Storytelling

Playing Among the Headstones

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Sometimes we are fortunate enough to look past what lies on the surface and find pleasure in unexpected places.  Before our children started school, we decided it would be best if I put off working until they started school.  Most days, the children and I were home.  I rambled the lanes around our rural home were on foot pulling the little ones in a red wagon behind me.

We frequently strolled to a lovely old pre-Civil War cemetery with off a gravel road near our home..  The children were fascinated by the tall, graceful tombstones and loved running between them, seeking out their favorites with angels, little lambs, ornate curlicues, or crypts enclosed within wrought-iron fences.

In their exuberant innocence, they played happily in the deep shade under the ancient oaks, having no knowledge of death or its connection to their favorite destination.  Sometimes they sat in the sand of the unpaved tracks, playing with their trucks or other small toys.  To them, it was no more than a park.  As often as not, I spread a blanket on the grass for them to picnic on peanut butter and jam sandwiches, milk and cookies.

Later, they’d stretch out on the blanket while I read to them, sometimes drifting off for their naps.  Late in the afternoon, We’d walk home in the long shadows as they searched for little treasures of pretty stones, colorful bird feathers, or bright flowers or toss small stones from their vantage point on a small wooden bridge into the clear creek below.

I cherish the memory of those lovely afternoons and hope that the souls resting beneath that cool green carpet of grass enjoyed the laughter of children playing and the time we shared with them.

Dozens of Cousins

Neither Corwin nor Kelvin could be rounded up for this  cousin picture.  They had other fish to fry.cousinsAunt Essie, like all of my aunts, was a wonder of fertility, if not child-rearing acumen.  She had seven of the meanest boys outside Alcatraz.  Thank God, her reproductive equipment gave out before she managed more.  I thought Mother was just exaggerating when she said they’d all end up in jail or dead before they were thirty.  She was wrong.  Only four of Continue reading →

Hard Time Marrying Part 25

big-wildflower

They got home well before dark.  While Joe and Little Joe milked and tended the stock, Anya put Sally in her sling and walked across the meadow down to the creek.  The cow and calf grazed near the willows, the calf didn’t have to be kept up to protect the milk, though all it enjoyed was its mother’s company since she’d gone dry.  Joe hadn’t bothered to scythe down the weeds since he didn’t have to worry about the coming calf.  The stand of Queen Anne’s lace waved its graceful heads, its regal beauty given no hint of its hidden use.  Anya had often gathered wildflowers on her walk, bringing back an apron full of Black-Eyed Susans, bright Indian Blanket, and Texas Bluebonnets, loving the way their colors brightened the cabin.  She’d never been especially fond of white, but today, filled her apron with the lacy white flowers and nothing else.

Emma had sent home enough chicken and dumplings for another meal.  With biscuits from breakfast and Emma’s conserve, it made a festive supper.  Little Joe licked his plate and Sally kept squealing and reaching for the conserve, long after she plastered herself with hers.  They laughed as they cleaned the little ones up.  The children were reluctant to settle in bed after their exciting day and the hilarity at supper.  Joe lay on the cot till his little namesake was still while Anya rocked Sally.

He came back to the table and took Anya’s hand.  Looking pointedly at the pot of white flowers, he said, “You want to be careful with those.  You know they made the cow lose her calf.  I don’t want nothin’ happenin’ to you.  A baby is just a baby.”

Anya started crying.  “Joe, I don’t even know if I want this baby.  I was hopin’ things could go on the way they were.  You have already taken in your dead wife’s little ones and now this.  This baby was forced on me.  I don’t know if I can do right by it, let alone love it.  I think it might be better if you let me do what I need to do and after, if you want, we can figure somethin’ out.  We can make a clean start or I can leave once I am back on my feet if you want. We ain’t married and you done took care of me a long time.  You don’t owe me nothin’.  You could always look for a woman to come stay and help out till Sally’s bigger.  The West is full of women who need somebody to do for an’ a place to stay.”

Joe was a man of few words.  “Anya, I know what it is to be alone.  I never knew my pa, these younguns don’t know their pa.  You done without a ma. The world don’t have to be such a cold place. You’re are a good woman an’ I seen how you love these little fellers.  I want you and that little feller you’re a’carrying if that’s the way you see it.”  He picked up his hat to go to the barn.

Anya looked from Sally to Joe as a tear dropped on Sally’s blonde head.  She reached out, putting a hand on Joe’s shoulder.  “Stay, Joe.  It’s time Sally started sleepin’ in with Little Joe.”

Tenderly, Joe tucked Sally in on the far side of the cot with Little Joe, then put out the light.

