As a small boy...

[kentuck]

I used to go with my Dad to the coal mine. He was a mule driver. He would hook the mule up to the coal cars and pull them out of the mine and dump the coal in the tipple. They used picks and shovels back then.

I can still remember the cool air that came from the mouth of the mine. There was nothing mechanical at all. The timbers to hold up the roof were cut from nearby poplars. It was dark as a dungeon, just as the old song said. The track was like a miniature railroad.

Sometimes they would set off a half-stick of dynamite just to loosen up the coal. Each foot of fuse was supposed to take about one minute to burn and they would squeeze the fuse into the dynamite cap with their teeth.

It was not a union mine. The average pay was between $20 and $30 per week. There was no health care. There was no black lung benefits. There was only $20 dollars to buy pinto beans, flour, meal, lard, and salt. It was not a way to live. It was a way to survive.

Now, as we approach Labor Day, I think of those miners. I think of my Dad going to work with double pneumonia. I think of the gray clay that caked on everything that entered the mine.

And I think of how much we have changed in the last 50 years, at least in Appalachia. We were on the front lines when LBJ declared war on "poverty". We knew the difference between being poor and being in poverty. It was a godsend for many people that I knew, especially in my own family.

But this Labor Day, we will be encouraged to go out and spend and get this economy going again. We will take a day off work to celebrate and barbecue and drink beers with our friends. Then on Tuesday, if we have a job, we will go back to the mine. It's just a different kind of mine.

[Sal Minella]

1. Dark as a dungeon, and damp as the dew

Where the dangers are many, and the pleasures are few
And the rain never falls, and the sun never shines,
It's dark as a dungeon, way down in the mines.

I hope when I die and the ages shall roll
That my bones they will blacken and turn into coal
And I'll look from the door of my heavenly home
And pity the miners, digging my bones.


From the 'sixties, that memory comes.
Just don't ask me where I parked the car.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. It's just a different kind of mine.

It sure is...

Well said...

K&R

:hug:

[sorcrow]

3. Wow.

Thanks for sharing that story.
Crow

[Old Codger]

4. AMEN n/c

[Gregorian]

5. What a story. We work to live. We don't live to work.

Underneath the veneer, there is humility. Rich or poor. Whether one knows it or not. We're all sustaining our life.

I always appreciate hearing a personal story such as yours. It's meaningful. I take care, and am frugal as much as possible, knowing that someone else has provided whatever it is I have that I didn't do for myself. Gratitude and humility.

[madamesilverspurs]

6. Amen, indeed.