A Snake, A Horse, and A Wise Dad

            It wasn’t easy for Daddy when Mama died. All through the last long days, Mama stayed at Uncle Leo’s house in town closer to the doctor, and Daddy sat by her bed, except when he went home twice a day to do the chores. Uncle Ray did the milking the day Mama died, since the doctor had said she could go any time, and a cousin did it the morning of the funeral. After the funeral, though, we drove to our little white house, and Daddy went out to milk while Sis built a fire in the cookstove to warm up the food the aunts and church ladies had sent. It was kind of the folks to look out for us, Daddy said, but everybody had chores of their own, and undone work wouldn’t bring Mama back.  

            Daddy and Sis harvested the garden, and the aunts took turns watching me and helping Sis can the food, so we’d have beans and corn and tomatoes through the winter. I read my books and stayed out of the way, because it was dangerous in the kitchen with the hot stove and the pressure canner.

            When summer ended, Sis had to go to school. I didn’t; I was only four years old and nobody back then expected the government to provide free babysitting. Daddy sat me down and had a talk with me about being good, so he could get the garden cleaned up and plowed under for next year. He also talked about the deep part of the creek that ran between the house and the barn. The road went right through the creek, so you could walk across ankle deep, but down past the garden it was deep enough to swim, if I’d known how. Daddy said if he caught me down there, I’d get a switching I’d remember. Daddy’s switchings hurt, so I stayed at the shallow spot and sailed my toy boat.

            Daddy had made my boat out of scrap wood and attached a piece of fishing line, so I could let it sail down the creek and then pull it back. When Daddy went to the garden, I sat on the porch for a while and read The Little Red Hen to my doll, and then I headed for the creek. One afternoon I had just put the boat in when a big black snake slithered out of the water, headed right for me.

            In my fright, I dropped my boat string. And when I tried to grab the string, that snake came even faster. I forgot about the boat and ran. I didn’t stop until I got to the garden, running through plowed dirt and tangled roots to Daddy and our horse, Dolly, who stopped short at the interruption. Daddy stumbled against the plow handles.

            “What in the world?”

            I sobbed out my sad story about the snake and my boat. Daddy told Dolly to stand still and took me by the hand. I followed him to the deeper part of the creek, where by this time the boat had floated down and lodged against some tree roots. “You’d better stay with me until I have time to look for the snake,” he said. “It was probably a regular ol’ black snake, but it might have been a blue racer, or even a cottonmouth.”

            I was afraid the snake might have followed me, so Daddy picked me up and swung me onto Dolly’s wide back, right behind the harness collar. I asked if Dolly would run away if the snake came, and he said no, but she would stomp it to death, so I’d better hang on. He slapped Dolly’s rump with the reins, and the plow jolted forward. I rode for a while, and when I got tired of the swaying and jolting, I waited at the edge of the garden—after Daddy checked for snakes. Finally, it was time to stop plowing. “Here, you can help,” he said. He lifted me up again, looped the reins over the collar, and told me to ride Dolly to the barn while he opened the gate for the cows.

            I felt important, taking the horse to the barn. Plus, up high I didn’t have to worry about that snake. Dolly went right to her stall, while Daddy brought the cows into the barn lot and the first two went into the milking stalls. Daddy hooked up the milking machines and then came and lifted me down and took off Dolly’s harness. I couldn’t carry the harness or her water bucket, but I got her a can of oats and stood on the board fence to rub her down with a rag.

            I asked Daddy if I could help with the cows, too. He said he reckoned that was a good idea. I couldn’t budge the heavy milk cans, but if I tugged really hard I could open the stanchions when a cow was finished. I could also open the gate to let the cows out, while Daddy let the next two in.

            When the school bus dropped Sis off, she came to the barn to see why I wasn’t on the porch or at the creek. I told her about the snake and how I had helped Daddy. She said if I liked helping, I could scrub the potatoes for supper. It wasn’t as much fun as the animals, but I wanted her and Daddy to be proud of me, so I did it.

The next day, I helped Daddy again, and the day after that. While Mama was sick, I had stayed with the aunts or played quietly in the house, but now I was learning about what Daddy did. I even learned to put Dolly’s bridle on while he fastened the harness. I stood on a bucket and she lowered her head so I could reach. Sometimes I still stayed with Aunt Erma or Aunt Irene, learning to slice cucumbers and roll piecrust and feed the chickens, but I liked the days with Daddy best.

            Every morning and night, Daddy put the milk cans in the spring that fed the creek, to keep them cold until the big truck came for them. Every so often a check came in the mail from the milk company. Daddy took the check to the bank, and that was how he bought feed and any groceries we couldn’t grow. Sometimes he gave Sis money for things she needed for school, or gave one of the aunts money for fabric to make me a dress. And after I started riding the horse to the barn and helping with the cows, he gave me three dimes of my very own when he went to the bank.  He let me go into the drugstore and spend one for candy, and he made me put one in the offering at our little country church and the other one in my piggy bank. He said I might as well learn young that if you spent all you got, you’d never get ahead.

            Years later, as a parent and now grandparent myself, I realize my opening the gate didn’t really save Daddy much time, and steady old Dolly probably knew the way to the barn much better than I did. But I’ve also come to understand that Daddy did the best he could with a little girl who had lost her Mama. With help from a gentle horse, he taught some important lessons through our simple everyday life.