We were Rock Farm Poor,
Me and Paw and my sister Blossom.
The first time we ate chicken,
Sis said it tasted just like ‘possum.

When they fought the war on poverty,
Paw was the biggest offender.
But they ran him out of the ‘crutin office
When he went down to surrender.

Blossom had to get married last year,
The wedding was really nice.
Wish she had to get married again.
It was the first time I’d tasted rice.

It was one of them slingshot wedding
There weren’t no candles or fancy bells.
I guess Pa would have used his shotgun
But we couldn’t afford the shells.

We couldn’t keep up with the Joneses.
But Pa said that he didn’t care,
They’ve gotten so hoity toity
With all their new cloths from welfare.”

The generation that I refer to as prime-timers in this book, was born during or just after the 1930’s depression. Some of us really experienced poverty. Our family was lucky. My dad never played the stock market and he had a pretty stable job, at the time, in the construction business.
The farm described in Poverty, is one of those with land so played out that you would have to sit on a sack of fertilizer to raise an objection. There were lots of ‘possum and ‘coon eaten back in those days.
One summer, when I was twelve, my grandparents went to Kentucky to help my aunt and uncle build a house. My sister Jo Anne, my cousin Richard and I went along. One morning Uncle Hobart trapped a groundhog under a lumber pile. He dressed it and Aunt Bea cooked it for supper. Grandpa wouldn’t touch it, Uncle Hobart’s comment was, “Well, it’s groundhog or no meat for supper.” That has since become a family saying to use when someone doesn’t like something and there is no alternative.