"THE MAMA"

My daughter, Debbie writes for a newspaper in Livingston, Texas, and they were discussing the medicinal value of onions and garlic. She asked me for my opinion, since I am old and wise. This is what I sent to her, and she published it in her paper. It has created such a stir, I might should have kept my mouth shut. HeeHee. Now those people are asking me to write a book.

Subject: Onions

All I know for a fact is, my Grandmother Reeder always wore a little white cloth bag of "stuff" around her neck that reeked of onion and garlic. She called it asafetida. It was used to repel all diseases and illnesses. All of us grandchildren never got close enough to her to give her any disease.

She lived to be 89, had 9 living children, never went to a doctor in her life, pulled all her own teeth and could eat anything that didn't eat her first. She dipped Garrett snuff, the bottle had to have 4 dots on the bottom, (strong) and she could out spit everyone in the family. She never wore any false teeth, hated them, but she loved to cook in old cast iron pots, some of which I still have, and she laughed just like my Daddy.

I watched as she beat my Grandfather over the head with her shoe, then grabbed an extension cord and began to whip the tar out of him with that too. I don't remember what he did to deserve it, because I was little, but I figured he must have needed it.

She was "THE MAMA" and Mama ran the house back then. Her hair was thick and white as snow gathered on a pine branch right after a winter snowfall and her eyes were so blue, you could almost fall into them, but when she got mad, she got quiet, and that was the loudest noise I ever heard.

I didn't get to really know her until she got older, I was always afraid of her and I didn't like to hug her for the smell that was hers personally, but I loved my Daddy, and so I had to love her too.

I wonder what my grandchildren will remember about me someday?