Slopping hogs

I had a Great Uncle, Raymond, that lived in a small town in Kansas in the same house he was born in and on the same farm he grew up on.  He left once in his life when he was a medic in the 38th Infantry Division, the Liberators of Bataan, during WWII.  

Town in Kansas may be stretching the truth a bit.  Spot on map is a more apt description.  His house, the Catholic church, the Priests house, a Knights of Columbus Hall (burned down in 1973), and Kamplings General Store (complete with pot bellied store and pickle barrels) and the Kamplings house is the entire town.

Uncle Ray had a barn with a hay loft, a pigpen, an old Allis Chalmers tractor, and HUGE mulberry trees lining the property.  The place as close to heaven as all us great nephews and nieces that visited out there would ever get to here on earth. 

My dream, as a kid, was to be just like my Uncle Ray.  As far as I was concerned he was the strongest, kindest most gentle man that ever lived.  He was so strong, that when slopping the hogs, he carried TWO five gallon buckets full of slop to the trough twice.  7 year old me would struggle to help him carry one of those buckets!  He would chuckle a bit watching me struggle with that bucket but never helped, saying "You want to be a man, work like one" always with a kind smile.  That would make me struggle even harder to prove myself in his eyes.  

My Dad, a Marine fighter pilot, had just returned from his second tour in Vietnam and was given a "rest" tour to Hawaii.  I made a promise to Uncle Ray that when we returned, I would be older and stronger and would spend the entire summer there with him helping him on the farm.   

We got the phone call from my Grandmother that Uncle Ray, her brother, had passed away.  I remember hearing the news and running to my room burying my head in the pillow to stifle my tears.  My Dad, knowing how close I was to him came in and tried comforting me.  I had never felt hurt like that before.

He is buried in the Catholic churches cemetery, along with his mother and father, sisters and brothers, 200 yards from where he lived his entire life.