Conquering Corwin (Part 1)

Pooped pantsIn my family of “Mixed Nuts” Cousin Corwin was the winner, hands down.  When he was about twelve, he and his twin Kelvin got in a little “dust up” with the police, so it seemed like a good time to get out of town.  Aunt Essie called Daddy, asking if the twins could come spend a few days.  Now if the image “twins” brings to mind thoughts of “barefoot boys with cheeks of tan,” think again.  Kelvin to all intents and purposes, could have passed for normal, but Corwin was nuts.  At five foot eight and two hundred and sixty pounds, he was physically intimidating.  His pale blue eyes blazed with madness.  He ripped through a fried chicken like a chain saw.  Mother had to double the amount she normally cooked the minute he arrived.

Aunt Essie’s call for relief was well-timed.  Mother and Daddy were just about to leave on a much-anticipated vacation.  Though Mother could only hear Daddy’s end of the conversation, it was clear he was assuring Aunt Essie “taking the boys will be no problem.  I’ll straighten them out. We’ll come get them as soon as we get back.  They can stay as long as they want.  They’ll always have a home with us.”  He hung up, turning to Mother.  She was murderous!  Like any right thinking human with twelve years’ experience with Corwin, she despised him.  She’d spent most of those years defending her girls from his attacks.

“Are you crazy?  I don’t want that maniac out here!  He is not coming!”

“Yes, he is!  I’ve already told Essie we’ll come get them as soon as we get back from vacation. I’m going to bring those boys out here, put ‘em to work and straighten ‘em out.  There’s not a kid in the world I can’t conquer!”

“You can’t straighten them out.  You deserve what you get!  Go get them whenever you want to.  We’re not going on vacation!”

Conceding that point, Daddy left, returning several hours later returning with two sullen, hostile boys.  Since neither Mother nor the girls had anything to say to him either, it was a quiet house except for chicken bones crunching when Corwin ate.  Corwin was exhausted after his big supper and brush with the police so Mother showed him to his bed right after supper.  As soon as she cleaned up the kitchen, she went on to bed, leaving Daddy up by himself.  He was horrified to find Corwin in his bed when he got ready to turn in.  He went to find Mother.  She bunked in with the girls, partly to protect them.

“Corwin’s in my bed!” Daddy roared.

“Yep.  You may as well go ahead and get started straightening him out tonight.”  She turned over, the bed shaking with her giggling.  Daddy knew when he was whipped.

He got up, blasting the boys out of bed the next morning about six.  They were sullen, rubbing their eyes.  He was full of false cheer, enjoying the prospect of teaching them to work, turning them into productive humans.  They dragged away from the table, out into the dawn’s early light.  They were back at noon, to eat and rest in the heat of the day.  The boys were unhappy.  I don’t think their morning had gone well.  Daddy was trying to force a good mood on everybody.  After an hour and a half’s rest, he had them back at it.  They ate, bathed, and fell in bed that night.  The next morning, he had to drag them out of bed, openly hostile.  They took potshots at him at breakfasts before he dragged them off.  By noon, things clearly had heated up.

By the fifth day, Daddy was sick of them, but stuck in the nightmare he’d created.  He had alienated everybody.  In one camp, Mother and the girls hated him.  In the other, he was spending his vacation trying “straighten out” two juvenile delinquents who openly despised him and made his life a misery on every turn. It was a challenge having to having work like a dog trying to teach them to work when he’d planned to be on vacation.

There was no escaping the nightmare as he spent his nights with the corpulent, malodorous, psychopathic Corwin, snuggled up against him.  One morning Daddy got up to find he had no clean underwear in his drawer.  While he was searching, the putrid scent of feces drifted from the general area of his closet.  He investigated, finding that Corwin had suffered digestive issues, soiled his dainties and concealed them deep in Daddy’s closet, rather than admit to his weak sphincter.  Exhausting his underwear wardrobe, he’d helped himself to Daddy’s, which he also soiled and concealed.  Daddy had had enough.  He made Corwin take the whole disgusting pile outdoors and wash it. Corwin found he didn’t care for washing aged crap out of his (and Daddy’s) drawers, retching the whole time.  He felt Daddy ought to wash out his own, even though Corwin had crapped them all and was doubly insulted when Daddy insisted he scoop up the piles of poop and haul the filthy wash water far from the house to dump it.  He would have had absolutely no problem leaving the slimy, stinking mess lying on the ground next to the faucet. To everyone’s relief, Corwin called Aunt Essie, begging to go home.  That saga had ended with Daddy finding a kid he couldn’t conquer.

