Emigrated to the US from Ireland. He walked and worked his way into logging country of central Arkansas where he hitched on with a company as a mule skinner, married my grandmother and had a passel of kids, 4 boys and three girls, the baby being my mother. Around 1925-26 he hitched his mules to a covered wagon, loaded his family into it and trekked into Oklahoma, settling on a farm near Binger. He arrived just in time for the dust bowl years. I don’t know how his family survived those years, but I do know it made him strong willed and hard as an anvil. He moved to town eventually and ran a hardware store. When I was a boy I would spend summers with my grandparents. They had a huge garden from which my grandmother would grow vegetables for dinner and can things to be opened in the winter. I loved going to the hardware store, especially going into the back warehouse. I can still recall the smell of the coils of rope.
I held my grandfather in the highest regard. He was one of those men that “didn’t give no shit and didn’t take no shit from nobody.” I don’t see many like him anymore.
I tell this story because he had an uncanny ability to read another person, could tell almost immediately what their character would be. More than once I heard him remark “that guy don’t look right in the face.” That saying has stayed with me all my life.
Those are words I would use to describe that looney governor of Michigan (I can never remember her name). I’ve seen pictures of her and watched her being interviewed on tv, and all I can say is “she don’t look right in the face.” There’s something deranged in her appearance. I’m not talking attractiveness. She just doesn’t look normal.
That is all.
I held my grandfather in the highest regard. He was one of those men that “didn’t give no shit and didn’t take no shit from nobody.” I don’t see many like him anymore.
I tell this story because he had an uncanny ability to read another person, could tell almost immediately what their character would be. More than once I heard him remark “that guy don’t look right in the face.” That saying has stayed with me all my life.
Those are words I would use to describe that looney governor of Michigan (I can never remember her name). I’ve seen pictures of her and watched her being interviewed on tv, and all I can say is “she don’t look right in the face.” There’s something deranged in her appearance. I’m not talking attractiveness. She just doesn’t look normal.
That is all.
