Happy Blogiversary Joe

Noticed on Joe.My.God :

I was born and raised in rural North Carolina.

My fondest childhood memory is of playing in the dense, acrid, poison fog that was belched out by the county mosquito control truck, during its daily dusk-time trip down our dirt road.

The cry of ‘Smokey! Smokey!’ would fly up and down Nine Foot Road, once the first faint sound of the pest control truck’s generator was detected in the distance. Trailer screen doors would slam open and kids would pour into the street for 10 minutes of gleeful, giddy, mad dashing around in the thick white clouds of DDT. We would smash into each other with full force in the blinding swirls and just scream and laugh hysterically, pick ourselves up and start running again. Parents had not a whit of concern about their children playing directly behind the spewing pipes of a pest control truck. In fact, NOT being allowed to play in the poison fog was often held out as potential punishment for misbehavior.