All Uphill…

There is something about dirt– something mysterious, satisfying, irresistible.  I like the smell of freshly turned earth.  I want to work it, to plant and grow something.  Although my parents didn’t grow up on farms, my grandparents did.  They knew mule-driving, cotton-picking, cow-milking, hog-butchering, heart-and-back-breaking, never-slacking, never-ending, get up at four and do-it-again dirt, sun, and sweat work. If the crops failed, the family went hungry. Although I am a few generations removed, and can’t claim a fraction of the toughness, knowledge, and resiliency of my forebears, still, even in my soft life of modern American ease-there’s something about working the dirt.  And there’s something about walking out the door and collecting a bucketful of vegetables from the garden- a garden like Granddaddy’s.

Although he never told me about it himself, by all accounts, my Granddaddy Cochran, the second of nine children, had a hard raising.  His father, Boone, was born into a rough-and-ready clan in the mountains near the Georgia-Tennessee border in the summer of 1889. Boone was brilliant, exacting, hard to get along with, and too often drunk.  His wife, Luna, Grandaddy’s mother, a devout Methodist and well-educated for her day, (the daughter of a scholarly public-school teacher), certainly had a hard time, too.  My dad told a story about Luna smuggling a hacksaw blade into the Benton, Tennessee jail to help Boone escape, (which he did). Perhaps that was merely a story, but it might have been true.

Anyway, my granddaddy, Lacey, left home and married young. Jobs being scarce during the Great Depression, he moved to New Orleans, where he worked nights at the port, unloading cargo.  He wasn’t a big man, but he was used to long hours, heavy work, and no complaining.  Lacey found a man willing to rent out a room in a nice house-at an affordable price- and sent for Tommie, his pretty, vivacious bride, who was the youngest daughter of a fiery Baptist minister.

The woman of the house where the newlyweds rented their room was elegant, fashionable, and even in those bleak times, had plenty of money. Before long, Tommie found out that a baby was on the way- and the landlady was dotingly kind and helpful.  She even gave Tommie the gift of a full layette- finest quality, beautiful clothes for the baby who would be arriving soon- everything the new mother would need.  Tommie was so appreciative, she told everyone she knew about her landlady’s generosity. In return, someone told my grandmama where her benefactress made all that money.  The lady’s wealth involved a certain house that she owned, and the profitable business she operated there- a business the sheltered daughter of a Baptist minister might find…shocking.  And there was Tommie’s sweet baby girl wearing lacy gowns bought with the wages of…well, you know. Unloading banana boats all night and living in the home of a well-known madam was not the life the young couple had envisioned.

They moved to Atlanta, where their second child, my dad, arrived- and Granddaddy worked as a short-order cook. Then they moved back to Grandmama’s hometown, Dalton; and over time, Granddaddy became a successful businessman, a leader in his church and community.  He purchased some acreage and brought Grandmama and their six children from town to a big house in the country.  Granddaddy wanted a farm again, but this time as a hobby and investment, not for survival. After all, there’s something about dirt.

When six children grow up, it’s a safe bet that grandchildren will follow…in Granddaddy’s case, lots of them.  I was one.  I loved my granddaddy, but not with a warm and snuggly, climb-up-in-his-lap kind of love. Grandmama greeted us at the door of their always-bustling house with a big smile, a bear hug, and an enthusiastic “Give me some sugar!” Granddaddy was harder to locate in the action.  I never doubted that he was a good, hard-working, honest, godly man who loved his family; but Granddaddy hid a tender, sensitive heart behind a gruff exterior.  As a child, I don’t remember him ever picking me up, or telling me a story, or even holding my hand.  I do remember him cooking omelets for everybody in the big kitchen- the best omelets ever. The secret ingredients were whatever he put in the tomato sauce and English peas. (The omelets were amazing; trust me).  I remember his savory beef stew (and the time the pressure cooker exploded).  I remember his sausage gravy.  And I remember his garden.

