Tender in the Grass
By Jimmy Johnson
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61 responses to “Tender in the Grass”
I remember running around the yard barefoot and occasionally stepping on a thistle week or the dog’s business. We had a gravel driveway and I even walked a bit on that. My oldest brother once dug his feet in and shot out gravel with his feet. (think The Flintstones,Roadrunner and other cartoons) I was amazed, but I suspect that it did not hurt as much as it looked to me.
Already bought the book. Gee, Jimmie, don’t you remember signing it for me?!
My sympathy goes out to David Letterman today for the loss of his mother (95). She was a delight when she appeared on his program.
I lost my own mother this year. She was 106. David and I are now very old orphans.
Sorry for the misspelling of “Jimmy” in the first post. I have a cousin named Jimmie so the name sort of falls off the typing fingers that way.
One set of grandparents had a huge sweetgum tree in their back yard, so I could never go barefoot there. Stepping on those burrs hurt like a sonofagun, even to a kid used to going barefoot. The other grandparents had a chinaberry tree. At night I had to wash berry gunk off my feet so as not to get it on my granma’s sheets. Life was tough as a kid.
Between the fire ants and some kind of weed that made stickers, running barefoot in my grandparent’s yard wasn’t an option. I enjoyed it other places, though. Supposed to be 80 here in Tulsa today, keep hearing geese flying overhead as I work here with my window open.
Some good music for today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53N99Nim6WE
and one more https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aY3vu6fzeU
That’s OK Tom, Janice understands as well. lol We all do it.
No bare feet in our yard for sure. Very little grass, lots of rock, downed twigs and sticks. A chance of yellow jackets, assorted weeds, bees in the small violets, a lost screw or nail or two. Yup it could get exciting.
I shall probably NEVER forget the afternoon [& weeks thereafter] when I played volleyball, barefoot, all afternoon in a Florida yard totally covered with sand burrs/thistles. It took several months before I got all the little spines out of my feet. Unbelievable – and stupid of me to have done so.
Decorah eagles are having “munch a bunch o’ lunch” time, featuring squirrel tartare. Color of said squirrel seems to have been on the yellowish-brown side; definitely not just grey and also definitely not red-brown.
c x-:
No pelage now in sight at either Decorah or Decorah North. In that area, both Sciurus carolinensis [gray sq.] and S. niger rufiventer [‘western’ fox sq.] are possible, and of course cottontail rabbit [Sylvilagus floridanus], unless you saw a long tail.
Peace,
p
I love to go barefoot. When I was a child, our yards were pretty easy on barefoot feet. I would be barefoot from the time the ground had warmed in the spring until the ground got too cold in the fall. I only wore shoes when I absolutely had to put them on. I still like to be barefoot,but it’s harder on my feet now.
Free range chickens that roamed everywhere and geese and cows all around house.
Horses and pigs too.
Made barefoot interesting along with gravel road.
c x-p: Growing up in Florida, we always called them sandspurs and, along with the possibility of ringworm and other pests that lurk in the dirt *, they were a main reason I was never allowed to go barefoot. Looked for their official name and found this article – http://www.eattheweeds.com/sandspurs-sandlot-sadists/ Bob’s grandmother must not have known they were edible or I’m sure he’d have tales of same!
* “Creeping eruption” is one you should be happy to have missed.
I’m surprised no one’s pointed out the fact that adults typically weigh a lot more than little kids, perhaps even more per square inch on those bare feet.
Three Evening Random Thoughts:
The older I become, the more I appreciate the wisdom of the ages – and the aged.
Tee Vee Or Not Tee Vee – that is no longer the question.
Politics makes strange bedfellows and boring acquaintances.
eMb: There were a complete foot (how I saw the color) and a long tail, mostly dehaired. Parent was not interested in the tail – no meat, I guess – and tossed it aside.
Ruth Anne: Yep, and I also missed whatever else lurked! I was/am not much for being barefoot, so the mentioned incident was exceptional. As it was, I knew what I was doing – and still did it – but my assessment of the probable results was far too mild. Otherwise, my family and I were shod.
Of course, there was the time young son’s “friend” took his shoe and threw it into a large puddle. Son retrieved same, but stepped on something sharp. He had much pain, and we could see only where something sharp had stuck him. About a week later, after medical treatment, out popped a thorn fully 1 9/16 inches long. It had been totally inside his foot so far that nothing could be seen from the outside. We are SO fortunate that no infections set in. “Friends” like that are not needed. I photocopied the thorn to prove its size.
Ruth Anne; these are part of what made barefooting hazardous in Alabama: http://waynesword.palomar.edu/plapr98.htm
I also recall going swimming in Lake Tuscaloosa, a man-made lake once and stepping barefoot on what I thought was barbed wire. Actually it turned out to be a wild blackberry cane that had been drowned by the rising water.
Mark: Ouch! I think I might have seen something like that, maybe a little smaller, somewhere in our travels but not where I grew up in (almost) downtown Orlando.
I drove through the Vine & Olive Colony last Thursday. Demo polis is a nice town.
I knew a young lad – when I was a young lad his age – that could walk the gravel
road and cut hay stubble in bare feet. Not me I am a tender foot.
Later knew a girl (now a Grandmother) that tended her horses – in the winter snow –
in bare feet. I figure there are too many things on the ground that want to do me
bodily harm.
When my MIL taught rural school some kids would walk barefoot to school then put
on shoes – to save shoe leather.
GM Debbe
Had another beautiful clear and pleasant night (61°F) here in my Utah valley. Before the moon rose I had a great view at x20 of Jupiter and 4 of its moons.