To be continued

https://nutsrok.wordpress.com/2014/09/24/mixed-nuts/

Conquering Corwin (Part 1)

Pooped pantsIn my family of “Mixed Nuts” Cousin Corwin was the winner, hands down.  When he was about twelve, he and his twin Kelvin got in a little “dust up” with the police, so it seemed like a good time to get out of town.  Aunt Essie called Daddy, asking if the twins could come spend a few days.  Now if the image “twins” brings to mind thoughts of “barefoot boys with cheeks of tan,” think again.  Kelvin to all intents and purposes, could have passed for normal, but Corwin was nuts.  At five foot eight and two hundred and sixty pounds, he was physically intimidating.  His pale blue eyes blazed with madness.  He ripped through a fried chicken like a chain saw.  Mother had to double the amount she normally cooked the minute he arrived.

Aunt Essie’s call for relief was well-timed.  Mother and Daddy were just about to leave on a much-anticipated vacation.  Though Mother could only hear Daddy’s end of the conversation, it was clear he was assuring Aunt Essie “taking the boys will be no problem.  I’ll straighten them out. We’ll come get them as soon as we get back.  They can stay as long as they want.  They’ll always have a home with us.”  He hung up, turning to Mother.  She was murderous!  Like any right thinking human with twelve years’ experience with Corwin, she despised him.  She’d spent most of those years defending her girls from his attacks.

“Are you crazy?  I don’t want that maniac out here!  He is not coming!”

“Yes, he is!  I’ve already told Essie we’ll come get them as soon as we get back from vacation. I’m going to bring those boys out here, put ‘em to work and straighten ‘em out.  There’s not a kid in the world I can’t conquer!”

“You can’t straighten them out.  You deserve what you get!  Go get them whenever you want to.  We’re not going on vacation!”

Conceding that point, Daddy left, returning several hours later returning with two sullen, hostile boys.  Since neither Mother nor the girls had anything to say to him either, it was a quiet house except for chicken bones crunching when Corwin ate.  Corwin was exhausted after his big supper and brush with the police so Mother showed him to his bed right after supper.  As soon as she cleaned up the kitchen, she went on to bed, leaving Daddy up by himself.  He was horrified to find Corwin in his bed when he got ready to turn in.  He went to find Mother.  She bunked in with the girls, partly to protect them.

“Corwin’s in my bed!” Daddy roared.

“Yep.  You may as well go ahead and get started straightening him out tonight.”  She turned over, the bed shaking with her giggling.  Daddy knew when he was whipped.

He got up, blasting the boys out of bed the next morning about six.  They were sullen, rubbing their eyes.  He was full of false cheer, enjoying the prospect of teaching them to work, turning them into productive humans.  They dragged away from the table, out into the dawn’s early light.  They were back at noon, to eat and rest in the heat of the day.  The boys were unhappy.  I don’t think their morning had gone well.  Daddy was trying to force a good mood on everybody.  After an hour and a half’s rest, he had them back at it.  They ate, bathed, and fell in bed that night.  The next morning, he had to drag them out of bed, openly hostile.  They took potshots at him at breakfasts before he dragged them off.  By noon, things clearly had heated up.

By the fifth day, Daddy was sick of them, but stuck in the nightmare he’d created.  He had alienated everybody.  In one camp, Mother and the girls hated him.  In the other, he was spending his vacation trying “straighten out” two juvenile delinquents who openly despised him and made his life a misery on every turn. It was a challenge having to having work like a dog trying to teach them to work when he’d planned to be on vacation.

There was no escaping the nightmare as he spent his nights with the corpulent, malodorous, psychopathic Corwin, snuggled up against him.  One morning Daddy got up to find he had no clean underwear in his drawer.  While he was searching, the putrid scent of feces drifted from the general area of his closet.  He investigated, finding that Corwin had suffered digestive issues, soiled his dainties and concealed them deep in Daddy’s closet, rather than admit to his weak sphincter.  Exhausting his underwear wardrobe, he’d helped himself to Daddy’s, which he also soiled and concealed.  Daddy had had enough.  He made Corwin take the whole disgusting pile outdoors and wash it. Corwin found he didn’t care for washing aged crap out of his (and Daddy’s) drawers, retching the whole time.  He felt Daddy ought to wash out his own, even though Corwin had crapped them all and was doubly insulted when Daddy insisted he scoop up the piles of poop and haul the filthy wash water far from the house to dump it.  He would have had absolutely no problem leaving the slimy, stinking mess lying on the ground next to the faucet. To everyone’s relief, Corwin called Aunt Essie, begging to go home.  That saga had ended with Daddy finding a kid he couldn’t conquer.

