It was a curios sight for a young boy intent on watching my rangy, big-boned father putting new shoes on a mule or just cleaning out his hoofs, sometimes clogged from long hours of plowing on days after a good soaking rain during the hot summer days.

It was a curios sight for a young boy intent on watching my rangy, big-boned father putting new shoes on a mule or just cleaning out his hoofs, sometimes clogged from long hours of plowing on days after a good soaking rain during the hot summer days. That boy, of course, was me.

Daddy, with his back to the mule, leans forward slightly as he cleans the dirt and muck out of the bottom of the hoof. Sweat begins to bead up on his forehead. Then he points to a giant-sized hoof clipper. "Hand those to me," he says.

I'm glad to be doing something and not just standing there gawking. It's a rare dad-boy thing -- a wonderful moment of closeness that, looking back, I am proud to have had. I think he prided himself in having me, his only begotten son.

The hoof-cleaning lasts five, maybe ten minute. In the distance is the sheet iron clad barn where Daddy kept his team of two mules. If they had names, I didn't know it, but he doted on those animal like good friends which, in a way, they were. He kept them busy most of the year pulling a plow, planter, cultivator, harrow, wagon and rake but made sure they were well-fed.

I will have to say he pampered those mules more than me, not that I was jealous. That's one thing about being young. You don't know what jealousy is. It's something that doesn't develop, I figure, until your courting years.

Those mule, who remain nameless to me all these years, were tied temporarily to a post outside this rusty toolshed/blacksmith shop. From here, I could look out on the alfalfa, cornfield, cotton patch and apple orchard. Farther afield lay the section line, a sandy road that led to State Highway 5. Sweat began to pour through his gray shirt as I watched him replace the old worn shoes with new ones..

Daddy seemed happiest to be working on something from dawn till night.. Hard work and bushels of sweat were required to keep up this small farm, which provided food and money for our family -- me, Daddy, Mama and my two half-brothers, Herbert and Ray.

This was back in the 1930's which now 70-odd years later, makes me think how tough life really was in those wonderful bygone days. Oklahoma, where we lived, was deep in a deep depression at the time. being a young kid, I didn't realize it.

I know now how blessed we were as a family. Daddy and Mama owned their farm, but many folks in many parts of Oklahoma didn't have so much as a job to go to in those days. I was just a boy, of course, and had no idea what a depression was all about. It was not until many years later that I realized just how bad it really was.

From "Falling Leaves"