eddietrapp012213

Eddie Trapp tells of live in Charleston, TX area in 1985.

From my ledger, 1985. August 12. Bret and I went to Jerry Cotton's Monday night auction. Visited with John and Judy Silman, Larry and Kelley Trapp, Mama and Tookie. Bought survival knife, $5.00, new umbrella, $2.00, two boxes of fancy candy at $2.00 a box, black and white television, $13.00, and a steel bar for packing fence posts, $2.50.

Tuesday, August 13. Bret and I to Charleston to cut wood. Saw Ben Chessher at Charleston Store. He is planning to bulldoze a road through thick woods southwest of Charleston to his forty acres beside the river so it will sell better. Home with a big load of wood at midmorning. To courthouse at night to a meeting about getting ambulance service.

Thursday, August 15. Just not my day. Bret, Greg, and I left at 7:30 to go cut wood. About two miles from home we noticed we left the saw at home. Back home and got it. Got to the woods and the saw wouldn't start. Our plastic gas can got a leak in it and gas ran out in the floor of the pickup. Dropped saw off at Bud Clark's shop south of Miller's Pharmacy. Got a twenty four dollar carburetor job on it.

Wednesday, August 21. The boys and I went to Charleston for gasoline and a Coke. The sign in front of the store said, "In Memory of T.J. Worden." I couldn't believe it. Hadn't heard about him passing away. Then I was more surprised to know I had missed the funeral that was going on right at that time. On to woods south of Clark Ridge and got a big load of wood. Home about noon and my beeper went off. A three year old girl at Highway Village had taken some blood pressure pills, Lopressin, or something like that. I got there in less than ten minutes but her mother had carried her to Miller's Pharmacy and got some Ipecac to make her vomit.

Sunday, August 25. Up at 5:00 a.m. to go hog hunting. Loaded Prissy, Ann, and Pearl then went south of Klondike to the old church by Honey Creek. (Now some of these places are under water in Cooper Lake.) Unloaded the dogs while still dark and walked south to the river. Walked west along the river planning on crossing later and coming back on the other side. By 7:30 had seen no sign and decided to go on southwest to Lost Ridge and Peak Field then hitchhike back from Horton. While near Lost Ridge I found a white rock pad where someone had drilled for oil. It was 8:30 and I was pretty thirsty. Hadn't carried any water. I saw something on the opposite side of the pad that looked like watermelons. Walking over I found three melons about twenty inches long and as big around as a stovepipe. I sat down and ate until I couldn't hold any more. Sure was a nice surprise.

Walking on southwest I passed through the Peak Field and just before getting to Johnny Moore's cotton patch I saw a lot of locust tree seed pods laying under a tree. I was pretty hungry and had read the seeds were good to eat so I got one and chewed it up. It was very hard and tasted awful. Decided maybe the hard outer part was like the shell on a pecan and that is why it was bitter. I got my knife and opened the hard shell, hoping to find a good tasting kernel. Instead of finding a tasty nut, there was a worm like larva of some kind. Maybe that's why the first one tasted so terrible. The taste stayed with me about four days.

After eating the watermelons and locust seeds I moved on toward Horton and was getting pretty tired. At the Horton Church about 10:15 they were having Sunday School where I came out to the highway. At the first house on the west side of the road a man from Baton Rouge was patching a hoop net and said his dad lived there. I kept walking north toward Highway 24 and got halfway there before Randy and Blair Freeman came along and picked me up. Carried me to Nu Way in Cooper where I called Huck Elmore and he took me to my pickup, allowing me to get to Mama and Tookie's house for lunch at 12:45.

Tuesday, August 27. Went to Mt. Pleasant School and was an inservice consultant for three programs. Wednesday, consultant at Texarkana.

Sunday, September 1. This afternoon drove to Kensing and visited with Newt Goforth. Said he was nervous like a squirrel. Couldn't get fixed. Would go in the house a while then come back out and sit on the porch. Told me about watching wasps catching spiders and dragging them up the wall of the house and put them in the cracks. Drove on to Kensing Crossing between Kensing and Taylortown. Three Slabtown guys were there riding mules and we talked awhile. They knew my Aunt Ina Mathews real well. To be continued.

Several people have asked about the bright object overhead about 9:00 each night. It is the planet Jupiter. Compare it with the brightest star of all, Sirius, which is more to the southeast. Notice how the star twinkles but Jupiter, like all planets only glows.

An elderly man was playing golf with a young man. On one shot a big pine tree was right between the young man's ball and the green. The old man said, "When I was your age I would hit the ball right over the top of that tree." The young man tried to hit the ball over the big tree, hit a limb, and the ball fell to the ground at the base of the tree. The old man told him, "Of course, when I was a young man that tree was only six feet tall."