Tag: Baby Boomers

In the continuing saga of Now you see her…Now you don’t… no worries…. we, the Children of the Forest, are still on the trail of our fearless, mysterious Delta Dawn.

Being sound of body and mind, (well, almost), the  Children of the Forest soon understood Father’s methods of Record Keeping of the Journal of Maps….It seemed every 7 years or so he updated the properties, their owners and had been doing so for the last 21 years or so…before that my Grandfather had kept the Journal, previous to that my Great Grandfather and so on and so on.

And so we flipped back through the pages, seeing VACANT noted on the Ramshackle Property, map after map…until some 40-50 years ago and then like a light in the wilderness it read: Property of Tom McEarnuff.   Who??? No such family lived among us now….no students at our school had that last name…we had plenty of Mc’s living in the area, but no Earnuffs…It also listed his wife’s name and their 4 children as well as listed their livestock – 2 horses, 4 cows, some sheep, chickens and a pig…How bizarre, how bizarre.

Another roundtable was necessary for the Children of the Forest to take a vote, have a consensus…maybe it was time to ask Father for further information if we really wanted to see Delta Dawn again. Now everyone knew Father’s ability to spin a tale for at least 7 counties but if  they made him understand the gravity of the outcome, maybe Truth and Reconciliation would follow.

With some skepticism and fingers crossed, the Children of the Forest, marched from their  Club House, and filed in the living room where Father was busy reading a National Geographic.  Mother was knitting more mittens because winter always was coming, often ahead of schedule.

The designated speaker of the Children of the Forest said, ‘Father, no more tall tales, no more half truths, we are here for the Truth so we can have Reconciliation.  Who are the McEarnuffs and where did they go? In our hearts, we know Delta Dawn was a McEarnuff and we hear her calling us to help her get home.  Please Father.’

Father looked at Mother, Mother looked at Father…silence followed with only the ticking of the Grandfather clock in the corner, rooting them to the past and the here and now.

With a sigh, Father said. ‘It is complicated.  I must speak to all the parents of the Children of the Forest before I share the truth, as we know it.  It is not only my story to tell. If all the parents are in agreement we will move forward. Just be patient a while longer.’

Had we uncovered a ‘Secret Never To Be Told’ or was Father yanking our chain, giving himself time to spin an epic fabrication…the man could write movies with his untethered, wondering mind…was it because he read all those National Geographic, ya think?

Delta Dawn… Did we hear ya say…you were meeting him here today????

Well, long as your stars align…..

And then one day, on the 2^nd Summer of her arrival, Delta Dawn was Gone.Baby.Gone.  The Children of the Forest diligently stalked the ramshackle old house, the alley she used to float down, for days, until we reached the unsavoury consensus, she had left, like she had come, disappearing like a soap bubble in to an unknown destination….And so, it was time to ask our inscrutable, sworn to secrecy, Mother and Father  just where was our Fallen Angel, Delta Dawn ?

It seems like Adults love Secrets, even more than their own kin because, total Poker Faced, one parent lying, the other swearing to it, Father said he heard (think Peter Rabbit???), Delta Dawn had been assigned another location where there were even more corrupt folks than ourselves, who had Lessons to Learn in order to find The Way, The Truth and The Light….we didn’t (really) believe him. 

In tandem, we rolled our eyes, filed outside and headed to what was once called our Play House…renamed our Little House and newly Christened our Club House (so much more mature, we thought) to brainstorm possibilities, run them up a flag pole, Plan-Do-Check-Act.

We Baby Boomers weren’t tethered to Social Media for entertainment… ‘in the day’…. we met face-to-face, we invented games, competitions and actually read books like Nancy Drew’s The Mystery of the Missing Candlesticks and the Hardy Boys, The Haunting at Echo Lake.  We considered ourselves to be First Class Detectives and Sleuths so…

So someone suggested we borrow our Auntie’s Ouija Board and ask it where Delta Dawn was hanging out, but after discussing it at length, we decided that that the Board gave such vague responses, which could be translated so many ways, so let’s shelf that idea for now. (Note: Not Reject… Maybe revisit in future if all else failed.)

Next someone brought forth the idea that maybe Auntie Spinster (christened Auntie out of respect, not related by blood) could read our Tea Leaves.  She did a great job of telling us we would all go far, get married, have children, live happily ever after. The only problem…she was a Never-to-Be-Trusted-Adult and if any of us let it slip that our intentions were to find Delta Dawn, she may tell our parents who would nip the idea (and us) in the bud.  We might endure House Arrest for the rest of the Summer….Probably best not to pursue this Chain of Action if your Freedom was at stake.

But there is always an answer, as long as there is a question… in’it? Our family had the original deeds of all the surrounding properties passed down through the generations….we’d see if that would lend a clue or two.

