year. She even had big flats full of cabbage, pepper, cantaloupe, watermelon, sweet potato, broccoli, and tomato plants growing on the south porch that I hadn't noticed. I always went out the side kitchen door, so I never saw them. I vaguely remembered her puttering around out there.
Joe and I walked out to the garden plot. I used the old push plow to lay off rows and Joe dropped seeds. He had a piece of 1" aluminum conduit about a yard long with a big tin can duct taped to the side of it to hold his seeds. That allowed him to stand up pretty straight while he dropped beans or whatever in the row, and the pipe put them exactly where he wanted them.
"Joe, how come you wanted a bigger garden this year? We still have a lot of canned goods left over from last year."
"That's how it is supposed to work. Sometimes you get a bad season, or the bugs lay waste to something, so if you don't get much of a crop, you still have enough from last year. Older canned food isnt as tasty, but it beats eating snowballs in January. We got two more people here to feed, so the garden gets bigger to make sure we have enough incase of a crop failure."
"You always think ahead, don't you?"
"Grampaw told me that if I want to make sure I keep my pants up, I better wear a belt AND suspenders. I don't, but HE did. He did everything that way. That idea rubbed off on me, I suppose, so I try hard to keep my behind covered."
I went on laying off rows and thought about that. We had agreed that we'd take care of Joe and Kate, and arranged things like he had suggested. I had already put some money in the farm, buying wire for new fencing for the back half of the 120 acres next to the woods, a new roof and metal siding on the barn, and fresh gravel on the driveway and farm lane. We had talked about trading in the tractor, too. That made me ask him, "What do we need to buy to have some backups for other things around here?"
Joe frowned and said, "That pond on the east side needs cleaned out. We don't have to pasture that field this summer, so it would be a good time to do that. The west pond is okay. We could sure use a grain truck, but only if it's a real cheap deal. Let me think on it."
"I'll keep looking for a deal on a truck. I hate to have to pay somebody to haul it to the elevator when we sell corn, and we could haul our own fertilizer with it, too."
Joe nodded. "Yep. And I've been thinking about cutting some trees for logs. That corner 'way in the back has a lot of good red and white oak in it, and it's ready to cut. I think there's some sawmills that would cut it up for us now that the price of timber is so low."
"You're not going to sell the logs?"
He shook his head. "We're way ahead to have 'em sawed and use the lumber. It cuts out the lumber yard as the middleman. We'll need some lumber to fix up some of the old buildings. I should talk to that guy down in the valley that has a portable sawmill. It's one of those bandsaw rigs on a trailer. He comes out to the farm and saws it up for you, so you don't have to haul the logs to the mill."
"I've heard of bandsaw mills, but I didn't know they were portable."
"Yeah, they come with trailer wheels now, if you want 'em. Grampaw said they used to move sawmills all the time, back when they used a steam engine. It was easier to move the mill to the next woods than to haul the logs to it. It was a lot bigger job to move one then. Now, this guy pulls it with a truck and has it set up in less than half a day."
"I know the hoghouse needs some work. What else you got in mind for the lumber?"
"If you are willing to work hard on the place, there's a lot we could do. Build a pole barn to store those round bales, maybe expand the hog operation. What do you think, Wes?"
"I'm game for it. You show me what to do, and I'll make it happen. I'll need some help on buildings. I don't know much about that."
"Just go look at the one on Les Baker's place up the road. That's what I had in mind. Take some pictures, and I'll tell you how it's done. I think there's enough big cedars to cut the poles for it, and the band mill can square 'em up and get the white wood off that rots easy. Don't need to be too tall, because we can't stack those round bales more than 2 high anyway. Lots of work cuttin' all them trees, though."
We finished planting all the seeds, then Kate and Ashley brought out the potatoes. I fetched the tractor with Joe's homemade shovel plow on the 3-point hitch. Kate had me plow four long, deep rows across the garden, and we began to drop potato sets. It was a slow job, and it was getting hot, so Joe went to the porch and sat in the shade to watch. I should have known that his mind was still working just fine, and he was busy using it. ____________________
CHAPTER 15
I got tired of cutting trees and trimming off limbs long before I got finished. The bandsaw mill was set up and running before I got enough cedars cut and dragged to the patch where he set up. He was busy working on sawing red and white oak for framing and poplar for roof stringers. Joe had him cut a whole mess of sticks for spacers between boards while they air-dried. He was picky about the size of them, which I thought was odd until he told me he planned to sell them for tomato stakes after we got the lumber dried.
Joe had made a list of what he wanted for the hay barn. There would also be a lot of 2 x 4's, 2 x8's and 1" thick planks we would store in the barn loft for future use. He had me cut a bunch of spare cedars, too, for making more shed posts than we needed. I figured right that he had more plans in mind.
The sawmill ran constantly for several days, and the stacks of lumber grew. The cedar was drying fast in the hot sun. Joe said that when the posts got dry in a couple weeks, he wanted me to paint the bottom 4 feet of them with used motor oil we had in a barrel. It should make them last longer.
When the sawmill man was paid and had left, we had a monster pile of sawdust and another pile of wood slabs from trimming the logs square. The slabs would become firewood, and the sawdust would be litter in the barn and henhouse, but they could stay where they were for now. I had a lot of hay to cut and bale. _________________
After the hay was all rolled up into big round bales, I left it in the field for now. I didn't want to move it but one time and that would be into the new barn when it was finished. I bought a power post hole auger for the tractor, for 2 reasons. One, I had no yearning to dig 4 dozen big postholes 4 feet deep for the hay barn, and two, because there was a lot of old fence that needed rebuilt, with hundreds more postholes to dig. With just me working on it, I would need all the help I could get from the tractor.
Fumbling through getting the first 12 foot tall post set for the building convinced me I needed to hire some help. With Joe's help, I got the locations marked for the other 43 posts, and the holes dug with the post hole auger. But manhandling all those posts was more than I wanted to do, so I took Joe's advice and made a trip out to the Amish community. I finally found the man who ran a conctruction crew there, a young fellow who had built a lot of pole buildings. I told him what we had, and asked him to come look it over and give me a price for finishing the building. He brought one of his men along and they concluded that the fairest way to do this was to pay them by the hour. They were short of work and could start the next day, so we shook hands on it.
A neighbor of the Amish man drove them to their jobs in his van and picked them up after work. The crew of 5 men were there at 7:00 AM the next morning, and had the posts all set and braced in 2 days. I had to hustle to get the metal siding and roofing delivered by the time they were ready for it. It took them 11 days to get the building framed and the metal put on. I was paying the men $100 each for a 9 hour day, or $500 a day for the crew. I was glad to give them the $5,500 at the end of it. They really did a job of it, and they were fast.
The sawmill man had cost us $250 a day for 6 days, and he paid his helper out of that. I thought it was cheap for the amount of lumber he made. He told me he had cut his price trying to get work, but there wasn't much to be had. So, we'd gotten a bargain. The stacks of lumber in front of the old barn were impressive for the $1,500 price. It was going to be a job to get it put away before the fall rains began, but a lot of it got used for the hay barn.
The metal roofing and siding material was running about $80 a 'square', or 100 square feet, but we had found a deal on that at a place that handled over runs and mismatched colors for half price, and they had a man who delivered for them. I bought 6200 square feet of metal, and had very little left over. The Amish guy had figured pretty close. The bill was just under $6,200 delivered, so I'd spent $13,200 on the barn and the big stack of lumber we had left. The lumber alone would have cost more than that retail.
The new hay barn was 24 feet wide, with 4 posts spaced 8 feet apart that direction. There were 11 rows of them, making 10 spaces 12 feet wide between rows. That made the hay barn 120 feet long. That is about the size of 2 average houses. It took some care, but I could get round bales stacked 2 wide, 2 bales high, and 4 rows like that, or 16 bales in each bay. If it was full it would hold 160 round bales at about 1,200 pounds each. That's a lot of hay.
We would never have enough cattle to eat that much, but we would have more next year, and part of the barn would be used for equipment. Joe's plans were flexible. If we decided to expand the cattle operation, we could max that out by buying some hay when it was cheapest, right out of the fields, and use our farm mostly for pasture. Or, we could even get into dairying again, if that looked good at some point. Presently, it did not, having too much government interference and foreign competition for the cheese market. Joe even mentioned the possibility of a big vegetable operation. That would require some big tube style greenhouses, and then the new hay building could be used for sorting, packing, and storage. It all depended on the markets, so the key to making it in a farm operation was being ready to take advantage of the changes as they came along.
I had put $18,000 of my money in the farm so far, but we had a lot to show for it. New fences, when I got around to building them, the new hay barn, and enough lumber to fix all the other buildings on the place. There was enough slabwood for at least one winter's heating, and if we could sell the drying spacers for tomato stakes, that was gravy. I liked the way Joe thought about business, and I was learning fast. ___________________
Things had progressed between my sister Gloria and Larry Barnes. I had seen him around town, but didn't know him until she brought him out to the farm one Sunday afternoon to pickup Dad's old shotgun. He had bought some hunting loads for it on sale at Wal Mart so she could do some practicing and learn more about how it worked. She had shot it a few times as a teenager, but didn't have much interest then. She still wasn't much interested in hunting, but wanted it for security at home. They spent the afternoon and Gloria was handling the gun safely and effectively by the time they left.
Dad had been choosy about what he bought, and got the best he could afford. The shotgun was a 12 gauge Winchester Model 12 with a full choke barrel, one of the best pump guns ever made. It showed a little wear on the bluing, but nowhere else. It had been oiled and put away in the closet after each use and was in like new condition. He never hunted that much, so I doubt if he had shot more than a couple hundred rounds in it's 60 year life. It was a little long for home defense use, but having the dog to warn her of any intruders would help.
Ashley had gone to the local gun shop and came home with the one I'd reccomended. She came home with a good used Ruger 10/22, an old Ruger .22 pistol with the heavy barrel, 6 bricks of .22 ammo, and an old Remington 870 12 gauge shotgun with the slug barrel and a big box of slugs, buckshot, and #6 shot.
For her personal rifle, she bought a Remington 700 BDL, chambered for .223 Remington, which is the same as the NATO 5.56. It was used and had a couple scratches here and there, but it was in good shape and came with a Redfield 6X scope mounted on it. She'd bought a 1,000 round case of import ammo in the deal, so we went to the back pasture and tried it out. Laying it on the hood of the truck with an old jacket for padding, I could put 5 rounds in a spot the size of a quarter at 100 paces, and the scope was pretty well dead on. Ashley did better. Her 5 shot groups were about the size of a nickel. With the wooded land in our neighborhood making for limited ranges, that meant that if she could see it, she could hit it.
That proved to be right when she saw some coyotes at the edge of our woods about dusk one evening. Two of them didn't get to the trees in time. I counted steps and got the distance at about 260 yards. The bad part was, she'd seen a bunch of dogs running with the bunch. That meant they were breeding with stray dogs, and the offspring were not afraid of people. We could have a problem if they were not controlled somehow. Coy-dogs were known to take down calves in the Spring. I decided to do some trapping next winter when they got hungry, and before our cattle started dropping calves in the Spring.
The next week she picked up a used Ruger Security Six in .357 Magnum and an old Smith and Wesson, also in .357. The gun shop had some white box .38 Special target loads pretty cheap so she bought ten boxes of those and another ten boxes of handloaded .357 ammo for about half what new stuff cost. It had 150 grain Speer hollow point bullets and was supposed to be loaded a little on the hot side. I asked if she was going to apply for a concealed carry permit and she said, "No. I bought all the guns from private owners, so none of them are papered, and I see any reason to create records of any kind. Not a good idea with your background, right?"
I thought about it and decided she was right. As usual, she had been thinking about this. She had a cardboard box full of cleaning supplies, too. I kept thinking about how lucky I was to have a wife who used her head. __________________
CHAPTER 16
Several loggers around the county had given up and quit because the market for hardwood was so bad. I ran into Jack Duggins in the grocery one day who said he was retiring from logging. Had all his stuff up for sale, and was going to start taking Social Security, because he'd had a downed tree roll over on him and his leg hadn't been the same since. I asked about his log trucks, and he said the one with the hydraulic loader thing on it was sold, but he had the other one still. The cab was rough, but he said the drive train was sound. It was a tandem axle 1984 GMC General with a Detroit Diesel in it, 13 speed box, 18,000 lb. front axle and 38,000 lb. rear axles.
I told him I wanted a grain hauler for the farm and would have to buy or build a box bed for it. Jack said he'd bought the truck with a box bed, and taken it off. It had been sitting for years, and was rusty, but he could put it back on for me.
I asked him, "How much money are we talking about here?"
"I'd like to get $8,000 out of it. That's a little under the market with that bed on it, but I want to get it sold. The rubber ain't too bad on it. It'd run you for a while. As far as I know the old truck is in pretty good shape. You come take a look at it and see what you think. I already sold the log bed frame, so it's a bare chassis right now. Wouldn't be that hard to set that box back on it."
I got his phone number and directions, and told him I'd be out that evening to look.
When I got there, I found he was right about the old box bed being rusty. I looked it over good and decided it would have to get cleaned up and painted, or it wouldn't last many years. That became a bargaining point, along with the less than wonderful cab. It started and ran really well, though, and idled nicely when it warmed up. He had come down to $7,500 pretty quick, so I looked it all over and drove it down the road a short ways to feel the gears, the steering and the brakes. It seemed all right, so I asked him if he could do a little better if I paid him in money?
"$7,000, and I put the box back on it. That's as far as I can go."
"You got a deal. I'll be by tomorrow night with the money." _____________
Back in late April or early May, the price of silver had gone up around $45 an ounce, but I had held onto mine, hoping for more. It dropped to about $40 and had stayed there all summer. I decided to sell it in case it went lower. At least I would be putting it into something to make a buck. I sold the four $250 bags I had for $26,000 back to the same coin shop where I bought it. Joe's tax accountant said I had to pay 28% tax on that for some reason, and it would add to my income tax for the year.
Anyway, I had about $18,000 left, and figured I should put a lot of it in that old truck. The front tires were nearly new, but the back ones were worn down. I took the truck to the sandblaster guy and had him take the box off to do separately. He cleaned the frame and rear axles first and shot primer on that. I took it home and painted all that with black paint and a brush. I had it up on blocks, so I took off the rear brake drums and cleaned all that out and lubed it all. I hauled the rear tires in my pickup, 4 at a time, to the tire shop for a set of recaps.
I had the sandblast man spray the box bed with primer, then 2 coats of red tractor enamel, because there was no way I could handle that bed at the farm. While he was doing that, I sanded down the cab and bought a big air compressor a spray gun we had been needing. For being my first time, it came out pretty decent, I thought.
When it all got back together, the old truck looked pretty good with a white cab, red box and black undercarriage and wheels. The recapped tires looked like new. The inside of the cab was still trashed, though, so I spent some time on that. New floor mats helped a lot, and I got by with a seat cover job done by an uphostery shop. The rest I just scrubbed until it was clean.
The retread tires cost me $1,100, the sandblast and paint work was $1,400, and I spent $800 on a compressor and painting stuff. I spent $780 on new U-joints and some exhaust repairs. Oil and filter changes ate another $90. The truck had saddle tanks on it that held over 100 gallons, so a fillup cost me $310. I hadn't bought farm tags and insurance on the truck, but I had only spent $11,500 and I had a farm truck that would haul 600 bushels of grain. A lot of people spend twice that for a car that has trouble hauling a week's groceries. I knew it would eat money, for a new batteries, coolant, air filters, and other maintenance. Trucks are expensive to own and operate. But trucks can make you money, too, and cars generally don't.
The first job for the truck would likely be hauling home some farm equipment, though. I planned to go to some auctions soon. ________________
We had just walked out of the new hay barn when Joe told me, "You did pretty well getting this built. The Amish crew was a good idea, and you kept the cost down. You've been through a planting and a harvest season now, and you know how the farm accounts work. You're coming right along, for a city boy!"
He had grinned when he said that, so I did too when I answered.
"Some of us city kids ain't so dumb after all, huh?"
"If I thought you were dumb, I wouldn't have let you marry that stubborn daughter of mine."
"She might have had something to say about that."
"Yeah, she's got an opinion on everything. Say, if you're going to town anytime soon, we need some...."
He stumbled and fell slowly to the ground without saying any more. His eyes were open, but he wasn't breathing that I could tell. We were just a few steps from the kitchen door, so I ran inside and yelled for Ashley to call 911. Kate heard me first and was doing it when she looked at me and said, "JOE! What happened??!!!"
"He just passed out and fell down! I don't know!"
Kate told the dispatcher her husband had a heart attack or a stroke, and to get there fast.
