writing doodle - as yet untitled - continued from the middle

My great-aunt Edna used to tell us about her mother's childhood during the depression.  The family lived near the railroad tracks, the house had a small farm, and they marked their house so men riding the trains looking for work or a place to start over and who needed something to eat or a safe place to camp could stay the night.

There were plenty of nights when the family ate thin soup because it had been stretched to feed three or four additional mouths.  The thinnest and the sickest men stayed in the garage and had to work on the place for a couple of weeks.  Some of them painted out buildings, others milked, some helped get in the harvest.  While they regained their health and their dignity, the family didn't have to hire extra workers for the farm.

My grandmother and her other siblings refused to talk about what the family did during that time.  Only  
aunt Edna used to tell this story because she wanted us to know that you don't talk about doing good, you do it and you kept your mouth shut.  And you hoped like hell nothing would befall you or your family that would make you reliant on the kindness of strangers.


Sometimes the men would arrive with the basic ingredients for Stone Soup and they just needed one more ingredient to fill their bellies.  They never left her table hungry or without a little something in their napsacks for later.

The recipe for stone soup is easy: one pot, some water, a stone, and whatever you can borrow from someone else.

That is what the interior of the guesthouse looked like, a decorator's version of stone soup.  Decent enough bones, but nothing went together.  It's not like I hoped to walk into a place that had all hardwood floors, stainless steel appliances, perfect energy efficiency, and low e glass windows.

Everything except the appliances was pretty close to original, those were almond 80s vintage.  Functional, overstuffed, and ugly, like so much of the 80s.  The rooms all had some kind of a border at the top, chickens or roosters.  Probably someone didn't have enough cock in their life, or it was a reminder to eat only white meat.

The place was offered either furnished or not; cheaper if I took it with the furniture.  Since all I owned was a coffee pot, a king sized bed, a flat screen TV and a couple of tables, short term it would save me money and I could decorate as I went and put the original stuff in storage if necessary.