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A Columbia County Boy's Recollections and Memories of Columbia County Florida (2012) Lenvil H. Dicks

MY FIRST ALARM CLOCK AND MAMA’S LAST DA YS

When I was approximately 10 years old, for some unknown reason I wanted an alarm clock for
Christmas. I got my wish, and once I got the alarm clock, I really did not know to what use it should be
put, because mama would always get us up in time to get dressed and eat breakfast before the school bus
came, so I did not really need an alarm clock to awaken me.

Notwithstanding all that, from the first morning 1 ever had that alarm clock, I set it for 6 A.M., and got
up and went into the bedroom of mama and daddy, and their bedroom had a big fireplace in it, and I
would build a fire at 6 am so that they would have a roaring fire going by the time that they got up.

During the winter time I continued to do that all the way up until I graduated from high school.

I do not know what gave me the idea to do that, but I have always had the desire to do things for my
mother particularly, and for my daddy to a lesser extent, since he was a man who was very self-
sufficient, but I always liked to do things for my mother. Later 1 furnished a complete wall to wall carpet
for her living room, and when her first refrigerator got to where it wasn’t working very well anymore I
bought her a brand new refrigerator at some time when I was a High School Band Director. She was an
exceptional woman, extremely inventive and intelligent, and if you rated mothers on a scale of 1 to 10,
she would have been al least a 12.

During her last days, right after she had passed her 86 birthday she was in Lake Shore Hospital, in her
th
last days, although we did not know it at the time. 1 was visiting her one night and the hospital had
already brought her supper, but she had not eaten but very little of it. I asked her, “Mama is there
anything you would like for me to go get and bring you to eat?” She said to me, “Well, you know some
fried oysters sure would be good”.

I told her I would be right back, and I drove the approximate 6 blocks from the hospital to the Magnolia
Barbeque, which was owned and operated by Sam Markham’s father, Grady D. Markham, and told him
that I would appreciate it if he would fry up a good batch of oysters so that I could take them to my
mother in the hospital. He did this, and you never saw such a fine platter of oysters as I took back to
mama at the hospital, and as I recall he would not let me pay for them. He was raised approximately a
half mile north of where our family lived, and the Markham family and my folks were good friends and
had been for years, and I guess he decided he would like to do that for my mother. As a matter of fact,
Grady Markham and my older sister, Golde, dated a few times back before they each married other
people.

It’s a little part of my story that has both a happy ending and a sad ending, and the happy part of it for
me is that I was able to fulfill my mother’s last wish, which was those fried oysters, and the sad part of it
is that she passed away the next day.

I was just in time, wasn’t I?

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