They did, but it wasn't any use. They told us Joe was probably dead when he hit the ground. They did all they could, but he was already gone. He was listed as DOA at the hospital, of a massive stroke. __________________
Kate was pretty calm, I thought. Ashley cried a river, but her Mom told her softly they were lucky to have him for that long, and try to be at peace about it. I kept expecting the old lady to break down about it, but if she did, it was when she was alone. She looked as sad as anyone I had ever seen, though. She and Ashley made the arrangements at a local funeral home and we all went through the next 3 days like it was unreal. I took care of things at the farm, like I had when Joe was in the hospital.
I did my share of crying while I fed livestock, and tried to comfort the dog. She was looking for Joe to come home, staring out the driveway. When Ashley and Kate came home at night, the dog kept looking and sniffing around the car for Joe. Me and Pat did some of our grieving together. I think that helped me and the dog get a lot closer, although she would always see Kate as her master.
I tried to comfort Ashley as best I could, but I had learned that people have to do their grieving, and you best let them do it their own way. She did spend some time crying on my shoulder, and it seemed like that was the best I could do for her.
Both women had a pretty stiff upper lip for the next month, but their grief began to get sidetracked by the garden harvest. Close on the heels of that was corn harvest coming soon with cooler weather. I spent some time chainsawing the slabwood into firewood lengths and stacking it in the woodshed. "Chop wood and carry water", was the advice of some old people for when you're really out of sorts for any reason. It works. Simple jobs give you time to work through things in your mind, and it keeps you from doing something silly, like drinking or eating too much. The exercise calmed me down, and gave me time to let it soak in that I had responsibility for the farm now, and didn't have Joe to show me the way. Inside, I was still a mess. I had no clue how to manage a farm, as in when to expand the cattle her or not, how to know when and what price to "hedge" our corn crop by selling a commodity contract, or whether we should get into raising broiler chickens, or a dairy operation. I had seen Joe make such decisions, but I had no confidence in having to make them myself. I was scared spitless about all that, and I had just lost a really good friend.
Kate and Ashley changed my thinking about that real fast. They had ideas about what to do, and even though I felt like they were bossing me around some, it helped me sort things out, so I didn't fuss about it. I wanted all the help I could get. ___________________
CHAPTER 17
I would have depended on Joe as long as he would have let me, I suppose. As it was, I felt like I'd been dropped in cold water about running the farm, and into the deep end, too. Kate was supportive of me, and let me pretty much do what I thought was right. I said something about that to her, and she told me that Joe had pretty much been letting me run the place anyway, so not to worry so much. I worried anyway, but it was nice of her to say that.
It seemed like Ashley wanted a bigger say in how things were done now, and I was really glad of it. She knew the place like her own skin, and noticed things I overlooked, like the gates that wanted attention, and a cow that didn't look just right and might need a vet to look at her. We began to spend more time together on the place because her hours had been cut back at the grocery. It cut our income a little, but I needed her at home. The corn was getting dry early this year, so in a couple weeks it would be time to get the combine out there and turn some of that standing corn into money.
Ashley said she'd rather learn to run the combine than try to drive that big truck, so I started getting her acquainted with it. She was thin enough to get in some places to grease things that were hard for me, so that was a good place to start her education. That's how Joe had taught me about the machine, describing the function of each part everytime we greased it. Then I got to climb all over the thing and replace bearings and other parts. Ashley didn't mind the maintenance, so we went over the machine in detail, and what could go wrong in operation.
"We shouldn't have much trouble this year, because it is so dry. That will keep the fodder flowing through the head and the ear will shell easier. With any luck, you shouldn't get it stopped up like we did last year."
She asked me, "What do you mean by stopped up?"
"The threshing cylinder can get packed up with green fodder and cobs and corn shucks, then it stalls the machine. You have to kick it out of gear, or risk burning up a belt or breaking something. I'll ride with you a while to show you what that sounds like when it is getting overloaded, then you back off the ground speed a little to give it time to digest what's in it."
"Okay, I've heard it do that, I think. If it got clogged up, Dad got mad because he'd have to dig stuff out of it. Is that what you mean?"
"Yep, that's it. If there's a lot of green weeds in the field, that can clog it up, too, but the corn is pretty clean this year, and that will help. It should run good."
"I never wanted to drive this thing because it is so HUGE! I was afraid I would run into something and wreck it."
"It's pretty controllable, and you don't go any faster than a fast walk, anyway, so you have time to watch where you're going. You can drive it around the yard here where there's lots of room, and get the feel of it. Then, I'll run the outer rows and get some room opened up for you. I figured we would load the truck first, so I can have the fields opened up good for you and have some room to maneuver out there."
"Yeah, I saw Dad doing that. Once some of the corn is picked, you have a lot of room to drive around."
"I'll get it out of the building and you can get acquainted with the gears out where there is lots of room, and the internal stuff won't be running, so the noise won't be driving you nuts while you learn. The cab is up high, so you can see around it really well, except in the back. You just gotta learn to estimate how big the butt end of this thing is. I'll start you in low gear, so it will go really slow while you get used to it. It's different about steering, because it steers in the BACK end!"
"I can back up a wagon, so I'm not scared of that. I can do this."
The combine was an old 4 row Allis Chalmers Gleaner and only held about 80 bushels in the bin, so Ashley would have to dump her bin often. Kate was going to drive the tractor like she had for years, hauling gravity wagons of grain to the grain bins by the barn. If we all worked at it, we could probably move the grain fast enough to keep Ashley going in the combine. We had 3 gravity wagons to rotate from the field to the grain bins, and each wagon held about 200 bushels. It was a full time job getting the shelled corn from the field to the bins, then dumping them in the elevator to the bins, then back to the field before the other wagons were full again.
Joe had contracted 5,000 bushels of corn to the local farm Co-op, so we had that contract to fill first. I kept the truck on the road for a few days, until I'd gotten 10 loads of 600 bushels each delivered as Ashley got it harvested with the combine. Most days, she had plenty of time to grease the combine in the middle of the day, take a long lunch, and still keep her Mom busy loading the gravity wagons while I made a run to the elevator. I'd get back in time to get another load on the truck before the evening humidity made the stalks too tough to run good. That way, I could leave early in the morning for town and get the trip done. Otherwise, I was helping here and there unloading wagons into the farm grain bins, checking over equipment everywhere, and keeping fuel hauled to Ashley in the field.
We stayed busy for a couple weeks, but at the end of it, we had sold 5,000 bushels of corn for the contract price of $4.06 a bushel, and another 1,000 bushels for $5.85. I was told this had almost never happened, to have the harvest time price so much higher than what futures prices had been the past Spring. I talked to a few people and they said it was a good thing, because everything else was going up, too.
This put $29,000 in the farm account, so we had a good start on income this year. The cattle that Joe had sold earlier, 22 head of feeder calves, amounted to $13,400, so the farm did okay for the year. $42,400 may sound like a lot of money, but the farm expenses came out of that. That had to support all 3 of us, plus pay upkeep on a tractor, a combine, a big truck, and a lot of implements and buildings. Yes, Ashley's job provided our spending money, and I made some on the side doing some welding and wrench work, but it wasn't all that much, and prices were getting higher on everything.
Farming does have some fringe benefits, but it isn't free insurance or retirement money. You get to work like a dog for the "benefits", such as a garden, raising livestock and hunting wildlife for meat, and cutting firewood for heat. Mostly, what those things do is cut expenses. When your income is limited, you need to work pretty hard at cutting expenses. It's no wonder that most farmers are a tight as a wart on a pickle. I did have some money in savings from the sale of Mom and Dad's house, so I needed to invest that as smart as I could to produce an income later on. I was still thinking about that, and it had my brain in a knot.
____________________
Things were busy at the nursing home for different reasons. Gloria learned that the owners had given the staff a directive to cut their expenses by 15%, across the board. It meant lesser quality food, less heat this winter, less frequent laundry of bed linens to save on utilities, no outside cleaning crew, and one of their 6 employees was laid off. The rest had to take up the slack, so care suffered while the remaining staff was overworked. The couple that owned the place were doing all they could personally to make it happen. They were there in the morning when the day shift came in, and they were there at night well into the second shift.
Gloria was really glad to see Larry Barnes when he was free to come by and feed his mother, for more than one reason. They spent some time together away from the nursing home, but it was limited by their jobs. The ready-mix plant was still somewhat busy, but like the nursing home, they had laid off 2 drivers to cut expenses. So, Larry and the other 3 remaining drivers were running 10 to 12 hours a day to keep up. It was cheaper for the company to pay them some overtime than to pay an extra man with his benefits cost.
When he had to work late, he still stopped at the nursing home to see his mother, but mostly to see Gloria. Mrs. Barnes' Alzheimer's had progressed enough that she seldom knew Larry now. He had done his grieving for this as it happened, and was resigned to her really not being there anymore. He helped give her meds, and turn her in the bed, and helped her to the bathroom before he left for the night, since her stroke had left her partially paralyzed.
The days when Larry got off work in time to be there early made up for it, because he could leave with Gloria at the end of her shift. They often went to her apartment for the evening meal, and sometimes talked into the evening. Gloria had been to Larry's place out north of town about 5 miles and she liked it. He lived at his parents' place, 40 acres of wooded hillsides and bottom land that allowed him to keep a few beef calves on pasture in the summer. His day job kept him from doing any more than that, and there wasn't enough tillable land to do much farming.
Larry's home was old and small, a 1930's era bungalow with one bedroom downstairs and a couple small ones upstairs. He kept the place neat and clean, but it looked old fashioned so he had been reluctant to take Gloria to see it. Larry was well aware of how Gloria had lived before her divorce. It was a small town, and word got around.
She surprised him when he finally took her out to see the place that October. The leaves were just beginning to turn their bright Fall colors, the pasture was still green with 5 fat beef calves in it, and the weather was a perfect Indian Summer day.
"I love it! It's so pretty out here!"
Larry said, "It's not so pretty in winter, when the leaves are gone and the roads get bad with snow and ice."
"It's like that everywhere in winter. And it's quiet. No traffic noise, no smelly trucks. OH! I want to look at that garden. "
She walked off behind the house to inspect it with him following.
"It's got some weeds now, but I'll clean it up after I get the last of the cabbage out to make sauerkraut and pick those dry beans. It's time to do that, but I've been busy. Now that work has slowed down some I'll get the tractor and disc in there and clean it up. I want to sow it in wheat next week for a cover crop this winter."
"Let's do it now! I know how to make kraut, and we can just pull the bean vines up and pick all of them. You have a bucket or a basket to put them in?"
They spent the morning in the garden and had a simple lunch of sandwiches and fresh coleslaw she made. They shredded cabbage into crocks after lunch, adding salt to each layer, then covering the filled crock with wilted cabbage leaves and a towel. It would take a few days to ferment.
"I'll come back and help you can the kraut when it's ready. I always enjoyed canning. Do you have a pressure canner?"
"Yeah, Mom had one. I've used it a lot and it's fine, but I need to get a new gasket for it. It leaked some when I did the sweet corn. I'll pick up one next week."
They sat in the yard relaxing when the work was finished, enjoying the sunset.
"I would have never thought you'd take to country life," Larry told her, as he began to have a glimmer of hope.
"We grew up at the edge of town and we always had a garden. I liked animals, but all we ever had was cats and a dog and a few chickens when I was little. I thought it would be nice to have a big farm with room for a pony and some cows. I liked to watch the farmer behind our lot when he plowed and planted, and later when harvest time came. That was all a man's world, but I thought I could do those things, too."
Gloria sat with a yellow farm cat near her chair, getting its' ears scratched. Larry's bird dog got jealous and came by for his share of attention. Larry thought it might be more than she wanted, so he called the dog away from her.
"Oh he's all right. I like dogs, and hunting dogs are really sweet," she told him. "Sandy is a retriever, you know. She doesn't know anything about hunting, though. Do you think you could teach her? She's only a little past 2 years old."
"Hmm, it's late to start, but she listens to you really well. You could try with Butch around and we'll see how it goes. You want to try for ducks this year? We have some wood ducks that land on our pond every year."
"Yeah! That would be great! We might even get Sandy to go fetch them out of the pond!"
Larry took her home later that evening and drove back with a smile on his face. __________________
CHAPTER 18
Inflation sneaks up on you. There are lots of prices that go up when you aren't looking. You don't buy some things very often, like tires, a refrigerator, or new underwear. Then when you go to get something of that kind, the price about knocks you over.
Ashley's car needed the alternator replaced, so I took the old one off and took it in to exchange for a rebuilt one. The last one I had bought for my previous truck cost me less than 30 bucks, so I had that in mind. This one was almost $100! I didn't have that much money on me so I wrote them a check and hustled on back home to get it installed.
I kept thinking about how much it cost the rest of the day, wondering what else had gone up in price lately. Farming had been keeping me busy all summer, so I hadn't spent much time on the internet. I logged on to my favorite homesteading forum that night and found everybody complaining about the high cost of everything, especially food. I never paid any attention to food prices because we raised almost everything. Ashley got a small discount at the grocery where she worked and she bought most of what we needed there, so I never did much grocery shopping.
I logged off and asked her, "Have you noticed grocery proces going up lately?"
She gave me a look like I was an alien life form and said, "Oh yeah! Pretty steadily for the past year, in fact. I guess you haven't been paying attention."
"Well, no, I haven't, but that alternator cost me over $96 today, and the last one was a third that much, just over a year ago. That got my attention. I was just reading on a forum and everybody is griping about food prices. I wonder what else has gone up when I wasn't looking."
"Pretty much everything I've seen is going up. Not 3 times the price, but a lot of stuff is near double what it was a not that long ago. Have you talked to the fertilizer guy lately? I bet we are in for a shock there."
"No, and I need to see what is going on now. I better check on some other things, too, like contracting diesel fuel for next year and filling our LP tanks for cooking."
We left it at that, and I got to thinking about what it would cost to put out next year's crops. Then there were the maintenance things. Motor oil was bound to have gone up even with the hefty quantity discount I normally got buying it by the 55 gallon barrel. We used a lot of oil, with a big tractor, the combine, my pickup, the grain truck, and Ashley's and Kate's cars. A couple of the grain wagons had some bad tires on them and the combine was due for major servicing now that the corn was in. This was going to add up. After thinking it over the next morning, I mentioned my concerns at lunch.
Kate said, "I've been thinking about this, too. At the rate things are going up, we need to work on our farm expenses, and everything we spend, I guess. I don't want to spend too much now and have to borrow money to put crops in next Spring. Me and Joe scrimped for years to get to where we had the money saved ahead for planting, and I don't want to have to do that ever again. The interest eats you up"
I put my oar in the water then. "I have some money left from the sale of my parents' house and I've been wondering how I should best invest it. It looks to me like I should buy some stuff ahead of time, so if prices are going to keep going up. The longer it stays in the banks, the less buy. And what I read on the forum last night said that the Federal Reserve has been creating money out of thin air and giving it to banks, and they speculate on commodities with it and make prices go up. So this might go on for a while. I'll look around the farm and start making a list."
Ashley said, "I'll make a list of things I buy regularly and we can stock up on those things, too. Like some things I buy at the store and what we normally buy at Wal Mart and the pharmacy. Things like those mega vitamins Mom takes have gone way the heck up. Household supplies, and whatever."
Kate said, "We won't ever need any dishes or kitchen things. I inherited my Mother's things and they are still all packed away in the attic. There is a lot of stuff up there, so better let me see your lists before you go spending money on anything."
We both agreed to that. I finished eating and headed back out to work as the women cleaned up the table.
After going through the numbers, we decided to try open pollinated seed corn next year, because we could save the seed from year to year, and not have to pay outrageous amounts for hybrid seed. It took a while to find it, but I got 500 pounds of seed ordered. The small fields of wheat and oats we grew were already standard open pollinated varieties so saving the seed from them was standard procedure for us. The smaller grain bins already were filled with this year's crops of those. It was fertilizer that worried me, because it doesn't store very well, is corrosive as the very devil, and the nitrogen component tends to degrade pretty fast if not stored in very good conditions. I decided that the best way to store fertilizer was to put it on the ground NOW and plant a cover crop to hold onto it. The bulk dealers were all out of stock, but I found several tons of bagged fertilizer available about 50 miles from us and planned the trip to pick it up. It cost more per ton, but not nearly what I had heard the price was estimated to be next Spring. _______________
Gloria came out one day to help can the last of our garden. There's a lot of time to talk when you are snapping breen beans. She told about the old man at the nursing home who convinced her to take her money out the bank. I asked what she planned to do with it? "Larry Barnes and I are getting married, and we are buying some livestock for the place, and then...." Kate interrupted, saying, "You ARE? Well, you'd have to look hard to find a better fellow. I like him a lot. Now you have to tell us how we can help with the wedding!"
Ashley had seen this coming for a long time, buut she enthused with her Mom about the prospect of a wedding. That kept the women busy talking all afternoon. I sat there snapping beans and thinking I heeded to know more about what was happening to banks. I read on the internet late that night and went to bed thinking that I had better do something with our remaining $25,000 or so that we had spread around 4 different banks.
The next day Ashley and I talked about this and got Kate involved, too. I said I wanted to use the money to make the farm as financially sound as we could. Kate said, "We could pay the taxes for next year. They will take payment ahead of time. We've done that before when our crop money came in."
