At five years old in the Salma’s Place, I can remember our house having linoleum floors and the house needed some renovation. A man came in who was an electrician. He would ask me for help because I was small enough to crawl into small holes. Later we moved to a different house, but the same electrician came back to do more work and I can remember following him around and helping out as needed. This work intrigued me, which led to my interest as an electrician in and out of the service.
One day I was crying and a white, female German Shepard came over and I thought it was stray dog from Jefferson City. So, I went and gathered some food for the dog. The dog stayed around for the next two to three years and I eventually named her Birdie. Birdie was always chasing squirrels, rabbits, and opossums. I often went hunting and was only allocated one bullet per animal and if I ever killed something, I was expected to eat it. I would catch animals in a box trap, bring it home for mother to fix it, and keep the skin. If the animal caught was not optimal for eating such as a opossum (which was very greasy), you would release it. All hamburger ate was a real treat because we had to grind it. One time I had brought home a opossum because I shot it, so in order to make it taste worthwhile mother ground the meat up and I loved it even though it was opossum. I liked to hunt because it put meat on the table.