SUMMERS COUNTY (Hinton News) – My Mom was never one to want to go camping or swimming, while my Dad was very much into outdoor activities. Somehow Dad convinced Mom it would be a good idea to set up a camp on the riverbank and spend the night. Several of her siblings decided to join them, and they thought they were prepared for anything. That is until they fell asleep and the fire went out.
It was cold and dark when a horrible scream awakened everyone. Dad soon discovered that the screech came from several Bobcats trying to get in their stash of food. They had no weapons and the fire had gone out, so there was only moonlight. My Mom was terrified. She said they started making noise with the pots and pans they had brought, trying to scare the bobcats off.
Apparently, they were extra hungry because it wasn’t working. It did buy them enough time to get the fire going again, which did scare off the hungry bobcats. Mom said you had never witnessed people pack up a camp so fast. They even left the biggest items and took a chance on coming back to get them the next day. All that mattered was getting everyone up the hill and home to safety.
Mom never let Dad talk her into camping again, although that wasn’t the last time they would have a run-in with bobcats.
My Aunt Ruth was staying with Mom and Dad for a while. She was asleep on the couch one night when suddenly she woke up by what sounded like a woman’s high-pitched screaming. I remember Ruth saying she sat straight up on that couch. She ran to wake up Mom and Dad.
Dad always said he remembered looking out the front window and seeing big, bright cat eyes staring back at him. Without giving anything much thought, he grabbed the broom off the porch and took out after the bobcats! Mom said she had never been so scared. After she and Ruth calmed down, they asked Dad what made him take a flimsy broom after several full-grown bobcats. Dad always laughed when he said it was the first thing he could get his hands on. He always figured it was all the noise he made rather than the broom that scared them off.
Right after that, Ruth stopped staying the night with Mom and Dad. Mom said that the bobcats never did make another appearance.
While Mom never did get a love for hunting or camping, she did love to fish. I spent many happy hours on the riverbank with Mom and Aunt Ruth. We loved to go to John’s Dairyette and get corn dogs to take or make no-bake cookies and a big thermos of piping hot coffee.
Mom and I never could stand to touch the worms, so Ruth did all the leg work for us. More important than the number of fish we caught, was the memories we were making. Now they have to last a lifetime, but it is more than enough.
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