ON ROMANY TRAIL Do you remember when gypsies roamed our back roads each Spring and Fall?
You would not have to go back too many years o be able to recall those creaking, overloaded wagons trekking along the side of our roads. Those strange, puzzling and interesting people lost a lot of their charm over us when they
were forced by economic pressures of the times -"Depression Years" - they have been called, to change their horse drawn and hand-powered carts and wagons for motorized just short junkyard permanence.
I recall anticipating their arrival each Spring and Fall. They followed the greening grasses northward in the Spring they drifted south like colorful leaves fallen to enjoy warmer climes in eastern Carolinas. They never seemed to hurry at any time and accepted whatever type of weather that came our way. They seem ready to accept and make the most of whatever weather came our way. With the worst kind of weather many deer and and a few hares disappeared. We spoke of such game as being "ours" and our parents and others openly accused the gypsy intruders as common thieves. Anything that happened to missed, misplaced, bartered off, or sold during the summer months ,automatically, deemed to have been stolen by "those gypsy people.
I remember hose times and wonder who was right and who might have been right and who could have been wrong. It was their. They were stand-offish, stubborn, light fingered, too. I still remember how happy some of those gypsy folks could seem to be. And happiness is something that's hard to fake. You are one or the other - happy or unhappy.
A.L.M. January 19, 2006 [c288wds]
