Travels With Becky

Flying high with stories

Eileen Alexander of the Arts Alliance of Northern New Hampshire organized a whirlwind one-day tour that included Glencliff Assisted Living Facilities outside Warren, Horse Meadow Senior Center in North Haverill, and Grafton Country Nursing Home right next door. It was a day of stories and talking with seniors about telling and preserving their own stories, plus a free lunch of sweet and sour meatballs with noodles at the Senior Center. Some fun.

Here’s a photo with members of the senior writing group from Horse Meadow, a dedicated group that meets weekly and shares writing. So lucky! Because as every writer knows, the greatest gift is a deadline. And a weekly deadline is a bonus.

We all have adventures to recount. A man in Chester told of younger days living in Alaska, when travel was by small plane or not at all. “Was it dangerous?”

“Well,” he said, “This one time on the way to Kenai on a small plane, about 13 passengers, the door popped open. We were up about 8,000 feet. The pilot called back, ‘You mind getting that door for me?’ So I did.”

Another time, true story, he noticed the gas cap was off on one of the wings. He alerted the pilot who calmly said, “No problem. We’ll do right banks only.”

May I just say, Eeeeek.

Good answer

This one is best told than written, but it is so cute, I’m giving it a try on the page. 

Mildred Perkins had seven children. When her husband, Dad Perkins, who also had seven children, sent the troupe off to bed, the youngest, a bit of a hell-raiser, stuck out his tongue.

Dad didn’t care for that sassiness. So he went to the bedroom to confront the child. The other children thought sure the little one would be punished one way or another.

No such luck. When Dad emerged from the little one’s room, he was smiling.

“Why’d you stick your tongue out at me?” Dad had asked the boy, who had a bit of a childish lisp.  

”Why, Dad,” the boy said, “Don’t you wet your whips before you go to bed?”

The cute ones always get away with murder! 

John & Billy

Tom worked in Boston but lived in rural New Hampshire. He invited his boss and his wife out to visit – city folks. Some time during the evening, the wife needed to use the facilities, an outhouse in the barn. Evidently a new experience for her.

Armed with directions, she headed to the barn. Soon though, the party heard a blood-curdling scream. She came running from the barn, screaming: “There’s a man down there!”

Investigation revealed that it wasn’t a man in the hole but a goat. What that goat wanted down there is anybody’s guess. But the Billy did have a beard. No wonder the city lady mistook him for a man.

An oldie, but a goodie

I found this story in the archives. Hadn’t thought of it in years, but it made me smile. 

In Antrim, Bert and John Coffee – both in their nineties – were helping their grampa repair the roof on his big house in the village, not far from the grange hall.

“Bert,” John says, “you better lay the shingles right. I don’t want to be back up here in another twenty years.”

Gotta hand it to him

Visited with the Merrimack Valley Retired Educators at Makris Lobster House in Concord. Teachers are rich! With stories.

True story. At the Walker School, a young student was charged with monitoring the boys' bathroom. As each boy came out, the monitor would ask, “Did you wash your hands?”

Dutifully, one after another answered, “Yes.”

“Did you wash your hands?” 

“Yes.”

Until ... “Did you wash your hands?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t need to. I kept my mittens on.”

Colorful ladies

Oh boy oh boy – I enjoyed a rollicking afternoon with ladies of the Red Hat Society in Bedford at the SERESC center. Walked in to a sea of purple and red, with splashes of pink. If you’re under 50, you wear pink. At 50, you earn the purple and red. I wore purple, but somehow it wasn’t quite purple enough and I felt underdressed. 

Many of the stories the ladies shared were a bit too colorful for this blog. (I’m not kidding!) But were they ever funny! We laughed until we could laugh no more.

Here’s one of the tamer stories. On the first day of first grade, Joe – precocious – read the big sign in the school yard: Drug Free Zone. “Mommy,” he said, “they got free medicine here.”

You hairy woodchuck!

This falls under the family sayings category.

When Rebecca was five, her mom (who told the story) asked her to take her laundry upstairs. Rebecca whined and complained, but ultimately complied. As she went up the stairs, Mother heard her say,“Take your laundry up! All right, I will, you hairy woodchuck.”

In the family, a favorite name to call someone who has fallen into disfavor is: Hairy woodchuck.

Do  you have special family expressions or name with stories attached? I’d love to hear them.

Which reminds me: my daughter calls her dad, The Fairy Lightfoot, because he’s so nimble. It’s ironic too, because he’s 6-foot-2 and solid. She also, inexplicably, calls him a Cake Sniffer. And when she tells him off, she’ll say, “Why don’t you go sniff some cake?”

Yup, this is how it goes around our house. I’m sure they all have names for me, but I don’t know what they are. They’re sneaky.

Tongue twister

Barbara McFarland recited (very fast) this old time tongue twister, which she learned from her grandmother (I think), Iva Louella Davis. Try saying it three times fast and see what happens:

Fannie Fae had a party – peanuts, candy, apple tarts. And they all kissed and parted and went home.

Then try moving p’s, f’s, and k’s around in the last sentence. See what happens then. 

Oh my!

Care for the caregivers

At the third annual Coalition of Caregiving Conference in at the Lake Opechee Inn and Spa in Lakeport, it was my pleasure to open the day with stories. It was a chilly day on the lake outside, but inside warm and toasty. These hardworking caregivers seemed happy to have a day just for themselves. Massages and Reiki were available as well as workshops on topics of interest.

The comment that sticks with me, advice from a father to a grown daughter:

“It’s never too late to have a happy childhood.”

You can get a sense of the crisp in the air from this photo of Lake Winnipesaukee from the spa grounds.

Live and learn

When Marie first moved to Andover from away, she and a neighbor, also from away, took a walk on a back road and discovered – to their delight – a chestnut tree. The ground was covered with them. They loaded up all their pockets and waddled home. These silly New Hampshire people didn’t seem to realize how delicious chestnuts are, Marie thought.

A few days later, the neighbor called in a panic: “Don’t eat those chestnuts,” she said. “They tasted like alum.” 

Sure enough, they were horse chestnuts, not the edible American chestnut Marie knew.