Book Group...57º

With a slight change in plans, book group met at the "Red Horse Cafe" in Joseph...Seven of us gathered around an outside table, discussed "The River Why" and Summer Fishtrap, enjoyed a drink and scones on a lovely July morning...Bobi, Cienna and I returned home to rising sourdough bread and immediately fell into a routine of finishing up the mornings chores and then to the deck for leisure time...It doesn't take much to entertain us and pass another day together...Rusty fixed tri tip and bbq'ed veggies for dinner, Bob gathered fresh greens from the garden, made the salad and we slathered slices of warm bread with butter to round out the meal...Late in the evening Becky and John joined us for a visit, storms had threatened all day long but continued to part and skirt around Joseph...A game of Apples to Apples and then it was bedtime!

This morning I have PT in Enterprise, Ci and Bobi will go to Soroptomists then we will join the write group for our weekly meeting...I will read the following essay written at "Summer Fishtrap".

SCHOOL DAYS

It was September 1951. Summer ended with the last batch of relatives leaving after spending their vacation with us in our new home in Lake Fork, Idaho. They claimed that Lake Fork was even more beautiful than Yellowstone Park and they made plans to return the next year. Summer had been a glorious time for me, playing with cousins, nieces and nephews, riding horses, and playing in the river. Exploring this new place we lived in, in a make believe world of cowboys and Indians, outlaws and a sheriffs posse. We used our fingers as guns, saying, “bang your dead” as another outlaw or Indian hit the dirt. We fashioned bows, using fishing line for the string, sharpened sticks for arrows and cut thick willow branches to make the stick horses that carried us into the woods, up and down hills and finally back to the house when our stomachs signaled suppertime. When the 4^th of July rolled around I got my own cap gun with a supply of caps and continued to bring law and order to the wilds of our ranch. The smell of the smoking cap gun remains in my nostrils to this day. Summer at nine years old was all play and no work.

Now I was excitedly looking forward to the coming year and the start of 4^th grade. I had started school in December of 1950 at Wood Grove School; a one-room schoolhouse located two miles from our home. It sat in a grove of trees along side a narrow dirt road. Off to one side was a woodshed, next to the woodshed was a small 2 room teacherage and nearby were 2 outhouses marked HIS and HERS, partially hidden from view. I had settled easily into this new school, although it was much different than the city school I attended previously. Only 11 children ranging from 1^st grade through 8^th grade came on this first day in 1951.  One teacher taught all 8 grades and did janitorial duties, building a fire in the potbellied stove through the winter months, sweeping the floor each day and on a regular basis also treated the wood floor with linseed oil. Some of the older students, usually boys were assigned turns at chopping wood and carrying it inside to stack by the stove in the corner of the room. A hand pump sat near the front door where water was pumped from a well and carried into the anteroom for washing and drinking. All students drank from the same dipper, and hands were washed in a small basin of water and dried on a lone towel each day, before we ate our sack lunch.

On this particular September morning I walked into the now familiar schoolhouse, excited and ready for the new school year. My Mom and I had shopped for school clothes at the local mercantile; two pairs of jeans, 4 t-shirts, underwear, socks and of course sturdy brown oxfords finished the outfit. Shoes tight on my feet but with extra room in the toe, jeans rolled up only to be unrolled as I grew through the winter. I was scrubbed clean of all the summer dirt and my hair so clean and tightly braided that my eyes felt like narrow slits, like the eyes of a cat.

I stopped inside the door to breath in the familiar smell of linseed oil that made the rough wooden floor look like new if only for a few days. Rows of desks, clean and shiny were waiting for the students return. Naked blackboards lined an entire wall with the alphabet written above in capital letters and lower case. Hard backed erasers pounded clean, rested along side fingers of chalk, waiting for the new teachers hand. Newly washed, half curtains, the color of freshly churned butter, fluttered in the breeze as the door opened and closed with each student’s arrival. The scarred and battered upright piano sat quietly in its special place waiting for hands to caress its keys, when a special program called for music.

A large oak desk sat at the front of the room and our new teacher, Mr. Whittaker, stood there watching as we filed in. We stood in awe as he walked toward us introducing himself, asking our names and grade, then pointing to each desk where we were to be seated. He was a tall, portly man and seemed giant-like in comparison to last years teacher, a petite lady, who always brought to my mind a wilting flower, waiting for a drink of water.

Mr. Whittaker had moved his wife and 5 children 100 miles north to Lake Fork from Boise, Idaho after he was hired to teach at Wood Grove. We never knew why he left the Boise Valley, where the climate was mild and he had taught and driven school bus. Boise was the largest city in Idaho and now this family would be living in a rural community 3 miles from a grocery store and post office in a 2 room cottage, with an outdoor toilet, no running water, and only a small wood stove for heat. I wonder now, how did they manage, where did they all sleep but at the time I gave no thought to those questions. I only wondered will I like him, will he be a good teacher?

Idella Allen

Fishtrap 2012

Hugs to all OWAV:)