Portia and me

I loved going to my grandmother's farm in Illionis. My mother was born and raised there.

My grandmother was widowed by the time I came along, and she ran the farming operation assisted by a couple of hired men, mainly neighbors. She tended the chickens, raised the garden, cooked the meals, and maintained the house. Grammy Spickler was a not a large woman, but she was strong and could carry two buckets of water from the pump quite easily.

She was very loving , but could be sterm when need be. When my sister and I got out of line, she would say that she was going to pulverize us or skin us alive. We had no idea what that meant, but it had to be something pretty awful. When we went to bed at night she always tucked us in and said our nightly prayer. "Now I lay me down to sleep."

I always had trouble going to sleep at night because I knew I'd get to see my friend Portia the next day. Portia lived on a farm about half a mile up the the road. At 9:00 Grammy Spickler would call Portia's mom to see if we could play together. The answer was always "yes."

So off I went up the road to Portia's farm. It was a long walk, especially in the winter. But I knew Grammy Spickler watched me all the way.

Portia's family raised horses and frequently road in trail rides and local horse shows. They were members of the Illinois City Saddle Club. Portia had two shetland ponies named Danny and Peanut, and they were the reason that I didn't sleep very well the night before. Portia and I were going to saddle up and ride.

Portia came out of the house wearing a checked shirt, dirty Levi's and a pair of worn-over cowboy boots that were hand-me-downs from Portia's older brother, Vaughn. (My sister had a crush on Vaughn.)

We saddled up the ponies and headed down into the timber. We would ride all morning before heading back up to the house where we ate peanut butter sandwiches and glasses of fresh farm milk. But first we unsaddled and watered the ponies, fed them some oats and let them roll in the dust.

After lunch we road the ponies back down to Grammy Spickler's farm and ate some of Grammy Spickler's sugar cookies and a glass of milk. After our snack we saddled up again and raced the ponies back to Portia's farm. For a while we'd help Vaughn do some of the chores in the barn. By then it was time for me to head back down the road to my grandmother's farm.

For years Portia and Iwere great friends. As we got older we rode bigger horses, took longer rides and participated in some of the saddle club events on Matched Pairs with fancy saddles and bridles. Portia's farm was sold after a big fire that took the house and barn. Portia got married and moved to a farm down in the bottom land along the Mississippi River. A few years back while Diane and I were visiting my cousin Keith we drove down to visit Portia who was just the same as ever, dirty jeans, rolled over cowboy boots, smoking a cigarette. Life hadn't been easy for Portia.

That's when I realized that in all the years of our friendship that Portia was not a boy.