Les and I went to the Cow Sale in Siler City Friday… We only stopped to have supper… My oh My! What memories came flooding back to me! And Ghosts were all round me! (In my mind!)
We went in the front doors of the sale barn and to the left through the next door and over to the Cow Sale Cafe. Years ago every Tuesday night there was a Horse Sale held here. Before I met Les , Grandpa and I would come to the sale and sometimes Grandma would come along as well. But horses and Horse Sales were not her thing and IF I was going with Grandpa lots of times she would stay home…Lord knows she attended many a sale with him through the years! After I met Les he and I went all over to the Horse Sales with Grandpa!
We would come in and head to the back where the horses were and check them out. Then before the Horse sale started we would have supper at the same tables in the same places and on the same chairs as Les and I did Friday evening! Not much has changed. The folk that run the cafe have aged and the chairs and tables too…the pictures on the wall are still the same. And the folk that run the cafe still know me… The routine is the same you go to the window make your order and pay, find a seat (this use to be so hard they were all ways so very busy!) and then a waitress would bring your freshly cooked hamburger steak with real cheese melted on top of it, along with the best cole slaw and delicious french fries and pickles. No nothing has changed …But yet so many things have…
I could see and feel all the people I use to see here all round me…It was all most like a low hum of voices…but Friday they were there only in my mind.
I saw Grandpa sitting at a round table with a pile of bridles laying on the floor beside him. He had his overalls on and his bill fold in that middle front pocket where he all ways kept it. He was waiting on his supper, tonight it was a hamburger with lettuce tomato and mayonnaise and a diet drink. He was talking to several folk at the tables around him about horses, the weather, cows, and things in general.
Across the way was Jess Davis doing the same, and his son Carson, close in age to me and he is the one my pony Dixie came from.
Mike Garner was talking to some guys about a good horse Ned Smith had brought to the sale…Ned (from Fort Smith had brought a large load of good horses) but he was still out back with the horses telling his tales…
Fatz a big tack trader would have been there too, gosh he peddled tack all over the country!
Then Mrs. Newell a local horse trader wearing that fancy hat with the feathers and her turquoise jewelry was at a table close by. She had a son and a daughter that came with her and boy was she a trader! But you did not want to buy from her!
The Wrights were in and out they sold tack and clothes out of a small trailer just out side the barn door. They had great deals!
All the cowboys and cow girls came and went through these doors I wonder what has become of them?
Ken Treadway all dressed so neat and looking like the real cowboy (and he is), his two brothers Ernie and Howard would have been here as well. They are all good horse traders.
I sure miss the Horse Sales at Siler City on Tuesday night! But most of all I miss Grandpa and the good times we shared there! And the nice people that have gone on and made it such a fun and interesting place!
It was a bitter sweet time for me but the food delicious as all ways…it seemed a bit harder to eat ! I suppose all the Ghosts and Memories had filled my mind up as well as my tummy.