Ashley said, "I like Gloria's idea of livestock. We have a lot of feed on hand, and that would pay off."
I agreed. The farm could produce more than what we had been doing, but it would be more work for all of us.
Kate said she would like to have a real dairy cow, and make cheese. We made a list and got busy on it that day. Things happened pretty fast, and we had to work out a new chore routine because within a month we had chickens in one corner of the barn, a beautiful Jersey cow that needed milked, a dozen brood sows and a boar hog to house and feed. It took some hurried work on pens and stalls, but we got them all housed. I bought a really good hammermill at the consignment auction, a couple tons of feed supplements, salt and minerals. I traded off the tractor for a younger one with low hours on it. It was the same model as the old John Deere, so all the equipment and maintenance supplies worked for it. It was just after Thanksgiving Day before we filled Ashley's and her Mom's lists and I got the farm supplies in place. Fuel tanks were topped off, I had fertilizer spread on all the cropland and what pasture and hay ground needed it, and the pantry was full. The shop still had stacks of boxes that wanted new shelves for them, but at least it was bought and paid for, and on hand for use. We had almost $4,000 left that I took out in cash, leaving only a nominal amount in one bank and the other accounts closed out. It wasn't much money to have on hand for a working farm, but we had enough on hand now to run the farm for at least 2 years, maybe more if we stretched things, and we could always sell grain or livestock if we needed ready money.
All that made us feel a lot better, but every time we read the news online we all wondered how long things would stay together.
_______________
CHAPTER 19
We didn't have long to wait to find out. Kate answered the phone one cold day as I came in for lunch. She said, "What? No, I don't know of anything we need from town. Why is the store closing early?" Pause. "Won't they get the computer fixed pretty soon?" Pause. "Why are the banks closed?"
My ears perked up and I was full of questions by the time Kate handed me the phone, saying, "It's Ashley, and she says all the banks are shut down!"
I picked up the phone and asked, "What's this all about?" She said, "All I got was a news report on the radio at the store that was talking about China dumping US Treasury bonds, and that caused a panic in the banks. The President shut all the banks down to stop a panic. Credit cards don't work so most businesses are closing for the day, or just taking cash. A customer said the ATM at our bank doesn't work, either. I needed some gas, but the only station that is open is Cowboy's and they have jacked up the price to $10 a gallon and cash only!"
"You'd better come straight on home. This sounds bad. Where are you?"
"I'm at Cowboy's station on Highway 60. There are some people getting pretty mad inside, it sounds like, so I'm outa here."
"Stay on the phone until you are out of town at least, okay?"
"Yeah. I'm on my way home now. Lots of traffic headed for town it looks like."
I stayed on the phone with her until she was close to home. In a few minutes I saw her turn into the farm lane and breathed a sigh of relief. I told Kate she was home and we both went outside to meet her.
Kate got on the computer and pulled up the Zerohedge website. Just the headlines told enough of the story to get the idea. "CHINA DUMPS US TREASURIES--DOLLAR PLUMETTING" "GOLD, SILVER AT ALL TIME HIGHS" "US MARKETS CLOSED, BANK HOLIDAY DECLARED UNTIL PANIC SUBSIDES" "COMEX CLOSED" "LONDON MARKETS CLOSED AMID PANIC IN EUROPE" "BERNANKE CALLS EMERGENCY MEETING OF THE G20" "US CURRENCY SWAP LINES ABORTED BY ECB" "BERNANKE VOWS TO SUPPORT US BANKS"
We all read this news without comment, then sat down to think. Kate was the first to speak. "I think we had all better stay home until we know what is going on out there. From what Ashley said, people are pretty upset by all this, and I don't want to be any part of that."
Ashley said, "I've never seen people behave like that! I'm not going anywhere until I know things have calmed down."
I nodded and said, "That's what I think, too. I need to call Gloria and make sure she is okay, though."
Gloria answered her cell phone, but the connection wasn't the best. "This is Wes. Are you okay?"
"Yes, I'm fine. I moved in with Larry and gave up the apartment. He came home from work and said things are crazy in town, so I called into work and they said they need me. Larry said he would go with me to make sure I'm okay. He's going to try the grocery while I'm at work and will pick me up later."
"Okay. If you need anything, let me know, all right? This could last a while."
"Yes, but we 're fine."
"Okay. See ya Sis. Love ya."
"Love you too. Bye."
Then the lights went out in the house and Wes said, "I wonder what caused that?"
It was Monday, December 5th, 2011.
_________________________
End of Part One
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 18, 2013 18:41:15 GMT -6
I have 5 chapters written in Part Two. We'll see what folks think of this much, while I work on more.
|
|
|
Post by notchman on Aug 19, 2013 1:34:29 GMT -6
Dang it patience, you've sucked me in to another one of your well written stories. Post faster so I can find out what's going to happen next
|
|
|
Post by papaof2 on Aug 19, 2013 8:51:41 GMT -6
Good so far - just not enough of it ;-)
Sent from my M1061 using proboards
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 19, 2013 9:06:00 GMT -6
Well, I've done what I said I never would do, to post something that is incomplete. I do have Part Two finished, so I'll begin putting that up here, but writing time is hard to come by just now, so it will take awhile to get the whole thing finished. It is outlined and I do have an ending planned.
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 19, 2013 9:07:21 GMT -6
Okay, here's something for today. FROM THE BOTTOM UP Part Two Chapter 20 2010 Ed Wilson knew he was getting old. Since he was a kid he'd had a trick knee that was easy to dislocate. It creaked a bit now, so he was careful with it. Sometimes arthritis in his hands made it harder to do the hobby woodworking he enjoyed. Too many hours around loud factory machinery had damaged his hearing, causing a constant ringing noise. Hearing aids helped that, but he couldn't wear them around noisy things. Since he was 40, he had become more farsighted and needed bifocals. By the time he was just past 50, he elected to get dentures to end the problems with his teeth. The dentures were getting more comfortable now, but were a bother. Ed came out of the bathroom and said to his wife, "I'm just about a bionic man now, Hon. It takes me half an hour to put myself together in the morning." He was adjusting his hearing aids to suit the kitchen noise level. His wife Sheryl said, "Happy sixty-second birthday! Come here. I've never kissed a guy that old before." She pecked him on the cheek. "I have a pecan pie started for your birthday." "Hmph. Don't be ragging on me about my age. You're a lot older than I am!" "RIGHT! Three whole months. When are you going to retire and get out of that factory? I had the good sense to retire 3 months ago!" "How about today? I've been threatening them with it for months now and nobody believes me, but I signed up for social Security, and it starts next month. We don't need my company pension to make it. I can get that started in a month or two, so I think I'll give 'em the good news today. The General Foreman has been griping about holding costs down for months, and I've been telling him I can retire soon and he can take my salary out of his budget. He says I can't retire because they don't have another foreman trained yet. I asked him whose fault was that?" "They'll miss you when you're gone. I've heard all the stories." "It's time to get out of there before the place goes under. Business has been down since the 2008 car model year started because of the bank mess. Lucky for me, our pensions aren't tied to company stock like some are. Car company stocks are in the toilet." ______________ Human Resources had some forms for Ed to sign to start the retirement process. It would take a month for the pension checks to begin, but his insurance would stay in effect, and transition to a Medicare Supplement next month. By lunchtime the word was out that Ed was retiring, and he got his share of teasing and congratulations. At the afternoon break, somebody had fetched cake from the bakery and the General Foreman and Plant Manager gave him a roasting with tales from years before. Roaring laughter followed, but Ed was ready for them. He had brought his old wind-up alarm clock to work and followed his workers back to the Press Department. "Hey! Wilbur! I need to use your 200 ton press for a minute!" "Huh? What for?" "No parts in it are there?" "No, boss. I always clear it before break..." "FIne! Put this damned alarm clock in the die and mash the button!" KACHUNK! Ed's alarm clock vaguely resembled an alternator bracket when he pulled the remains out of the die. Ed found a piece of wire and hung it on the doorknob of the General Foreman's office. He smiled and waved goodbye, and walked out of the plant with his lunch box for the last time. _________________ Ed and Sheryl had talked about what to do with themselves after they retired. He liked to fish, hunt squirrels, and generally be outdoors, things he had promised himself he would do when he had the time. She liked the peace and quiet of the country and enjoyed visiting their son Mike and his wife Laura at their off grid homestead. She wasn't sure she'd want to live the way they did. Cooking on a wood stove was time consuming, hot, and something of an art as she remembered from childhood. On the way home from visiting their son and his wife, Ed said, "I'd like to camp out there for a week at a time. It's my kind of place. Reminds me of when I was a kid on my Dad's farm." "If you're talking about a camper, I'd like it. No tents for me, though." "With the economy down, I bet we could find a deal on a camper", Ed said. "I'll talk to Mike and see if that is okay with them. We could put it away from their house so we wouldn't be in their way. Maybe by that overlook where you can see the valley below." Mike and Laura were agreeable. They didn't use the wooded area except for hunting mushrooms and cutting a little firewood. An ad on Craigslist got Sheryl's attention. An older camping trailer that they could easily afford looked to be a good deal. She shopped online and compared prices. They got a look at it and learned the owner needed to sell it fast to make car repairs. For $1,900 he not only delivered it, but threw in a decent TV and a generator on the deal. Ed had him park it at the back of their driveway and set to work fixing it up a bit. Sheryl did some sewing for new curtains and upholstery on the somewhat tired interior. Ed redid the wiring for LED lights, repaired the plumbing, and fixed whatever it needed. By late summer he thought it was ready, so they did a trial run at home. Ed filled the water tank, Sheryl filled the cabinets and the fridge, and they sorted out enough spare clothing to live for a week. T hey moved into the camper for a few days and learned they had overlooked a few things they needed to buy, some spices, a longer extension cord for the generator, and a few things in the bathroom. They had a neighbor with a heavy 3/4 ton truck move the heavy trailer to Mike and Laura's place. After several trips that summer, they liked it well enough to put in a septic tank and avoid the problem of emptying the holding tank. That Fall they put in a concrete parking spot for it to have a paved patio. Ed added some solar panels so they didn't have to run the generator so much, and had a water line run from Mike's house back to the camper. By midsummer, it was shaping up nicely and they spent most weekends there, taking only their big white cat Charlie when they left home and clothing they had washed from the last trip. Ed had bought a prefabbed shed and had it moved to the spot. That gave him a place to park the old lawn mower and tools to make minor repairs. The twilight over the valley below was lovely when they sat on the patio to enjoy one last cup of coffee after supper. _______________
|
|
|
Post by weapons762 on Aug 19, 2013 12:28:55 GMT -6
moar please, i'm hooked
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 19, 2013 15:13:12 GMT -6
Here ya go.... CHAPTER 21 Winter, 2011 Ed felt like he was sweating bullets when he learned his wife was diagnosed with cancer. It was a dark time for them. She was terrified of a lingering, painful death, but tried to keep most of her fear inside. Ed drew the feelings out of her with carefully chosen words so she could talk about it. He could see that she was distraught and ached with frustration at being unable to make it go away. She told him it helped just for him to be there. Despite their fears, the surgeon did an outstanding job and said she got all the offending tissue. The cancer was removed and did not recur. As the months went by, their confidence grew that it was gone. They had a reprieve. Sheryl recovered so they could go camping again by late winter. She was much more aware of her own mortality and a little depressed about that, but looking out the camper window at a new snowfall, Sheryl thought of her favorite poem by Robert Frost, and the lines, "The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep." She decided she would live whatever time she had left as fully as she could. She told Ed about it when he came in with his .22 over his arm and a fat rabbit hanging from his belt. Soon Sheryl got back into her hobbies of sewing, canning the food that Ed raised in the back yard, and reading, especially history. She browsed the auctions and antique places where she found a few pieces she liked. They got back into some activities at the Senior Center in town with some old friends. _______________ Early Spring was warm and wet for a while, but there were a lot of sunny days. Sheryl and Ed planted a big garden and kept their yard mowed and looking better than last year when they had been gone so much during her illness. When Sheryl was busy with her interests, Ed worked on building a shelter house for the camper trailer and moved the solar panels up to that new roof. He had repaired the trailer roof when it had leaked a little, but he knew it would last a lot longer if it was covered. A few weeks later, he had it finished. They hiked to one of the flood control lakes in the nearby forestry where he caught some panfish for supper. Shirley complained of a bad headache the next night when they got back to their home on the edge of town. She took some Tylenol and went to bed. Ed turned in early, too, tired from the outing. He awoke when Sheryl got up early the next morning and took more Tylenol. It was better by lunchtime, but came back in the afternoon. Ed was concerned. "You'd better call your doctor and find out what is causing that headache." "I'm tired of doctors. It will get better." She took a couple more pills and laid down on the couch. Ed called her doctor who said to come see her right away at the emergency room. Sheryl protested, but got in the car and went with him. The doctor checked her blood pressure and found it very high. Prescription in hand, they headed for the pharmacy to get it filled, but Sheryl collapsed before they got out of the ER. Ed followed the nurses and doctor back into a treatment room where they shooed him out. An hour later he was informed that she had passed away of a massive stroke. Ed had never felt so empty and alone. He went through the motions of living, numbly doing what had to be done to have her cremated as she wished. He notified Social Security of her death, called the various insurance agencies to claim her life insurance, and gave the necessary information to the funeral director for publishing an obituary. After her brother and sisters came for the memorial service at the funeral home, he doubted if he would be seeing any of them again, since they lived some distance away. It felt like he was losing a lot of old friends along with his wife. She had told him to scatter her ashes where he wanted to plant a tree, and she would nourish it for him. He thought a fruit tree was the right choice, and planted a pair of Winesap apple trees below their camp site on the south slope. They took off and grew well that Spring. Ed carefully pruned them the next year as they grew for the proper open shape. ___________________ He was getting out of shape and he knew it, but he was too discouraged to do very much. The more he thought about it, the less he was inclined to stay in their old home. It was just too empty by himself. He was tired of mowing the big yard, too. Seeing Mike and Laura on Sundays was the high point of his week now. He decided to sell their old home and move to the camp site. He didn't need much room for just one person, and the money from the house could be important in his old age. Old work habits helped him get moving again, now that he had some sort of goal. On his job, his innate stubbornness made him follow things through to completion. Once begun, he would see it through. He began with cleaning up the property, hauling off a couple loads of accumulated junk. Next, he cleaned out Sheryl's closet and gave a lot of her clothes to her sisters. Laura took a few things, but a lot remained to donate to the Goodwill store. He sold Sheryl's car with an ad in the newspaper and gave the woman who bought it the spare parts and filters he had in the garage. He cleaned out old flower beds and replanted them with cheap annuals for some bright colors, painted the house trim, and had a fresh layer of fine gravel put on the driveway. He tilled the garden to get rid of this year's crop residues. He took extra trash cans, a lot of his workshop things, the charcoal grill, and some lawn furniture to the camp site. The garage was pretty well emptied of junk from the past, so he scrubbed the floor with detergent and TSP. Ed had a week long yard sale and got rid of a big pile of extra clothing and inherited junk. That helped clear out the garage of boxes of dishes, pots and pans, and other junk. He made enough money at that to buy a big roll of screen wire for enclosing the camp shelter. His old S10 Chevy pickup was on the road a lot, hauling things to and fro, but the old house was looking good. He painted the interior walls and trim, then rented a carpet steamer and had the inside looking almost like new. The house had been a bit crowded with furniture, some of which he sold to improve the appearance. The antiques brought enough to be worth his time. The place looked a lot better when the realtor put out a For Sale sign. He gave the woman a key to the house, and spent some time sorting out and hauling things to the campsite. The first couple that came to look at the property bought it. They were retired and wanted to move out from the city and rent out their old house for income. The deal closed on a Thursday. Ed counted himself lucky to have sold it so fast when real estate was hardly moving at all. He deposited the cashier's check for $140,000 in his savings acount and sold the rest of what was in the house to a used furniture dealer. In less than a week he loaded Charlie into his cat carrier and moved to the camp site.
