GOD first...Heavenly Father, many of us ask for forgiveness for the sins we have committed in hopes that it will be forgiven by Your Amazing Grace and the sacrifice of Your Son, Jesus Christ. We are secure in knowing we are promised forgiveness through the words in many bible verses. Lord, encourage us in learning more about our salvation through Jesus Crist as we pray in His name. Amen.
**One day a man looked out the window of his tenth-floor room in a Dallas Hotel. He saw a man on the ledge outside ready to jump. He tried to be calm as he put his head out the window.
'Don't jump, my friend. Remember your children.'
'Haven't any children.'
'Remember your wife.'
'Haven't a wife.'
'Remember the Alamo.'
'What's that?' 'Go ahead and jump, you durn furriner.'
Ever wonder what it was like in the old days without all the conveniences we have today. Few can remember but what I'm about to relate are some of the things old folks at the time went through. As a young kid, my dad told me that he made a radio that didn't need batteries while I thought it was a fib. So he built a crystal set and showed me how it worked. As fascinated as I became, I tried to improve the antenna that was in the attic of our house. I concluded that if I wired it to our party line, I could get all kinds of reception and maybe as far as overseas. That didn't work as well as I thought. But I still could listen to Louisiana Hay Ride on Saturday nights and WSM in Nashville, Tennessee.
But I really hit the jackpot when I discovered that I could listen in on all the women on our party line. Every time around midmorning, the phone rang and all the women would get on the phone and listen, including my mother. Only I didn't tell her about my discovery. I found out who was going to have a baby, who was going to get married and such, which was more than a kid my age was supposed to know. I knew all the secrets all these women knew and sometimes used it to my devious mind.
I told some of my friends at school who was going to have another brother or sister. I could see into the future to their disbelief. 'Somebody told you' or so they thought. But I knew more but kept it as a secret to myself.... sometimes.
One of the individuals on our party line would sneak in and try to listen in but that little click on the line made all the women switch into German which she couldn't understand. Before I started school, all I knew was German and Spanish, which when my dad and uncle didn't want anyone to know what they were talking about only talked in Spanish. All of my aunts on my daddy's side also spoke Spanish. They weren't on our line. One party line could be connected at the operator in Runge and Central connected it to another party line or also to long distance calls to kinfolks in Nordheim. I wore out two pairs of army surplus earphones.
I've forgotten most of the stories I heard, thank goodness, but some I remember in detail. Some of them I will maybe relate in future articles, so I will have something to write about. I'm sorry I digress from my original intent about what old folks went through in the old days. Maybe later. See you next week.
