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K N < E K P George after Hee Haw The best George ever treated me was after I got Hee Haw. We had more money, of course. We bought a big fine house in Smyrna and leather furniture and all the brand new things that we could get. We had Frigidaire appliances which we thought was high dollar. Of course I paid for the house and everything that went in it. George became a gourmet cook. We would have little groups of people come over. I had a swimming pool and I’d put candles in it and let them float. George would mix frozen tequila sunrises. He would be real cordial to all my guests, and everybody just . . . well, you couldn’t find a finer host than George Hemrick. He would talk so properly, and he would get his guitar and sing in a sad voice, Ah yesterday, when I was young—and he would miss that C chord every damn time. I thought to myself, How does he play that song a hundred thousand times and never hit that chord right once? He goes duh duh duh, and he’d hit it, Geor George after Hee Haw 152 / pressing on on the fourth try. Every time, for fifteen years of being married. I never said anything. I was trying not to get punched in the face. Why did I stay with him? Well, I didn’t want to, but I kept thinking he would get better and stop the abuse, and he was my second husband and, well, if you’re on your second, you really try harder. Another reason I stayed with him was that in some ways he was good with the children. For instance, he would play word games with Georgia when she was two or three. While he was shaving in the morning, he would say a word. Then he’d tell her, “Now go get your secret box.” And we’d write the word down, like “doctor” or “baby doll,” and then she’d make sentences and put the word in the little plastic “secret” box. Every day she’d learn one, two, maybe three words. George also was fond of Eugene. He thought he was very bright, and would try to teach him, watching classic films with him on TV, handing him books to read like War and Peace, buying him a telescope when he got interested in astronomy, and encouraging him when he showed talent for drawing. In other words, in some ways I was right about George helping me educate the kids. Because of Hee Haw I was being hired for many fair dates and shows. I was away from home a lot, out on the road, but as long as I was bringing in enough money, that seemed to satisfy George better. It didn’t stop him from drinking or taking pills, but he didn’t beat on me as much. Sometimes I could go a week without getting beaten up. I would feel pretty good about that. And I was feeling better about other things, about Hee Haw, and all the show dates, and the fact that the kids were growing up and they had everything they needed. ...

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