The "A Positive Influence Early In Life" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Reading a story titled "What Will Make You Fall in Love?" that appeared in ozy.com.  Story written by Carlos Watson the CEO and co-founder of Ozy.  Told of his childhood memories of his father who would take him to the Miami Airport, hand him $10 and tell him to run inside and buy newspapers from around the world; some being in languages they didn't even speak.  They would go home and his father would sit in his big armchair and read the newspapers for hours.  Seems that fact was what drove his love of the news.  Neat story and brought back memories of my Grandpap, William Cochran; my mother's father whose name I carry as my middle name.  My story started when I was a youngster about 8 or 9 years old and living in the last house on North Queen Street with my mom and dad.  

My Grandpap holding his first grandchild.
That would be me soon after birth.

During the summer months, when school wasn't in session, Grandpap would stop at 929 N. Queen Street on Tuesday nights, pick me up about 6:00 p.m. and take me to Root's Country Market and Auction in nearby East Petersburg.  We would spend the evening together roaming the indoor market where he would buy me just about anything I wanted such as donuts, candy, cookies, whoopie pies, ice cream or at times a fried oyster sandwich.  He introduced me one summer Tuesday night years ago to the single fried oyster sandwich slathered with tartar sauce and I still love them to this day.  Anyway, after our inside trip around the main building we would head to the auction house to watch the auctioneer do his thing.  Not sure why I liked it, but I never complained about sitting in the auction house for an hour or so watching people act like fools at times as they bought other people's junk.  But, it was those other Tuesday nights that we would head to the animal auction house that I remember the most.  We would roam the aisles looking at boxes of rabbits, white and multi-colored rats, guinea pigs, chickens, rabbits.....oh, did I say rabbits again.....probably because there were so many rabbits, pigeons and a big variety of other four-legged and two legged poor animals who were hoping for someone to buy them and give them a nice home.  Which is exactly what my Grandpap did on a regular basis, much to the chagrin of my mom and dad.  

Some of the many cages of animals to be bid on at Roots.

He bought me a pigeon with a broken wing that my mom put a popsicle stick on its wing until it was healthy and when it escaped its cage by mistake, I tried to lasso it with a rope and fell off a fence and broke my arm.  He bought me a box of eight white rats one evening that chewed through the wooden crate the were in while in the basement of our house on North Queen Street.  Dad and I rigged up a wooden peach basket from the ceiling and when they went under it to retrieve the scrap food, we lowered the basket.  They were taken to a local field and released.  Then there was the cardboard box with a few rabbits in it that I took home and gave to my brother who raised them for a year or two before we found another family that would take them and feed them.  The box with the snake in it never made it into the house.  I can still hear mom chewing out her dad that Tuesday evening.  Same thing went for the box of kittens on another Tuesday evening.  He tried to tell her what good a deal it was, but she wouldn't budge.  Another trip brought home half a dozen white mice that I kept next to my bed in an aquarium and played with every day after coming home from school after it started in the fall that year.  I used to let them climb up the ladder on my Hubley hook-and-ladder fire truck.  One day they mysteriously disappeared.  

Mr. Guinea Pig

But, the one item, or should I say 8 items, that I will remember the most that my Grandpap bid on and won were the eight guinea pigs that I turned into a business and used the money to buy my first car, my second car, and help pay for my first year of college.  I sold hundreds of guinea pigs that were all related to those eight original guinea pigs my Grandpap bought for me at Roots.  My love of animals of all sizes and shapes was nurtured by my grandfather much like Carlos Watson was influenced by his father years ago.  Every one has a story they can tell about someone special in their life that influenced them in a profound way they will never forget.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.