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 19, 2013 21:33:02 GMT -6
Here's the rest of Part Two. The rest of the story is under construction. Will post it as fast as I get it finished. CHAPTER 22 Summer sunlight filtered through the leaf canopy, flashing on the truck's hood as Ed drove slowly along the winding gravel road toward his son's place and his camp site there. He was in no hurry. Since his wife died, he had been loafing from one day to the next. Selling their house and moving out here had kept him busy for a while, but that was accomplished now. Sheryl had been his love for 43 years. Without her, Ed didn't really care much about what went on around him. He had wanted to move to make his life less complicated and have something of a fresh start. The curves hept his attention. Steep dropoffs could be seen on first one side of the road then the other. It was a long ways to the bottom, too. The gravel rolled under his tires, letting the truck drift slightly in the turns. It had been recently graded and the loose stone rolled like ball bearings under the tires. He had to go slow to stay on the road. It reminded him of when he learned to drive well on the local dirt track as a teenager. A friend had let him drive their race car, and he proved to be good at it, but he quickly saw how expensive racing could be and walked away from it. A poor farm kid couldn't afford it. He had gone from one job to another until he landed at the auto parts plant and stayed there for the next 32 years, working his way up to a Foreman's position. That job had paid for raising a family with his high school sweetheart. With her gone, the bottom had fallen out of his life. He had read about grieving, and some of what they said he had found to be true. He was trying to keep the grief from causing him to do anything foolish while he wasn't thinking clearly. The logic of that was fine, but it didn't make him feel any better. Ed sighed and tried to think about his future, but there didn't seem to be anything out there. Mike and Laura's driveway came into view, so Ed downshifted and expertly bent the small pickup around the turn. Back the lane 100 yards from the road he could see their SUV was gone, so they were still at work and there was no need to disturb the dogs in the house. Still, they barked at the truck's sound. They knew him well, but he didn't want to push it without their masters being home. They were serious guard dogs, a Rottweiller, a Husky/German Shepherd cross, and a German Shepherd/Coyote cross. Ed left them alone and drove on back another 100 yards to his trailer. He carried Charlie inside and they made themselves comfortable, Ed on the couch with a cup of coffee, and the big white cat sprawled beside him shedding white fur on the cushions. Mike's place laid on the top of the ridge and extended over the edge at the back where it dropped about 300 feet to the valley below. Erosion gullies the size of small canyons began at the road and dropped off deeper toward the back, but the flat land on top got wider the farther back you went until you got to the bluff. A second gravel road meandered along the valley floor below. The flat land was partially cleared on top, but the rest was all forested. At the edge of the cleared land was where Ed's trailer sat, hidden to all until the leaves fell in autumn. It was just off the crest of the ridge, so it was not visible as part of the skyline even in winter. The south slope in front of the trailer was gentle for 70 yards before it fell off into the gulley on that side that ran roughly parallel to the deeper one on the north. Sometime before 1950, this whole ridgetop had been cleared and farmed, but now only a few homesteads dotted the 3 miles of dead end road he travelled today. It was not a prime real estate area. The last 3 homes on the road were off grid. Power lines had never been extended that far, although the county water lines did go to the end of the road. It was as remote as could be found in Indiana and surrounded on 3 sides by State Forest, with small flood control lakes here and there. The residents were mostly poor, or retired, which was much the same thing. Two older couples had come from Chicago to get away from the city, but the rest were locals. Old vehicles and older mobile homes were all most could afford. Property taxes were low and road maintenance was at a bare minimum. There weren't any school age children beyond the first half of the 3 mile long road, so the school bus never came back this far. The only traffic was 3 neighbors beyond him, and two of those couples were retired. If you paid attention, you could identify all the vehicles that passed his place. ______________ Today Ed had brought his 4 chickens to their new shed near the trailer. He opened the antique wood transport coop, lifted them out, and into the small shed. They looked somewhat confused, but one soon wandered to the feeder and began to eat. The others joined her and they were settled in their new home. A few years of experience had shown 4 to be just about right to supply his and Mike's homes. The henhouse had a small shed roof extending from the back he'd built recently. It stored a barrel each of wheat and shelled corn, and a third barrel with feed supplement. There was a shelf over the barrels with bags of mineralized salt, crushed oyster shells, and crushed granite grit to feed the hens. He had converted his feed grinding burr mill to use a small gasoline engine. It stood on it's stand amid an assortment of feed and water buckets, and a covered metal trash can for storing the ground feed. The garden tractor finished filling the space. It was only enclosed on 3 sides, but he planned to make double doors for it soon. Rain water from the whole roof drained into a rain barrel near the hen house door, so he didn't have to carry water very far for the chickens. The past few months he had accumulated more eggs than they could use, so he had dehydrated quite a lot of eggs and vacuum sealed them. He had been keeping them in the freezer, but even when thawed they would keep for several more months. The only freezer he had now was in the tiny refrigerator. It made enough ice for Ed and kept some bacon stored for his breakfast. They never kept much food here when they were camping, so Ed thought about how he would live and keep more stored food with limited electricity. A big freezer was out of the question, but he had read about canning bacon on the internet and decided to look into that. He believed in keeping a stock of food stored like his family did when he was a child. It had been a big help when he got laid off one time, and several other times in bad weather when they couldn't get to the store reasonably. He and Sheryl had always bought meat in bulk when it was on sale and kept it frozen, although lately she had canned a bunch of pork loin, some beef, and a lot of chicken. He wouldn't have to go to the grocery for a year or more, if he didn't want to. It was just the way they had always lived and the way he thought. He had kept her All American pressure canner and knew how to use it. He had bought materials to build a solar dehydrator, too, but had never got around to getting it built. He had moved the old refrigerator he'd found to use for drying racks in that project, along with the plastic screening for trays and some vent tubing. He could work on that this winter when he got bored, he supposed. He had the old fridge parked under the shleter by the back end of the trailer. They had made their own soap for most of their married life because Sheryl was allergic to the detergents in commercial soaps. Likewise with laundry soap, lest she break out in hives. Ed liked it because it made his skin feel better, too. So, they had saved bacon grease and beef tallow for the purpose and he still had a few plastic bottles of lye. They seemed to have more fat than was needed for this, so Sheryl had canned cleaned bacon grease in quart jars. He had moved a couple dozen of the jars into his storage shed. The trailer didn't have room for storage so he was glad now that he'd bought the biggest storage shed he could find, an 8 ft. x 20 ft. with a barn style roof. It sat down the slope from the trailer and off to the southwest, with the chicken coop being just beyond it. He already had the loft of the little barn full of stuff he had moved from the old house. Ed decided that he needed a root cellar to store the canned food he had moved out here. There was a lot of it. He had filled the trailer bedroom shelves to overflowing and the rest went into Mike's root cellar, mostly on the floor in stacked boxes. Being past age 60, or 62, he couldn't remember which, meant that he didn't have to pay as much tax on the money from selling their house, so the accountant had told him. After his taxes were paid for the year, he would have about $120,000 left from that. They had paid for their both their funerals several years ago, to assure that Mike didn't have to pay for them. Sheryl had cheap life insurance from where she worked for $50,000 and there were no taxes on that money, so Ed had a little over $210,000 in the bank, counting their previous savings. It worried him what to do with that money, more than he'd ever had before. Banks paid almost nothing in interest now, and from what he had seen of prices going up, he needed to invest in something better. There were too many tales of bank problems on the internet, and the government being deep in debt. Some said the dollar could crash and be worth nothing. Ed didn't know what to do with his money, but he was convinced that the bank was not the right place for it. His coffee finished, Ed absently petted the sleeping cat beside him and said, "Charlie, we have a lot to do here, and you're sleeping the day away. Come on out to the porch and get acquainted with the place." The cat stretched and yawned, got up and slowly followed Ed outside where he found a sunny spot and parked himself on a small table, then promptly went back to sleep. All his life they had been careful with money and stayed in good financial shape. Ed didn't want to lose it now when he was getting old. He didn't like the idea of buying gold, but he felt like he needed some form of cash on hand. He had been thinking about this for some time, but hadn't found an answer. His living expenses here would be very small, but he still had expenses. They could grow food, but many other things cost money. Gasoline was over $3.50 a gallon, and everything he looked at was much higher than what he remembered. He decided that whatever he thought he might need, he should go ahead and buy it like he and Sheryl had done. He said something to that effect to Mike and Laura when they got home that day, and planned to go shopping the next day. That evening he put the camper top back on his pickup because he planned to go to several stores and wanted to be able to lock it up. __________________________ CHAPTER 23 Mid summer, 2011 Bass Pro had a huge store in Clarksville that Ed had never taken time to explore. It would have been more fun if he had someone along to talk to, but he enjoyed it anyway. In the fishing section he bumped in to a young man and said, "Excuse me", then stepped out of the way. He got a better look at the fellow and asked, "Don't I know you? I think you fixed the head gasket on my truck at John Wilson's Garage, didn't you?" Wes thought a minute and said, "I think so, I'm Wes Hardin". He offered his hand and Ed shook it. "This is a long ways to go to see the neighbor's. I haven't seen you at Wilson's this year. What are you doing now?" "I'm farming. Joe Kemper's old place. I married his daughter Ashley here." Wes indicated his wife beside him. "Is your truck running okay?' "Oh yes, it's just fine. Did you quit doing mechanic work then?" "I do a little at home now, mostly farm equipment for the neighbors." "That's good to know. It's hard to find a good mechanic. I don't need anything right now, but if I do how can I get in touch with you?" "The phone is still listed as Joe Kemper, but he passed away recently." "I'm sorry to hear that. I knew Joe a little bit. He drove a truck for the County Highway Department, didn't he?" Ashley nodded and said, "Yes, he did that for years, and farmed on the side. We miss him a lot." Ed said, "Well, I wish you folks the best, and give your Mother my condolences, too. Maybe I'll see you fishing someplace." Wes said, "We plan to go to the lake down in Delaney Park. I'm pretty new at fishing, but Ashley says it's a good place to start." "Thanks for the tip. I'm sort of new to it myself and the park is close to me. I live just up on the ridge from there. Catch you later!" Ed went on down the aisle to select a better reel for panfishing while the young couple went on their way. The Kemper farm was only a couple miles across the highway from the county road Ed lived on , so he figured 5 miles at the most to their place. He'd have to keep the guy in mind. Ed bought an armload of fishing gear, a couple bricks of .22 shells, some 1 1/4 ounce deer slugs for his shotgun, and 5 boxes of .30-06 ammunition for his old rifle. It looked pretty bad, with it's old military stock and it had been years since he shot it, although he took it out and cleaned it occassionally. It was a war surplus thing his Dad had bought many years ago, but it was accurate with the peep sights out to 300 yards or more if he was really careful shooting. His next stop was at Rural King, then Sam's Club and Wal Mart. The truck was full when he headed home. It took some careful thought to get it all put away in the trailer and his workshop building. He decided he HAD to get a root cellar built for canned food so he could reclaim his bedroom. The next day he went to see Gerald Tomes, the neighbor across the road who had an old backhoe sitting around. He was a good friend of Mike's that did some odd jobs. Gerald agreed to do the job for a reasonable amount, if he wasn't in a big hurry. Gerald had a day job, and would have to do it evenings and weekends. Meanwhile, Ed had some other ideas. He needed internet service, he wanted a TV antenna so he could get storm warnings, and he thought it would be good to have a CB radio. The junkyard provided a pretty good used TV antenna tower that he took directly to Mike's shop and had them do some minor welding on it, then gave it a good coat of aluminum paint. He bought a few bags of Sakrete and mixed it up in the wheelbarrow to pour a base for the tower. With the help of the backhoe man, he got it set up and guyed to 3 trees with some light galvanized cables. Before they set it up, he installed high quality antennas for the TV and a CB radio. A truck stop provided a 14" TV that ran on 12 volts, and a good CB base station radio. He bought a pair of good CB walkie talkies at the same time. On his high hilltop, he found he could get TV channels from Louisville, Kentucky and from Bloomington, Indiana. The CB base station picked up trucker talk on Interstate 65 halfway to Indianapolis on a good night. Now he needed internet, and he had an idea how to get it out here in the boonies. It took some negotiating, but after checking out his location, the local internet provider agreed to put up the wireless broadband equipment on Ed's tower. Ed would get broadband service and internet based phone service installed free and only had to pay a reduced monthly service fee. The internet provider got the free use of his tower to serve customers they could not reach before. Ed had to provide a little 12 volt power to run the high frequency radios, but he had that. He left the details to them. Ed was beginning to enjoy doing things again. _________________ He had a notion that investing in real estate might be an answer for his savings, if he could get an income from the property. After lunch at a restaurant in town, he picked up a free magazine advertising local real estate. After watching the TV news that evening, he read the real estate ads until he fell asleep. A week later, he had internet service. He got out his laptop and an adapter to run it on 12 volts, and soon was surfing the internet for the first time in several weeks. The alternative news sites were full of worries about banking and finance, and the Euro countries debt problems. He found some homesteading sites that talked about interesting issues. Charlie landed on the keyboard with his front feet and let out a yowl. Ed checked his food dish--empty, and not much water, either. he took care of that and Charlie was content. He went back to surfing and learned some things about currencies and how they really worked. It kept him up late again. __________________ Two weeks later later he had a root cellar and went to pay Gerald Tomes for the work. Soon they got to talking about higher prices and inflation. Gerald said, "It's gonna come all unwrapped here before long. We've been seein' this coming for a long time. That's why we put in all those grapes and the catfish ponds. Our place ain't much, but it's paid for, and we can live on near nuthin' for income now. Took a long time to get it all done, but I feel a lot better knowin' we can raise all we eat, if we have to." Nodding agreement Ed said, "That's what's worrying me. Prices go up and my income doesn't. I have some savings, but it isn't making me a dime. Banks don't pay any interest to speak of, so inflation is making me lose money on it. I have to find an investment that will make enough to stay ahead of inflation. I've been thinking about buying a rental property." Gerald said, "There's a little farm just down the road that went back to the bank. A big farmer bought it, but he had some bad luck and couldn't make the payments. You could buy it and rent out the ground if you don't want to work it yourself." "I thought the price of farm land was still going up." "The asking prices are up, but there ain't much land being sold. Nobody can get the money with credit so tight. The want at least half for a down payment, and we've had a couple bad crop years, too." Ed said, "I haven't done any farming since I was a kid. Maybe raising beef hasn't changed all that much, but I'm pretty old to be starting something like that. I don't have any better ideas. Maybe I should look into that place. Do you know who owns it?" "Yeah, my wife works at First National Bank. They foreclosed on it, but they don't want the farm. They want the money for it. The house burned down years ago, so it's just land and a barn. You should be able to buy it right. It's gettin' kinda grown up in weeds and brush this year because they didn't get it rented in time for a crop, but a bush hog would take care of that. The ground grows good hay and pasture. " "I'll think about that. Thanks for telling me about it!" Gerald shook hands with him and Ed decided to go talk to someone at the bank, but first he drove sown the road to inspect the place. It was as Gerald had said, rough looking. There was an small old barn and some rusted out fencing around it, but the clear ground was growing a fine crop of weeds and grass, with a few small cedar bushes here and there. The foundation of an old house and the stump of a chimney were surrounded by tall grass and a couple old sheds, one that had probably been a chicken house long ago. Ed went home to think about it. ___________________ CHAPTER 24 Martin Abstract Company provided him with topographic maps of the area and a plat book that showed who owned what tracts of land. The cost was nominal. From there, he dropped in at the bank and asked to see the loan officer. She sent him to her boss and they got down to business. Ed haggled with the man for a while, asking him if they were going to rent the farm out next year, or continue to let it grow up in brush and depreciate? The tract was 42 acres in an irregular shape, with less than 30 acres tillable. He told the man the timber ground had been logged off recently so it was of no value, but he thought the pasture land might be worth $2,000 an acre. He didn't mention the pond that made it feasible to put cattle on the place. They finally settled on $88,000 for the property, since it had no significant improvements on it, and no utilities available. They did not tell Ed, but this was the amount of the outstanding loan balance. Ed asked for a title search and warranty deed and they set the closing for a week later. ______________ Ed got busy looking for a small farm tractor and some equipment. He first needed to get his new property mowed so he could learn the details of the land he'd bought. He was still undecided whether to try to work the land or rent it out, but in any case he wanted to get the place in better shape, at least mowed and fenced. He found something, although it was bigger than what he wanted, on Craigslist. Bigger might be better in this case. A used equipment dealer in Kentucky had a 1981 IH 786, an 80 HP tractor with a front end loader. They were asking $9,500. It showed 4,500 hours on the meter, and the rear tires were worn out, but it ran well. The dealer swore it had an engine overhaul recently. Ed bought a used 8 foot Bush Hog with it and the dealer delivered it for a total of $10,900. It arrived the day after he closed on the farm deal. www.fastline.com/v100/1981-International-786-KADDATZ-AUCTIONEERING-FARM-EQUIPMENT-SALES-HILLSBORO-TX-equipment-detail-16c9db3d-50c2-4c62-92de-b8ba46ca0f7f.aspxEd