Georgia Magazine - September 2019 - 36

My GEORGIA

By Neil Joiner

Lessons in a new
cotton sack

uring my childhood in the 1950s, the
cotton on our Dooly County farm was
harvested by hand. I picked a few bolls,
but not enough to pretend the hot work shaped my
outlook on life. It was, however, because of cotton
that I got my first experience in buying on credit.
My approach to picking cotton was admittedly
unremarkable, but I felt slighted by being given a
short, tattered, secondhand sack for my field expeditions. With the innate wisdom of a 9-year-old, I
knew my success in the cotton field hinged on being
equipped to look the part. Mickey Mantle didn't
swing a kids' bat with cracks in the wood. Neither
would I.
Joiner's Store was just a short walk from our
home. Uncle Emmett kept charge tickets in a cigar
box for Daddy and many others in the community.

COURTESY DAVIS FARMS IN DOERUN

As a boy, Neil
Joiner used a
sack similar
to this to pick
cotton on his
family's farm.
This sack and
other artifacts
related to
Georgia's cotton
industry are on
display at the
Georgia State
Cotton Museum
in Vienna. Learn
more at bit.ly/
cottonmuseum.

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JANET JOINER

Georgia Magazine

Customers would pay him weekly or monthly or when the
crops were gathered. I saw something one day in the store that I
wanted, and I figured it might be time to start my own account.
There was a brand-new 6-foot cotton sack hanging on the
store wall that begged me to try it on. Its beige cloth body was
beautifully accented with a reinforced brown-leather bottom.
That sack whispered my name just like sirens call sailors from
the deep blue water. Uncle Emmett didn't try to talk me out of
buying that cotton sack. He let me enjoy my boundless optimism.
It didn't take long for me to realize I'd made a mistake.
That big sack was heavy to drag and took considerable time to
fill. The welcome breaks to empty the bag and weigh the cotton
came less often. My enthusiasm melted more quickly than the
ice in the Mason jar at the edge of the field.
I paid for the cotton sack, but I was thrilled to retire it when
Daddy bought a one-row tractor-mounted picker. I'd had a good
lesson about easy credit-a valuable reminder to use caution
when spending money I don't have.
Uncle Emmett also helped me to understand that old saying: "All that glitters isn't gold." I foolishly thought that new sack
would transform my cotton picking to legendary status.
Even now I sometimes ignore lessons I've already learned.
It can happen to any of us. We see that new cotton sack and
we're smitten. We like the fresh scent of the material and the
smooth texture. We believe that if we
had that new cotton sack, life would be
much better.
It didn't take but a few rows of cotton for me to understand that I didn't
need a new sack. What I needed was a
new attitude and a better effort. That
new sack was seldom filled to the top
with cotton, but it was packed full of
lessons that, thankfully, linger on.
Neil Joiner lives near Vienna and
writes a column found in several
newspapers as well as a blog at
Pickers such as this
make the process
joinerscorner.com. He is a member
easier for cotton
of Middle Georgia Electric Membership
farmers.
Corp.

September 2019

http://www.bit.ly/cottonmuseum http://www.bit.ly/cottonmuseum http://www.joinerscorner.com

Georgia Magazine - September 2019

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