It’s funny how these shoes are “standard issue”.  Except for the boots, the outside casing of this uniform and my Army haircut, there’s nothing standard about me.   I didn’t grow up with “Good morning, Cono” smiles or quiet and calm conversations around the supper table. Maybe, we just learned not to speak our mind.  Especially since one or two of the minds around the kitchen table might not like our notions.  If somebody were to peek in the window at suppertime, they’d have seen four mouths that moved due to chewing, not from that risky pastime called “talking”.  In fact, if we tried to catch each word that came out of our mouths, especially at suppertime, there wouldn’t be enough to fill a soup bowl.  And if we were counting on words for our nourishment, well then, we would have starved plumb to death.

I grew up believing that conversation cost money and since those were hard times, Mother and Dad tried to save every penny they could.  So if Dad were to tell me, “Son, please leave the pie in front’a Ike’s plate,” it would have cost fifty cents and we could have put that half dollar towards new shoes for Delma.

A couple of months ago I had gone home for a short leave, showed Dad my red boxing trunks with “Kid Dennis” stitched on the bottom left. He eagle-eyed my trunks with jealous know-it-all eyes, but when I showed him my eight ounce gloves he held them in his hands like they were newborn pups, carefully feeling the fine leather and laces. Then, for whatever reason, I said, “Here Dad, you can have them.  I’m not fighting for the Army anymore, no how.”  He looked up at me from the couch he was sitting on, rubbed his index finger back and forth around his thumb and said, “Then, next time ya come, bring another pair and I’ll spar with ya.”   Well, I’ll be damned, I thought.  That son of a bitch still isn’t done hitting me.   Hah! “Denny Dennis,” the once carnival boxer doesn’t stand a chance.

from “No Hill for a Stepper”- Chapter One

http://www.nohillforastepper.com

          “You don’t really know much when you’re born, but that’s where it starts alright, whether you like it or not. When you’re just a little suckling pig on your mamma’s teat, all you really want to know is that the teat will keep filling up so you can start suckling all over again. Once you reckon the food’s always gonna be there when you’re hungry, you move on to wondering whether you’re gonna be kept safe from harm and warm when it’s cold. As you get a little older, you find out that maybe there isn’t always going to be enough to eat after all, and you won’t always be warm either. This is especially true if you were growing up during the Great Depression in Texas, in the western part, where any stranger is sized up from boot to hat—if, that is, they’re lucky enough to own both. Texans trust themselves first and foremost, and then maybe one or two of their kinfolk, as long as they’ve found that trust to be right as rain, if the sun can set on their words. I grew up trying to figure out who to put in which category: those I could trust and those never to turn my back on. I learned what I know from watching those who crossed over and the others who stayed on their own side.                      I did both.”