changed the oil, oil filter, and fuel filters, flushed out the radiatior, and refilled it with coolant. There were some hydraulic leaks, so he replaced some hoses and couplers. He found an empty fuel tank and stand advertised in the free weekly newspaper and had the man deliver it for $150. A new hose and filter for it cost him another $70. The Co-op filled it with 300 gallons of off-road (untaxed) diesel for $2.95 a gallon, but that still came to $885. Mowing the farm went pretty well, going slow and watching for obstructions. He did hit a few limbs that had blown down around the edges, but all that did was make a lot of noise. The fences he found were rusty, but in tolerable shape. A few posts needed to be replaced, and there was no gate to be found. Ed spent a few days cleaning up around the place and used the loader to haul trash to a gulley where he buried it. The barn lot cleaned up pretty well, but it also needed a new gate and the barn itself mostly wanted something done about the siding. He hired a crew to paint the roof and paid Gerald Tomes to cover the siding with metal. He bought a hay spike to handle round hay bales and hunted for hay to buy. The pasture was looking much better after some early Fall rains when he bought 15 head of feeder calves averaging 600 pounds each for just over $12,000. He put a mineral feeder near the barn and counted himself lucky that none of the calves got sick from being moved. It was an old man's farm operation, not needing much work that he couldn't do with the tractor, moving hay bales and scraping manure away from the feeding area. Ed thought he could handle this, and it would at least make a little money for him. There was just enough room in the barn driveway to squeeze the big tractor in where it was out of the weather. The battery acted a little tired, so Ed bought a new one, figuring he would have to start it in cold weather and that wouldn't be easy. It did have ether on it, though, so if it would crank, he could probably get it running when it was cold out. _______________ The internet was full of Greece's financial troubles, and other dismal money news. Ed felt a lot better about his financial position now. He had invested over half his savings in the farm, but still had to do something with over $95,000 he had left. He called Wes Hardin about fixing up his tractor. "Hello, could I speak to Wes, please? This is Ed Wilson about some tractor repairs." "Just a minute. He's outside." Pause. A little out of breath, Wes answered, "Yeah, this is Wes. Whatcha need?" "I bought an old International 786 tractor and I'd like for you to check it over and see what it needs done to make it reliable. Are you interested in doing that?" "Yeah, I'll do that. How do we get it here?" "If you'll give me directions, I can drive it there. I don't think it's too far." The next day was hot and clear, so Ed drove the tractor to him. Wes took him home and they exchanged cell phone numbers. Ed told him, "When you need parts, let me know and I'll pay for them so you don't worry about that." "That will help me. It's easy to get a lot of my money tied up otherwise. What do you think it needs? Have you used it?" "I changed the fluids and filters and did some bush hogging with it. The right brake needs adjusted or something, and the clutch pedal is pretty shallow. It may need a clutch. I'd like for you to check compression, and also see about an exhaust leak where the manifold bolts on. " Wes was making notes as he talked. "The rear tires are about shot, so I want some new rubber on it. Can you get that done? I don't have any way to do dismount wheels." Wes nodded. "Sure can. I'll call around and get some tire prices for you. D'you want fluid in them?" "Yes, better do that, and make sure the wheels are okay, because the man said they have fluid now. It tends to rust the heck out of wheels." "Okay. Anything else?" "Just a general going over and see what you find. I want it to work this winter when I need to feed cows." "Will do. I'll call you as soon as I know more about what it needs. I won't do anything without asking you, all right?" "That'll work. I appreciate you doing this. And thanks for the ride home!" __________________ Wes learned that it needed front wheel bearings, steering bushings, a brake job, a clutch, some wiring on the lights, and the new tires, but the engine was in fine with good compression and oil pressure. The loader needed new seals in the lift cylinders and were going to a hydraulic shop for that. Ed took him some money to get started and went on to other things. He told Wes to go ahead and put new tires on the front, too. He knew that loaders were hard on front ends and he planned to use that loader bucket. Ed began to go to farm auctions and learn equipment prices. He quickly bought a flat bed wagon and a heavy log chain he could get home with his small pickup, but kept watching prices at several auctions on more expensive items. While he was learning he stocked up on engine oil, transhydraulic oil, and filters. He took Wes new radiator hoses and whatever else he asked for. The feeder calves were doing well on pasture, but they would need some grain in winter to really gain weight. Ed began to look for some way to store grain. Meanwhile, he had Gerald clean the catttails out of the pond and dig out some of the accumulated silt. The water cleared up in a few days and when rains came later it held a lot more water. By the time Wes brought the tractor home, it was in good running condition and had some new paint on it. Wes got $2,400 for his labor, and the parts and tires totalled $2,200, which was cheap enough, Ed thought. Ed parked the tractor in the barn and put up a couple game cameras on trees that would take pictures of anyone who entered the farm gate or the barn. From his trailer he could see the farm through the trees, since it was at slightly lower elevation. On the next trip to an auction, Ed found a pair of grain wagons that were cheap enough, and fetched them home with the tractor. The 10 mile trip didn't take all that long. He parked these by the barn and began to build a metal roof over each one with a trap door on the top for filling them. They would not only haul grain home for him, but would also store it. They were cheaper than a grain bin and more versatile for his small operation. He made a deal with Wes to bring them over for him to fill when he picked corn. As soon as he found a feed grinder, he would be ready for winter. That came at the next quarterly consignment auction, for $3,200. He didn't feel like he was ready for winter until he had put shelves in the root cellar, moved the canned food there, and had a 1,000 gallon LP tank set and filled for his trailer. If the winters weren't too cold, that should last for a couple years, at least. Ed scratched Charlie's ears while he thought about his progress. He had completely transformed his life in less than 6 months, and he was liking it. He still had over $80,000 in the bank and he hadn't decided what to do with it yet. Maybe some more solar power would be nice, and then he could have a food freezer, he thought. He could set it on his "porch" under the trailer shelter. Hmm. He might want some more farm equiment, too, if he decided to raise some corn. He got busy ordering those items. ______________ CHAPTER 25 November, 2011 Mike Wilson was worried about what he had been reading on the internet homesteading sites. Too many of the old reliable posters were getting upset about the dollar and international finance troubles. Because they were off grid he didn't have internet at home, so he only had access at work, or at his Dad's, now that he had gotten broadband hooked up. It meant not much time to spend online, but he saw key figures on many sites talking about this. His own feeling was that the US economy had been on life support since 2008, and it would not get better with what was being done. He thought that confidence in the dollar would continue until some event rattled the system. The Chinese were making a lot of threats. They always did, but they sounded more strident now. Maybe it was time to crawl in the financial foxhole, just in case. His Dad said he didn't want to wait for the dollar to crash. He had been spending money like mad this summer. The problem for Mike was, it would be hard for him to do business without a bank account. Still, he didn't have to leave very much in there. And there were some things they needed and simply had not had time to get them. Mike resolved to take a day off and take Laura shopping. He saw a light still on in his Dad's trailer, so he told his wife, "I'm going down to Dad's for a while. I want to order garden seeds early online. I think we have some major trouble coming up from what I can tell." She was pretty much up to speed on the subject and said, "Think the dollar bubble is going to pop?" "I think there is a good chance of it. I know Dad has bet most of what he has on it." "Make sure you get enough, both kinds and quantity." "Right. Be back after while." "I think I'll go with you." __________________ Ed saw their flashlight coming and opened the door. "Hi there. What are you all up to tonight?" Mike said, "We need to use your internet for a while. What was that seed company you liked so well?" "Google Mountain Valley Seeds and that should find it." Mike entered that, and then clicked on "mvseeds.com" and got the catalog. It was impressive. He browsed for while, getting used to the site, then began to select things for his order. The coffee was hot by then and Ed sat a cup on the table for Mike and one for Laura. "What are you getting there?" "Well, I plan to get enough to last a couple years, and all of it the old varieties so we can save seeds. I'm getting worried about this money thing, too, and I want to be sure we can plant a garden." Ed frowned and said, "I don't know why I didn't think about that. I should have. I need to get some fertilizer and lime, and I don't know what all. Say, how about we combine orders here? I want to buy some bigger quantities of things, in case I might want to sell some later. It would make excellent trade goods, wouldn't it?" Laura said, "If money goes bad, then seeds will be like gold. Business can't operate without the money system. Seeds don't cost all that much and they store well, so yeah, I think it is a good idea." Ed said, "They do have large quantities. They have green bean seed in 50 pound bags! I don't want that much, but I would go for 5 or 10 pounds on speculation that we will need them before they go bad." They pored over the order for a couple hours, and finally got it together. Ed put the order in his name and they would share it out when they got it. Something inside him said things were not right, and he didn't have much time. __________________ Ed called the fertilizer company the next day and ordered lime for his pasture, to be put on right away, and also some fertilizer to be spread soon after that. He took his truck and picked up several bags of Urea nitrogen fertilizer and when that was stowed away in the barn, he went back for an assortment of chemicals--Roundup weed killer, Rotenone for the garden, some Sevin for bugs, and an assortment of rat and mouse poison. He bought Kentucky 31 Fescue, Red Clover, and Ladino Clover seeds, and a hand cranked broadcast seeder. He got to thinking that if the dollar went bad, the US would not be able to buy imported items, and that started him off on another shopping spree. He laid in a big supply of coffee, tea, and spices. Then a gasoline tank was next on his list. He had the Co-op bring him a farm tank and fill it the day the UPS man brought the seed order. He left and went to farm stores in 2 different towns to buy vet supplies and medicines. Wes Hardin had filled his grain wagons, so Ed drove the tractor over to his farm and brought them home, loaded down with corn. He took the pickup back to Wes' place and had him fill some barrels with wheat. Ed had another pre-fabbed storage barn delivered, and filled it in a week with items that wouldn't freeze. By now, all the neighbor's were used to his little truck going past. They knew he was getting that old farm in shape and thought nothing of it. Ed spent a lot of money, then he made a trip to Louisville to a coin shop and spent a lot more money on silver coins. A dealer in surplus building materials delivered a big load of roofing metal, plastic buckets of nails and screws, and some treated posts and lumber. Ed showed him where to unload it all back in the old logging road past the trailer, and paid him with a check. He went to the bank a few days later and drew out $7,500 in cash, too. There was some left in the bank, but not a lot. He stopped by the plumbing supply place and bought some thick 4" PVC pipe and several caps for it. Then he went home and dug some post holes to put them in. He told Mike and Laura where they were and what was in them, in case anything happened to him. He bought a lot of barbed wire and fencing supplies for the farm, and stashed it in the barn. He set the last new post for the fence around his trailer on December 1st, 2011. Ed thought he was in pretty good shape for anything, but he still got a sinking feeling 4 days later when the evening news on TV said that the banks had been closed until further notice. He watched reporters run away from a riot at Wal Mart in Clarksville. He was pretty shook up, so he went out to tend the chickens and gather eggs before he walked up to Mike's house for a conference. They were both home. That was a good thing. __________________________ End of Part Two.
|
|
|
Post by kaijafon on Aug 19, 2013 21:48:07 GMT -6
uhm, yeah I sure hope you post the other parts!!! I just sat and spent all day reading this one!! lol! Very good! I want to know what happens!!!! I'm especially worried about Larry's mom!
Thanks so much!
|
|
|
Post by papaof2 on Aug 19, 2013 22:11:35 GMT -6
Things would be easier for the authors if we didn't get wrapped up in the stories and read them about 50 times faster than they can write ;-)
Sent from my M1061 using proboards
|
|
|
Post by notchman on Aug 19, 2013 22:14:02 GMT -6
Things would be easier for the authors if we didn't get wrapped up in the stories and read them about 50 times faster than they can write ;-) Sent from my M1061 using proboards I agree. There's a certain story titled "Accidental Family" that has me hooked and I find I am always resisting the urge to go see if there is an update
|
|
|
Post by kaijafon on Aug 19, 2013 22:43:09 GMT -6
LOL! while I was reading, you posted more! all very good!! it really looks like that small community is ready. That is great! I can't wait to find out what happens next. thank you!
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 20, 2013 9:10:03 GMT -6
Here is the rest of what I have at this time. Now you get to wait for it as it is written.
FROM THE BOTTOM UP Part Three
CHAPTER 26 November, 2011
Melvin Sawyer was not happy. Somebody had plundered his tool shed and stolen his chain saw and weed eater. The lock was busted off the door, and he had a good idea who might have done that. He didn't bother with the shed right then, but walked out through the trees and got down his motion-activated game camera. It was a new one that had a memory card. He pulled that out and went inside to the computer and plugged in the card.
Soon he was looking at pictures of that worthless Duncan boy, Mark, from down at the end of the road, carrying his stuff out. He had just got out of the state prison on "Shock Probation", which meant that the State didn't have the money or space to keep drug heads locked up. So, he was on the loose again and running wild. The kid had been in trouble since grade school, and it wasn't the first time Mel had crossed paths with him.
The last time he had gotten out of Juvenile Detention, his mother had convinced Mel to hire him for the summer to help clear some ground. Mel figured any dern fool oughta be able to drag brush and pile it, but not so, when he was higher'n a kite on dope. It was the second day when the boy disappeared after lunch and didn't come back. When his Mom got home from work she found him passed out in their kitchen with a bottle of her painkiller pills. They had his stomach pumped and saved him. More's the pity, Mel thought. The next time he got arrested with dope, she lost her house when she put it up for bail and he ran off. He didn't know where she lived now. A nice couple from Chicago had bought the house.
Mel debated what to do. He took the card out of the computer and cleared the pictures from memory. He needed a chain saw and he was sure the boy had already sold it since last night when the picture was taken. He figured he was too old to try to thump the boy's head, although it would give him great satisfaction. An old retired guy shouldn't be getting in fights anyway. For now, Mel decided to go buy himself a chain saw tomorrow and not say anything about it. He might turn it in on his insurance later. ______________
A little early snow was on the ground, just a dusting of it, when Mel noticed tracks outside his mobile home one night. It had only been snowing for a few minutes, so they had to be fresh. Mel went back inside and got a heavier coat, some leather gloves, and stuck his .38 in his belt and some extra shells in his pocket. He put a flashlight in his coat pocket and went back out to follow the tracks. He wouldn't use the light unless he had to. When his eyes adjusted to the moonlight, he easily followed them first to his truck, then the tool shed (with a new lock), then through the woods and over the hill to the next county road.
A little way down the road sat the Duncan boy's car, with him in it fumbling around in the seat for something. Mel crept up quietly to the open car window and stuck the .38 behind the boy's ear.
"Don't move dumb sh!t, or it'll be the last stupid thing you do today!"
"D-D-D-Don't-Don't Shoot! I didn't do nuthin'!"
"Not tonight, but you tried, didn'ya?"
Mel eased the door open, still holding the gun on the boy and stood beside him.
There was a plastic bag of pills on the seat beyond him.
"What's in the bag there boy? That dope?"
The kid stammered something and with some prompting from the gun barrel, admitted that it was.
"You like that stuff? Is it pretty good?"
The boy mumbled something unintelligible.
"Well, don't let me get in the way of enjoyin' yerself. Go ahead and get yerself some. Go on!"
Mel gouged him hard in the ribs with the gun, and the boy picked up the bag.
"Now. You open that sack REAL careful, and pour 'em in yer mouth. DO IT NOW!!
The boy did it, pouring a couple dozen capsules in his mouth.
"Swaller 'em down boy! All of it!"
Mel stuck the gun in his ear and waited. The boy choked the pills down, swallowing hard.
"Now, fasten yer seat belt boy. Yer gonna need it."
He did as instructed and sat there. Mel reached in the open door and with one hand behind his head, slammed it forward against the steering wheel as hard as he could, twice. The boy was out cold. Mel started the car and put it in gear, letting it idle until it ran off the road, down a bank and into a tree. The car was still running when Mel stepped back into the woods. He didn't see much in the way of tracks on the gravel road. It was still snowing a few flakes when Mel got home, but the sun came out early the next morning and melted it all away.
He read in the paper a couple days later that the boy had been found dead of an apparent overdose of drugs. ____________________
The first day of December, Mel was checking his trapline and saw Mike Wilson drive in his lane with a pretty good load in the back of his SUV. Mel walked over to visit. He liked Mike a lot.
"Hey, Mel! How're ya doin'? You catch anything today?"
"No, I just got my feet cold is all. You need a hand with any of that?"
"I can get it. If you want to, you can carry in some those canned goods."
"You're stockin' up fer bad weather, looks like."
"Yeah, you probably got that done a'ready, with that big garden last summer."
"It did pretty good. I got the pantry full of what I canned."
Mike thought about it, then told Mel, "It's lookin' like we could have some real trouble with money. China is sayin' if we keep printing money they won't put up with it and they'll do something about it. They own alot of US Treasury Bonds and it's costing them."
"Yeah. That could blow up any time. Dam fools won't quit givin' away money they don't have and printin' it to make up the diff'rence. Now that the Duncan woman is gone, most ever'body else back here is in purty good shape, I think. I hope yer Dad's all fixed up. Looks like he's got that old farm goin' again."
"Yep. Dad is the one set me off to stockin' up lately. He'll be okay. He said if anybody around here needs to use that big tractor of his, just say so. He got it mainly to clean up some new ground over there, and he won't use it much. "
"I wondered about that. It's a whopper for that little place. "
"He said it was cheaper to get the tractor and clear what he has, than to buy more ground."
"That makes sense. I might want to use that loader sometime. Maybe I can do somethin' fer him, too."
Mike remembered something and said, "You hear about that Duncan boy?"
"What'd he do now?"
"Nothin'. He took too much dope, I guess. They found him dead about half a mile over on the next road."
