The Cocklebur Story

About 1950

This may be the second oldest memory that I have. I was about 5 years old in 1950 and we were living under the Cap not far from Afton, Texas in a community referred to as Duncan Flat.. The house sat off the road about one quarter of a mile near a creek bed located in a mesquite pasture. I had been playing in the sand in the creek bed when my mother asked me to watch my little sister, Linda, born in 1948. I guess I was annoyed, for I decided to feed my sister cocklebur leaves which grow at the side of the creek. My mother discovered that things were too quiet and came to check on us. I was feeding my sister cocklebur leaves to keep her quiet. This was very upsetting to my mother thinking these leaves might be poisonous. My mother never knew how many cocklebur leaves my sister ate, obviously, they were not poisonous as my sister lived to the age of 55, when she died of a heart attack.

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