For your reading enjoyment, we continue to publish Rambling Vines by the late Marylea Vines as she recalls events and names of Corning folks from many years ago. We are currently in the year 1992

I saw something on television over the recent holidays that really caught my attention… it is a safety device that is placed over a gun barrel (any size gun), then bolted down, (it can be padlocked). This device somehow stops the bullet if the gun is fired. They sounded a little expensive at $30.00 to $40.00 each, but that is a small price to pay to save a life. Anyone with children and loaded guns in the same household should look into this.

My neighbor Dot and I have been engaged in a craft project of decorating sweatshirts and I might say we have made some rather pretty ones. Another friend, Beverly, stood it as long as she could before buying the needed materials and asking for step-by-step instructions. Now, you have to remember that any craft that takes over 20 minutes from start to finish does not interest Beverly. She selected this complicated pattern which required nearly an hour of careful trimming, complaining every minute… “well, this is not what I thought it was” … “this just isn’t as simple as it looks,” … “I don’t believe I am interested in doing any more of these” … “this is for the birds” … and on and on she complained as she trimmed with scissors. Next step was to spread the cutout with glue on the back side, to the front of the sweatshirt and anchor it in place with a hot iron. I had my back to her when she discovered that she had fastened the pattern to the back of the shirt, instead of the front. What happened for the next 10-15 minutes was so funny that I was actually down in the floor trying to control my laughter. Best I can tell, Beverly is looking for something that looks complicated but can be whipped up in one night.

My little great-niece, Christina, spent a few days before Christmas with her aunt, who is my niece. She was kept busy wrapping packages, helping to bake Christmas cookies, and doing last-minute shopping. Sharon said that one trip to a St. Louis area mall, Christina laid down the law, “Sharon, I will help you find things, will carry packages and do anything you want me to, except I do not intend to sit on Santa’s lap.” There comes a time when little girls think they are too big to believe in Santa… they only trouble is they begin to question Santa’s authenticity at a much younger age than my generation. Let’s face it, today’s elementary school children know more about a lot of things than my generation knew when we graduated from high school. About two years ago a couple of great-nieces, Trisha and Tracey, decided that they should tell their father that there is no Santa. He was crushed because he enjoys Christmas and the Santa thing so much he wanted them to keep believing until they were teenagers. But that’s not the way it works.

I understand that we had a lot of spectators reporting each day to watch as the rural water line was laid across Black River. I wonder how many can remember the last time that we had big excitement out that way? I’m talking about the unsuccessful 1953 digging operation in search of the Jesse James treasure. That went on for most of the Winter and not only attracted area residents, we had some pretty well-known television people out there doing on-the-scene interviews.

Talk about something good… the Newsoms, Route Two, gave me a jar of honey with the comb included. Reminds me of years ago when we used to visit with Uncle Will and Aunt Dovie Perdue down at Cache Lake. Uncle Will always had bee hives in different places around the farm and no one had to tell us to keep our distance… we might play hide an seek in the hay loft, climb to the top of the silo and have corncob fights in the crib, but we never bothered those bees.

An old superstition is that a person has to earn some money on the first day of the new year in order to ensure wealth throughout the year. By noon, Wednesday, I still had not earned any money, but early in the afternoon friend Beverly asked me to hand her some boxes of Christmas decorations to store away in the attic. I thought, oh boy, now’s my chance so I charged her a penny… that’s money, even though some folks don’t think so. I find pennies all over the place, especially in store parking lots. I always stop to pick them up, I’m not proud. Now that I earned some money (good wealth) and ate black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day (good health), I’m ready for the new year. By the way, the black-eyed peas and cornbread were twice as good this year, with a heaping spoon of chow-chow (gift from Mrs. Daughhetee at Peach Orchard), mixed in.

Speaking of cornbread, I thought everyone had eaten hot cornbread topped with milk gravy with a generous sprinkling of black pepper but apparently not so, because friends laughed at me the other day when I was feasting in that manner. That’s okay with me, because no one understands my eating habits anyway, especially when I have mustard with chili and sprinkle black paper on cornbread and sweet milk and on cantaloupe. I had rather have pie dough cut into strips, draped over the bottom of the pie pan and baked, than to have a whole pie; I enjoy raw oatmeal with milk and sugar, but can’t stand cooked oatmeal. Now, if you really want some good eating, fry some ham or pork shoulder slices, making a lot of redeye (streaked) gravy and eat with hot cornbread right from the oven, also fried bologna goes well with redeye gravy.