M Snyder
I always thought this old story illustrated the importance of fathers. Of having the mindset that you will not teach your children to fear every little thing. Often it's the Dads who put the rough and tumble in their kids,
(Even Tomboys)while the mom's watch with wide eyed worry and prayer pressed palms against their lips.
I used to watch the little kids jump from the diving rock at Audra River State Park. I wished I had the guts of some of those 8 year old girls.
I've always been the timid one, and clumsy enough to end up with 2 nice sets of stitches in my forehead and under my eye before the age of 8. Monica, she'd skateboard standing, down our long steep driveway in Frederick. Do y'all remember that driveway? Puts West Virginia hills to shame! I think she once rode her bike down and knocked herself out, but no stitches! Melonda, well Melonda will swim right up into the face of Barracuda! Not a pretty face, that, but hers is. A story for another time.
I don't remember if it was mom who complained or dad who confessed, but somebody told me this story.
I don't even know which kid it happened to, though I suspect it was Melonda.
This is the way I remember....
They always had a nice garden at the Mountaindale MD house. I believe there's an adorable picture somewhere of a blonde blue eyed bonneted Monica holding a strawberry about as big as her baby head.
Once upon a time Mom and Dad were playing with baby M by the edge of the garden. On dad's 30 second watch, baby M managed to get into the garden dirt.
Mom was a bit put out and scolded dad for exposing poor baby M to dirty germs.
Dad took a handful of dirt and plopped it right in baby M's lap in protest. "It's not going to hurt her to get a little dirty!"
All that build up and that's pretty much the whole story.
Not as Anticlimactic as you might think because Mom never forgot and I never forgot the lesson about fear.
And the world much later confirmed that children are better off exposed to a reasonable amount of rough and tumble in the dirt, to build up immunity.
Who knew?!
Dad did.
I assume he made this scientific observation way back then, because he had rolled in a lot of dirt in his days and never died.
Good enough for me.
