I remember every word my Great
grand mother Katherine Ernst said to me. I want to interject this now for it
puts bearing to where I was going, not that I had any idea, at that time and
until just recently it bares strong words for this time, and the one Great
Grandma spoke about. We being a list of possibilities us to be chosen in the
gold and brown striped station wagon that carried the Fisher family Aunt Irean
my dad’s sister, Uncle Jim my cousins Becky, Mary, Mark, and I. The station
wagon was one of those grand editions with an extra seat that flipped up in
back so if the back window was open you could see out and were just a few
inches above the front riders, also it was the 70’s so seat belts were a kind
of, turbulent weather and all, like the blinking lights on the fasten seat belt
signs on an airplane for I would get a mental imagine of this any time some one
would say fasten your seat ever since I could remember on planes I would stare
at the flashing lights as a child amazed when the captain talked for as usual
Mom or Dad could sometimes get me to
visit the captain and the cockpit of the air plane, so I would feel a personal connection
eyes to the lights and sometimes with wings pined to my chest. The road was a
long drive just about two hours or so back to the “Ernst Farm’ still what
remained passed down for generations.
We piled out of the car and headed
out to the back yard. Great Grandma Katherine Ernst had a huge garden which
required grandchildren and great grandchildren to keep the many rows of
vegetables, planted and tended, weeded and hoed, and finally picked. I was on
my knees, and it was a big garden: you see it was a big task and Great grandma
led it. It was unspoken we should work as long, or longer than she did. We did.
It was green bean day, and we must of picked for hours harvesting all forms of
vegs, but mostly green beans. The earth was soft and well shaded for the beans
had grown little mini canapés with there leaves, and getting under them to pick
was well suited for a young boy. Picking green beans is pretty simple and I
could get my finger moving pretty quick, Mark would be in one row; I another,
and Mary another, so naturally we raced in spurts. There were a lot of rows.
The sun began it’s slow decent in the sky and we all washed out side. We were
finally able to play and mini goof until dinner. It was before dinner Great
grandma called us to the house. Mark, Mary and I after Aunt Irean went and
spoke to her; for it was a choice of hers who would be in her area. I say area,
for her living area, front living room past the kitchen were you could look
down on the very field we just had been picking in was nestled deeper in the
house. You know when your at the movies and they use that real old type faded
black and white just a touch of bright back light. That was what her room
looked like as the sun spilled across the red carpet, but first it had to get
through all the photos. Each one of her fourteen children, all their
descendants into four generations the newest and brightest color Polaroid picks
in new frames lay, spread amongst the old black and white wrapper in ornate
silver, porcelain, or glass fully
engulfed the room, along side was a picture of the president with a real happy
birthday signature for turning one hundred years old.
Great grandma sat in an old blue
chair which was in contrast to the pinkish red ornate wall paper were it not
for the white lace over lays that covered its back and sides. She had a still
about her all the time, and never a wasted movement. She was tall under six
feet by a few inches with long strong arms, and wide hips under her mild
flowered dress, and slip. Her hair was long and tied behind her head, and her
face was long oval with a soft nose and
mouth with eyes just of a gray sort, with a far away look all the time, all the
time whether she was saying hello as we entered the room and paid our respects,
wearing her spectacles, or telling a story. This was my first time since I was
real small that I had meet her, and my first time ever at the farm house. She
looked at me watching as I looked at all the pictures and really old things not
daring to disturb any thing, for it lay sacred like an alter. She motioned us
to seat. We did and I blurted out, “Is that really the president’s signature?”
as I pointed to the picture sitting next to her. She sat and smiled back, like
a treasure was about to be found and then regaining more posure mixed with
humility. “Yes,”
“And that one to?” I quick as a
button pointed to John Wayne. She replied in nod, then leaning forward she
rattled through a list of names, some presidents, or some other famous persons
of such and such. I being a kid had no idea who some of the big names she
spilled out as memories seeming just a hand reach away came back to her. I
think she had a memory like mine and it spanned a century, well almost. I said,
“How far back can you remember/” We really weren’t supposed to ask questions,
and my natural curiosity to know things took a hold of me and I was out of
control. Mark and Mary we still sitting on the couch but I had been up at the
end of great grandma finger as she pointed to each name. Marry and Mark had
seen this room several times, and had herd some of great grandma’s stories. I
had not.
She leaned back in her chair, and
began. “I can go back. She started, “I lived through two world wars, and the
turn of the century. I seen so many presidents and have been able to vote for a
bunch of them after we won the right to vote” “ I remember most of all back
then even as a young girl. The war had been over for almost”, She paused and
looked at us as our faces got a look of confusion. “The Civil War didn’t just
finish we had reconstruction to do everything was a mess, and the work was
still going. Boy everybody was working, the mothers all gathered to feed the
men, for new roads, bridges, buildings, farming, everything needed doing. Those
fat cats, they took a lot right from the beginning so it took ten to twenty
years to really get anything going, so we all had to work, everybody, but we
did it together. We all worked together we gathered on some nights and had
great dances, all the musicians, would bring their instruments, and we would
have a time. But the next day we were all working again. It wasn’t for yourself
we worked, we worked for everybody, and everybody had a job, and everybody new
each other, we all shared the work on all the farms, as the men did their part.
We had to share and receive helping each other we had communities, well a whole
country that still needed rebuilding. It took those first ten or so years for
folks to start getting along again, and at first everyone waited for the
government to make the difference right here at home.” She paused and looked
out the window again, “At least that’s what my mom told me, not complaining
about the work but just telling her daughter why everybody decided to start
working together, and why. It was out of necessity. We had to do our part.” ‘Things
as I remember didn’t start really getting get up and running, schools,
universities, the whole system again until after the turn of the century, then
the industrial revolution started, and again everybody had jobs, people started
moving to the cities. Yep things took a while, then a World War took men away
again, in stead of our men dying at home our men went off fighting across the
sea. She stood up and pressed down her dress, and said, “Well let’s all go we
got some more work to do before dinner.” Some things you never forget, and like
how good the green beans were after we picked them and had them for dinner.
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