On the other side of the creek, Granddaddy had tilled up a long patch of ground and grew his vegetables in rows.  He always planted a line of zinnias (he called them old maids) in front.  I don’t need a photograph to remember how he looked, walking in from the garden wearing Bermuda shorts (riding low), his white ribbed tank undershirt, and dark socks- deeply tanned and carrying a big bucket full of the day’s bounty.  He and Grandmama would fry up a “mess of squash” and “okrie,” and serve up corn on the cob, sliced tomatoes (some almost as big as the plate), green beans, and corn bread.  There’s no better food in the world.  Different aunts, uncles, and cousins would be gathered there eating dinner and “cutting up,” but Granddaddy didn’t linger long at the table.  He wasn’t one for idle chatter or sitting around.

Granddaddy made the most wonderful bread and butter pickles.  When I was grown and he had retired, I asked for his recipe.  He said he didn’t have a recipe, but would be glad to show me how he did it. We spent the afternoon making pickles- just Granddaddy and me.  I treasure the memory of that day.

I have to think that my love of vegetable gardening comes mostly from him.  When I’m collecting ripe, juicy tomatoes for a sandwich (best with Miracle Whip and white bread), or picking a bucket of beans, I think about a sweet little boy who had too much work and responsibility thrust on him far too soon- an intelligent boy who had to give up school for farm work, and who dreaded for his father to come home, mean and full of whiskey.  I think of a young man who was determined to provide for his family- even if the only job he could get was unloading banana boats or working the grill.  I think of a father and mother who built a happy home for six lively, fun-loving children, and left a strong and true faith-legacy.  I think of a talented businessman whose hard work and sound decisions carried him farther than he dreamed he could go.  I think of a granddaddy who might have seemed crusty to a granddaughter who, like him, expects too much out of people, and who sometimes may seem a little crusty herself. I think about a family patriarch leading, advising, and praying for his family; and, right before dark, the homemade banana ice cream devoured, the ball games played, while everybody is sitting around “cutting up,” he abruptly stands, grumbling, “It’s time for y’all to go home now.  I’m going to bed.”

When I graduated high school, Granddaddy wrote me a letter- in his own hand- on Chief Home and Auto stationery.  I still have it- the only letter I ever got from him.  He said he was proud of me. He offered encouragement- writing that my “fine training” and “faith in God” would keep me “strong and upright.” Finally, he gave me a blessing.   The words mean a lot because his words of praise were not liberally or flippantly bestowed.  I’m proud of you, too, Granddaddy; and while you were here, I never understood or appreciated all you overcame.

But now the sun is shining and I’m going to the garden to dig in the dirt.  I found a package of old maid seeds that I haven’t planted yet.  I’ll pick a mess of squash to fry up for supper, and fill a bucket with green beans. There are some weeds in the sweet potatoes that need to come out and an ailing pepper plant to tend to.  I’ll squish the bugs that I can catch- the ones eating holes in the bean leaves, and I will listen to the birds.  I will escape the noise of the world to think, and plan, and dream.  In a couple of days there will be enough cucumbers to make bread and butter pickles.  A little dirt under the fingernails is good for the soul. I hope my grandchildren figure that out, growing “strong and upright,” like Granddaddy and the plants in his garden.

Keeping chickens was not on any list of things I planned or hoped to do.  I felt satisfied with my level of poultry-knowledge: “That is a chicken.” Sometimes, however, the road takes an unexpected turn and one may find oneself engaged in all sorts of uncharacteristic behaviors: applying Preparation H to a hen’s hindparts, spending the night in a barn, poking roosting possums with a garden rake in the dead of night, and taking a chicken to kindergarten.  My road to chicken-keeping started with an innocent gift- and then one thing led to another.

Daughter 2 gave me a book- Margaret Floyd’s Eat Naked– and my ideas about food and stuff masquerading as food turned upside down. Appalled and enlightened, I purged pantry and refrigerator- and learned to cook all over again.  My revamped, reformed, clean grocery list now included fresh, locally sourced, organic eggs from pastured hens.  No problem- I found some just around the corner.  A thirteen-year-old neighbor was an enterprising egg-merchant.  I had my source, and she had a steady customer, until two unrelated events coincided and put her out of business: a fox got into her henhouse and she got a learner’s permit to drive.  She had no more hens and no more interest.  I had no more fresh eggs delivered to my door.

