I was born on April 7, 1967. Some of my fondest memories when I was really young were playing in the pasture. I think that was one of my favorite things to do. I remember when I was a little boy I loved cowboys. I would pretend to be a cowboy out in the pasture and every time I went to go play I’d have to put on all my cowboy things; my cowboy hat, my guns, and my cowboy boots. I remember Mom even made me some chaps. I couldn’t go out and play unless I had all those things…I just wasn’t a cowboy.
I remember going through the pasture and doing all kinds of things. We’d pick leaves and pretend they were money. I remember Grandpa Klaassen had that little barn that he set up and many times we’d pretend that was our general store or saloon. That’s how we’d pay for supplies or whatever. I remember many times I’d go out and pretend that I was a bad guy or a good guy… or I’d rob the bank and I’d hide… or sometimes I’d be in fights with Indians. I remember pulling bark off trees and pretending it was deer meat that I just hunted for a meal. Many, many hours were spent in my childhood playing in the pasture.
Dad had some old sawhorses behind the garage and I remember tying a belt around one and I’d play rodeo. The sawhorse would be my bull. I’d climb on top of it and hold on to the belt, then get ready, then sit there and I’d nod to the guy working the shoot. He would open it and I would kick back and forth and make the sawhorse tip up and back. I remember many times I’d get too carried away and I’d tip over. I’d get up, dust my pants off like the cowboys did, and be ready to do it again. I remember doing that over and over. I just loved being a cowboy.
When I was a little bit older, I loved to play basketball. Every time I played, I had to have my shorts, jersey, and sweatbands to wear around my wrists. If I didn’t have all that I just couldn’t play. I remember a big part of my childhood was my sense of make-believe and imagination. Still to this day, I have wild imagination. I still do some of the things I did when I was young. I used to pretend that I was Mike Hiebert on the college or professional team. I would make up teammates…names and heights and positions… like Taylor Smith, 7’0 center. I would do that for every position. I even had 2 of 3 subs. I’d also set up brackets and different teams in a League and I’d set up tournaments. I remember doing that for years and years. It’s still kind of funny because even to this day sometimes when I go out and shoot around; I’ll pretend that I’m playing KU. Back then I would always make the winning shot or I’d get fouled and had to shoot a 1 and 1 with no time left.
One of my fondest memories of growing up was when I would go hunting and fishing with Dad. A lot of times he took me fishing; sometimes Lonnie would come along and we’d go hunting too. I remember one time, it was just me and Dad and we went to Marion Lake when we had that green boat, “The Viking”. It was an extremely windy day. The waves were really rough. I remember going across the lake to fish in a cove when I kept flying off my seat like 2 or 3 feet in the air. I just remember Dad had to lean and reach over with his hand and hold me to the seat. He was afraid I was going to bounce out of the boat because the waves were so rough. We were hardly going at all. I still remember it felt like I was flying 3 or 4 feet in the air. I’ll never forget that.
Another time we went to Maxwell Game Reserve and we went fishing in the little lake they have. We had so much fun and don’t think I’ve ever caught so many fish in my life. Over the course of a couple hours, we caught like 32 croppie and I don’t remember how many we could take home because of the limit. I remember how much fun that was and how thrilled I was. I thoroughly enjoyed the times I had with Dad fishing.
I remember going hunting a lot with Dad. I loved to go dove hunting. I think that was my favorite sport. I remember we had different hunting dogs. Some times we took the dogs and sometimes we didn’t. One time when Lonnie was old enough to come along, we brought him with us but he wasn’t old enough to hunt yet. But Lonnie loved to go get birds. When you hunt and catch a bird, you rip the head off and drain some of the blood. That was the first part of field dressing you do. I distinctly remember one time, Dad showed Lonnie how to pick up a bird and yank it’s head off. I can still see Lonnie running after a bird, take the head and yank and twist it off…he just loved it. He was always so excited. Every time we got one, Lonnie would run to find it and rip the head off.
Dad showed us how to clean the fish and field dress the birds. It was always fun. I always felt so important and mature after I learned how to do those things. I thought I had really become a man.
Many times we would go fishing with my Grandpa Klaassen. He would load up the two-wheel wagon and hook it behind the tractor. We’d get out the bamboo poles and bait. Grandpa would pack snacks and drinks. We’d get on the back of the wagon and drive out to the creek. A lot of time Suzie and Lisa would be along. A lot of times, it would just be me and Grandpa. Sometimes Mom would come. After we’d bait our hooks, Grandpa always told us we needed to spit on the worm. That’s what attracted the catfish. We pulled many catfish out of that creek. Sometimes me and Grandpa would go seining. That was always a lot of fun. And we’d pull giant catfish out of that creek. One time Grandpa pulled out a big huge giant snapping turtle. He kept it and ate the thing. I don’t know how he ate it I just remember taking it to the yard and getting it to bite on a stick. After we pulled his head out we chopped it off. I don’t believe I ate it. If I did, I didn’t know it.
