A story never told
I have never told this story to anyone — not even my mother! In The Wichita Eagle in the past week, there had been news of a man trying to pick up school girls. Somehow that rang a bell and I remembered while walking to school in El Dorado, a middle-aged man stopped and asked me if I wanted a ride to school.
I don't know if I had ever been warned or not. Anyway, I got in and he took me to school! Now, I get goose pimples thinking about what might have happened.
I know I have done many other foolish things which might have been disastrous.
Once, my folks were gone and I decided to drive the car. I took my little sister and off we went. I drove around the block and it came to me that I didn't know how to stop the car! So I just kept going around the block until it ran out of gas!
When I was a teen-ager I went swimming in a 10-foot tall water tank. As I was trying to get over the edge to get out, my hands slipped and I fell the 10 feet to a platform. I was knocked out and my only injury was a small bone broken in my right wrist. I always felt like I had a weak wrist ever afterward.
The worst accident was when I reached down to pick up a Coke bottle off the car floor and went into the ditch. I did end up for a long stay in the hospital. I know there must be other near tragedies, but my guardian angel took care of me.
State fairs make me think about going to a carnival back in the '20s down south of our new library. I was wearing a half slip with elastic top. All at once, it went down. I just stepped out of it and went on with my girl friends. As we left, I saw that slip hanging on a pole. Did I pick it up? Guess again. I never told my mother about that, either.
— NORMA HANNAFORD
