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Show 155 fans made in Japan, while their offspring competed in the races, beginning with the tiny tots, who all won, of course, even though some veered off to their mamas' laps and never finished the race. There would be egg races, three-legged races, races by age, working up from the bottom, relay races with men having to don womens' clothes, especially corsets. There were pie-eating contests, one notable one when Mama and Et Wells made the lemon pies filled with sawdust and other inedible ingredients. Greedy fellows always like to get in on those, and the ones that got in on it swallowed the pie, sawdust and all and never knew the difference. After the horse-races everybody went home to get ready for the dance (after the cows were milked) and return to the hall. It was all changed this year, though, because in the middle of June before I would be seventeen in August, cataclysm fell upon our household. On that night we came home to find Mama sick in bed. After supper she called me to her bedside and told me to call the doctor. The men were still outside doing chores. "What shall I tell him, Mama?" "Tell him I am haemorrhaging. Tell him he'd better come. " The doctor was there in less than half an hour. He ordered Mama to the hospital immediately. Her leaving made me numb with shock. I had no feeling whatsoever. Ershel lay on the lawn and wept. His mother had died three years before. I watched him and wondered why I didn't |