To be continued

https://nutsrok.wordpress.com/2014/09/24/mixed-nuts/

Tough Teacher

The new teacher intended to brook no nonsense in his one room school. The students took their seats as he walked around slapping his hand with his strap.

He whirled and turned his attention to the first boy in the first row. “You boy! What’s your name, boy?”

“Sam.” answered the boy.

“Hold out your hand!” The teacher snapped. He strapped the palm of the boy’s hand. “Your name is Samuel! Don’t ever let me hear you say Sam, again!”

He turned to the next boy. “What’s your name?”

“Zeke.” said the boy.

“Hold out your hand!” When the boy extended his hand, the teacher strapped his palm smartly. “Your name is Ezekial! Don’t ever say Zeke again!”

He turned to the third boy. “Boy, what’s your name?”

Trembling the boy answered, “Bobual?”

Christmas Revelations

We’d put away all the Christmas decorations weeks before.   We’d finally gotten our eighteen month old, John, to bed after several unsuccessful attempts and had collapsed, totally whipped.  Meanwhile, he’d  been entertaining himself rummaging quietly through a dresser drawer we’d thought inaccessible.  After a few minutes, he toddled into the living room victorious dragging garland, an ornament in each hand, announcing, “Santa Claus is coming to town.  I’ll be damned!”

Remembering the Care: A Nurse’s Reflection

Dear Patient,

You probably don’t remember me,but I was your nurse.  I took care of you when you had your baby, took care of your sick child, comforted you when you were in pain.  I worked extra shifts on holidays and weekends because you needed me.  I rejoiced when you got better.  Cried with you when you needed a friend and tried to help you find the answers.  I visited with yoy when no visitors came. I sang and talked to you when you seemed unresponsive because I knew you were in there.  I brought Easter baskets for your children so they wouldn’t be disappointed when they came to see you on Easter.  I hugged you and your family. I inderstood and didn’t get mad when you were angry or mean when you were in pain. I talked to you about things outside the hospital to give you something else to think about, trying to bring you a story that would interest you everyday, unless you just needed me to be quiet with you.  I was there for your miracle and to hold your hand when you died talking to Mama.  I never corrected you, knowing it was her hand you were holding. I talked about death with you if you wanted to.

Nursing was my job, but taking care of you was my privilege.  Thank you for letting me be a part of your life.

Cousin Kathleen and the Groundhog

imageThis is the time of year we’d visit Cousin Kathleen, a tiny, self-sufficient, little mountain woman.  The first time Bud and I went to visit at her little house clinging to the side of a mountain in Virginia’s Blue Ridge Moutains we were lingering over coffee at the breakfast table overlooking her garden when she spotted a fat groundhog eating her tomatoes.  Without a word, she jumped up, grabbed a 357 pistol off the top of her refrigerator and flew out the back door firing a shot.  The ground hog escaped, but she blew the tomato plant away!  She was quite disappointed, since she’d been planning to eat him.  Later that morning, we caught a couple of trout in Little Wilson Creek, Just down from her house.  Bud usually practiced catch and release, but she was outraged at the thought.  Rushing us home, by ten- thirty she had cooked and trout eaten them all herself, horrified to think they might have been wasting their afternoon back in the creek.

That afternoon, we had to go see the cemetery.  Cousin Kathleen proudly confided she “ran” the cemetery.  Not sure what that meant, I had to ask.

“I am in charge of the man who mows.  I keep up with the money.  I decide where folks get plots.  I am the one to call in case of emergencies.”

I wanted to ask what kind of emergencies cemeteries might have, except for the rapture, of course, but kept my mouth shut.

One morning, Cousin Kathleen took us out to see the countryside.  Deep in the hills, she had Bud whip into a drive.  “I used to work with the woman who lives here.  Come on.  I want you to meet her.”  Uncomfortable at dropping in on unknown mountaineers, we dragged a little getting out.  A man in overalls sat on the porch.

“Where’s Molly?  I sed to work with her.”  Cousin Kathleen greeted him.

“Molly’s gone.”

Clearly anxious to see her friend, Cousin Kathleen demanded, “Gone where?  When will she be back?”

“She’s dead.  She ain’t gonna be back.”

“Oh well, see you later, then.”  She scurried back to the car with us right her.  “Well, I sure never heard she was dead!”  I kind of thought she hadn’t by that time.

We went fishing that afternnoon.  For dinner that night, we had fresh-caught trout, green beans and potatoes, tomatoes, and cucumbers fresh from the garden.  For dessert, we had fresh rhubarb cobbler.  What a wonderful dinner and day of memories!