In 1919 I saw my first airplane. It was probably an old Jenny left over from The Great War. (That's what World War I was called, for we expected it to be the last war of such magnitude).
(It looks kinda...rickety, doesn't it?)
It happened down on the farm on a Sunday afternoon when all the relatives had gathered for Sunday dinner. (We called the main meal at noon dinner and the evening meal supper.) The airplane's appearance raised considerable speculation as to where the world was going next. As it turned out, we were preparing to witness explosive change.
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The Box Supper or Box Pie event was held annually at the school to raise money. It was one of the few social functions held outside church. Only males did the bidding and a successful bidder had the privilege, or duty, to sit and eat with the woman that had brought the Box. At one such Box Pie affair, I had my eye on a particular box brought in by an attractive woman. There was probably ten downright ugly women for every attractive one and that meant an absolute maximum of two pretty ones for the evening.
Pop had given me a silver dollar to buy my pie. Usually the bidding started at twenty-five cents and went up by increments of five or ten cents, seldom exceeding one dollar. When the box I had my eye on was offered for auction, I lost control in my eagerness to get the right box and immediately shouted,
"ONE DOLLAR!"
That outburst was followed by snickering and considerable aside comment, but no one raised my bid, so I got the pie. The reason no one else was interested in raising my bid soon became evident; I had gotten the boxes confused.
I was not to eat a pie with an attractive woman that night; the one I sat with might have rated a one on a ten-point scale. On the other hand, she was obligated to eat with a snotty nosed seven-year-old kid, which she may have deemed less than interesting.
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