I considered that if a middle-schooler could oversee a chicken operation, I could, too.  I researched chickens and began the task of convincing a skeptical husband that we needed laying hens and they would make me happy.  By and by Husband and Son built a pen, Son-in-law 2 constructed a chicken house, Daughter 1 found a sketchy mountain woman who was willing to part with four hens at a special city-slicker rate, and we were poultry farmers.

Although I had never touched a live chicken before I brought Violet, Victoria, Margaret, and Edith home, it wasn’t long before I was catching and cleaning up after them (chickens are messy critters), tucking them into bed each night, highlighting passages in chicken books, frequenting farm supply stores, and unblinkingly treating prolapsed vent.  (If you don’t know, don’t ask).  Unfortunately, the condition recurred and we ended up eating Margaret.

As shocking as eating Margaret may sound, Margaret’s homegoing was mercifully quick and not nearly as traumatic as what happened to Octavia.  Over time, we doubled the size of the pen and added to the flock (chickens are like tattoos- or potato chips- you always want another one- or six).  Except for Edith’s demise and a tragic  incident involving an unlatched door and Pumpkin the terrier, things had gone fairly well- until the morning I found what was left of stunning, iridescent-plumed Octavia.  Violet, the flock’s benevolent matriarch, was alive, but missing half her feathers.

According to Storey’s Guide to Raising Chickens, “Predators” chapter, evidence indicated a raccoon raid; and Storey warned that the perpetrator would return.  I determined to stakeout the crime scene.  I would spend the night in the barn with ninety-five pounds of tooth and muscle (Scout) and a remorseless killer (Pumpkin).  We would be ready for trouble, when trouble came.

After dark, Ray set a humane trap, wished us good night and good luck, and hurried back to the house. I had a pillow, a blanket, and a LED flashlight with a strobe feature that could cause a stroke.  Scout promptly ran into Ray’s trap and sprung it. Pumpkin wanted the fish inside and they growled at each other while I crouched between them with the flashlight, permanently stuck on strobe, vainly trying to reset the trap.  Giving up, I searched the barn for a weapon; I chose my driver and my four-iron, and set the clubs by the door.  Any good chicken farmer would do the same, I think.

In the barn, windows open to the strange noises of the night,  I lay on a tiny cot. Scout and Pumpkin disagreed over who would sleep on an old car cover until Pumpkin, seeing he couldn’t win, jumped on the cot with me.  Scout came over and licked my face with a foot-long tongue that had licked a lot of other things that day, and Pumpkin objected.  My face was between a lot of teeth.  Finally, I curled up with too few covers and too much Pumpkin, listening for a ruckus, while Scout cried and wanted to go home.  So passed the long hours of the night.

In the pale gray light before sunrise, all was well in the coop.  Shivering and exhausted, I called our vigil a success.  My comrades and I headed back to the house, and that’s when the raccoon came for Roxanne.  A few days later, in broad daylight, he ate sassy Victoria (or at least the part he wanted).

Ray chicken-wired the rafters.  He set the trap every night, but Pumpkin viewed it as a handy cat food dispenser.  Seasoned poultry farmers know that displaying a sprung trap, decorated with tufts of dog hair, is not an effective anti-predator strategy. Someone advised that voices on a radio fool animals into thinking that people are around, so I blared conservative talk radio from the barn around the clock.  A month went by, with no more attacks.  Aha!   The raccoon was a democrat!

We were down three hens- and Beatrice hadn’t laid an egg in five weeks, she was so traumatized- (whether by the violent murders of her friends or the election-year politics she had been listening to for seven hundred twenty hours, it’s hard to say).  Anyway, it was time to replenish the flock.

I like started pullets-self-sufficient “teenagers” that quickly mature- but they’re hard to find locally in midsummer. I had never raised chicks- talk of heat lamps, brooders, and pasty-vent seemed too intimidating; but after reading up on chick-raising, I decided to try.  The grandchildren, my mother, and I headed to the farm supply.