"Hmph. I guess I won't miss him much."
Mike laughed and said, "No, I don't think I will either. Want a cup of coffee?"
"I guess not. I better get home and do some things. Tell your Dad if I can help him I'll be glad to."
"Sure will. You take care Mel." ______________________
Ed had noticed that somebody had been poking around his barn. There were footprints, a door left open, and things had been moved. He didn't miss anything, but he never left anything in the barn that most thieves would want. He checked his game cameras and found pictures of a young man coming and going. A couple weeks later, he recognized the mug shot in the newspaper of some local kid who died of a drug overdose. Later he learned from Mike that the boy had once lived at the end of the road and knew the area.
Maybe the problem has been solved, he thought. ______________________
CHAPTER 27
Gloria had been busy since she moved in with Larry Barnes. They seemed to work together really well. It was fun for a change to have someone she could talk to without his ego getting in the way. And Larry treated her like a queen. They had talked about what the old man at the nursing home told her, about getting her money out of the bank. Larry had talked to the old man, too, and respected what he had to say.
Neither of them had much money saved, but they didn't have any debts, either. Their vehicles were in good shape, and Larry had the house stocked with food he had raised. They decided to take almost all of their cash out of the bank and put it to work on the little farm. Larry bought 4 feeder pigs, one of them a boar, and 2 dozen year old hens from a woman he knew that was getting out of the egg business. Gloria found some goats for sale and bought a young one that was milking now and one that was pregnant. She had milked a cow before. Goats couldn't be that much different.
While Larry stocked up on feed and grain, and Gloria looked over the pantry for what they might need. She made a trip to Sam's Club with Ashley to fill things out. Ashley went to Wal Mart next door to stock up on birth control items, and they both got extra feminine needs. Gloria had learned that she was infertile several years ago, something she faced with mixed emotions.
They still had a little money left, so Larry filled the LP tank they used for cooking and to heat the house, then filled a couple barrels with gasoline, bringing it home 20 gallons at a trip in 5 gallon cans. It was sitting in an old outbuilding, and he would have to siphon it to get it out, but he could at least run the tractor and chainsaw for a long time with that. They kept what they had left in cash at home for emergency needs. Gloria didn't have a credit card, and Larry didn't use his except rarely for some mail order or online purchase.
When Wes and his family butchered this year, they had bought a quarter of beef from them and put it in the freezer, except for what Gloria was learning how to can for making soups and stews. She had a canner load of beef on the stove when it occurred to her that they hadn't found time to get married yet. She decided that it wasn't important. They had a lot to do that WAS important. She had forgotten to pick up a spare gasket for the canner. She'd do that tomorrow, and look for more jar lids, too. Maybe she should get a LOT of jar lids. _______________
Bob Stowe was carrying his head higher now. The bank job had the dignity that he felt he deserved and paid well enough that he could live better. He had moved to a new apartment that was nicer and spoiled himself a little eating out at good restaurants, basking in recognition by a few well to do customers that recognized him. He bought a new winter coat, a London Fog that fit him well, and got a good haircut. He was feeling much better, and did his best to forget about the past.
Bob had been in his office all day, not talking to anyone and skipping lunch to complete the work on his desk. By mid-afternoon he had just about finished his monthly report when his boss burst into his office.
"Bob, we are closing the bank today. You can go home."
"What's the occasion? I didn't think it was a holiday..."
"No. The BANK is closing. As in permanently. The President declared a bank "Holiday", but the dollar has been crashing all day and our derivative contracts and interest rate swaps have all gone to hell. It's over Bob. The bank is insolvent. We won't be getting paid this week. Take whatever is yours and go on home. That's what I am doing."
"But... It CAN'T be... "
"Go home Bob." His boss turned abruptly and went out.
Bob sat there for a long moment and looked out into the main lobby. Tellers were locking their drawers in the vault and goin through the normal day closing procedures. Bob walked slowly out and asked the head teller what was going on. With tears in her eyes, she said, "We're all out of a job, THAT'S what's going on!" The bank president's office was dark and locked. The Vice President walked past and and told Bob to hurry up and clear his office, because he wanted to lock up soon.
Bob was in a daze, but he followed orders and pulled his meager belongings out of his desk into a trash bag. It was all he could find. He put on his new winter coat and walked stiffly out of the bank, being hurried by the VP, who locked the door behind him.
He could not believe what had just happened, but he was standing in the parking lot and a cold breeze got his attention. He got in his car and drove slowly back to his apartment. He didn't know what to do next, so he turned on his rent-to own big screen TV and found all the channels had breaking news stories about the dollar crash. There was a lot of talk about "supporting the banks" and a "strong dollar", but also reports of riots in cities where credit cards and ATM cards had quit working and EBT cards as well. Semi trucks were said to be stranded when their fuel cards wouldn't work. He saw videos of riots in Wal Marts and other stores. He sat there stupified until late that night, and fell asleep with the TV on.
The next morning, he awoke with a dry mouth and hungry. The TV was still chattering away about all the financial woes. He went to the refrigerator and got a glass of milk, noticing that there wasn't much left. He needed to shop for groceries today. Hell, the BANK was closed. It began to sink in that he was in very big trouble. He'd have to go see his brother again. There wasn't any other choice. He put on his coat, got in his car and started it. He saw the gas gauge was below a quarter tank. He hoped it would be enough to make it back to his brother's house.
Bob's brother stuck a gun in his face and told him to go on down the road. He had his own problems and couldn't support him anymore. He was still cursing him when Bob closed his car door. Bob knew where Gloria had gone when she left him. It was to that farm where her brother lived. He had been past it a few times and knew where it was. He probably had enough gas to get there. She would HAVE to help him. After all, it was HER that got him into this mess, and she would have to make it up to him.
He was still creating delusions as he sped down the county road to the farm. He forgot that sharp turn, and went head on into a power pole. In his mind, Bob was too dignified to use seat belts. The air bag in the old Jetta failed to deploy. He died instantly, half a mile from the farm. ________________________
The cook at the Nursing Home told the owner that they were running low on food, and would have to resupply today or tomorrow. She handed him a list. The owner, Pat McClain, said he would see to it. But when he tried to call their food supplier, he got a recording that said they were closed until further notice. Last week's order, however, showed up on the truck in just a few minutes. Pat went to see the driver.
"What's this about you being closed until further notice?"
"Huh? I don't know about any such thing. What are you talkin' about?"
"That's the message I got when I called the office just now."
"That's crazy. I'll call and see what's going on." He pulled out his cell phone and hit some buttons.
"Yeah. June, this is Rob. What's this about being closed? A customer told me that..."
He listened for a minute and looked shocked, saying nothing.
Pat overheard some of the conversation. "No banks, no business. That's....."
The driver looked dumbfounded when he said, "Yeah. Okay. Bye."
He looked at Pat and said, "The whole world must be nuts. They closed all the banks in the country. Nobody can do business now."
Pat said, "WHAT???!!!" "What are you talking about?!"
"That's what she said. She's my sister, and she wouldn't lie about anything like that. She said I could take the truck home and whatever is left in it. That I'd need the food on the truck because there wouldn't be any more coming in. She said it was on TV. The President closed all the banks."
Pat thought furiously, then said, "Come inside with me and we'll find a TV."
They did, and did not like what they saw. It was less than an hour later when Gloria arrived for her shift with Larry driving. Pat told him he needed to talk to him, and broke the news about the food. "We won't be able to feed our residents very long if we can't get something at the groceries here in town," he told them. "I might have to send your mother home with you. Let me do some checking."
The nursing home was on the North edge of town, so Pat knew nothing about the chaos there yet. Gloria told him, "You won't get anything there. They are all closed, from what my brother told me."
Larry nodded and they went inside. Gloria told Larry, "If we can get some canning lids anywhere and a spare gasket, we'd better get it now."
He thought for a second and said, "Let's try the hardware store." Jones Hardware was on that side of town and they found Orville Jones inside, alone, watching the TV. They grabbed what they needed as fast as possible and went to the counter with it. Larry handed him some money and he checked them out. Orville looked at them and said, "THis is crazy! Have you seen this stuff on TV?"
"We sure have and that's why we're here. I got my Mom in the truck because the nursing home can't buy any more food. We need some other things if you are willing to sell for cash."
"I always take cash! Go find what you want." He went back to watching TV.
The couple made a mad dash around the store and got a basket full of things, cans of lye to make soap, bug spray, some garden seeds, mouse and rat poison, and a lot more. They had to pool their money to cover it. Orville was overjoyed at the big sale when they left.
An hour later they had Mrs. Barnes back at her old home. She perked right up and said, "I've been needing to come home. I have a lot to do here..." Then she faded out again and was wondering where she was. They led her to her room and turned down the bed for her. She decided she was tired and wanted to take a nap.
Gloria and Larry held each other for along time and cried together. Gloria found herself wishing it wasn't so far to Wes and Ashley's place. The 5 miles would be a long ways if they didn't have gasoline, and every station she had seen on the way out of town was closed. ______________
The old fellow that had advised Gloria to take her money out of the bank was sitting in his wheelchair in the day room of the nursing home, watching the TV gleefully. Pat McClain went past him, going somewhere in a hurry. The old man called after him, "I TOLD ya it was goin' ta hell, now, didn't I? An' you all thought I was crazy! Now what d'ya say, huh?" He laughed heartily as Pat gave him a blank look. He relaxed after a while watching the TV and dozed off for a nap. He passed away a short time later in his sleep. _______________
The larger businesses in town began to close when they were unable to process credit, debit, and EBT cards. Headquarters for major retail chains called their stores and told them to close until the banks reopened. Smaller locally owned stores stayed open for a while, selling only for cash. Their prices ordinarily tended to be a little higher. As the more astute ones quickly figured out the implications, they either set prices at double or more, or, they closed and locked up. Most people were in shock, wondering what would happen next. Without knowing what to do, most went home and did nothing that day.
The President and others were on TV with lots of speeches about how this crisis would be resolved quickly, and to remain calm. The banks would reopen soon and all would be well. As the speeches were being delivered, orders went out to call up the National Guard for aiding Homeland Security in maintaining order in the major cities. The word of that spread like wildfire on the streets and added to the sense of panic.
The second day into the crisis with the dollar losing value in other countries and no way to clear payments, international trade was stalled. Ships sat in harbors wiith their cargo in the holds, pending orders from their home ports before they would unload. Trucks sat at truck stops unable to refuel, some with perishable goods going bad for want of diesel fuel to run the reefer units. The Wal Mart hub in Seymour, Indiana had been ordered to close up and send waiting drivers home. Gas stations were closed, almost without exception. Traffic volume was reduced to a trickle on most highways, and roadblocks were set up on major highways as a National Curfew was ordered and a State of Emergency was declared along with Martial Law.
At the Wal Mart store in Seymour just blocks from the shipping hub, a crowd of people waving EBT food stamp cards were getting unruly and police were called. By evening, some other stores had been broken into and looted. As darkness fell, small riots broke out in most major cities around retail stores. Police were soon overwhelmed and could only watch as some stores were looted that night. ____________________
|
|
|
Post by idahobob on Aug 20, 2013 10:06:49 GMT -6
Well, you naughty person, You got me hooked yesterday, and I read all that you had posted, and now today, there is more!
Excellent writing! I could read your stuff all of the time. It is very realistic and you do not waste words.
Can't wait for more!
Bob III
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 20, 2013 10:38:39 GMT -6
Idahobob, Thanks for the kind words. I'm afraid that life is intervening with the pleasure of writing today. Hope to get back to it in a couple days, but I have posted all that I have written for now. Any suggestions for the direction of the tale from here? I do know we have to check up on what all the characters are doing when they get the word of the curfew and all that. I'm sure that will be laughed at out there in the sticks....
|
|
|
Post by papaof2 on Aug 20, 2013 13:16:06 GMT -6
The rural population likely wouldn't be affected as much initially by the shutdown of the banks and credit cards as the urban/suburban population. There's always the possibility of a mass exodus from the city to the country.
Most city people have limited awareness of being prepared, let alone any actual physical preps. My wife thought I was crazy to prepare for Y2K, until we had an ice storm and were without power for a few days in January of 2000. She appreciated having the kerosene heater with plenty of fuel, oil for the lamps and fuel for the Coleman stove and lantern. Refrigeration isn't a problem when the outside world is coated in ice - plenty of ice to keep the insulated coolers cold.
She still sometimes questions my concerns for being prepared, but mostly considers it a cheaper hobby than golf ;-)
Certainly not where I'd like to be (either in location or preparedness level) but probably much better off than most of my neighbors. Tried talking to one person (a diabetic on oral meds) about having at least two weeks food and water on hand (as a lead-in to stocking up on her medication) but got the "I'll come to your house" response. That wouldn't work for long - no diabetes meds here and no sheep to kill to get a pancreas to extract insulin- nor do I have the tools and supplies needed to do so. If someone raises sheep, that might be a side business in an extended disaster. (There's a reference to killing sheep for insulin in either "Lucifer's Hammer" or "The Hammer of God.")
The people "out in the sticks" generally get it better than city dewllers. If it's 30 minutes or more each way by car to the closest store to replenish supplies, you tend to keep plenty on hand - and/or grow as much as you can.
Sent from my M1061 using proboards
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 20, 2013 15:26:23 GMT -6
A bit more here, since I had some time today. Too hot to work outside.
CHAPTER 28 December 7th, 2011 (Pearl Harbor Day)
Wes went to the barn to feed pigs while Kate was cooking supper. Ashley took the dog out to fetch cows in, having decided she would feel better with them closer to the house with al the craziness she had seen in town. As she topped the rise in the middle of the 40 acre pasture, she noticed a wrecked car down the road at the curve. She had brought her rifle in case she saw some coyotes, and brought it up to her shoulder to have a look through the scope. The 6X Redfield brought the scene up close enough to see a dark blue car with a utility pole on top of it. There was no one around the wreck.
She stared at it for a minute until her arm tired and wavered some, then let the rifle down. She thought to herself, "Looks like that's why we lost power. Hope they get it fixed soon." Then she realized that it might not get fixed soon with all the trouble going on. No telling what this bank thing might do to us. She and the dog got the cattle up and moving toward the barn.
As Wes came out to help her herd the cattle into the barn lot, she told him what she had seen. They stopped by the house to tell Kate they were going to investigate, then took Ashley's car to the scene. It was a mess. Ashley turned pale and then looked away. Wes felt his stomach roil and forced himself to look at it. Bob's head was crushed by the utility pole falling on the car and there was blood everywhere. Wes looked at the power lines laying on the pavement and decided to stay well away from the scene. The wires were broken on the side toward their farm, explaining the power outage, but they were still unbroken on the town side of the pole.
Both got back in the car and Wes drove home. Ashley was still a little green when they told Kate what they saw. Wes said, "It looked like it might have been Bob Stowe's car, but he was too messed up to be sure it was him. We need to repot the accident in case nobody else has done it yet."
Kate got on the phone and called the Sheriff's office. The girl acting as dispatcher told her there were no deputies available to go to the wreck. They would have to deal with it the best they could. The Sheriff was in a meeting with a man from Homeland Security, and not available to talk to them, but she would have him return their call later.
"Well. That's something," Kate said. They don't have any deputies that can come out here! Said we would have to deal with it!"
Wes said, "Call REMC and tell them they have a pole down. I bet you get some action there."
They got a recording at the electric CO-OP, and they would get a return call later. They sat down to the table, but Ashley didn't have an appetite. Wes forced himself to eat something. It was after they finished supper that the Sheriff called.
"Yeah," Wes said, "We have a car wrecked on the county road, just South of us half a mile or less." "Yeah, it's totaled, and the man in it is dead for sure. Power line is down and on the car, but REMC didn't answer my call. I'm sure that wire is hot, too."
"No, I'm not messing with the wire. We'll wait for the power company to fix it."
Wes hung up and said, "He only has one deputy that is still there. The other 3 have quit and gone because Homeland Security told them they had to stay in town and do what they say now."
Kate asked, "What has Homeland Security got to do with anything?"
"They showed up and said they are in charge for the duration of the emergency. The Sheriff says he takes orders from them now that Martial Law is in effect."
Wes tried the power company again and got an answer this time. The woman told him that they had been "Nationalized" by the government and most of their people quit on the spot. They wouldn't be able to get anyone out there for an undetermined length of time. When he told Kate and Ashley this, Ashley said, "That power line is touching our pasture fence. Anything that gets close to it is going to get electrocuted. We have to do something about that."
Wes thought for a minute and asked here, "How good are you with that rifle of yours?"
She was good enough, they found out, even in the twilight to shoot the wires off of the next pole toward town. It made a CRACK and big sparks when the wires were cut by bullets, but they were now down in the road and disconnected. Wes began to roll up wires and Ashley went to the house to get the tractor. She backed it up to the end of the broken pole and Wes tied a chain to it. She drove to the barnyard with the broken pole. The road was now clear and safe, but the wreck was still there.