I remember the camping and fishing trips our family would take. We always had so much fun. Especially when we went with other families. We got to play and go skiing. I remember when I got older I enjoyed the skiing more than the fishing. I probably wasn’t a born fisherman, but rather born to do skiing and tubing cause that was just always blast for me.
Some things I did, I could get in trouble for now or probably will when Mom and Dad read this (I think they know about this one though). One time I was told to go wake up Lonnie because he was sleeping. I think this was in our younger years. We got along but we still liked to pick on each other and fight a little bit. I grabbed a small pack of firecrackers, lit them and through them in the basement room on the concrete floor. I remember them going off and Lonnie jumping out of bed nearly scaring him to death. I don’t think I got in trouble for it back then but I probably will now.
When Lonnie and I were younger we fought a lot. Then we got older. There was a point in my life I enjoyed having a younger brother. Many times when I was driving around in high school I would take Lonnie and Greg Bergen. We’d drive around and go do stuff, or I’d take them to Newton and hang out.
One time we were driving around and Greg was in the back. We were listening to music, cutting up and acting crazy. I had an English paper in the back seat and Greg through it out the window. We had to turn around to get it and the paper was all crushed up. I remember I was about ready to beat him, but I didn’t.
Lonnie and I would get mad about different things and start fighting. One time I was sitting in the living room watching TV and Lonnie did something to get me mad. I was eating pickles so I took one and threw it at him because he hated pickles. Lonnie screamed and ran and was absolutely terrified. When I discovered that I thought, “Well, this is something I can use against him.” Sure enough, it was. Every once in a while if I’d get mad at him, I take a pickle and throw it at him. And I don’t know if I should be bringing up all these old memories because he’s a lot bigger and stronger than I am now and he’ll probably whip my tail if he reads all this stuff.
A lot of times we’d get in fights and start hitting. Usually I was stronger than him, and I would hit him too hard and he’d cry and tell mom. That’s the way it always kind of worked out. I guess that’s normal with brothers.
We loved to play football in the house. One time Dad told us not to play football in the house. We were home by ourselves; our parents just went to Grandpa and Grandma’s. As soon as they left we got out the old football and I distinctly remember playing and scoring a touchdown. And of course after a touchdown a person would punt across the living to the other person. Keep in mind; we just got scolded for playing in the house. I took the ball, kicked it, it went flying straight up and it broke one of those light coverings. I got in so much trouble for that. Needless to say, even though that happened, I still think we played football in the house till we were in high school. We also had little nerf basketball hoops and we would play constantly in the house. We were always roughhousing and play nerf hoops.
We played Atari all the time. One time when I was playing (I have a temper), I got really mad. My mom and dad weren’t home and I was playing space invaders. I was so good at that game I would flip the score. After playing for almost an hour on one game, I messed up and died. I turned around and out of frustration I hit the piano bench really hard and broke it. I remember getting in trouble for that and not being able to play for a while.
Another time, Dad and Lonnie were wrestling in the living room. We used to have this old rocker. I don’t remember who’s it was. Somehow they slammed up against it and it broke. Mom was a little upset about it but I think she got over it. I think if you go look in the attic, it’s probably still there today because I think they were going to fix it at one time. I remember Mom wanted to save that because it was something special. I was kind of glad when that happened because I wasn’t involved with that. Finally something got broke that I didn’t get blamed for.
I remember wrestling with Dad. It was a tradition…Sunday we’d come home from church, we’d have dinner and before we’d take naps, we’d wrestle on the floor with dad. It was always so fun to see if he could hold us down. We ‘d be so proud when we could escape. We wrestled like crazy!
We also had boxing gloves and loved having boxing matches. We’d have Deena stand by the piano to act as our bell between rounds. She’d play ding..ding..ding…to start and finish our rounds. When we boxed, Dad would never let us hit each other in the face, only body punches. Every once in a while, we’d get carried away and we’d start slugging each other in the face. Sometimes one person would accidentally hit the other in the face and of course, it would turn out to be slug-fest. One afternoon, mom and dad put them on and they were boxing against each other. We got a kick out of that. I think we even have a picture of that somewhere. We got a lot of wear and tear out of those 2 sets of boxing gloves.