To my surprise, a shipment of pullets had just arrived.  I went to choose a few, leaving Mother and the children watching chicks.  Although I no longer needed chicks, leaving without them wasn’t an option.  My pullets crated, I came back to the chick box and caught six of the biggest, most active birds, having learned that chicken-raising can carry a high mortality rate.  At the register I said, ” I need a bag of chick starter and a bag of shavings. I have four pullets and six chicks.”  I turned to smile at my favorite six-year-old, who was holding something in her hands.

While I was picking out pullets, a kindly farmer had caught for her the chick she pointed out- the tiniest, most delicate, downy yellow baby in the box.  “This is Penny,” she said, beaming.

“Make that seven chicks,” I told the cashier, with a feeling of dread in my heart.

The pullets went into the chicken pen.  The chicks went on the back porch. They quickly outgrew the red tub that formerly housed an earthworm colony, and  graduated to a kiddie pool filled with shavings and enclosed with a rigging of plastic garden fencing, crossbeams and clothespins.  They were fun to watch for several weeks, but cleaning their quarters wasn’t fun; and when we returned from a day out to find escaped chicks (and their calling cards) all over the porch, we deemed them ready to try their luck in the chicken penitentiary.

Everyone lived in happy harmony- four hens, four pullets, seven thriving chicklets until… the massacre.  I could have been playing NPR on the radio- the raccoon wasn’t a democrat after all. It had ripped through the chicken wire in the rafters, dispatched one of the pullets, and killed every single chick.  I wept over Penny and cussed all the raccoons in the county.  While I bore a bucket of remains to Poultry Memorial Gardens, Pumpkin discovered five raccoons under the barn, sleeping off breakfast and dreaming of seconds.  (There were none).

Thankfully we somehow intercepted the subsequent possum invasion just in time, Son-in-law 1 hearing me yelling for help that night.  And the five-foot rat snake got tangled in the netting between the roof and the rafters all by itself. Chicken keeping is a dangerous endeavor.  Everybody likes chicken.

At the moment, we have a flock of twelve hens. They remind me of a crowd of middle school girls.  Violet, Beatrice, and Francine are the “cool kids.”  Ingrid is a big girl with low self esteem who has no idea how pretty she is.  She sort of hangs out with the cool kids because she and Francine became friends before Francine climbed up the raccoon-emptied-rungs on the social ladder.  Eleanor, Rosalynn, and Jacqueline have their own clique.  Blanche and Delores are outsiders who “lay low” but roost together to stay warm.  Cindy, Suzy, and Pepper started in the community as tiny chicks and will always be best friends.  Francine minds everybody’s business.  Pepper is shy.  Violet is curious and likes to be petted.   (She’s the one who went to kindergarten).  All twelve of the clucky girls are funny, and beautiful, and busy.  They have a combined I.Q. of about forty.   I like to watch them carry on.

Who knew when my daughter handed me a book about clean food, Ray and I would end up doing strange things like eating quinoa and working for a bunch of chickens?  Ray claims the  fresh,  locally sourced, organic eggs from pastured hens that we collect each day cost us about fifty dollars apiece. I disagree.  They are priceless.

We do it every year.  First, we drag an evergreen tree into the house, set it in a prominent location, cover it with white or colored, blinking or non-blinking, large or tiny lights, and hang shiny objects all over it.  We pile gifts under it, party around it, then, after about a month, we haul it away, clean up the house, and begin a new year.  Our custom might seem strange to an outsider- but a lot of things we do aren’t necessarily logical.

The meaning of the custom has evolved over time- pagans celebrating the winter solstice may have started decorating their homes with evergreens, hoping for the rebirth of nature after the cold dark winter; but German Christians adopted the idea, brought in a whole tree, attached lights, and celebrated new spiritual life through the Savior who brought light to a cold, dark world. The holiday we call Christmas, with its odd melding and tension between sacred and secular, generosity and materialism, festivity and sadness, is here once more.  In comes the tree.

