Growing up on Chestnut Street

Like many of you I have fond memories of growing up in a small town in the 1960's.  Our street that I lived on as a child was Chestnut St. in Magnolia, AR.  It was the equivalent of living at summer camp the whole year.  My dad once counted 26 kids that lived on the street!  Anytime you have that many kids you have a lot of fun.  Lacy lived down the street {or did she live at our house?}  Anyway, Lacy was always good for a laugh.  She could get anything that she wanted out of her maid named Polly.  It involved a simple plan.  We would all follow her to her house where she would be betting us all the way there that she could make Polly do anything that she wanted.  When we got there, Lacy would ask Polly for something so ridiculous that we would all snicker.  Polly would tell her there was no way she was gonna do that.  Lacy then would say, "If you don't, I'm gonna eat dog food!"  Polly would yell, "I don't care if you do eat dog food, I'm not gonna do that!"  Lacy would proceed to eat dog food and Polly would come running with what ever it was she wanted in the first place.  We would all die laughing and proceed to the yard to plan Polly's next entertainment for the neighborhood.  Little Jack was always doing something crazy!  "Little Jack had to go to the hospital again!"  This bit of info would spread from one house to the next like the flu.  "What happened this time?"  "He drank the gas out of the lawn mower with a straw!"  "Oh, I'm sure he'll be fine, he's done worse than that many times."  Stephanie lived across the street for a couple of years.  She was truly one of the prettiest little girls I ever knew.  She had some sort of medical problem though that always made her  smell like cheese!  I can't tell you how much of my adult life has been wasted trying to figure out how come she always smelled like cheese--cheddar to be exact!  If she had been rolled in pimento cheese  she couldn't have smelled more like it.  She was always clean.  She just smelled like cheese!  Even to this day after I visit my doctor sometimes I think, "Oh shoot, why didn't I ask him why Stephanie always smelled like cheese."  Every street has "the mean Man."  We actually had two.  One lived on the left side of us but we knew his name.  We also knew never to step on his grass!  The other man lived down the street {next to the cheese girl.}  I don't remember ever knowing his name.  He was just "the mean man" to all of us kids.  The Elliots lived at the other end, and they had 3 of the biggest dogs you've ever seen.  Apparently they had trained their dogs not to go to the bathroom in there own yard but to go to the neighbors.  I still to this day cannot possibly describe to you in terms that you will find believable the size of there "waste."  This act would set my mother off like no other!  On several occasions, I was sent down to their house to inform them that they were expected pronto down at our house with a shovel and a wheelbarrow "to get that cow patty"  out of our front yard!  Kids are attracted to things that shouldn't be stepped in.  If you have 3 acres with one cow patty, you can make sure that some kids playing outside are going to find that sucker and have it up to their necks within 5 minutes.  I don't know why my mother didn't just call their house and respectfully ask that they come clean up after their dog.  No, she had to send me down there embarrassed as I could be to inform them that mama wasn't happy and when mama ain't happy ain't nobody happy!  Several of us {I don't remember who all but I think that Lacy was involved} had a race once to see who could eat the most baked beans.  I won and quickly proceeded to the bathroom where I threw up whole beans up out of my nose.  Don't think that I was bulimic as a child or anything.  I was about 8 years old and I just wanted to win the race.  We had a teenager that drove the ice cream truck around the neighborhood almost everyday.  We would hear the music and all run inside to get money.  My search would always involve my father's white recliner.  Every time he sat in it his coins would spill out of his pockets and fall underneath.  My mother always wondered where I always came up with all my change.  By the time we ran back to the truck I was almost always last in line.  I don't remember this guys name but I can still see him to this day.  He had the worst case of acne that I have ever seen in my life!  Some of the kids called him "pizza face." Half the time by the time my turn came I wasn't hungry anymore and just turned around and walked off.  Why hasn't anyone ever come up with the "zit diet."  There has been every other kind of diet out there.  It's supper time right now and I just lost my appetite thinking of it!  Who needs a picture of a pig on the refrigerator--never worked for me.  But give me the ice cream man of my childhood and I could drop weight faster than the Elliot's dogs!