I remember spending hours and hours playing in Grandpa Klaassens hayloft on the farm. I remember climbing in the bales. He had a swing in the hayloft. Usually he would stack bales way high up on one side. We would crawl way up to the top (the bales were like 10 or 11 high). We’d grab the rope, run around the stack, and we’d swing way out where there were no bales. We’d go around and around. We used to love to do that. The rope was a good size rope, but that swing had been up there forever. One time I was swinging on it and it broke on me. I went flying and hit the floor really hard. Luckily I landed okay and I wasn’t seriously hurt. I remember after that happened we wanted the swing up again and instead of using rope, Grandpa tied up a chain. We spent endless hours in that hayloft. He also had a hay shoot in the hayloft. You could open this little door and it would lead to bottom part of the barn. They used it to throw hay or straw down if they needed to feed the cows when they were being milked. One of my favorite things to do was open that hay shoot, throw rope down, and climb it down to the bottom and crawl back up. I always thought that was really cool.
On top of the hayloft he had two places off to the sides to store things. Towards the south of that old barn, he used to have an area he would fill with walnuts from his walnut trees. Grandpa would throw all the walnuts up there to let them dry. He had lots of nutcrackers. I remember us getting a bunch of walnuts from there and sitting in the back cracking and eating walnuts. That was always a favorite treat.
When I got older and I was strong enough to lift the hay bales, we’d go up to the hayloft and make tunnels with the bales. We’d pile a couple up side by side, then put some across to make a roof. One time, we made tunnels all over the hayloft. We kept them up there for weeks. We’d crawl through them, play and hide inside. It was absolutely a blast. We loved doing that.
When I was older, I worked for Grandpa Klaassen. When we were younger, whenever Grandpa’s truck came on the yard, Lonnie would always go and hide because he never wanted to work. I always got so mad at him. Every one knew that when Grandpa came over we had to work. And he would make us work. He wouldn’t just let us sit inside and watch TV. He’d make us come help him work in the garden, etc. Even if there wasn’t any garden work, he’d find something for us to do. I was always so mad at Lonnie because he always got out of working and I always got stuck with it.
When I was really young, I would help him and he always told me, “Ya know, Mike, if you don’t learn how to work hard, you’ll grow up and you’ll get thrown in jail. If you don’t know how to work, you’ll have to steal or do something bad. And for the rest of your life all you’ll have to eat is bread and water.” I can still remember those words echoing in my ears to this day. Grandpa always instilled in me the importance of hard work.
Grandpa Klaassen always loved to have fun with us. I remember sitting in the front eating watermelon. Grandpa had a little basketball goal in the garage, and I remember always playing basketball there. He had a teeter-totter that would go around in a circle and up and down, we played on that for hours. He would get us spinning really fast. We played with that thing until we were old and it finally fell apart. I remember the handles falling off.
When I got older, I would work for Grandpa during the summer. I would plow and help him bale and stack bales, and help him with harvest. Those are some of my fondest memories of my Grandfather. We became very close and I enjoyed working with him and I know he always paid me for it. I don’t know if I would have done it at the time if he wouldn’t have, but looking back on it (knowing what I know and having the opportunity to get to know him), I would have done it for free. I really cherish those times with my Grandfather. Grandpa Arnold was one of my best friends. I remember the day he died so clearly. I was out in front of the high school and Dad pulls up and says, “You better come home.” I knew right away something was wrong by the look on his face. He wasn’t at work. He told me that Grandpa Arnold had passed away. I just remember I started crying and I ran out of the high school. I remember that was the first time I lost anyone that I really truly loved and cared about. That was really difficult for me. At that time, he was probably my best friend, if not THE best friend I had. It’s so weird because I remember the night before; Mom had been trying to call him. She was kind of worried and I remember her saying, “Probably I should go check on him.” It was late and mom would come down and talk with us and tuck us in, even when we were in high school. I always enjoyed those times when we would visit. She was worried about her dad, and I assured her Grandpa’s a grown man, he can take care of himself. That happened to be the night he had passed away. I’ll never forget that. I carry a piece of Grandpa in my heart always because of that bond and friendship. Grandpa loved to play the harmonica and he made me play the spoons. We did that all the time at family gatherings. He just thoroughly enjoyed that. He also enjoyed so much when all of us could come over. Grandpa had nicknames for all of us. He called me “Half-pint”, he called Lonnie, “Cotton Top”, and he called Deena “Cracker Buster”. He called mom “Bunny” and I can’t remember what he called Dad. Every time we’d come over he’d call us by our nicknames. Fond, fond memories of Grandpa Klaassen.
At home, we had all kinds of different dogs and I remember playing with the puppies. Long before that, dad used to have goats. He had a pen in the back for roping and they’d rope goats to practice for rodeos. I would crawl into the pen and tried to ride the goats. That was always a lot of fun and really enjoyed watching when dad would rope the goats.
I remember all the horses we had. Sam (the young horse we had) threw me so many times. He was a good horse, but he was still pretty wild. Many times I would take him out for a ride and when he decided to go back he would just simply throw me and would proceed to go to the barn. I remember countless times being thrown off that horse. Horses were a lot of fun, but near as much fun as motorcycles.