Today, our Christmas tree stands in all its glory. Mine is no perfectly decorated, stunning arrangement of color-coordinated ornaments, ribbons, and expensive foo-fahs.  Mine is a tree of memory- the process of decorating a full-hearted, sometimes chuckly, sometimes misty-eyed walk with the Ghost of Christmas Past, who is far kinder to me than he was to Scrooge.

While there are fragile, beautiful, valuable, sparkling orbs- store bought, gifted, or stolen during cut-throat competition at ornament exchanges- many of the most precious ornaments I pull from the boxes are those handcrafted by beloved artists of highly variable levels of skill.

Back in the early years of family-building, my friend Susan hosted a party each December. Every guest fashioned twelve identical ornaments and we gave them to each other. None of us had yet undergone the collection process that fills attics or basements with plastic containers labeled “Christmas.”  We were helping each other get started (and escaping from babies).  I treasure Ellen’s hand-cut paper angels sewn together in a perpetual dance, even though they are now bent and yellowed and would prefer to lie flat.  I cannot blame them. Every year for decades, they continue to come out: Rhonda’s funky wood creations, Robyn’s ribbon stars, Anna’s noodly Christmas tree…I marvel at the creativity of Susan’s tree bark Santa, smile at Jan’s festoonment of a big Christmas bulb, and finger the little doily Jenny Modge-Podged, be-ribboned, spray-painted, and turned into a work of art.  We were young moms, trying to make ends meet, laughing and learning together- now many of us are grandmas- and the ornaments I hang on my tree are symbols of friendships forged during a joyful, exhausting, action-packed season of life.

Representing less skill, perhaps, but just as much value, are child-made ornaments: glitter-encrusted popsicle sticks glued crookedly into the approximation of snowflakes, yarn-angels tied at a long-ago Girl Scout meeting, cinnamon stars, a faux stained-glass Christmas tree constructed by one of the Fain boys and acquired at a homeschool group party. I think about happy, messy hours around our kitchen table, a cold rain falling outside, Christmas carols on the casette player, and my little ones busily gluing, twisting pipe cleaners, shaping salt dough, painting, and glitterizing the entire home. One special treasure is a snowman Ray made with clear plastic beads that melted together in the oven when he was a kid in Connecticut.  It was probably a toxic process, but what did we know in 1966?

Precious remnants and rejects from Ray’s parents’ trees in Hauppauge and my parents’ trees on Hardwick Circle in the early 1960’s may be found- “Shiny Brite” balls that aren’t so shiny or bright any more, but wear the mellow patina of many Christmases hanging among tinsel icicles.  For a moment, as I hang a Shiny Brite bell, Mama’s graham cracker cake is in the oven, a piece of hard clove candy is in my mouth, “Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol” is on TV, and I am thinking that Christmas Eve is the longest day of the year. Daddy will come home late, when he closes the store, after every family in town has picked up their lay-aways.  My brother and I will have our pajamas on, and we will sit in Daddy’s lap as he opens the Bible to Luke 2.  “It came about in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus…”   After the story of the birth of Jesus, read from the King James with his storyteller’s expression, Daddy will read “Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house…” Later, my parents, young and filled with excitement, assured that my brother and I are finally asleep, quietly will set out Santa’s bounty. Ray’s parents and my dad are gone now- and my mom is no longer young- but the Shiny Brites remain.

My ornament boxes aren’t empty yet.  There are enough animals to fill a zoo: lots of sheep, a prodigious number of bears (mostly inherited from Ray’s mom, who was the real Mrs. Santa Claus), at least a dozen species of birds (some with real feathers), a surprising number of moose, one orange salt-dough camel (a gift from Jan W., who also taught me how to make bread), reindeer in abundance, Boston terriers, and a German Shepherd peeking out of a stocking.  And then, there are the cats. Where and how we acquired a pair of porcelain cats dressed in gay apparel has faded out of memory, but I think Ray’s mother had something to do with it. The problem arises each year: where to put the cats? We are not “cat people.”  They are heavy. The boy cat’s hanger is broken, so he is awkwardly attached to the tree by a wire hot-glued to the seat of his corduroy overalls. They know they must hang near the bottom, and probably in the back, but out they come each year, suspended in splendor with ice-skating penguins, a raccoon, geese, mice, and a cow.  I haven’t figured out the cow connection to Christmas tree ornamentation, unless this honorable folk-painted bovine represents the patient animal who long ago lent her feeding trough to the Son of God.

