The Jones'- by Dori and Gary

We loved to visit our favorite cousins, the Jones’, and would visit them often. Aunt Audrey and Uncle Lyle, cousins Sharon and Joe and Denise and Dale. Sharon was like a sister to me she was just between Gary and me in age, Joe was a younger than I and the twins were a couple years younger than Joe. Aunt Audrey and Uncle Lyle were quite a bit older than mom and dad. They took care of 3 other kids Alan, Connie and Rose when they had polio. (??? Need more information about this.)

The Jones’ were quite poor, they lived in Rainer Washington; and had an outhouse, and no electricity. It was quite and adventure to go to their house, before going to bed you had to get a friend and go to the outhouse. You didn’t want to have to get up in the middle of the night and go to the bathroom. We were really close and would see them a couple times a year. They would come to see us and loved our electricity and indoor plumbing. They thought we were rich, but we didn’t have a lot of money. When they moved to Castle Rock they got electricity and they thought they hit it big.

Once when we were there during the holiday season they cooked a turkey and Connie babysat us while adults went dancing, when they got back all of us kids had eaten the turkey right to the bone.

Gary-
We had a good time; they had a good piece of property. They had a rain barrel and we would draw water out of it and boil it. They had a wood burning stove, kerosene lamps, no phone, no pole or anything going to the house or in the ground. You had to sit on a toilet in an outhouse and there was always a stick there. You had to take the stick and stir it in the toilet before sitting down to make sure there weren’t any black widow spiders. If you hit a black widow spider web it would make a snap. As a kid I was so traumatized by this, I would have to go to the bathroom, but once I got out there I would get so cared I wouldn’t have to go anymore. Black widow spiders were especially present in Eastern Washington, they were common outside every once in a while they would be in a toilet. You had to be careful because a bite could kill a man or make them very sick. The old expression was that a black widow spider could kill a horse and that would take a lot of venom.