Chink. Chink. The swing rocked to the rhythm of our feet skimming across the thick gray paint of the porch floor. My grandmother and I sat together on the August afternoon. The mist of the sudden shower dampened our faces, a welcome relief from the heat. As the rain stopped, steam arose over the lush green pasture, the musty smell of wet hay replacing the freshness of the rain.
My brother and I spent a week each summer at our grandparents’ farm in Enon, Louisiana. My grandmother indulged her passion for family heritage and storytelling during those lazy afternoons on the front porch. I was her only audience, the only family member who seemed to value her stories.
“Tell me about when your mother died.”
“When I was three years old, my mother died of typhoid fever and left seven motherless children.” Then, she told how her 16-year-old sister Evie took over the daunting task of running a farm household. I cringed at tales of the cruel woman who became her father’s second wife.
“She died after only one year of marriage.” Her soft face crinkled with a touch of mischief as she admitted that she was not sad at all. “Later Daddy married the kind woman we called Mother.”
Of our ancestors, she always said, “we are of pioneer stock, sturdy and dependable.”
The white farmhouse was full with treasures. I learned where and when each piece of furniture was bought. Little notes were taped onto the back of photos, pieces of jewelry and other items.
“Remember to tell your mom and uncle to look for these notes. I have already decided who gets what.” She pointed to a photograph of herself and chuckled “They can use this to scare away the rats.”
“Now this has your name on it. Remember, this is a real antique, so take care of it. It is a rose bottle and used my mother to make perfume from rose petals and water.”
I examined each of the miniature knick-knacks on the shelf hung on the living room wall and looked at the black pages of her photo albums. MawMaw watched, hoping that I would remember and appreciate the heritage she had worked so hard to preserve.
The smell of biscuits and bacon reached my room at the front of the farmhouse. It was summer vacation at my grandparents’ farm.
“I thought I heard little feet padding around,” MawMaw laughed and said softly. She wore a cotton housedress, its printed fabric not much different from the worn curtains that rustled in the window above the sink.
“Odell, would you take the children to the watermelon patch this morning?”
“Hmmm.” PawPaw continued to read the Bogalusa Daily News at the white enamel kitchen table.
“Will you drop me off at the garden so I can finish picking the sweet corn Mike likes so much?”
“Um hmmm.”
PawPaw finally looked up from his paper and said, “Do you kids want to take a ride to the watermelon patch after breakfast?” PawPaw finally looked up from his paper and asked.
I put down my fork and answered, “Yeah!” I was a big fan of Washington Parish melons. PawPaw always let us thump them to see if they were ripe.
“Okay. We can pick those round little melons you like so much. Now hop on the back of the trailer.”
We all jumped onto the wooden bed of the trailer. Mike said, “Don’t forget to drop MawMaw off at the vegetable garden,”
PawPaw started the red tractor and began to drive slowly in the direction of the garden.
“Hold onto your hat, Rose,” he said and chuckled as he floored the tractor and took off, not to the garden after all, but through the woods.
MawMaw shouted, “Now, Odell, you stop right now!”
We held on as tightly as we could as the trailer bounced and tree limbs pelted our heads. PawPaw was well satisfied with the result of his escapade--MawMaw’s screams and our delight.
On Sunday, we’d go to Enon Baptist Church in the center of “town” on Highway 16 between Franklinton and Bogalusa. “Town” consisted of a caution light, the church, Enon School for grades 1-12 and Cousin Hollis Green’s gas station. My great-grandfather Green had helped build the original church building in the late 1800’s. The rustic church pew I used in my home for over twenty years was a reject from those he built for that church. The present church building was built in 1938 of large chunks of Mississippi sandstone. My grandparents took pride in showing us off to the “community” of Enon. On Monday, we would visit Aunt Evie Green Magee who lived in on the adjoining Green property, the sister who raised my grandmother after her mother’s death. Stately at almost six feet tall, Aunt Evie was the kindest woman I ever met. We sampled her famous egg custard pie and carried home jars of crisp sweet pickles. Then we went across the street to Aunt Maude Jenkins’s weathered farm house, where all the Green siblings had been born. Aunt Maude’s pale blue eyes welcomed me as her weathered face krinkled around her loving smile. Also tall, Aunt Maude was a little more stooped and frail. MawMaw said it was because she had worked so hard helping Uncle Fred with farm chores. MawMaw thought of her and PawPaw as more “city folk” They had lived in Bogalusa most of their married life where he was postmaster until his retirement. Unlike Aunt Maude and Uncle Fred, their farm was “non-working”, except for a garden and a fledging Christmas tree crop. Aunt Maude also had her specialties, fresh churned country butter and the rich pound cake she made with it. There were more rounds to be made: Uncle Hollis, Uncle Arthur and Cousin Glenna. Each relative commented on who Mike and I resembled. I envied the third-cousins we played with because they saw each other every week of the year.
After getting a pound of butter from Aunt Maude, MawMaw gave me a cooking lesson, along with a lecture about the importance of learning how to cook. The recipe for Aunt Maude’s pound cake called for six eggs, still warm from Uncle Fred’s hens. MawMaw would take out six custard cups and break each egg into a separate cup before it went into the rich batter. By the time the cake went into the oven, the entire kitchen was a mess. I’ve been accused of inheriting her habit of dirtying every dish in the kitchen.
During the week, we visited each aunt and uncle. Aunt Evie had baked her legendary egg custard pie. Aunt Maude supplied fresh eggs and soft butter to make MawMaw’s famous pound cake. The relatives thought of my grandparents as “city folk.” They had lived in Bogalusa most of their married life where he was postmaster until his retirement. Their farm was “non-working”, except for a vegetable garden and a fledging Christmas tree crop. I envied the third-cousins we played with because they saw each other every week of the year.
We left at the end of the week stocked with packages of frozen vegetables, jars of sweet pickles and dozens of little round watermelons, feeling a part something solid and lasting. We knew that when we returned next summer, everything would be exactly the same.
