Chapter 28

There was no school on Thursday because of the drifting snow. I cleared our driveway and sidewalks. The drift on the side of the garage was so tall I could walk up to it and step onto the roof. Well, that is what I thought until I sank in up to my waist while trying it. Mum wasn’t real happy when I came in all soaked through.

Denny and Eddie got all bundled up and went out to make a few bucks by clearing sidewalks. They came back at noon looking like five-foot-long icicles but very happy ones as they had made nine dollars each.

They spent the rest of the afternoon building things with tinker toys and Lincoln logs. Mum and Mary were watching As the World Turns. I watched it a little. I hoped Bob and Lisa would get married. They seemed like they would be a perfect couple.

Mrs. Hernandez came over later. We sat and talked about the snow and all the problems it was causing. It took me about ten minutes to realize that I was thinking in Spanish! I had enough of a vocabulary that when I thought about what to say next I didn’t have to translate.

I told everyone about it. Denny said that happened to him a little, Eddie not at all. Mary said she had been doing that for a long time now.

Since she would go visit Mrs. Hernandez when the weather permitted she had almost double the lesson time we had. I think Mrs. Hernandez got lonely by herself every day since both of the Wingers worked and liked having Mary come over.

We read Cuban newspapers. From the editorials, I think Batista wasn’t very well-liked and would have trouble in the future.

I finished up the story about slavery. To me all the characters were stereotypes and it was hard to relate to them. Well, I guess I hated Simon Legree, so that was a type of relating. What was interesting about him was that he was a transplanted Northerner. I thought it was only Southerners who owned slaves and were cruel to them.

Friday I awoke to the sound of water. The temperatures had risen overnight and a thaw was in progress. You could almost watch the snow sink into the ground. The gutters in the street had running water. I bet the Mad River was mad today!

When we lived on Detroit Street one of the creeks was a brick tunnel which ran near Mary Rutan Hospital to under the house next door. It was for storm runoff. It must be flooded to the ceiling today. We had explored the entire length of the tunnel. Mum hated that and warned us of flash floods and catching polio.

School was all about catching up for the missed time. That meant we would have quizzes all day. Since I was ahead on my material it didn’t matter to me. To hear some of the kids it was the end of the world. I mean they hadn’t had some classes since last Monday, how could they be expected to remember anything from that long ago.

As predicted almost every class had a snap quiz on Friday. How can it be a snap quiz when everyone knew it was coming? At least lunch was good in the cafeteria. They had barbeque sandwiches.

Not Texas barbeque but Ohio school barbeque. That was a hamburger with some sort of sauce on a bun. They weren’t great but I ate three anyway plus two rice puddings for dessert along with four pints of milk.

Hey, I am a big boy. They also put something green on my plate but since I couldn’t name it I wouldn’t eat it.

At lunch I sat with Tom and Tracey, we talked about going ice skating on Sunday afternoon, if the ice was thick enough. The way it was melting today it wouldn’t be.

After school, I went downtown and browsed for Christmas presents. The kids would be easy it was my parents that I didn’t have any ideas for.

I then stopped at the library downtown and spent more time with the Bellefontaine Gazette published in the early 1800s. The advertisements were hilarious. I looked for but never found another mention of the robbery at Blackhoof’s. With his death, the Indians seem to disappear from the area.

I got home in time to turn around and go with the family to pick out a Christmas tree. For some reason, we always put it up about this time every year. Most people put them up on the first of the month or Christmas Eve.

We put it up and left it up for twelve days after Christmas. I don’t know if it had anything to do with the song or not. I should ask.

We always bought it from the Boy Scouts at my Troop so we went to the lot. Mr. Geist my Scout Master was there. We talked for a while. He knew about my involvement with the Council and encouraged me to keep at it.

He told me my Eagle had been approved and that we could have the ceremony in late January as planned. There had been a scheduling problem at the church but it was now confirmed for January 25 if I wanted to start sending invitations out.

I could order them from the BSA catalog or pick them up at the Council Headquarters in Springfield.

We picked out blue spruce that was about seven-foot tall. When we got it home Dad took a fresh cut off the bottom and put the tree up in our metal stand. We had bricks to put on each leg of the stand so it wouldn’t fall over. I filled the stand with a mixture of Karo syrup and water to feed the tree. We wouldn’t decorate it till Sunday afternoon. That gave it time for the limbs to settle in place.

At home, our Spanish conversation was about what we wanted for Christmas. There was a letter from Marvin Christenson the patent attorney. He acknowledged receiving the updated drawings with a built-in ball joint.

He told me that one of the engineers reviewing the system had asked about that. He also wrote that the first look at the patent search was looking good, but they had a way to go before filing.

After the other kids went to their rooms I had a discussion with Mum and Dad of what I would like to buy my brothers and sister for Christmas so we didn’t buy two of the same item. I asked them what they would like, but they were no help at all.

Saturday I slept so late I had to rush through my pushups and other exercises, shower and gulp some breakfast down before Mrs. Rupert showed up. Of course, she sat and had coffee and talked with my parents for another half hour so I hadn’t needed to hurry. It was good that she did, she was able to explain to my parents what was going on much better than I could.