Storytime Tapestry Newsletter

The newsletter devoted to spreading love and cultural awareness throughout the world.

Special Treat – Jen Donier

February 21, 2007

The Ogre, by Jen Donier,

Copyright, October, 6, 1979

As a child growing up, quiet moments in our home were a rarity.  My dad was an adventurer, he believed in playing with his kids and teaching them wood lore, telling stories and stimulating our minds.

Mom usually went along with him, making few objections most the time. Dad brought many a colorful character home for dinner and often they stayed for longer periods; from overnight to a month or more, depending on their and our circumstances.  Visitors consisted of both the human variety as well as that from the animal kingdom.  At times the latter's mannerisms were of a more proper nature than the first.  I have changed the names of some of the people we encountered to protect the guilty along with the innocent but the names of the critters are true and in ever aspect the events and materials of my stories are true as far as I can make them in my memory.

One of the first persons who came into my life that I strongly remember was our next door neighbor; a night watchman at the local sawmill where both he and my dad worked. I was about seven years old at the time and can remember being told by my mother not to play near his house.  Children like my brothers, sister, myself as well as several other mill house children envisioned a mean ogre with fiery red eyes, shaggy hair and long sharp teeth that ate little children for supper.

Naturally we dared one another to see who could get close to his house before he might come out to get us.  But none of us dared get very close for a long time.  Then one day my two little brothers age's three and four ventured into a small wooded copse behind the Ogre's house and climbed up on an old sawdust pile and peeked into the window.  The oldest brother Davy reported in awed stage whispers that the fellow was sleeping.  And he had hair in his nose and was bald with tufts of hair.   This caused much speculation among all the kids, because first we had never seen him without a hat on his head and that at a distance.  In our child fantasies we did not think Ogre's ever slept. But this one apparently was sleeping with his mouth open too, reported Davy.  

One day my uncle Donald and his four children came to visit at our house.  After a bit, mama shooed us kids outdoors to play.  We usually played in the dirt road that ran between five of the mill houses, our house being the closest to the road and we played in the woods behind the houses as well.

One of the greatest things we loved to do was to jump and splash in the big mud puddles after a rain.  Or we would ride our bikes and trikes through them slosh as fast as we could, watching the muddy droplets spray out around us.  We especially took delight if some of the neighbor’s kids were stupid enough to stand near a puddle and we were able to splash them with the muddy water.   Well if you can imagine the mischief that four children could get to all by themselves, double that and add in two or three neighbor kids and you have a peck of trouble and orneriness that one sleeping Ogre could not bear.

We were all of us outside, screaming, laughing, running and playing and have a good old time, not realizing just how near we had gotten to the Ogre's house.  All of a sudden, he jerked his door open and came stomping and roaring out to the road.  "You stinkin', little monster's he roared, I’m gonna beat the heck out of all of ya!”   We all froze with shock and fright and he went on ranting, "A man can't sleep because of all the ruckus and racket and blankety blank noise your all making".

I'll tell you nine kids split into nine different directions; we sure were not going to let that mean looking Ogre get us, and Boy! was he Mad!  We all hid in the brush and behind trees and parked cars and peeked out to see if he was still coming.  He was; and right at my three year old little brother who was standing in the middle of the road, bawling his eyes out, and splattered with muddy water from head to toe from some of us running pell mell through the big puddles to get away from the Ogre.

Well------ I was the oldest of all the kids and I wasn't about to let any Ogre get my little brother. So I ran blazing mad out to that giant Ogre and with a defiant air told him to leave my little brother alone or I was gonna tell my mama.   He glared at me and said, "Why your little twerp of a thing and grabbed me by the arm and picked up my little brother and started walking toward our house.  I let out a blood curdling scream and he said. "You bet you're going to tell your mama and I'm going to help!"  I gulped and tried to get away and bit his arm.  

Meanwhile the rest of the kids had saw the ogre grab my arm and pick up my little brother and they made a beeline fast toward the house, screaming the ogre was trying to eat us up.   The adults came out in to the yard to see what all the ruckus was about and why the kids were screaming in terror. 

Daddy and my Uncle got them settled down just about the time the Ogre marched up with me and my little brother in tow.   My dad looked us all over then said, “Well looks like you met my kids, Mr. Canfield, come on in and have a cup of coffee; which did not make ten kids very happy at all.  My mom told two of the kids to go on home so they did, the rest of us were taken in the house and made to sit down while mama poured that mean old looking Ogre a hot cup of coffee.  Then in awhile eight kids and two daddies made a trip to the woodshed and it was not for firewood.  I won't say what all happened there but my bottom was warm for a few hours afterwards.  

