Donald Davis - Tales from a Free-Range Childhood

JOHN F. BLAIR

PUBLISHER

1406 Plaza Drive

Winston-Salem, North Carolina 27103

www.blairpub.com

Copyright 2011 by Donald Davis

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address John F. Blair, Publisher, Subsidiary Rights Department, 1406 Plaza Drive, Winston-Salem, North Carolina 27103.

Manufactured in the United States of America

COVER PHOTO BY DONALDS FATHER JOE DAVIS,
WHO LOVED TO TAKE PICTURES WITH HIS KODAK 616 BOX CAMERA

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Davis, Donald, 1944

Tales from a free-range childhood / by Donald Davis.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-0-89587-507-5 (hardcover : alk. paper)ISBN 978-0-89587-509-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)- ISBN 978-0-89587-508-2 (ebook) 1. Davis, Donald, 1944Childhood and youth. 2. North CarolinaSocial life and customs. 3. Authors, American20th century--Biography. 4. Davis, Donald, 1944-Family. I. Title.

PS3554.A93347Z475 2011

813.54dc22

[B]

2010051339

Design by Debra Long Hampton

For Thomas D. D.

For more than thirty years, I have traveled as a performing storyteller. The stories that I tell are my own, built from reflections upon personal experiences and a lifetime of memories. They are put together to work first in a setting of telling with a live audience and, as such, are created in an oral/kinesthetic process without text. No writing is done until I know how the story goes, how it works, and all of the ins and outs of telling with various audiences and various time requirements.

The stories in this collection are in that sense not new. They are part of the total canon of stories that I have been telling, some for years. Two things bring them into print now. First, they have now matured to the point at which I feel comfortable documenting a written version for readers whom I shall perhaps never meet and who can ask no questions for unresolved clarity. Second, none of them have been previously published.

They are built of childhood memories, seen through one tellers eyes but told with certain belief that others who were there would not fail to have parallel memories. I have arranged them in the order of their chronological ending places, so the whole may have a more integrated memoir feel than in a set of unconnected stories.

My hope is always that they will serve as memory dusters for readers, and that readers will end up telling stories of their own about which they would not have thought without reading these.

B eing the firstborn child in our household and the first grandson in Mamas entire extended family, I experienced early confusion about exactly what my name was supposed to be. When you are a child, you do not learn your name by reading it on your birth certificate. No, you infer your intended label by the repeated observation of what you happen to be called by those adults (or available children) whom you happen to trust.

According to this process, I soon determined that my given name was Baby! After all, that was the constant oral label placed upon me by Mama, Daddy, and even my trustworthy grandmother. After all, I was the first (in our family) baby.

In case anyone without this experience wonders, it is important to know that Baby is not a bad name. No, it is in fact a very good name. When your name is Baby, you get to do exactly whatever you want to do! It was spoiling and wonderful!

I got along very well being the singular family Baby for nearly three years. But when the unanticipated arrival of my little brother interfered with the established order of things, even my name changed. Suddenly, everyone started calling me Donald. And my old, dear name, Baby, went to my uninvited (by me) little brother.

People came to see him in droves. Their assessment was always the same: Look at that beautiful baby! He is so gorgeous! My disgust was profound.

When I stop to think about it, the real trouble with having a little brother was not with the fact of his personal existence. No, I did not actually mind his presence at all. In fact, the first thing I did when he came home from the hospital was to admire and kiss him. No, the problem was that he interfered with my already busy life.

As a child, I was very involved in scientific inquiry. Each day was filled with educational experiments in my early effort to put the world in controllable order. My realization was that parents simply refused to tell you things that you need to know (example: Do you think that my broken dump truck will flush down the toilet?), which led to a constant life of scientific experimentation. This is where the little brother problem came into the mix.

I would be right in the middle of an educational scientific experiment when suddenly my mama would arrive. There you are! was her normal announcement. I was looking for you. Then something like this would follow: I need to go out in the yard and hang out the clothes. You come in the house and watch the baby.

I was unbelievably amazed as I stared back at her. You, I thought, are an adult woman, and you cannot see that I am busy! I do not have time to watch your baby. You wanted the little thing. I guess you can watch it! Of course, these words were thought and never actually spoken.

Come on, now, you are my only little helper. Come in the house and watch the baby!

Okay, I thought. I will watch the baby. Maybe someone will come to the door, and they can have him! I simply hated to stop my important work to watch the baby.

I had a cousin named Andy. Andy and I were born less than a year apart. I happened to get here first, but he was close behind me. Most people understood Andy and me very clearly: since we were cousins and not brothers, we liked one another! I would go to his house and spend the day playing. He would come to my house and spend the day playing. Either way, we were happy!

One day, Andys mama, my aunt Eddie, had to go somewhere for the day. So the plan was made for her to bring him over to our house, where he would play with me until she got back.

When they arrived, Andy had brought a basket that was filled with his little cars and trucks. When I saw that, I added enough of my own little cars and trucks to fill the basket to the rim. With these toys in hand, we told his mama goodbye and headed out the back door and across the yard to the corner of my daddys garden. There were four things there that we needed: dirt, tools for digging, the water hose, and... it was out of sight of my mama!

Andy and I worked very hard. We dug the dirt loose, turned on the water hose, mixed and stirred. Pretty soon, we had created a gigantic and gorgeous pit of mud. Now we could use the mud like it was asphalt and build little roads all over the backyard that could then bake in the hot sun and be smooth and hard for our little cars and trucks. It really was hard work. When we first got out there, there was grass we had to get rid of before we could even begin to do anything.

All of a sudden, our work was disturbed. It was Mama coming to look for us. There you are, boys! I need you! I need to go back in the garden and pick some beans for our supper. Andy, you and Eddie will probably stay and eat with us before you go home tonight. So I need for you boys to go in the house and watch the baby while I am out in the garden.