It was, as you can imagine, a huge convoluted Journal of Maps and names  listing of every family.  Surely it would show the ramshackle old house, its listed owner and his progeny…..maybe the very missing clue to find our Fallen Angel, Delta Dawn.

Father kept the Journal, with its strange hieroglyphics, at the bottom of an old trunk, up in the attic, away from little snooping eyes because it listed every birth, even those who were stillborn or born ‘on the wrong side of the blanket’ as the Old Folks would say….and it wasn’t any of our business to know the details, according to our Mother and Father.  

Even families in the Children of the Forest held such pink and blue surprises and somehow we would have to bypass that information as to not bring them embarrassment….everyone knew…but ssshhh…it’s still a Secret….And ya never knew when you’d need them to help build a barn, birth a child or help out at the Church Bazaar…so, as mentioned in other revelations, Country Folk play the Long Game…Never Forget…. yet Never Reveal…

So…Hang on Delta Dawn….We’re gonna rescue you….Hang on Delta Dawn….We’re gonna rescue you….

In the country…deep in the country, you know everyone…..their names and the nicknames assigned to them…

Hey, you even know the names of their dogs, cats, horses, cows, piggies, their picky hens and noisy roosters ….so when some stranger appears, he or she is quickly scrutinized, categorized and assigned an identifying tagline based on appearance, attitude and what we perceive as aptitude…like a trucker’s handle, with more thought put in to it…. (What else do we have to do?).

So World, meet Delta Dawn…. One night, just after sunset, she just was there, walking down the middle of the unpaved road…..

a flower in her hair, carrying what seemed to be a baby in a knitted shawl, she floated past us, her feet barely contacting the ground. She was tall with long blonde hair flowing past her waist, the face of an angel, so ethereal, so other worldly, so named Delta Dawn.

Where did she come from? Where was she going?

We the Good Children of the Forest, hid behind the bushes and spied on her, noting her apparel, her habits and her rigid routine…it seemed she had taken up residence in that unpainted ramshackle old house with the broken windows, sagging porch and gate with the missing slats.

Every night after sunset, she would push open the creaky front door, near off its hinges, walk carefully down the path to the alley, dressed in ankle length pastel dress of pink or blue or mint green or light lemon or a splashy floral of pastels, a fresh flower in her hair, flat sandals, cradling what we believed to be her baby, (after heated discussion and differences of opinion).  It was like a uniform, of sorts…always the same, always changing…in the winter she wore a long black coat, black lace up boots and a black hat, held in place by a thick net black scarf….with her long blonde hair still flowing down her back.

Back in the day, there were no libraries so we ran home and sought answers from the smartest people in our world, our parents – it was summer, so it was not like we could ask our teachers – anyway, seemed our parents were much smarter than those who had been hired to actually educate us…..Mother said, well, no one seemed to know much about her, not even Peg-Legged Jack or Mad-As-A-Hatter Maddie, or the Spinster Twins, Ina and Ivy, not even born the same day but we couldn’t tell them apart – ask your Father, Mother said (maybe sardonically)…He knows everything. 

Now Father was our Last Resource because he had a way of spinning fact and fiction, so although it might be a mighty good story, it could never be proven scientifically.  Not letting truth get in our way, we asked Father….and he had an answer (When did he not have an answer?) which brought more questions to our already hyperactive minds.

Delta Dawn, it seemed was a Fallen Angel, injected into our otherwise mundane life to teach us the lesson of what will happen to us if we didn’t walk the Straight and Narrow…Hadn’t we noticed on the back of her shoulders, down to her rib cage on each side, a small bony protrusion where her wings were once attached….Because of some grievous sin Delta Dawn committed, her wings fell off and she dropped to the Earth, landing where she was most needed….to show us the Way, the Truth and the Light.

We begged for more answers….what had Delta Dawn done that she would be so punished….what had we done that Delta Dawn was sent to live among us…so many questions…but Father took the Fifth Amendment….One day, when the time is right, all will be revealed, he said…Mother reminded us how she had said your Father knows everything, as they exchanged, I swear, it was a smirk…

I promise, I am working on it…and as soon as I know, you will know because a riddle without an answer is like a pig without a poke….So…

Delta Dawn, what’s that flower you have on?…Could it be a faded rose from days gone by? ….And did I hear you say he was a-meeting you here today? … To take you to his mansion in the sky?

The uneasiness of not knowing the road…On which we travel…Wraps around us like a long, black cloak…

Looking in my eyes, you see fear…Of the Unknown…Haunting our present, overshadowing our future…

Awakened in the night, by creaking floorboards…I ponder the odds…And face a grim reality of failure…

But when the morning sun bathes…The world in splendor…All troubles are on hold, till night falls again…