Memories As A Young Girl

When I was a small childmy mother tucked all of us children into bed as they say in Dixie 'with the chickens." This meaning all eight of us had to go to bed at the setting of the sun or a dusk. My parents were very hard-working middle class citizens who rose early and put in hard day of work. My Father worked for Southern Railway for over twenty years but somehow always had a huge garden, chickens, cows, pigs, and a dog or two. Father was fairly knowable of the creatures in the forest and of wild animals and country farm life in general. Being put to bed at such a early hour my sister and I always lay awake an hour or so giggling and whispering about God only knows what. Everyy night after being tucked in under the covers we would hear the strangest most ghostly sound coming from up on the hill behind our house. This eerie and sometimes very scary noise was like no sound ever heard before (or since) in our little community called Snow Hill. At various times the neighbors, when by chance meeting came across each other ,would take delightful periods in discussing this phenomenon. I remember hearing whispered conversations beween my Mom and Dad about what this unusual ghastly sound was.

Finally after approximately two years my Dad came in to report the mystery was solved. By chance he was out squirrel hunting and came upon a sickly looking fox. Being the hunter he was he decided to go ahead and shoot it and skin it for the fur. When he was skinning the fox with his very sharp knife he opened it up at one point under its head and throat. Inside the throat lay a small plastic whistle the fox had lodged in the throat area. You know, the small whistles that use to come in Cracker Jacks or other treats. I almost missed the famaliar although scary sounds indicating it was time to go to sleep after the nightly performance of what was a concert of an unlnown source.