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look out Steve's back door and see the wreckage it hurts me to think of how much money was wasted. I guess you'd say as we didn't get that may years of pleasure out of it. Oh; why should we cry over spilled milk. There are other things more important than a house boat. When the two boys that were the cause of the boat sinking saw what had happened they came to our rescue. They helped Steve to get one of the couches out of the house boat.
One Sunday afternoon a young fellow I had known since a child came to see me and when he left he asked me when he could come back again and I told him I had a date but I said I can recommend a girl to you who has never had a boy friend and she's just like myself, as common as an old shoe but one of the finest girls I've ever known. Her mother died when she was real young and left she and four boys so she took the responsibility of raising those boys, kept the house did all the chores a woman has in the home. All of them went to school everyday with starched and ironed clothes on, then at eleven o'clock the teacher would let her go home which was only a few hundred yards from the school house to fix dinner for her daddy and the rest of them. I've seen her sit at her desk and cry with a bone felon on her finger and it was a horrible looking thing. The flesh was turned wrong side out. She really suffered and then not long after that she had another one but her daddy took her to the doctor and he lanced it. I happen to know how they feel because I had one and the doctor lanced mine. Anyway to go on with my story. I told this boy to go see her and he did and it wasn't long until they were married and lived a long happy life together as far as I ever knew. They raised a large family. Most of the girls are still living. He was a good fellow but I didn't care for him. He worked off on a boat and made good money.
I'll give you a little sample of why I feel that the Lord took care of me in my young days. I've said before in this diary the way the old road ran between our front hard and our field fence. In other words, a long lane. People used to travel that way instead of the new highway because it cut off quite a distance. So one day I had gone down to the spring to wash out a few pieces as there was where we did our washing under two large oak trees on the bank above the spring and this man who we had known for some time was driving an ox wagon, hauling logs to Gainesville to the river. He came that way
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