Too many years ago when I was around the age of fifteen I took the job of mowing down horse weeds (Ok, I don't know what they are really. When they were green they were horse weeds and when they died and dried out they were stick weeds.) from around her born.
She was not like a next door neighbor, 30 second hike of neighbor. She lived in the head of the branch of Nat's Creek known as "The Julie Fork". Places tended to be named for people who lived there. The ones this was named for was Burns and Julie Ratliff. Burns had passed away some years earlier but Julie still lived up in the head of that hollow (holler).
I got up bright and early and took a borrowed mowing scythe and headed up the hollow to her house. Goodness, I have so many memories surrounding that hollow. Half the time one was wading the creek because that is where the road was at the time.
I'm not sure how far it was to her place or how long it took me to make the walk but I did and began mowing down all the horse weeds. Now remember I had not had any breakfast either. By noon I was starving and she called me in for lunch. I still get queasy thinking about it.
She had one cast iron skillet on the stove that had old grease in it. When she got the grease hot she sliced of some bologna from a large roll she had. One edge was paper-thin while the other edge would have choked a hog.
She fried that thing up until the thin edge was coal black and charred yet the thick edge was still cold. This is what she served me for lunch. I was starved so I ate it with gratitude and went back to cutting down horse weeds.
As I recall she paid me $5.00 for that day's work (along with my lunch, of course). I can't really remember when the day's lunch became irrelevant but I know I did not keep it down all the way home.
I can never even hear the word bologna since then without thinking of that event.
During the day it was not very much fun at all but, in hindsight, it was one of those "good old days" moments.
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