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YOU CAN GO HOME AGAIN!
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THE ONE-HUNDREDTH POST: FOR MY GRANDPARENTS
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Places are important to most people! All life and all history happen somewhere...in a place.
Places have always been important to me. I can't help it. In this ever-changing life and world, one can look back and think: such event happened right there in that spot; a loved one stood right over there.
I believe I could head back to Pop's Place, a sandy Dawson County cotton farm with a now 75 year old house on it, and move in tomorrow (if I owned it), and live there surrounded by dozens of happy memories---of family gatherings, Christmases and holidays, happy conversations and laughter, turkey and cornbread dressing dinners, ham and egg breakfasts (sometimes with Pop's own-cured sausages), and buttery grits! .
The big table where we always ate was there in the dining room. Pop sat at the head of the table, in his blue bib overalls, and proudly passed the trays of meat and other foods his farm had produced. Have you ever noticed---farm folks always had several choices of meat?! The table was full of people except when my uncles were off inItaly and New Guinea
If I were to move back into Pop's Place tomorrow, I'd have to fix a few things. (Haven't been there since 1971 but friends have brought me photos.) That nice rock fence of 1937 days is almost gone around the front and sides. You can still see part of it and the gate in front.
The elm disease got most of his great shade trees and the big windbreak to the west. We'll need some new trees of some kind. The barn needs a bright new coat of red paint. The excellent "chicken house" probably needs paint also, some white.
His barn has a sort of big second-story floor up under the roof, for storing all manner of feed and supplies. You can stand up there. I'd clean out that nice cozy place for some flooded-out family to stay, if needed. (Remember John Grisham's "The Painted House.")
When I finished all that work, and my clothes were dirty, I'd go lie down on the rug on the living room floor after lunch, and take a nap, in the manner of old farmers.
Outside again, over there by the "car house" door was where we got some stools and sat and hand-cranked the big old ice cream freezer for holiday ice cream. The kids had to try it and made six or eight turns before pooping out.
The grape arbor cedar posts will last forever, but someone didn't take care of the grapevines. Will have to replant. Then it will be a cool, green, shady, fragrant haven again---good place for some lawn chairs...to sit and meditate or read...and eat grapes!
YOU CAN GO HOME AGAIN!
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THE ONE-HUNDREDTH POST: FOR MY GRANDPARENTS
*************************************************************************
Places are important to most people! All life and all history happen somewhere...in a place.
Places have always been important to me. I can't help it. In this ever-changing life and world, one can look back and think: such event happened right there in that spot; a loved one stood right over there.
I believe I could head back to Pop's Place, a sandy Dawson County cotton farm with a now 75 year old house on it, and move in tomorrow (if I owned it), and live there surrounded by dozens of happy memories---of family gatherings, Christmases and holidays, happy conversations and laughter, turkey and cornbread dressing dinners, ham and egg breakfasts (sometimes with Pop's own-cured sausages), and buttery grits! .
The big table where we always ate was there in the dining room. Pop sat at the head of the table, in his blue bib overalls, and proudly passed the trays of meat and other foods his farm had produced. Have you ever noticed---farm folks always had several choices of meat?! The table was full of people except when my uncles were off in
If I were to move back into Pop's Place tomorrow, I'd have to fix a few things. (Haven't been there since 1971 but friends have brought me photos.) That nice rock fence of 1937 days is almost gone around the front and sides. You can still see part of it and the gate in front.
The elm disease got most of his great shade trees and the big windbreak to the west. We'll need some new trees of some kind. The barn needs a bright new coat of red paint. The excellent "chicken house" probably needs paint also, some white.
His barn has a sort of big second-story floor up under the roof, for storing all manner of feed and supplies. You can stand up there. I'd clean out that nice cozy place for some flooded-out family to stay, if needed. (Remember John Grisham's "The Painted House.")
When I finished all that work, and my clothes were dirty, I'd go lie down on the rug on the living room floor after lunch, and take a nap, in the manner of old farmers.
Outside again, over there by the "car house" door was where we got some stools and sat and hand-cranked the big old ice cream freezer for holiday ice cream. The kids had to try it and made six or eight turns before pooping out.
The grape arbor cedar posts will last forever, but someone didn't take care of the grapevines. Will have to replant. Then it will be a cool, green, shady, fragrant haven again---good place for some lawn chairs...to sit and meditate or read...and eat grapes!
.
After replanting those grapes, Mom's rose garden, bordering the master bedroom windows must be completely redone also. She lived a hard life, raised four children, cooked, sewed, quilted, canned, butchered hogs, smoked meat, washed clothes, made soap, heated bath water, picked cotton, washed dishes, and lived in a number of drafty old farmhouses built of grey lumber that restaurants would die for---then in 1937 she got this always-wanted rose garden. Soon after...it was arthritis and a wheelchair.
