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I got such a giggle from Sixredheads' post today entitled From Backyard to Table. It is well worth a read. I was transported back to summertime, some 30-35 years ago, right here in East Tennessee. My Grandpa exhibited a certain panache when killing his chickens. In fact, I remember Mom even calling him to come up and kill hers when the time came. Grandpa didn't need an axe -- he just swung them around by the neck until, well, you get the picture. In our little corner of paradise, known as Six Mile, all our relatives on my dad's side lived close by -- in one long string up and down the road, with the bulk of Grandpa's 40-acre scratch farm backing up to everyone's property. And after you passed the house of the last Miller, you got to the Walkers or Youngs (depending on which direction you drove) who lived in another long string all down the road, and then the Sparks family (displaced from Cades Cove), and then so on and so forth, with extended family after extended family. Most of them, or their offspring, still live there today. My dad and his brothers still live there, and several of my cousins. And when Daddy and Uncles were kids, they played with the Sparkses and the Walkers, just as my cousins and I played with a different generation of these families when we were kids. I remember many a time that our back steps, then shaded by an enormous sweet gum ball tree, were lined up with kids either husking corn, stringing beans (for canning), plucking dead chickens, or just spitting watermelon seeds as far as we could in childish competition. I remember the vines that hung temptingly over the deep, deep ravine (really more like a cliff) that called us out to our dangerous game of swinging out over the creek -- barbed wire border and all -- and back to crash into the small crowd of cousins waiting their turn. We called those the "vine swings" and my sister is still mad that we left her there once, presuming a bout of hypochondria, which turned out to be a broken ankle. (Sorry, Merry!) I recall episodes of eperimentation that included everything from "Gee, what happens if you pee on that electric fence?" to "Oh Golly, that dead horse has laid on the ground until its intestines have exploded!" I'll never forget the time the vet pulled a calf from its mother's womb using a tractor and a rope tied around its feet. Or the smell of the hay on the conveyor belt as it was conducted to the barnloft -- later to be made into something akin to a giant game of Legos by us kids. (Much to Grandpa's chagrin.) We made rooms and caves in that hay, and tunnels with secret entrances. Our creation would keep us busy for days until the grim discovery of a snake in one of our secret rooms would close us down for the summer. When the summer days were really hot and long and getting a little boring, we would plead with our parents for some change and permission to walk to Dude's store. Off we would go, some six or sometimes more kids, with all our dogs, and our dreams of candy and a can of soda. We almost ritualistically stopped at the shack on the crest of the largest hill between our homes and Dude's. This shack was owned by an old man named Lonnie who lived with his sister (Melvina). They'd often be sitting on their front stoop -- this predated the advent of airconditioning in Six Mile by quite some time -- and Lonnie'd (you'll have to look THAT contraction up in the Dictionary of Appalachia What I wouldn't do for an exhiliarating swing over the creek, or a swig of water from Lonnie's gourd cup, or even to hear Grandpa shout at us for playing in the hay just one more time. But instead, I'll just have to plan a few watermelon seed spitting competitions of my own and try to create some great summer memories for my own precious off-spring! |
) always offer us some water from the barrel under the faucet in front of the shack and we always took it. Why? Because even back then, it was special to get to drink your water from a gourd cup! I'm sure that was what made the water so irresistable and more people should try drinking from gourds these days. But I digress. On the way home from the store, someone would inevitably experiment with the digestive system of one of the pets who had accompanied us. I remember that "Wolf" really seemed to enjoy bubble gum, while "Foxy" preferred chocolate. (Yes, I know now that this was unhealthy for the dog, but I was about 6 at this time.)Comments
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