Wes reported this to the Sheriff's office and was told by the dispatcher that if the wreck got cleared, he would have to do it. No wrecker nor ambulance service was available. The Sheriff came on the line and said for him to bury the body as he saw fit, but don't bother him about it. He could not do anything for them at this time. He would make a record of this order to protect Wes, but get that guy in the ground somehow, and soon. He told Wes he could have the wrecked car for his trouble.
The family couldn't believe what Wes told them. Wes sat there for a while and let this soak into his mind. He decided that if he had to bury the man, he'd better get started. The tractor had the loader on the front and the post hole auger on the back, from the latest fencing project, so he drove it to the rough corner of the North Hay field and began to drill holes in the ground as close together as he could. When one hole was dug, he used the loader to push the dirt aside and began another one. After an hour's work, he had a big pile of dirt and a rough grave begun. He drove to the house for help. He and Ashley dug the rest of the dirt out with shovels using the tractor headlights to see, and had a grave about 3 feet deep.
Wes dragged the car home with the big tractor, slightly supported on the front end by the 3 point hitch lift, and took it to the gravesite. With a chain tied to the front end loader, he managed to pull up the top of the car enough to drag the body out and roll it into the grave. He had emptied the man's pockets and gotten his wallet with a drivers license in it and his personal effects. it was Bob Stowe all right, but nobody could have recognized him. Wes dragged the car to the barn lot and turned the hose in it they used for washing down the hog pens. It wasn't a perfect job, but the smell was mostly gone when he finished. He dragged the car out sight from the house in a low spot behind a thicket.
The tractor made short work of refilling the grave and packing it down to keep coyotes or other scavengers away. Wes drove the tractor to the barnyard and gave it a bath with the hose, too, then parked it back in the machine shed about 10:00 PM that night. He went in the house where Ashley and Kate very quietly said, "Thank you." Wes went to the kitchen cabinet and got the quart of whiskey there. He sat down at the table and poured himself a glass full, then began to drink it. Ashley finally went to bed and found him the next morning doing feeding chores when she got up. He didn't want to talk about the day for a long time after. _____________________
|
|
|
Post by notchman on Aug 20, 2013 16:26:39 GMT -6
Another great installment patience. Can't wait until you post more.
|
|
|
Post by patience on Aug 20, 2013 20:52:53 GMT -6
CHAPTER 29
Kate told Wes at lunch the next day that a State of Emergency and Martial Law had been declared, and a National Curfew was in effect. People were supposed to stay in their homes after dark. Homeland Security would to enforce this with the aid of local law enforcement and the National Guard.
Wes said, "Yeah, sure. This is a working farm and I plan to work it. Some of that work is going to be after dark. They can kiss my country ass."
He fetched Joe's old .45 Government Model from the kitchen drawer,checked it was on safety, and stuck it in his pants. The extra magazine went in his hip pocket. Not saying another word to anyone, Wes went out to go to work.
Kate watched him go and said to Ashley, "Remind me to never make him real mad at me."
Ashley said, "Yeah. He's different now."
"I didn't want to tell him about the curfew last night, " Kate said.
Ashley shook her head, saying , "Me neither."
Kate sighed and said, "We better cook the rest of what's in the refrigerator before it goes bad. Maybe we should make a big pot of soup. I can reheat it a couple times a day and keep it good for a few days that way, like Mom used to do."
Ashley said, "I better go help Wes. It's a job carrying all that water for the pigs with no electricity to pump it. Wes had the generator going last night to wash up the mess, but we need to save gas." ________________________
Mel Sawyer walked to the door of each home on their dead end road and told them he was having community meeting in his garage the next day at 5:00 PM. Everyone was invited to talk about how they could help each other get through the trouble going on. He had some questions and ideas for everybody. He said he hoped all the others would bring the latest news they had and help anyone they could. He was going to make a big pot of ham and beans, and it would be a pitch-in supper, so bring whatever you liked. Because everyone was short of gas, he suggested they walk if they could. Everyone said they would come. _____________________
"Making cheese isn't all that hard," Larry said as Gloria drained the curds using an old muslin pilow case. She didn't have a strainer big enough, so this would have to do.
"The pigs will like the whey with their feed tonight," she answered.
They heard Mrs. Barnes stirring in her room, so Larry went to check on her. She was always wanting to come out in the kitchen and do things, but she was liable to cause no end of trouble there. They had her with them as much as they could, but somebody had to watch her all the time.
Gloria thought about what Larry had said about the electricity going off, if things didn't straigthen up soon. She guessed it was something to be ready for, but she didn't know much about how to deal with that and it worried her. Gloria was worried about the TV stations playing reruns and old movies all the time. They didn't get any real news now, except talking to people they knew and that was all local. The TV news was so obviously all written by the government now. She wondered what was really going on around the country. The internet was down now, and that was a blow, but she had heard that was a local problem and might get fixed.
The last they had heard was from a neighbor who said their son was in the National Guard and had gotten word through a friend that Louisville was locked down at all the major highways and bridges. Nobody could get in or out, and there were some big fires burning in the city. Larry had chanced going got town and seen that there were either cops or soldiers all over the place, so he came back home without learning much. The mail hadn't come for a couple days, either. __________________
The Cabinet meeting was called to order and with, "We are assured that the new currency will be ready and distributed to most major banks within 2 weeks. That will restore confidence in our money system and we can get commerce going again. Until that is accomplished and order is restored, we must keep the electric grid running at all costs. Accordingly, I have used my authority by Executive Orders under the Emergency Powers Act, to nationalize all public utilities and assume authority for oversight of their operations. I have done the same with the domestic petroleum industry, to assure supplies for the greatest needs first, being the military, freight transportation, and agriculture.
I have delegated this authority to the appropriate agencies, and will not accept anything but succcess in this endeavor. Are there any questions?"
He waited for a minute and then said, "Very well, you have your orders. You are dismissed." Nobody said a word. It was widely known that he never did like questions, and was more touchy about them now. The meeting was therefore cut short and everyone filed out.
In the hallway outside, there was some quiet talk among the Cabinet members, relating to how long diesel fuel would be available for rail transport of coal to generating plants. The refineries were reporting that more than half their workers were absent and some were being shut in because of it. It was going to be an iffy situation, and most saw it as hingeing on the ability to keep food and fuel flowing to the nation.
When he thought it was safe to do so, one individual had the cheek to stick a finger in the air and say, "So shall it be written! So shall it be done!" These older officials all remembered that line of Pharoah's from the movie long ago and silently thought it was appropriate. They agreed with the priorities, but they were concerned about how it was said. _____________________
The nursing home was closed now. Pat McClain and his wife had done all they could to find homes fo r their residents, but not all had family to take them. Those who did not were a real problem, but they had been mostly sent to the hospital, which the government was forcing to stay open. Somehow they managed to get food there, and there were attempted abuses of that fact when people ran short at home. Pat's big problem now was how to feed his own family and provide heat for the winter. It was getting colder at night, their pantry was running very low, and Pat didn't have any answers.
Two big poultry producers in the area had donated their chickens and turkeys to the government aid program. They didn't want to do that, but they couldn't get any feed for the birds so they were going to be lost anyway. That kept some meat coming in for a while, but that supply dried up. There was still quite a stench in the air from the slaughter of those birds, done in less than ideal conditions. _______________________
Bert Hollister, the Sheriff was ready to pull his hair out in frustration at the orders he was getting from the Federal guy. He had no idea how a small town worked. His ideas might work in a big city, but this was Mayberry country, and big city thinking was not going to fly here. He wanted to have farmers bring grain and meat to town to be trucked to a bigger city somewhere for central processing, then trucked BACK here to be distributed. Minus what the big city wanted, of course.
He finally convinced the guy to go with him to the fairgrounds, where an impromptu farmers market had sprung up with farmers trading poultry, hogs, shelled corn and wheat for whatever the customers had of value. A tractor and hammermill was set up nearby to grind cornmeal and flour. There was a guy with a huge wood fired smoker doing a booming business cooking freshly killed hogs. Another farmer had 2 wagons loaded down with firewwood cut into short lengths and split small for outdoor cooking fires. He was trading for gasoline, oil, and diesel fuel. It ws working smoothly and trade was brisk.
The HSA guy's name was Harlan Pell, to be addressed as AGENT Pell. It took some convincing to get him to the fairgrounds, but after he'd got a taste of smoked, pulled pork barbecue, he began to loosen up a little. Bert invited him to just walk around and see what was going on.
Agent Pell wanted to know, "Does this food preparation meet FDA standards?"
Bert said, "It has passed our State Health Department inpsections for several years now when we have a County Fair."
Pell had noticed that there weren't nearly as many people at the high school as he expected asking for government food. This must be the reason, as Bert had pointed out. Bert talked to a few people as they made their way back toward his office. Pell didn't say much until they were almost there, when he said, "So you want me to let these people fend for themselves, is that it?"
Bert nodded. "Pretty much," he said. "If it ain't broke, don't try to fix it."
"So you think your county is self sufficient and doesn't need any help."
Bert said, "I didn't say that. We need a source of fuels and electrical power and chemicals for the water treatment plant, and a lot of other things we normally buy. But we can grow food and we do. And we have a surplus to trade, if we can find someone to trade with. That commerce used to be done with money, but money isn't working now, so we need a way to get those things we need and sell what we have. Can you do anything with that?"
Pell spent some time thinking. "Maybe I can. Can you get grain to the old rail depot here?"
"Sure, if the farmers can expect to be paid for it some way."
"How about being paid with Diesel fuel and gasoline?"
Bert smiled for the first time in many days. "You get to do your own haggling for the trades, but, Yep! That'll work!" __________________________
|
|
|
Post by idahobob on Aug 21, 2013 7:31:06 GMT -6
Thanks for the new installments.
Great morning treat!
Bob III
|
|
|
Post by papaof2 on Aug 21, 2013 15:11:25 GMT -6
Amazing!!! A member of an alphabet agency that has at least a little common sense ;-) I'm loving it!
Sent from my M1061 using proboards
|
|
|
Post by hardtrailz on Aug 28, 2013 10:24:01 GMT -6
So ready for more.
Thanks
|
|
|
Post by patience on Sept 2, 2013 18:39:30 GMT -6
I had some time over the holiday weekend, so here is some more.
CHAPTER 30 December 1st, 2011
It was hard to see with the windshield fogged, so Ronnie Nichols opened the truck windows just a crack to clear it. The cold air made him shiver, but missing a turn on the ridge road could land him 300 feet down a steep hollow, so he endured it until he could see to drive again. Chevy didn't have a very good heater in 1953, and the defroster was worse. But he had lovingly restored the truck to like new condition over the past 12 years. The only thing really modern about it was the bed mounted tool box that contained his mechanics' tools and spare parts for the truck. It was bolted down and locked, because he had been living where thievery was common. The bed tarp covered the rest of his belongings, except for two duffel bags in the cab with his clothes.
He'd converted the truck from 6 volts to a 12 volt system, replacing the starter, battery, head lights and other bulbs, ignition coil, voltage regulator, and replaced the old generator with a rebuilt Delco alternator. It started like a new one, the headlights were bright now, and the battery stayed charged. A complete new exhaust system made it quiet as could be. All the seals and rubber parts were new, along with shocks, tires, and all the wear parts in the suspension. The rebuilt engine was not original. It was a much younger 250 six cylinder with transmission and rear end to match. For all practical purposes, it was a new truck, and the black paint job looked like it.
He had been out of work for several months and had finally gone to his mother to ask if she could help him find a job, and maybe give him a place to stay until he could find something. That was the last thing he wanted to do, because he didn't get along with his step father. But after the County Road Department had laid him off at the end of last summer, there were no jobs to be found, and unemployment would hardly pay rent on his room and buy food. He had been eating really cheap so he could put some gas in the old truck and look for a job, but expenses still ate into his meager savings.
It did not go well at his mother's house. Paul was there, and berated him for being a bum. Again. Paul had been drinking some, and made it clear HE would not support her "worthless son". That had provoked a major fight between Ronnie's mother, Joann and Paul. Ronnie saw this was going nowhere and apologized to his mother for causing a problem. She wanted him to stay, but he knew better. Ronnie left and went back to his truck. All he owned was in it, having given up his weekly rate room downtown. Ronnie decided to go see his grandfather.
He hadn't seen Grandpa Ames for a couple years, but he knew he'd be welcome for a visit. He hated to ask for anything from the old man, who was poor as a church mouse.
At the gas station Ronnie had filled his truck with gas and also filled 2 plastic jugs with gas, and one with kerosene. He bought some motor oil, too, then went to the grocery. He spent most of what money he had left on food that would keep, knowing what the old man normally bought. Mostly, he raised his own food, so it was flour, sugar, coffee, salt and pepper, some chili seasoning and other staples he bought. He stopped at the Dollar Store and bought a few first aid items and some canned meat and fish that was on sale. He bought half a gallon of milk. The old man didn't have electricity nor a refrigerator, but it was cold enough out to keep the milk from spoiling. It wasn't a very big box of food, but he thought it was the least he could do if he was going to ask to stay for a while. He dropped in at the local hardware store and bought a brick of Remington .22 shells. He knew Grandpa would appreciate that. That about cleaned out his remaining cash. There was still his last resort money in the back of his wallet, three $100 bills behind the liner.
Ronnie didn't know all the people on the ridge road now, just the ones who had been there for a long time. As he passed Mel Sawyer's place, he waved at the old man who was in his garden pulling some turnips and greens, it looked like. Mel returned the wave and went back to work. Some distance down the road Ronnie saw that an old farm had been cleaned up and had some cattle in the pasture. There was no house there, so he wondered who owned it now. He drove slowly on, seeing other changes since he had been out here, smoke from the chimney of a new metal building that looked like a house, and some well tended yards by a couple mobile homes.
He finally came to the end of the gravel road and turned onto the dirt track that led to his grandpa's cabin. The ground was fairly dry, a good thing on this rutted lane. In low gear, he ngotiated the slight grade down to the cabin, past the old slat corn crib, now 2/3 full of ear corn, and then parked by the old barn, near the rock fence that kept livestock out of the yard. A little smoke was coming from the chimney, and the old man's pickup was in the shed. Soon the old man stepped out on the porch, shotgun in hand. He recognized the truck and set the shotgun down against the house wall, then walked out to meet Ronnie.
"Long time no see. Ya doin' alright?"
Ronnie smiled and shook his hand. "Yep. Well, I ain't gonna lie to you. I need a place to stay for a while. I haven't been able to find any work since last summer, and I ain't going to live with Paul. You know how he is."
The old man nodded with out speaking and looked down at the ground. Then, he looked into Ronnie's eyes and said, "You're welcome here, anytime. C'mon in." He turned toward the house.
"I brought some groceries. I'll get 'em." Ronnie began to move things to the porch. He noticed then how quiet it was out here. The old man took his gun inside and came back to lend a hand. In a few minutes, he was moved in.
Harlan Ames said, "I got to go to the spring for water before it gets dark. I'd better do that."
Ronnie said, "I'll get it. This bucket, right?"
Harlan nodded and they both stepped outside. Ronnie said, "I'd forgot how peaceful it is here."
"It's peaceful all right. Just not much else to reccomend livin' on a pore farm."
"I don't know about that," Ronnie said, "Peaceful can be important, and hard to find."
"I'll feed the stock and we'll go make some supper." Harlan went toward the barn while Ronnie headed over the hill to the small spring.
_____________
"I got to go see Mel Sawyer today, and see when he wants the pig I sold him," Harlan said over breakfast. "I done milked the goats and put the milk in the spring to cool."
"Wanna drive your old truck?"
Harlan got the message that Ronnie wanted to show off how he'd restored the old truck and said, "Why not? I been wonderin' what all ya done to it. Sure looks nice now."
Ronnie grabbed the breakfast dishes and pit them in the dish pan of suds on the wood cook stove to soak clean. He said, "I'll refill the water bucket and we'll be about done here." _______________
Over a cup of strong coffee at Mel's place they visited for a while before getting down to business. Mel was in fine form, saying, "I tell you that Chinese head honcho ain't gonna take much more crap offa the United States before he clamps down. He's said he'll get back at us for printin' so much money that makes them lose value on the Treasury bonds they bought. If he dumps all their US bonds on the market, the dollar will sink like a rock. If you got any money in the bank, it's time to get it out and do something with it. The idea of havin' money in the bank ain't what it used to be. You're better off to buy somethin' with it, anything that will last and be worth somethin' later."
Harlan said, "I don't know anything about investing money."
"Investin' ain't no good now. You're a hog farmer, so buy some hogs! They'll grow and make you money. Lemme say that diff'rent. A hog will still be worth a hog next year, even if a dollar ain't worth a dollar, y'see? A dollar is just PAPER, an' pretty soon that's what it'll be worth. Paper."
