The Crock Pot Story

A friend of mine told me this story a few days ago.......and I thought I would share it with you. I am not sure if it an urban legend....or if its really true......but I hope I do it justice. My friend told me that it is best told in first person.....so I will take on the role of the main character.

FOCUS..................

Fade.............


This story is sad, but true. You see, I was born in a very rural area in Appalachia. My family did not have a lot of money. My dad worked in the coal mines and my mom did laundry and sewed dresses for the more well-to-do families who lived in town. Our little town was a company town, and we were miles from a hospital. An hour or so away......

My mom was ironing Mrs. Settle's dress when she went into labor......eight weeks early! She had planned to go to my Grandmother's home in Charleston so that she would be minutes from the hospital. She had heard horror stories about giving birth at home. My mom did not want a midwife to deliver her child.

She went to our front porch and yelled for Stella Ruth Roane.......She screamed, "Stella.....I need a ride to the clinic!" Stella was hanging laundry out on the clothesline....Momma said she threw down the bras she had just washed on the wringer washer and ran over to help her out. Stella had a car......and Daddy was at work. Stella drove Momma over to Doc Brown's clinic. Momma told me that she was screaming so much in the waiting room that Nurse Beasley had to slap her! They got Momma back to the one of the two patient rooms in the small clinic. Momma said that she cussed my daddy left and right. "You asshole.....You'll pay for this.....sticking that rod of yours en me and making me pregnant. I ain't never gonna let you poke me again!"

Well......Doc Brown said there was no time to take Momma to the hospital. She'd never make it....so Nurse Beasley and Doc Brown somehow helped Momma deliver me....though they didn't have many modern medical conveniences. Now what? The ambulance would not be at the clinic for some time.......What would they do with me? The clinic did not have an incubator! All premature babies must be placed in an incubator! What were they going to do?

Well....it just so happened that Nurse Beasley had celebrated her 25th wedding anniversary a few days earlier......and her husband, Joe Bob Earl had given her a new present. A crock pot. She had cooked a beef roast in her new crock pot....and she had made some chili the day before. Nurse Beasley had this bright idea....Why not put me in a crock pot until the ambulance came? It came with a lid? They could put some water in the crock put and turn it down low....It would keep me warm until the ambulance came.

And that is what they did....They actually put me in a crock pot.

And somehow.....I survived...It worked. Nurse Beasley and Doctor Brown saved my momma and me.........but scars from this beginning of my life still haunt me.........

There is more to the story....but this brings back painful memories from my childhood. I might reveal more of the story later.