Holidays at our home were always special. Thanksgiving dinner was a marvel, Easter was treat, and Christmas an experience. Come poverty or good times, mother always made us a good Christmas. She had picked up a custom somewhere that I always looked forward to and still remember, possibly from Aunt Emily, as Rhoda remembers this festivity in Aunt Emily's home earlier than in ours. By New Years the Christmas candy and cookies and the popcorn balls were gone, but on New Years Eve we would put our plates on a table in the living room to wake up the next morning with a plate full of candy and goodies. There were many things we did without because we didn't have them, but mother always made us a lovely, pleasant and attractive home.

Even when mother was away, and it wasn't just rarely, we were cared for at home. On one occasion I came home from high school having stopped in Montpelier to have a much needed tonsil-ectomy. I was very unfortable and mother was making her rounds of almost twenty-four hours a day, at least it seemed to me that many, caring for the sick because we were experiencing the second terrible epidemic of influenza in the town. I came home and went to bed. During the four or five days it took me to recuperate, I hardly saw mother. But whenever I awakened I would find a dish of fresh custard, fresh water and milk by my bed. Although she was going day and night with the sick, of which there were plenty, she still found time to see to my needs.

It was during this "Flu" epidemic while she was helping in the Roy Wixum home and Roy was critically ill, the flu having developed into pneumonia, that mother had an idea that if she could get Roy to cough real hard that the congestion in his lungs would move and allow him to breath. He was too weak to put forth the effort and mother thought that perhaps a swallow of whiskey might get the job done. This was a time of prohibition of alcoholic drinks and, although whiskey was available, it was not easy to come by.

However, someone had heard that mother wished to try a whiskey treatment and that night, after dark, someone knocked at the door of the Wixum home. Mother opened the door and a hand from the shadows beside the door held out a bottle of whiskey. "Here," they said was the whiskey she had hoped for. Mother looked out into the dark and said, "Who am I to thank for this?"

"Never mind," A voice replied, "I just hope it will do some good." Mother felt this was a vote of confidence and appreciation. Incidently, the patient did not recover.

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