Happy Birthday, Granny

To answer Fred ~ Left to Right: ddd, Granny, Nevik and Actonbell.
AP3 wasn't around yet when this photo was taken.

Today Granny would have been 95 years old. She passed away four years ago, and I miss her a lot.

When I was around six or so, we lived around the corner of a long block from my Aunt Mary and my cousins Tommy and Fletcher. Fletcher was always in trouble, and this time he got me in trouble, too.

They had a large black dog named Cindy, who recently had puppies. Fletcher convinced me they needed a bath and he filled the wheelbarrow with water. I guess that I was ignorant enough that I didn't realize that puppies - their eyes were still shut - didn't need us to keep them clean. So we put them in the water and they yelped and doggie-paddled away. Aunt Mary came out and started yelling.

Fletcher and I ran like the dickens. We hopped on our tricycles - we had just gotten them for Xmas and they were identical (except HIS had fancy tassles on the handlebars and MINE didn't) and we pedaled like mad to get away.

For some reason, we didn't turn left to go up the slight incline to get around to my house. We turned right, which meant we would have to go around most of the block. But that's what we did. I remember pretty vividly being about half way up the other side of the block and turning around to find that Fletcher had fallen behind, and beyond him, in the middle of the street, was Aunt Mary, waving the flyswatter (that's what was used across the back of the legs) at us. Mary was a pretty good-sized woman, but she was gaining ground on Fletcher. I was scared and pedaled faster.

I reached my house, where Granny was with Actonbell and infant Nevik. I ran into the house, screaming that Aunt Mary was going to kill me, ran to the back of the house to my room and slammed the door shut.

I sat with my ear to the door, heart pounding so hard that I could barely hear. I could hear Granny speaking with Mary, and that Mary was angry.

Then it got quiet. I cautiously opened the door, and then crept to the front room. Granny looked at me. "Didn't you know that those puppies didn't need to have a bath?" she asked. I mutely shook my head. Granny sighed. "Well, they didn't, you could've drowned them. But they're okay, just don't do anything like that again."

So, that's my story of how Granny Saved Me.