Sitting at the table on Sunday telling stories is my favorite part of being a Hegelund. There are so many stories everybody tells, including me that I can barely remember them all. This Sunday was no different; we found out that Double Mamaw and Big Daddy actually were thieves at one point in their life! Well, sort of.

I will let Double Mamaw tell y’all in her own words, since she is more fun anyway:

Double Mamaw began, “Y’all, I got a story y’all might want to hear about me and Big Daddy living up in North Hopinatta in that little one room house that time.” We all egged her on, “Tell it Double Mamaw, we ain’t heard that one yet.” Of course we have heard almost all of her stories, but I don’t remember her ever telling this particular one.

Double Mamaw continued, “Well, as everyone here in this room knows, when me and Big Daddy was first married, we was so poor if it cost a dime to wave howdy, you’d have to just sit there for an hour while I tried to scrape up ten cents. It was mighty cold that winter; Charlene and Hiram Eustace was just about age three and four. Lucius Eustace wasn’t even born yet, since I was with child at that time, and we found ourselves hungry and out of money.”

Shady asked, “Double Mamaw!? You mean you didn’t have no food or anything?”

Double Mamaw replied, “That’s right son, we was fixing to have to boil shoe leather and toothpicks to try to stay alive. There wasn’t even a onion in the house; the only thing we had was a pack of taco shells, them crunchy kind and two heel pieces left of a loaf of bread. Well Big Daddy and me got some kind of upset. They hadn’t hired him at the railroad for work, and he wasn’t able to pick up construction work, or anything since the weather was so bad and it was so cold out. That’s the most snow I’d ever seen here in Mississippi ever.”

Double Mamaw took a deep breath, then a sigh as if she was pondering a tragic, yet fond memory, then dabbed her eye with her handkerchief. “Yeah, me and Big Daddy was in a bad way financially. So we cooked us up a plan; we dug through all of our old pants pockets, my old purses, coin bags and even in the chair cushions for any money we could find.”

“We managed to scrape up two whole dollars, but we could not buy gas for that old ratty car, and get enough to eat enough for all of us too. The nearest store just a quarter of a mile away we always went to was closed due to all the snow on the ground, and the nearest one from that was five miles away. I was thinking it may as well be on the moon, with the roads all slick and us in a bad way.”

Double Mamaw paused again, then went on, “Anyhow, we dressed you kids up as warm as could be, and packed y’all in that old ratty car. Nothing worked on it and it leaked every vital fluid out of it known to man. Big Daddy put three big old water jugs in the back seat, so the radiator wouldn’t overheat driving to that farther grocery store. We had several prayers going, praying the car would make it, and not run out of gas in that bitter cold, prayed that the other store would be open, and praying we could get us some food.”

“All we did was pray it seems back then, but somehow we managed. We made it to the gas station and put a dollar in the gas tank. That left us a dollar to get some food; y’all know a dollar went a lot farther back then than it does now. We made it to that further away store, which was open thank the Lord, and Big Daddy got out by himself and went in with that last dollar we had.”

Double Mamaw pointed at Uncle Mudwink and Mamaw; “Now you two kids had got some food that morning, since I had saved back the last of the eggs and bacon so y’all could eat. But me and Big Daddy hadn’t had a bite in over three days, except them taco shells and bread heels we nibbled on. We had water of course, it wasn’t froze up so thank the Lord for that. You two were fast asleep in that back seat of that old car. Big Daddy wasn’t gone for ten minutes, and he was kind of moving fast when he got to the car.”

“He had come back carrying a small brown sack with a few things in it, so I knew he was able to get something. He had a banana for me, an apple for him, and we woke you two up and fed you some peanut butter crackers. I had me a pack of them peanut butter crackers; there must have been ten packs in there! I swear I can’t eat ’em now but I had never tasted something so fine in my whole life!”

Double Mamaw continued, “He had gotten a small carton of milk for me, and him to share and a whole gallon of milk for the house! He let us eat and drove out of there kind of quick for him, since he always drove real slow. I don’t like fast driving at all!. When we got home, I noticed he looked bigger under that jacket than usual, and I asked him why he put on so many clothes under it.”

Big Daddy told me, “Well it ain’t exactly clothes under here.” He pulled that coat off, one of the big ones that has all kinds of pockets to put stuff in under it, and then he went to unloading groceries from that coat. He pulled out a small packaged ham, a whole roll of bologna, and three blocks of cheese. He also had hot chocolate and all kinds of candy in those pockets. He managed to steal a few potatoes loose, some tomatoes and and carrots, and all kinds of other food he smuggled out of that store! He even had some cans of soup and some of them dry Italian noodles.”

She began to finished up her story, “Now I was steady chewing, because I was so hungry, with me being expecting with Lucius Eustace and all that. We had sliced up the bologna and made some sandwiches and it was some oh fine! You kids ate a whole lot and was running around that little house with that big fire going. But now I was crying between bites! I told Big Daddy I had never had nothing stolen to eat in my life! He just told me to not worry; he would go back in when times got good and pull the store manager aside and pay for all of it.”

“He actually did pay for the gallon of milk, and a few other things while he was in there the first time. All that stolen food under that jacket that day may have made Big Daddy a plain outright robber, but it saved our lives. We counted up all the stuff he had stolen, and it came to just under $7. Big Daddy knew I was upset, so he wrote out an IOU for that store, and put it on the mantel to where I could see it. And as providence would have it, he got called out to work on the railroad that very evening.”

“One of the big railroad people had a traveling worker out sick for awhile, and the railroad boss was desperate to find a replacement. The boss came and knocked on the door, telling Big Daddy he had a long run of steady work for about three months, with good pay if he could stand to be gone that long. Big Daddy agreed immediately to take that work. We were so excited, what a prayer answered!”

“I will see you when I see you, baby.” Big Daddy told me that. “This run swings back through here about two times, so I will send word via the post office on the telephone, and have them send a note out with the mailman, to when I will be back through. Hopefully I will be able to get you some money real quick like too. I will ask the boss for an advance in the meantime.”

“Big Daddy went out on the porch with that man for a few minutes, telling him he had to pack up a suitcase, since the man was going to take him to the train station. Whatever else he told him, that man gave us $40 dollars advance, and we were able to eat pretty good while Big Daddy was on that run. I didn’t find out until he got back after that three month run though, that Big Daddy had the man take him straight to the grocery store that very same day, and tell that store manager what he did. He got just enough advance to pay for all that food.”

“The grocery store man -Big Daddy told me this later – was so dumbfounded that Big Daddy actually came back in and payed for what he stole, that he didn’t know what to do. He told Big Daddy, “In all my years doing this job, you are the only one who ever came back and paid for anything they took. And on the same day too, I am truly amazed! Thank you so much for that, sir. Oh and by the way I knew you were taking a few things, but I was too busy to really worry over it. But for you to come back and risk me calling the law, on the very same day and own up to it? Now that is a real honest man right there!”

Now ain’t that something! I never knew that about Double Mamaw and Big Daddy at all. It pays to be honest, even when you had to steal to eat. I don’t think its OK to steal though. I ain’t never been in that situation neither.

(Note: Special thanks to my late parents, Don and Nancy Gressett for the inspiration to write this story. It has been greatly embellished, but it is loosely based on a true story from my own childhood).