Monday Memory

As told by my mother:

Grandaddy Mack

When I was a little girl, my Grandaddy would come to visit, and his name, uh... his name was... Mack. And he would come to visit and he would bring Ruth, who was his wife. So we always called 'em Grandaddy and Ruth. And we would just have a wonderful time.

And my Grandaddy loved to tell stories and he would tell all kinda stories and some stories my brothers later told to me that he would tell about when he was a hobo. And so that would have been during the depression. He had left my Grandmother and my mom when she was a little girl... and lookin' for work and didn't come back until she was like, 14.

But, uh... one of the stories that he told 'em was about when he was a hobo and they said that he useta, um, ride the trains and everything. And he was tellin' 'em one day 'bout how they used to smoke this ol' wacky weed that they would find on the tracks. But, he uh... Anyway, they tried to tell me it was marijuana, but I said they were just tellin'... pullin' my leg. But, that's what they would say, but...

I was talkin' to my mom one time, long, long after that. And she said that, yeah, my grandfather was a great story teller and that he loved telling stories. And that as he would tell a story, he would get very involved in it 'cause people would enjoy it so much, and that, uh, he liked to embellish the stories. So, she said that you couldn't always believe everything that he told you, 'cause he just like to tell stories.

So... and that was my Grandfather, and his... born... he was born Vary Americus Huyler and, uh, had his name legally changed to Mack. So, that was my Grandaddy.