Harlan had heard of such things from his wife's mother, who had lived in Germany when their money went bad. People had starved to death there, but she said the farmer's did all right. Mel was ranting on about the stock market and other things being fake, but Harlan only half understood him. He was still digesting his memories from that old woman who would never put money in a bank. Harlan said, "I reckon you're right about that Mel. We got some work to do right quick, I suppose. We better get goin'. When d'you want me to bring you that hog?"
"How about day after tomorrow? I got some things to do myself, and I want to butcher that hog as soon as I get him. That all right?"
"That's fine with me. I'll see ya then. Me an' Ronnie needs to go to town today, so we better move along." _____________
"I thought we were going to town?"
Harlan had turned back toward his farm. He said, "I got to get the old stock racks on this thing, and get some other things."
They dragged the old wood stock racks out of the barn and had them on the truck in a hurry. Ronnie looked for the corner bolts and Harlan handed him a piece of wire, saying, "We'll get some new bolts in town. This'll do fer now."
The old man went in the house and soon came out with a fat envelope in the coat pocket and got back in the driver's seat.
"Boy! This thing sure runs good now! Just like it was new. And it drives good, too. It wallered all over the road when I gave to you."
"I made some changes, Grandpa."
"I'll say you did. The back springs was pretty tired, but now it sits high like it should. Ought to haul a good load now, I'd say."
"It's got the whole drive train from a late model 3/4 ton under it now. It will haul all you can put in it."
Harlan grinned and said, "Let's find out. I'm goin' to the Feed Store." ___________
They made a couple loads with feed, seed and fertilizer, then another trip with fencing wire from Brownstown's Farm Co-op. over the next few days, the truck was on the road a lot. They saw Ed Wilson with his little truck loaded down a couple times and waved at him. Harlan explained that he was the one who fixed up the old farm with the cattle.
Harlan had written checks for most of what he bought, then used cash from his envelope at the sporting goods store where he bought a variety of things. The Co-op truck driver always complained about Harlan's lane, but he delivered gasoline and filled his tank, saying he had another stop to make back here anyway. Harlan had him leave a couple 5 gallon buckets of oil and hydraulic fluid, and wrote him a check for it all. they made a stop at the bank where he drew out some cash, not leaving much in the account. They stopped for lunch at a fast food place, then the old man turned west.
"I need to see an Amish man about some pigs. "He said he had some last month, and they oughta be ready to wean now."
It took 2 trips to get them all, including a boar pig from another farmer down the road. On the way home with the last load, Ronnie asked, "Grandpa, how come you never got electricity at your place?"
"Never needed it. An' the REMC wanted the price of a farm to run it way back there. When Louise was still livin', she said she was used to the old ways and didn't particularly want it. Same with a gas stove. She was used to cookin' on the wood range. After she died, I never saw a need to change. That's why I got money for what I want now. Think I better get some parts for the tractor, too. I been puttin' that off."
Ronnie was rethinking about his grandfather being poor like his mother and Paul always said. The old man was full of surprises. ________________
CHAPTER 31 December 12th, 2011
"You could at least have bought something to EAT!!" , Joann said. "But no, you had to get DRUNK!"
Paul Taylor was belligerent. "If you don' like it here, you c'n go someplace else!"
He was confident she would shut up at that, since he knew she had no place to go. He smiled to himself. Joann saw the smirk and told him, "I think I'll just do that."
Paul chuckled softly and passed out on the couch. Joann stood there fuming. She went to the kitchen to get a drink of water and take an aspirin for her headache. She sat down at the kitchen table and rested her head in her hands. Since her husband died, things had gone from bad to worse. By the time she paid for the funeral the life insurance money was gone. She got a job at the drug store finally, but she couldn't make the house payments and the bank had the Sheriff kick her out after a few months. Paul was good looking and she had fallen for his line of comforting words, followed by his invitation to move in with him. It had been all right for a little over a year. But he had let her believe he owned his home, only to find out later that he rented it. She learned other things he'd lied about. She had made a classic mistake of the newly widowed.
The rent was due a couple weeks ago when Paul got laid off, then the drug store closed when the banks did. The home office said it was only until the banks opened again, but nobody knew when that would be, if ever. Nobody believed anything the government said on TV now. She had no place to go, either. She couldn't bring herself to face her Dad. He would never change, and that had made life hard in high school. She was the butt of jokes and called white trash and other less complimentary things just for being poor. She had vowed to herself she would get away from that old poor farm and never come back to it again. Her husband had been a good man and they lived pretty well on his factory wages. Joann had finally been able to hold her head up and dress better than those who had called her trash in school. Now, at 52 years old she had nothing and had been living with that piece of crap that snored on the couch, passed out drunk.
The government was handing out food at the high school, but Joann would rather starve than be seen there as needing charity. Her headache wasn't any better, but she was thinking hard despite that. After an hour she came to a decision, and went to look for cardboard boxes in the garage. Methodically, she emptied the kitchen cabinets of food and her tableware. Next was the bathroom cabinets. She toted boxes to her car and packed them in tight. Clothing was next, and went into trash bags she packed into the back seat. She took some of Paul's work clothes, too. He owed her that much and she would need them. They fit tolerably well, although the shirts were a little big. The car wasn't all that big, so it took all the room it had. It was past sundown when she started the car and headed for her Dad's old farm on the ridge road north of town. At least she knew he would have food to eat. She hurried to get out of town and beat the curfew. She only saw one other car moving in town and it looked like an unmarked police car headed away from her. There were no other cars on the highway. She noticed a lot of houses that were dark and wondered what that meant. She hadn't been north of town in quite a while, so maybe they had been foreclosed.
Joann was pretty sure her son Ronnie had gone to her Dad's place. The boy thought the world of him, despite her trying to motivate him to do better than that. Her Dad had given him that old junk truck of his, then Ronnie had spent all his money and time making it like new. Why he wanted a 60 year old truck, she had no idea, but she couldn't talk him into buying a newer one. It still looked like a piece of junk even after he had spent thousands of dollars on a new engine and all that. When he moved out to live in an apartment, she was glad the eyesore of a truck was gone. He had been working on it ever since then for ten years. She knew he had dated a few girls, but it had never gone anywhere. She had hoped he would find a good job somewhere and settle down, but jobs had been hard to get. He had been suupporting himself. She had to give him that much credit, although now he was hurting like everybody else.
Once she got off the highway, she drove slowly on the crooked gravel road. There was quite a gathering at old Mel Sawyer's place, with lights on in his garage. Then she spotted Ronnie's old truck there and on impulse she stopped and backed up to get in the driveway. The first person she saw was her Dad standing just outside the garage door. _______________
"Hello Dad."
"Hi Joann. What brings you out this way?"
Joann's mind raced, trying to think of what to say to him. It wasn't easy to begin, but then the words came tumbling out.
"I'm sorry Dad. I didn't understand. I got so.... so taken up in the world and I had to get away, and then it all went to hell and I don't have any place to go." The tears came running down her face as she stood there shaking as she cried.
"You've always got a place to go," Harlan said and reached out for her hand. They held each other while tears ran down his cheeks, following wrinkles that made it look like old wet leather in the light from the open garage door.
From inside, Mel yelled out, "You all come on in and close the door, and we'll get down to the business of eatin'. I think better on a full stomach, and you all prob'ly do too."
To Joann's surprise, the people who knew her smiled at her and pointed her at the food and utensils. There were no questions. She realized she was still part of this community. It was an important discovery for her. She spoke to those people, but otherwise remained silent, sitting with her Dad on one side and her son on the other as they ate. She softly asked her Dad what was going on here?"
"We're havin' a meetin' to figure out how we can all best get through this trouble. Some folks here don't have any heat, an' others need food and such like. We're here to see what we can do about it."
Joann didn't answer. She hadn't seen anything of the sort since she was child out here. Her life in town had been very different.
People began to stack plates and tableware on the front table, so she followed there example. Mel stood up and asked for their attention.
"We all have some troubles and we're here to see if we can help each other out somehow. Some need heat, others need food, and we all know that money is about worthless, if you could find a store that's open, or if you even have enough gas to get to town. Let's each of us tell what we have to offer, and tell what we need. Some of you might think you don't have anything, but others might need what you can do, so tell us what you're good at doin', too. Ed Wilson, how about you start it off?"
Ed stood up and said, "I'm okay for most things, but I'm getting pretty old to be startin' to farm, so I'm going to need some help now and then. I have some beef cattle I could sell and feed some people. I'll need help making hay, or buying it some way next summer. I've got a big tractor and enough fuel to do some things for a while. I need to clear more pasture and hay ground, so I'll need help doing that. Oh, and I'd appreciate any news anybody has about what's going on in town and around the area. We'd have to can the extra until we could eat a whole beef, but that could be done. I have a hammerill, too, and can grind cornmeal and flour. I have some corn, but no wheat, so If somebody can come up with wheat, we can all have flour. You ate some of my cornmeal in that cornbread, so judge by that if it suits you."
Mel said, "Thanks for that, Ed. Who's next? I know there are people without heat, so speak up. We might be able to help that. Who needs help baking biscuits and bread? My old wood cookstove ain''t beautiful, but it bakes real fine, an' I got lots of wood."
Lennie Hoskins said, "I'm living on borrowed time, and I know it. I have a pace maker and if I don't get the battery changed in about 2 months, that's it for me. Somehow I doubt our insurance is any good now, even if the hospital here could do it. I always got it done in Louisville at Jewish Hospital, and that was on fire the last I saw on TV. My wife has to drive me there and we don't have much gas in the car. I heard the gas stations are closed."
Mel asked, "What does anyone know about hospitals? Are any of them around open?"
Mike said, "The one in Salem is open. At least I heard that they took some folks there from the nursing homes, and the government is sending food there. I think it's heated with natural gas, and they are keeping the gas and electric going. It's small, so I don't know what they can do there."
Charlie Allen spoke up. "I got some gas at the Co-op station in Brownstown, but I paid dear for it, and that was the day after the banks closed. It about cleaned me out of cash at over $8.00 a gallon, and he said their truck wasn't coming on time, so they may be out now. There might be some gas in Salem, but I haven't heard. I didn't go to town after I heard about the Martial Law thing. I don't want some fool soldier to shoot us."
"I'm milking goats," Harlan said. "I could wean some kids and have milk from all four right now, if somebody needs milk. We cool it in the spring water, an' it's cold enough out now to keep it for a day or two. I don't know what to ask for in trade, but we can prob'ly work out somethin'. I got some hogs we could butcher soon, in fact you ate some of one tonight that I sold to Mel. We can salt cure and smoke some of it an' make good bacon and hams. I always sold the hogs for money to live on, but I don't know what to do hardly, with money bein' no good. But I ain't goin' to let nobody starve when I got food. If you're willin' to work, I'll see that you get enough to eat."
Mel said, "Thanks a lot, Harlan. Can't nobody find fault with what he said. But he brought up something important here. What can we use instead of money? It's gonna get real complicated tradin' around. You might need milk and not have what Harlan needs, or Ed there has a beef cow, but we need to share that amongst us all, but how do we pay him?"
"Why don't we just write Ed an IOU from each one who gets some beef," Gerald Tomes said. "Then we can add up the IOU's and settle up with some trade later? My grandad said people done that back during the Depression when they closed the banks. We all know each other here, so we can surely trust each other that much. I mean, if we didn't pay Ed for his cow, he wouldn't sell us any more, would he? So we all have to treat each other right. I don't see why it wouldn't work."
Ed allowed that would be okay with him and a few others nodded. Then Vickie Hoskins said, "We're not in good health, neither me nor Lennie, so we can't do farm work to pay for what we need. But we do have some silver coins, if anybody would be willing to take those at some fair price for food."
Harlan and Ed said they would do that, and Gerald, who raised catfish said he would, too.
Vickie continued, "We are going to need some way to heat the house before winter is over because our tank of LP won't last all winter. Then we won't be able to cook, either. If we could get a wood stove soon, we could save the gas to cook with for a long time. Could anybody get us a wood stove and put it in?"
"I don't HAVE a wood stove, but I have some steel plate and can make one as long as the electricity stays on," Mike Wilson said. "The government said on TV they were taking over the power companies and would keep 'em running, but I worry about that. If we are going to make something, I have to have my welder going. We'll find some way to get it put in your house. You have a chimney?"
"Yes, there's a chimney," Lennie said. "The house had a coal furnace years ago, so they used that chimney to vent the gas furnace."
The meeting began to break up into small groups of people working out needs, who had what, and how they could arrange payment. After an hour of that, Mel stood up and said, "If it's all right with the rest of you, how about we do this again in a couple weeks? In the meantime, don't be strangers. If you need something TELL somebody and get it figured out. I think we can make it. What do you all think?"
Several folks thanked Mel for getting them together and began to wander off toward their homes. Not everyone had done much talking during the meeting, but they did a lot of it afterward. The word "neighbor" was taking on a whole new meaning. _______________
CHAPTER 32 December 25th, 2011
The Sheriff had turned the grain for fuel deal over to the Mayor's office, and apparently they had done a pretty good job of working with Agent Pell and the farmers. The fuel would be delivered by tank cars today, and farmers were to bring grain in and dump it at the grain elevator for weighing and storage, just like usual. They would be have the amount recorded and the fuels would be assigned to each seller whatever amount they were owed. They had 2 weeks to move the fuel from the tank cars to some storage of their own. City Police would guard the tank cars until the fuel had all been dispensed. Some other deal had been reached with a gas station in town, where fuel sales would be rationed and sold by the government. Nobody was happy with the results, but nobody had money to buy much gas or diesel fuel, so the rationing was a moot point. Other stations would get supplied with fuels as soon as possible, but there were problems with that. Banks had reopened the day before, after being recapitalized by the Federal Reserve Bank with "New Dollars". The old coins would be honored for their original portion of a dollar, but the paper money would be exchanged, 5 old dollars for one New Dollar. All bank accounts would be recalculated to reflect the amounts in New Dollars. Businesses and individuals had a month to turn in their old paper dollars for New Dollars. There was a shortage of printed New Dollars, so all transactions were encouraged to be done electronically. The price of gold in New Dollars was first decreed to be 1/5th of the last Spot Price, but the US government had done nothing to change their budget and spending, except to divide every number by 5. The result of that was the New Dollar price of gold immediately being traded only with high "Premiums" over the decreed spot price, and likewise for silver. The news of the Federal Reseve recapitalizing banks with money created from thin air was taken into account on all trading in Dollars. Prices of goods sold in New Dollars were not 1 /5th the old amounts, but more like 1/2 the old amounts. Oil was worse. It had been trading in a range from $135 to $145/barrel and was expected to decrease to 1/5 of that, or $27 to $29/barrel. Instead, oil went to $58 then $66. That effectively made it cost double what it had before the new currency was issued. The announcement on TV, radio, and internet resulted in some other problems. Within 24 hours, most vending and change machines in the entire country had been robbed or stolen, since change was worth it's original value and paper money had been devalued to 1/5th the old value. Businesses were trying to assure they could resupply their stocks, so they kept prices high, because imported goods were either very high priced, or not available without payment in some other currency. The New Dollar was already trading foreign exchanges at well below its' stated value. Some businesses reopened under pressure from Federal officials, but the prices were high, and shortages were showing up in everything. The average person had his buying power cut in half, IF he still had a job, and IF he could find anything he needed to buy. When SNAP cards were refilled, the recipients were shocked at how little their allowance actually bought. Rioting began again, despite continuing Martial Law and curfews. Crime rates exploded as the poor began to steal anything they could get their hands on. Police were overwhelmed and didn't even respond to burglary calls, so people began to take matters into their own hands. The murder rate soared in cities. Life in the US began to resemble that in other very poor countries around the world. _______________ The grain for fuel deal had been good for a few farmers, providing some assurance they could plant a crop the next year, with only the market being an unknown. That grain was sent to food processors under government control to be made into basic foodstuffs. Some Federal assistance had been available to city residents, but the predictable result was too little, too late, and inflation to follow as the government spent money it did not have. The free market, what there was of it, was at least half black market, or direct barter. some farmers and opportunists did very well at that. A few got caught in violation of new Federal mandates and sentenced to prison, but the prisons were a revolving door now, the government being unable to feed and supply them. Long sentences were either commuted, or given probation after only a few weeks, or days. Many long term prisoners had been released during the emergency. Some State prisons were virtually emptied for lack of food. Most of the released prisoners, finding the conditions in cities, began to work their way out to less populated areas searching for food and shelter. Home invasions were commonplace and shootouts were the norm. What police were still on the job began to mete out justice as they saw fit, aided by National Guard and Regular Army troops, with less than perfect results. Most cities were bankrupt and depended on Federal assistance to pay their employees, so the number of police and other emergency employees had decreased rapidly. Garbage collection was done only in more prosperous areas, if at all. The water was undrinkable, many old homes and other buildings had burned to the ground, and sewers backed up. Vermin invaded the trash heaps. Disease wasn't far behind, and hospitals were woefully understaffed with little medication available. City life had degraded from miserable to intolerable.
|
|