After that Jack Canfield became a regular visitor at our home, stopping in for a cup of coffee on his way to work and longer visits on his days off.   When he and daddy both had days off together Jack would come over and ask my folks if they wanted to go for a ride and take all us kids somewhere too.  My mom would look at us ratty looking kids, our hair mussed from play and dirt smudges on clothes hands and faces and say, "Well they are awful dirty".  But Jack would say, "Oh, that's alright, a little dirt ain't nothin, climb in and let's go.  So we would climb into to his big Green Brier van and go to town for ice cream or up into the woods and pick berries.  On one such trip he drove all the way down to Portland, Oregon over one hundred miles to Jantzen Beach amusement park. He paid for and took us kids, and mom and dad on a lot of rides and afterwards took us all the "Paul Bunyan" Restaurant smorgasbord where we could have all we could eat for seventy nine cents; kids were even less than that.  We had dirt on our faces and clothes but we all trooped into that restaurant like royalty.  

Somewhere along the way us kids learned why we were not supposed to play near Jack's house during the day because he worked the grave yard shift my daddy said.  Well our Ogre theory was gone but we the thought it was pretty awful that poor Mr. Canfield had to work in the dark of the night in a grave yard full of ghosts and goblins.  After we were told to be quiet and stay away from Jack's house when we played we minded pretty good after that.  After all, the poor man had to be awake all night watching out for ghosts.  

One day near the end of school I got home to a darkened and lonely cold house.  This had happened only once before and that had been a year earlier when we had lived somewhere else and had neighbors I could go to that my mom and dad knew real well.  But this was a different situation as we did not yet know most of the mill house neighbors and a lot of people moved in and out all the time.  Being scared and cold the only person I knew then was Jack and I was not supposed to bother him.  But I was scared, hungry, cold and very lonely and had no idea where my family was or when they would come home; I was only seven.  I imagined that they had left me and it seemed like a long time I wandered around the house and outside, looking up the road toward town hoping to see my folks then looking at Jack's house.  Probably only ten or fifteen minutes had passed since I had climbed down off the school bus but to a little seven year old girl, it seemed like a very long time.

So finally I marched bravely toward Jack's house. My new red boots walked slower and slower as I neared his door, my heart was pounding. They stopped at his porch step and I stood shivering in the cold miserable with indecision.  All of a sudden his door opened and he growled, "Well, What do you want?  At that moment two big tears plopped down my face and I blurted out that my mama and daddy were gone and my house was dark and cold and I was hungry.  

Jack reached inside and got his hat and jacket on then took me by the hand to his big station wagon and sat me on the front seat.  He told me to quit crying because he was going to find my mama and dad for me.  The car was a pretty yellow on the outside and had nice white and tan seats and they were not all tore up like in our car.  It was big and roomy and warm.  As he drove along he said, "Well, if I don't find your folks, I will marry you and give you a diamond ring".  I looked sideways at him and said, " But, I can't marry you"!,  He chuckled and said, "Well why not? "Because, I am too little.” I told him.   "Oh well", he said, "that's okay I will wait until you’re bigger."

I smiled at him and squirmed in my seat and said, "Okay", Whew, I got out of that one.  All of a sudden I saw my mama and daddy driving toward us in their car.  I sat up straighter and pointed excitedly and said, "There's my mama and daddy, I can go home now".  

He winked and said, "Does that mean your not going to come home and live with me?'  I looked at him, smiled and shrugged my shoulders.  He reached over and squeezed my arm and said,  "Well, I guess I can wait awhile until you grow up a bit,  You're to skinny anyway,  I would have to fatten you up so you could work and cook food for me.  I squirmed some and told him that would be a long, long, long time.  He said, okay and pulled into the local cafe parking lot and daddy who saw us pulled in behind him.  Jack then told my folks why I was with them and he treated all of us to hamburgers, french fries and milkshakes.  Every so often after that he would tease me and ask me if I was ready to go and get married.  I knew he was just joshing me and would squirm and tell him nope I am still too little.  

Jack remained friends with my family until he died in 1984.  He actually became my great uncle because a few years later he married my Aunt Evelyn who had been a widow for twelve years when her husband had been killed in a logging accident.   Sometimes he would tease me and tell me that when my aunt kicked the bucket he would marry me next.  I always knew he was kidding me.  My aunt would laugh and tell him, that she planned to live a long time.  She actually did outlive him by ten years.  So he went from Ogre to friend and finally to family.  

Jen Donier

cedarsong@icehouse.net