The Storyteller

A new year rings in and 12 days later I have a birthday. I am always surprised at the sheer number of birthday greetings I receive from people near and far. But I believe the person who should really receive all that attention is my mother, Polly.

She never failed to tell me the ordeal she went through to give birth to me.

 (To make a long story short) she would start off by saying, “It was the first time I ever had a child delivered by a doctor, a male at that. The clinic was being built and was not scheduled to open for another month, but the old folks managed to get me there to meet my doctor. He pushed sawdust off the delivery table, found some newspapers for me to lay on, and got right down to business.” She continued to tell me how my father was out drinking and when he finally got there he was so drunk he tried to kiss her and broke her glasses. But the part she always elaborated on was how my father was supposed to help dispose of the soiled newspapers and ‘afterbirth’ because the clinic didn’t have a disposal system yet. Of course, he forgot until he made it home and had to turn around and go back to the clinic to get it.

Once when I lived in another state as a young newly wed, she even wrote it down and mailed it to me so my husband and I would never forget! (During our Lamaze classes, the instructor asked the wives to talk about what they knew about their own births. My husband leaned close and whispered under his breath, “do NOT tell that story.”

So I always celebrated by doing something fun for Mom. One year I saw she had cut out a little story and taped it on her fridge next to her version of the story. So I sat down at the computer and did some cut and paste in some cheap software and gave her this picture to go with the clipping.

Polly loved this photo. She kept it on display and laughed every time she looked at it.

Polly's Version:

My great-grandfather rode on horses because he was afraid of trains.

My grandfather rode on trains because he was afraid of cars.

My father rode in cars because he was afraid of airplanes.

I ride in airplanes but I am afraid of horses. I fell off every time I tried learning how to ride.

I never learned how to ride a bike either. I fell over every time I tried learning how to ride on the danged things.

But I did go for a motorcycle ride with Clarency Ritchey! No one at the senior citizen complex could believe what they were seeing when he came riding up on that BIG thing! I loved Clarency and was honored that he would take me for a ride around the neighborhood.