Colebaugh Family
In the Evening
In the early evening neighbors might stop to visit.
Gram would sit in her rocker. She would take the pins out of her hair and it would fall all the way to floor. About half way down it would change from grey to blonde. She had never had her hair cut in her life. Aunt Coila used to laugh that Ma's hair had changed to grey while she was pregnant with Martin. She was so ashamed to be pregnant with grey hair.
I liked to sit at the kitchen table under one bare bulb from which a long tape of tar paper hung to catch flies and draw floor plans, usually of castles and houses with secret rooms. Sometimes we would play a game using flash cards of the states. We had to guess the name of the state from its shape, the name of the capital, the state bird, the state motto, the biggest cities and what they were famous for.
When we slept in the house, gram would put a big garbage pail in
the lean to so we wouldn't have to go outdoors. She put a toilet seat on top but
we were only allowed to pee, nothing else. I must have slept in Gram's bed but
then where did she sleep?
She must have slept in the granary. I remember I woke up one morning and put on
my shoe but something kept wiggling in my shoe. So I had to take it off and a
beetle fell out.
There was a big hand-made dresser in her room. It sat in our
basement for many, many years. I tried to find some relative to take it but
nobody would. I finally had a friend of mine, an antique dealer, sell it for me.
He appreciated knowing the history of it. I know somebody in the family made
that dresser maybe grandpa, maybe his father. I think it was a wedding present
for them.
It meant so much to gramma. Aunt Coila's china doll was on top of that dresser.
As a child she played with a china doll.
When I became a few years older, we cousins would sleep out in the granary, 3 to a bed. There were so many beds in there and we had to climb over one to get to another. It was so much fun.
The old house - My Mother's Memories
From Article Colebaugh family
From Heading Personal
From Website MyGrandRapids
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