MEMOIRS PART 3 - THE GRAIN FIELD EPISODE

One of the next things I remember about Dad was an episode in a grain field. I had apparently found some matches and I sneaked away from the house so that i wouldn't be seen playing with them. Someone, I think Marian Boyer, saw me and immediately reported it to Dad. I don’t remember if he caught me in the act, but in any event he chastised me severely, cut a switch from a nearby tree, and gave me a good switching. I was careful about matches thereafter.

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Another time, maybe a few years later, I was playing with a new B-B gun along with Gene Jeffries. There was an opened keg of staples in the garage I mentioned earlier, and I shot a BB into it to see what would happen. Unfortunately, the BB ricocheted and hit Gene about half an inch from one of his eyes. He ran home and soon Edith, his mother, stormed over. Again I was chastised and warned about careless use of guns. I don’t recall being spanked, but I lost the use of the gun for some time.

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The next episode involves our mother. In about 1926 or 1927 I developed appendicitis. Dr. Phipps was our doctor at the time; he rushed me to the L.D.S. hospital in Salt Lake, where my appendix was removed. During my recuperation in the hospital, a little girl in the next bed died. She had been burned severely in what I recall was a Halloween accident. It was my first experience with that aspect if life.
When I got home, I spent a week or so in a bed which was set up in the kitchen, which later became Dad’s office. After a few days I apparently became bored with the whole thing and did something bad and needless. I think, but am not sure, that it was wetting the bed. Mother was horrified and outraged. It was the first time I had seen her really angry. She scolded me severely and told Dad about it; then they both scolded me, and I think might have spanked me if I hadn't been an invalid. They threatened to do so, invalid or not, if I did it again. I didn't.