Tuesday, May 06, 2014

Our place

My father worked civil service and my mother was a stay
at home mom... Which was the norm for the 40's and 50's.
With just my brother and I.

Around back of the house there was a small yard and a
cement patio, which joined the back steps to the back
door.  We had chairs on the patio.. but no umbrella,
or cover.  It border the barn. When you left the patio,
and stepped down, to the direct right was a gate to
the horse area. A small place we let the horses out
in the winter, while we clean stalls. Unless the doors
were snow blocked. We also had two geese. The
meanest suckers you ever saw.  The male wasn't
too bad.. he was an odd one.. as he would sink
when in water. We had a 8 foot long water  tank there.
And when ever the male goose got in there, by
choice or not..(little brother) he sank and we would
have to rescue him.  Inside the barn was 4 stalls.
One on one side which shared the wall with the
feed room/ mini tack room and garage.  On the
other side was 3 stalls. Above was the loft for hay for
the winter.  I say for the winter, as we had a hay stack
outside for the rest of the year.  Of which we would
run across the roof of the barn and jump on the hay
stack and slide off.. Which of course, would take
hay with us.. and usually ended up a tail end whipping
for our fun. Starting out with a loose hay that we stacked
there. Our job, my brother and I... was to stomp it down
while Mom and Dad threw had on top. Later bales of hay.

Outside of this fence where the hay stack stood, was
all open. Which had a large ring that my mother would
practice for her shows.  She started out with 3 gaited
horse, dabbled in a 5 gaited horse, and then ended
up in the 50's with jumpers. Beyond that was the manure
pile. With a ramp. Which when I got old enough to clean
stalls was a wonderful exercise of running with a wheel
barrow full of manure, across the area to the ramp and
up.. You really had to have a good run by the time you
got to the ramp or you would die mid way up with the
wheel barrow going off the ramp and dumping the stuff.
Not a good thing.
more tomorrow...

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