There's a "TIme Capsule," buried by me in 1943 in the ground over there near the fence under that old dead elm tree. For posterity, an old tin can contains three of my best marbles, two brand new WWII lead pennies, and a couple of rolled up comic strips of Joe Palooka fighting the Germans in France, with his .45 Colt! I must dig for that "capsule!"
Just for atmosphere and decor, I'll get some old overalls, coveralls, and an old denim jacket, spray a bit of oil on them in spots, and hang them on the back porch and in the garage on nails---soon they will collect dust and look "farmy." If you've ever been on a farm, you've seen plenty of these old work clothes hanging around.
You can't imagine the beauty of the sand down there! It is a kind of reddish-golden-tan, depending on the light. From the front gate of Pop's, 40 yards to the Star Route 4 road, the red hard pan clay fills up with this beautiful sand after a big wind. Need to get me a little John Deere tractor with a blade! Isn't that terrible---what we farmers have to do? Must push that sand back over into the cotton field.
After replanting those grapes, Mom's rose garden, bordering the master bedroom windows must be completely redone also. She lived a hard life, raised four children, cooked, sewed, quilted, canned, butchered hogs, smoked meat, washed clothes, made soap, heated bath water, picked cotton, washed dishes, and lived in a number of drafty old farmhouses built of grey lumber that restaurants would die for---then in 1937 she got this always-wanted rose garden. Soon after...it was arthritis and a wheelchair.
There's a "TIme Capsule," buried by me in 1943 in the ground over there near the fence under that old dead elm tree. For posterity, an old tin can contains three of my best marbles, two brand new WWII lead pennies, and a couple of rolled up comic strips of Joe Palooka fighting the Germans in France, with his .45 Colt! I must dig for that "capsule!"
Just for atmosphere and decor, I'll get some old overalls, coveralls, and an old denim jacket, spray a bit of oil on them in spots, and hang them on the back porch and in the garage on nails---soon they will collect dust and look "farmy." If you've ever been on a farm, you've seen plenty of these old work clothes hanging around.
You can't imagine the beauty of the sand down there! It is a kind of reddish-golden-tan, depending on the light. From the front gate of Pop's, 40 yards to the Star Route 4 road, the red hard pan clay fills up with this beautiful sand after a big wind. Need to get me a little John Deere tractor with a blade! Isn't that terrible---what we farmers have to do? Must push that sand back over into the cotton field.
May go out from time to time and spend the night in the "boys' room," on the back side of the "car house." (I slept there plenty of times as a boy!) "Car House" is what Pop called his three-car garage, which was almost a two story building with a storage loft up in the back, in front of the cars, and over the boys' room.
In the house I'll put my Philco floor radio replica over in the corner of the big back bedroom (the den for all practical purposes). Right in that little niche in the corner, I'll put my old .22 rifle like Pop did, for two legged and four legged varmints. Will need to get a rocking chair like his with a cane bottom!
He never locked his house day or night (but times have changed!) Nor was his .22 loaded either. A few rounds of lint-covered .22 ammo could usually be scavenged from the overflowing ashtray.... filled with safety pins, straight pins, needles, buttons, paperclips, pennies, loose keys, and a roll of white thread!
Pop had the sharpest knives in the world; but they are gone of course. I do have Dad's knives which are a close second in sharpness. These go in the kitchen drawer.
We'll put a box of vanilla wafers in that low cabinet in the dining room, where Mom always kept them for us kids.
Saturday afternoon's coming up and I may just go down to the Lamesa courthouse square. All the farmers in the county used to go to town, get a shave, shine, or haircut, and then gather "on the west side" in the shade. They'd sit on car fenders, lean against store fronts, and clog the sidewalk. Wending your way down that crowded sidewalk on a hot summer Saturday afternoon, you would pause in front of the two drug stores, and feel the cool air of their four or five ceiling fans, blowing out that marvelous fountain smell onto the hot sidewalk.
But customs have changed. There may not be any farmers there in Lamesa (or the rest of
These farmers of yesterday got up very early, milked their cows, walked miles behind mules, plowing all day; later they did he same long days with tractors. They milked again in the evening, fed the pigs their slop, and on and on with their work. Sometimes crops failed due to lack of rain, boll weevils, or hail storms. These rural people were the backbone of our young country...and produced many of the sons of "the greatest generation" that went off to defend our country in WWII.
In my final thoughts about Pop's Place, I may not own it legally, but in my heart it will always be mine! Borrowing a favorite line from the poet Khalil Gibran: "Too many fragments of the spirit have I scattered..." there.
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BY MIL
8/13/12
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(Writer's note: "Mom" passed away in February, 1953. Pop lived in his house until a few months before he died in 1973. His place remained in the family for a long time. It was remodeled and bricked a number of years ago. I have been unable to find out who the present owner is. Pictures seem to show a run-down condition of the property. The house may be empty right now; that could be good, for old farms need a rest just like all of us. For more, google Mil's Place: "POP."
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