[or-roots] Aunt Charlotte's book

[DAVIESW739 at aol.com]

It was getting well into summer and the sun seemed a great red disk in the  
smoky sky. No  one, who has not experienced it, can realize the tedious  
monotony  of those long hot days in the lumbering, swaying old wagons, with  the 
dust and the sun and the slow oxen barely moving, the  creaking wagons  keeping 
time to the puff, puff of the oxen's feet in the dust, mile after mile,  day 
after day, and week after week. 
 
  The talk became half hearted, was disconnected or had ceased  altogether. 
It was easier  to sleep, so women and children slept a great  deal. Even the 
drivers would nod and nod, till the slowing up of the oxen would  call them to 
themselves again, for even the oxen seemed spiritless  and  drowsy and had to 
be continually urged, to keep them moving at all. 
 
  I used to sit beside the driver and let my feet hang over the  front of the 
wagon box. Hour  after hour, I have watched the slow fore feet  of the oxen 
as they lifted them out of pockets of heavy dust, the suction  causing little 
whirls that drifted and settled about their hind feet, as  each  in turn found 
almost the exact spot where the fore feet had been, but  a moment before.
 
  It makes me drowsy even now when I think about it. Mile after  mile I have 
watched them,  till I fancied that I saw red where Dave and  Jerry stepped. I 
tried to show it to Mother for I thought  their feet were  bleeding and I was 
worried. Mother said "No, you have looked too long at the  red  sun." I tried 
to accept that explanation. I also tried to keep from  looking at their feet, 
but there  was nothing else to look at, except the  wagon just ahead and the 
perfectly round rim of the  horizon.
 
  The grass was dying and looked burned and yellow in the glare.  
Occasionally a driver  would go to sleep. One day my brother, Daniel, a  great easy going 
dreamy eyed boy, was driving  one of our teams. He was  well toward the rear 
of the long line of wagons. He fell asleep and the   oxen, going slower and 
slower, finally stopped altogether. The following drivers  thought it a fine  
joke when they pulled out and around to leave the boy  and the wagon standing 
there in the  lonely road. It was not till camp was  made several hours later 
that Father missed the boy and his  oxen. A party  was hastily organized to go 
back for him. Everyone was frightened, for we were  in  an Indian country, but 
they found him quite safe, still asleep, in the  middle of the dusty road.
 
  Father was very angry at the men who had left him behind.  Everyone was 
provoked about  it. I suppose that something was said, there  usually was when 
Father felt justified. But anyway, it  never happened to  Daniel again or to 
anyone else for that matter, and it was not laughed  about  or spoken of as a 
joke either.
 
 
Walt  Davies
Cooper Hollow Farm
Monmouth, OR 97361
503 623-0460 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://omls.oregon.gov/pipermail/or-roots/attachments/20050213/6b6ec2d5/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: walt%20at%2055%20icon.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 2892 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://omls.oregon.gov/pipermail/or-roots/attachments/20050213/6b6ec2d5/attachment.jpg>