The Riddle Song
trad
When I think about it, the words of this song very much resemble a Dad joke. However, the melody is gentle and the sentiment is about love. Johnny Mathis had a hit with the song “The Twelfth of Never”, which is sung to the same tune as this.
I gave my love a cherry that had no stone
I gave my love a chicken that had no bone
I told my love a story that has no end,
I gave my love a baby that's no cryin'.
How can there be a cherry that has no stone,
How can there be a chicken that has no bone,
How can there be a story that has no end,
How can there be a baby that's no cryin'.
A cherry when it's blooming it has no stone,
A chicken when it's pippin' it has no bone,
The story of I love you it has no end,
A baby when it's sleeping is no cryin'.
Coffee Finds Us
The last dog we had before leaving America was Coffee, a medium-sized dog that seemed to be a bit of husky and maybe German shepherd. Coffee was the only animal I have ever really loved. Here’s how he came to live with us.
Hurricane Donna was raging outside during our Sunday dinner. We heard the sound of a dog whining during a brief lull in the wind. We opened the front door and there was this dog, wet and miserable looking. Of course, we let him in. We were just about to have dessert, which included coffee iced cream and strawberry iced cream. My father said we had to give him a name to call him by, even though we wouldn’t be keeping him, and the name should remind us of the day. "Let's call him Strawberry," he said. Seriously! I'm not sure if it was me or my mother that pointed out he was much more coffee-colored. We all agreed to call him Coffee.
A few days later, my parents tracked down the owners, who had no children. They said he was always looking for kids to hang out with, so if we wanted him we could keep him. I remember those few days trying to track down the owners and hoping we wouldn't, so we were ecstatic when he became ours.
Coffee loved traveling in the car with us. Sometimes, that was okay, such as when we visited Grandma and Grandpa, where he was welcome and loved to play with us and our Maes cousins. Mostly, though, we had to use all sorts of tricks to get us all into the car and leave Coffee out.
We couldn’t bring him to Australia so we left him with the Maes boys. They were more than happy to have him. We would get news of him in the letters Grandma wrote, when she’d get one or two of the boys to write a few lines for us. One left a funny image in my head. Tommy and Lenny were trying to wash him, which he didn’t much like. They tied him to a tree, hosed him down, and soaped him up. Before they could rinse the soap off, Coffee escaped. Tommy continued to squirt the hose in his general direction while Lenny tried to coax Coffee within range of the hose. It seems Coffee won that round.
I can’t remember exactly when it was that we got the news Coffee had died from taking a poison bait one of the neighbors had deliberately set for him. I think we all shed a little tear when we read that. It was sad, too, that someone from Lynnhurst would do such a thing, but there is always a boogeyman.
The photo is one which my cousin Charlie gave me during my 2015 visit. Charlie, Tommy and Lenny all thanked me for having left Coffee with them. The kids all loved him.
