One of the things Grandma let me do to help out was candle eggs. Every egg had to be place on a machine that weighed them and it had an electric bulb that showed if there were any defects like blood clots in the eggs. Then the eggs were put in boxes by the weight. Many of the large eggs were double yolked, something you never see today. I used to feel so grown up to be able to help that way and I could do it when I was very small. Today when you buy a dozen eggs and crack one open you never know what you will find.

     Grandma only needed glasses for reading and she always went into the dime store to buy them. At one time the state of Massachusetts passed a law that they could not be sold any more. Grandma was quite upset because she wondered where she would get her glasses. Aunt Ina and Aunt Lucy told her she should go to an eye doctor and have her eyes tested correctly. They made an appointment for her with a doctor in Clinton and they took her and got her glasses. She always swore she could not see out of the new glasses. When she saw an ad in the paper that said you could still buy glasses in the dime store in New Hampshire, she had my father drive her to Nashua and went in to Woolworth's and tried on glasses until she got a pair that she could see thru and bought them. She was very happy with the new pair and never did wear the ones she got in Clinton at all.

     One of my strongest memories of Grandpa was when we were out driving and he would see a new sidewalk going in along the road out in a woodsy section where there were no houses. He'd get real excited and exclaim at the top of his lungs "Look at that - look at that - another Curley sidewalk" I used to look and look and I could never see why they were curly - they always looked perfectly straight to me. I don't know why I never asked but everyone in the car always seemed to know what he was talking about so I suppose I thought it was just me that didn't understand. Much later - after Grandpa was dead - when I was in high school we were studying about the governor of the state, James Michael Curley, and how it was alleged he got ten cents for every curb stone used while he was in office. And suddenly I knew what Grandpa was talking about when he said Curley sidewalks.

     The funny thing about it when Curley was Mayor of Boston there was an open air market that the farm used to sell produce all during the summer and fall that was going to close. Mayor Curley had taken part in the opening ceremonies when the market had opened so some of the men using the market went to his office to ask him to keep the market open. He agreed and one of the men said, "If you run for governor we will ALL vote for you. Now Grandpa was a staunch Republican and he really hated everything about Curley. But the man had given his word and Grandpa would never go back on his word so when James Michael Curley ran for governor, Grandpa voted for him. He took quite a kidding from most of his sons except Uncle Harry who was the only Democrat in the family. 

     Many the hot and heavy argument was had in the farm kitchen on Sunday afternoons. Grandpa had a loud voice when he was excited and Uncle Harry and some of the other could keep up with him. So there was a lot of shouting and some yelling going on at times. But the nice part of it was that when it came time to milk or to get supper it was all forgotten and everyone was friends again.

     Grandpa would never drive any car but a Ford Model A or Model T. When they stopped making those cars he stopped driving. But then somebody found an old one that was in fairly good condition and Grandpa drove that happily for several more years. The boys tried to talk him into getting a new type, but he wouldn't consider it. He said the Model T was good enough for him.

     My cousin Myrtle was very allergic to poison ivy, just walking by a plant she would catch it. One day she was up on the main road waiting for the mail. The Postman thinking to tease her drove the car at her as if he was going to hit her. She jumped back and into a patch of ivy. He immediately put her in the car and drove her down to the farm. She scrubbed herself with yellow soap head to foot but it didn't make any difference. She still got poison ivy so badly she almost died. The doctor said she had it inside and out.

     Because she was so sick she had to have a private nurse. She came down and saw all the cars and expected to hear a lot of noise and was already to throw everybody out and make them shut up. Myrt was on a bed in Aunt May's front room. The front hall gave entrance to Grandma's rooms on the left and Aunt May's on the right. The nurse came into the gall and Grandma's door was shut and she couldn't hear a sound. She didn't hear anything all day. She couldn't get over how a big family could be all together without making a lot of noise. Myrtle made a slow but steady recovery and was finally alright, but the nurse had to stay quite a long time.

     My Uncle Doc took a shine to the nurse - Clarissa Kay Sisson - in the time she was there and she became my Aunt Kay. She hated the name Clarissa and preferred to go by Kay. She spent a lot of time trying to shut up Barbara and Teddy who persisted in call her Aunt Clarissa. If she'd just been quiet and not said a word they would have soon tired of the game.

     Speaking of poison ivy there were some in the family that never got poison ivy, my father was one and I was another. Somebody said if you ate a piece of the leaf you would never get poison ivy again. Probably if you were allergic to it you'd never get it again because you'd be dead. But since I was very proud of the fact that I didn't catch it - I'd pick a leaf - walk in a patch of it, etc. - somebody (probably Barbara and Teddy) dared me to eat a piece so I did. Broke off a piece of leaf and ate it. There surely must be someone who watches out for fools because it never bothered me at all. I seem to remember is that Barbara and Teddy suddenly made themselves scarce.

Contact Diane Wetherbee at ddwbee@aol.com  for comments or information