Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1919-09-05
MANY CHANGES9
AS TIME FLIES
AS Years Increase We Forget
About Customs and Seasons
That Prevailed When We
Were Boys on the Farm.

Times aint like they used to be-"
snid the old man. who sat musing
and smoking on his front porch" In
what ways and how? he was asked.
We'll" he said, us he knocked the
ashes from his pipe Oh the toe of
his shoe. "Wcll," he went on, take
the seasons, fer instance. When |
was boy we used to have winters
that was winters. have had my
mill pond frozc over for weeks at r
time with ice thick enough to hold
up Il loaded horse wagon. We could
get ice to fill all the icc-houses in the
neighborhood in them days. You can't
these days. And such SHOWS as we
had when | was Il boy, was plumb
sight. 1t used to be that the ground
would be covered with show nearly
all winter. ! remember when we had
to shovel snow waist deep to make
Al path to the barn and the spring.
"And, then take drinking. Times
days rabbit hunting and sliding Oh
the snow. Now, as last winter for in
stance, there wasn't snow enough to
track Il rabbit in. We always had
snow for Christmas, and could sleigh
and we went to the post office, town
and church, and to mill, in slcighs.
Eut not these late years. aint seen
Il sleigh, nor heard IL sleigh bell for
twenty of more years.
And, then, taxed rinking. Times
Lave changed. When was boy
every body took dram that wanted
to. but no body got drunk. We had
cggnog ut Christmas, and had our
bitters in the spring. w. used t.
make brandy right here in my barn,
and you never seed II man drunk.
Taint 80 now. People has changed,
We have got to have phohybiton now,
and laws made to keep people from
gittin' drunk, and they git drunk all
the same. | had four boys, and they
had their dram when ever they want
Cd 1T. Two of them worked in nv
still house, and mother used to rive
her babies brandy when they had the
collie, just naturally raised 'em on il,
and when they growed up they was
use to it, and seemed to kecr nothin'
about it. Times have changed. ! tell
you, but not for the better. like n
dram myself. sometimes, on Il cold
or when | feel bad and have
no appetite fer breakfast, but das'nt |
tech it now. | was in town sometime |
back, when you could buy little |
liqour fer sickness, and ! got quart |
to take home, and on the way, feelin'
bad, | took drink or two and it |
flew to my head, and when I got
home coundn't put my mare in the
stable. And don't you know, they had
me up before the church fer drnkin'
intoxicatin' liquor to excess. ! could |
have TUX twice as much of the brandy |
! used to make and il wouldntcr
faxed me, and if it had nobody
wouldcr kcered or said anything
about it,"
While the old man was pausing to
relight his pipe asked him if he
hadn't perhaps forgotten, that there
was as much drunkenness then, when
liquor was plentiful and free, as In
these later years? or whether or not
The drinking men of those days did
not lay the foundation, or sow the
seed of modern drinking? He stuck
to it, that times had changed for the
worse
reminded him that as far as the
weather man was concerned etc. that
reliable figures gathered by the
weather bureau for the past 80 years,
show scarcely degree Of difference
m the average temperature, that we
mad just as much suow and ice now
rs we ever had, and that possibly he
1ad forgotten. But he still held to his
opinion. He was living in the past OF
ong ago. The years in their going
nad left the old man high and dry
behind them. Times change, it is true,
,ut we do not always change with
hem.
And then, it is characteristic of
many of us to grumble, growl and
if everything does not go
Oh as we think it should. We take
views of things. This same
Did pilgrim, who thought things all
'ut of plumb, sold his wheat at $3.50
a bushel, and corn at 1925 last year,
and his cattle and sheep at CORES
high prices. At the same
lime he was paying his farm hands,
(he employed two mcn) $1.00 day
and their dinner, with a few other
If we could only look at things
from the other fellows point of view
we might get proper
view.
The Chautauqua.