At Fulton’s we also could play with our cousin Anna Faye who was 7 years older than Portia. We played Monopoly and Rummy. Anna Faye and Portia, who thought they were very grown-up, spoke piglatin so that Veta couldn’t understand them and their big-girl secrets. We explored the creeks and the South Canadian river. We explored the canyons where arrow heads were easy to find after a rain washed away a layer of sand.
Granny was mostly Cherokee. Fulton and Allen would never admit it since, at that time, to be Indian was terribly embarrassing to them. But, Granny told her true story to the women of the family who did not partake in the prejudices of the men.
The downside of visiting our Uncle Fulton’s house was that he was a practical joker. He particularly liked shocking unsuspecting kids with the a device he had taken off an oil well. He and Allen had always played tricks on each other. Once when Allen was young after a night’s revelry he was sound asleep on an army cot on the front porch. Mattie had called to him a couple of times with no answer. Fulton tied Allen’s feet to the army cot and lit cigarette papers placed between Allen’s toes. Allen came out of the cot with such violence that he landed on the other end of the porch with the cot on top of him.
At times Allen and Fulton would take Fulton’s prized hounds, his Model-T pickup, and hunt wolves all night. There was a bounty for the wolves and they would come home with a set of ears that were turned in to collect the bounty.
© 1997, 1998, 1999, 2003 Portia Isaacson Bass and Veta Leigh. All rights reserved.