Mexico Missouri message., 1902-07-03

Memory Yet.
And another thing that my boys !
miss that their old dad enjoyed wAeH
he was their age" said the midtle'
aged man with the ample walstbSnu,
"is what | called the snoaked swim
the swim in the old criclt or river that |
a fellows folks didn't know anything |
about-until they found out, and then
the things that happened! NOW, le'
my boys so down to the bathinS
beach--take EN- down there myself as
often as not. They get their swlms
and enjoy EN-. and the swlms DO EN-
good and teach 'em to take care Oh
themselves. But there aint any shch
thing as believing That those boys Gi
mine enjoy their t,ut.and.dried sHims
as much as we kids used to when we
had to sneak our swims, upbGknownst
to the old folks, in the old creek or
riyer-thcre isn't any believing sucA
a thing as TX
ut surely is queer how we all, from
childhood up, take sort of particular
delight in dong just those things that
we know are forbidden and that We
ought not TO do-seems to me that the
fact shows that there's a whole heap
O. cussedness in human nature that's
Just naturally got to get worked out
of our systems before were inserted
into our little six feet of earth. When
it got so that my parents didn't par
ticularly mind my going in swimming
| wouldn't feel like going in more II
couple OF times a week, whereas be.
tore Id been found out ia hang
around the old crick or river without
any buds on. from morning till night,
and hated to see the sun going down
because that meant my having TO
slope hOmewards for supper.
Long about this time of the year,
when the days nd be getting long and
warmish, was when I'd first begin to
take my sneaked swims when | was
kid. There was only one process in
those days. That was to keep right
on going on the quiet until found out
tho getting nabbcd was inevitable
and then, after being padded almost
to death in the wOodshCd by your
angry dad, have him take you down
the crick TO see whether you would
tell the truth or not in saying that
you could swim. When You made good
and you could always make good
having probably been going in on the
quiet for year or so. and like as not
being able to swim all around him
why, then he'd come home and say,
Nav, the boys all right in the water,
and that settled il.
1T makes Inc feel cheap right down
to the present minute to remember
some of the whoppers | used to tell
my mother in those days when | was
| sncaking my swims. 1t sure does.
Member one time I'd been sitting on
a sand bar all day long until my back
was almost the color Of a Eeranium
and that night, in passing by me, my
mother brushed against me. | could
not refrain from letting out hOllor,
my sun-brOiled back hurt me sO-and
then she made me take off my jacket
and shrt-my dad wasn't at home
so she could see what aIled my back.
| squirmed and wrigGlCd and tried to
get out of it, but had to do it, and of
course she saw in a second that had
about as bad case of blistored back
as there was in four counties.
Son she said to me, regarding me
Cravely, how did your back get that
way?'
We'll, say, hate to own up to it,
/ but burned if | didn't have the nerve
to tell that grand, good woman that
, I'd been eating wild Strawberries in
| the woods all day and the condition
| of my back must be attributable tu
, hives, Say, wouldn't that make q
| cigar store Indian blush if he had
/ to own up to il? She rubbed cold
| crcam-not the stuff that you buy AT
| drug stores, but the real thing right
out Of the pan-on my back, and then
sat beside my bed and told me that
she wouldn't tell dad on me if I'd
| promise her never to 20 in any more
without permission, which would be
when | was older. and she said that
/ ought to know that her life ana dad s
! life wouldn't be worth anything &c
them if / got drowned, and | prom
ised-and, of course | went rirht IN
again the next day like the whclp that
was in common with ali the rest ol
the Kids of my day.
"Of course, | was only an irrcspOn
siblc tad" said the mIuIl"-aCcd mar
in conclusion, according 20 the Wash
ington Star, "and yet, dye know, ever
yet, often think of the little mother
sitting there on the edge of the bed
in the tiny, quiet room, with the moon
light streaming in and somehow OF
another | often wish that hadn't bro
ken those promises to her thc way
did"
Too Much DIFFERENCE