The Van Buren press., 1896-01-18
Aunt Nancy's Fool Notions.

Aunt Nancy's Fool Notions.
You mought saddle up right now and
pitch out and ride three hundred miles
before you could find another woman as
smart as my Aunt Nancy Newton. She
has never went off to college and she
don't put any on frills and fancy fxments
to speak Of. She is what l call plain,
old-fashion, fint-and-steel woman. But
when it comes to hayin sense-plenty of
IT and some to spare-my Aunt Nancy
is right there. And yet still at the
same time, that dear, delightful old
soul can take up more fool notions, it
seems to me, than any one woman in
the whole discovered country.
If Aunt Nancy was to turn in tonight
and dream about crossin high and
muddy waters-freshets and floods and
the like of that-she wouldn't sleep no
more in week. She says it is dead
certain sign of death in the family for
anybody to dream about crossin muddy
waters. But if death in the family
had come to pass every time l have
dreamt about crossin floods and freshets
and muddy waters the Sanders genera
tion would of faded out years and years
ago. So that is jest simply one of Aunt
Nancy's fool notions.
| was buildin of new house last
summer in one of the most loveliest
spots on the broad bosom of the earth
perhaps. There is big oak grove ali
around and spring right down there
under the hill.
"You will have to take your ak,
Rufus, and cut them trees down." said
Aunt Nancy the first time she driv by.
at will never do to leave 'em standin
there. They will draw lightnn, Rufus,
they will draw lightnin as certgin as
the Lord made little apples"
Well, | never have cut them trees
down, and what is more l never will.
They have been standin right there for
a hundred years. l reckon, and they
never have drawed any lightnin yet
And so far as | can see there amt no
particlar reason why they will start to
drawin of it now But at any rates,
that is one more of Aunt Nancy's fool
notions.
If Aunt Nancy was to run out of job
on Thursday night-as smart and
stirrin as she is-she would set down
and smoke her pipe and hold her hands
and play with the children whole en-
tire day before she would start a piece
of work on Friday. "Its bad luck,
Rufus, it's bad luck" says she, and that
is the onlyest reason she can give. The
Good Book tells us to work SIX days
and rest on Sunday, but it don't say
nothin about taken Friday for luck.
Every day is workin day with me, ex-
cepin Sunday, and l have had more good
luck than any man in the settlement.
Whereas, accordin to my doxologN that
is another one of Aunt Nancy's fool no.
tions.
And then Aunt Nancy she runs every
thing by the moon. She regulates the
weather, and sows her garden seed, and
plants out her flowers, and sets her hens
and kills her hogs all accordin to the
size and shape and stage and general
appearments of the moon. AS to me,
1t takes my level blamdest to keep up
with the sun, and l don't know one turn
of the moon from another But the
weather changes with the seasons, and
the garden seed come up, and the chick
ems hatch off, and the flowers grow at
our house the same as they do over at
the Newton place. So there we are
with one more of Aunt Nancy's fool no.
tions.
Finally at last, accordin to my lgura-
tion, it would take hamper basket and
a good big book to hold all the sense
and all the fool notions that Aunt
Nancy has got in her head.