Another good memory I have of being a kid in central Florida was digging cactus.
My brother and I wanted to earn money to buy some toys and comic books
but there wasn't a lot of opportunity were we lived. We lived 5 miles
away from the nearest Jiffy store and the road was such that our
parents would not let us ride all the way there and all the way back
on our own.
We lived next door to our grandparents. And they own the big field
that had a lake in it. My dad mentioned our desire to earn some money
to my grandfather and he said that he needed cactus dug up in the
field and put us to work digging prickly pear cactus for three dollars
a bucket.
My brother and I thought we were going to be rich! We were so excited
to be able to go out in the field and do this. But we know it was
going to be hard work!
We suited up with the our silly looking bucket hats. They were light
blue and were supposed to protect us from the sun. They did, just not
anything except the top of our heads.
We would go over to grandma and grandpa's house and get our buckets
and our hoes and head out into the field. We didn't go out early
because there was so much dew and the grass was so tall that we didn't
want to be soaked. But then we didn't want to be out there in the
middle of the day and get baked by the sun. So we went around 10
o'clock and worked until 12:30pm or when we got thirsty we would go
back to the house and get something to drink. I had my transistor
radio tuned to some music station. I remember hearing the song Baker
Street over and over and over! And then the news would come on and I
would try to change the radio to a different station to get some
music.
We dug the prickly pair cactus up with the hoes. I got more needles
in my hands and legs than I ever want to get again in my life. We saw
gopher turtles and snakes. We saw birds and bugs. We got chiggers.
When we were done digging for the day we had to go back to the house
and get grandpa to come out and inspect our buckets. He made sure we
were filling them up and not trying to cheat him out of three dollars.
And then he would pour the prickly pear cactus on the sheet of tin so
that they would die in the sun
I wish I had counted how many buckets of prickly pear cactus we dug
but I didn't. I was too focused on the payoff. I only remember doing
that for one summer, maybe two. I remember my brother sweating
profusely and me being concerned that he was getting too hot. He is
six years younger than me so I was responsible for him even though he
was usually doing something that would get me into trouble.
But we never got in trouble digging cactus. And then later we got
accused of planting cactus out there, but that's a whole different
story. Every time I hear the song Baker Street I think about being
out in the field in the of summer digging of prickly pear cactus.
Good stuff!