Lest the Santas, ballerinas, and snowmen crowd out and overshadow the King of Kings, stars and angels soar on the branches, reminding me of the night that the skies opened and angels shouted “Good News!  The Savior has come!”  Jesus, in silver, wood, and glass, in walnut shells, and embroidery- lies cradled in honor and reverence (though such was not the case when he came from heaven to make peace between God and man).

When I think there is no other spot left, I spy one of great-aunt Flo Belle’s handpainted china ornaments, or Grandmother Hackney’s needlepoints, or a clothespin constable, reindeer, or drum-major.  There is room after all, for one more- until the boxes are empty except for bits of broken glass and dried spruce needles in the bottom.  I step back, and view the ragtag assortment of crocheted snowflakes, various rocking horses, elves, skiers, canoe-paddling bears, wooden soldiers, angels made from everything from macaroni to flower pots- the porcelain cats- and more than one partridge in a pear tree.

In the warm glow of mostly-working white lights, I am satisfied.  I see the love of family, the love of friends, the love of God.  I hear the children giggle as dogs bark out Jingle Bells over the minivan radio, and the soaring pipe organ at Christmas morning church service.  I remember Ray’s mother lighting her flaming Cherries Jubilee, and bedlam at my grandparents’ as all the cousins tear into our gifts.  Those are memories hanging on the branches.  My Christmas tree is not perfectly decorated, but it is perfectly beautiful- and I am thankful for this strange custom.

It’s happened to me lots of times: in Denver, New England, San Francisco- I open my mouth and someone looks at me like I’m some kind of oddity.   “Where are you from?”    As the world becomes smaller, more connected and homogeneous, what sets a small-town Southerner apart?  (Besides the friendly demeanor and beautiful accent):

Courtesy is the hallmark of a true Southerner.  From infancy we’re soaked in it and consumed by it like ice cubes in a sweaty glass of sweet, refreshing tea.

Courtesy is a simple concept- it’s treating people with respect and graciousness. Anybody can do it, but Southerners are deliberately and methodically trained so that courtesy gradually becomes an involuntary process like breathing.

We learn to call our elders “Sir” and “Ma’am” as we learn to talk.  Every Southerner has taken part in the following conversation both as a young child and as an adult:

Adult: (Asks any question requiring an affirmative answer).

Young Child: “Yeah.”

Adult: (severely) “Yeah?”

Young Child: “Yes, Sir.”

Adult: “That’s better.”  (Pats head of child) “Now run along.”

Southerners invite someone else go first, whether in line at the church supper, the bank, or the grocery store; we let other drivers out at busy intersections, and we refrain from honking our horns when the light turns green.  We hold doors open.  We shake our heads and say, “Bless her heart, she’s trying,” instead of becoming impatient toward inept, flustered people.   We do not fail to say “please” and “thank you,” and remember our mamas would tan our hides if we acted ugly.

In the South, family bonds are tight as the bark on a hickory tree.  Grandparents help raise us, cousins feel like brothers and sisters, we know well our great-aunts and third cousins.  We search for ways to claim kin, we look forward to reunions, and somebody has compiled a book on how we are related to every other native of our hometown, by blood or marriage.

Family is deeper than shared history and traditions.  Family is more than whom we eat with, play with, fight with, and fight for.  Family demands the sacrifices of love, commitment, forgiveness, loyalty, and responsibility.  Family is honor. Family is identity.  Family is where we come from, who we are, and what we leave behind.

We listen to the wisdom of old ones, and consider the times, people, and places they have known.  We welcome new ones, crowding joyfully to weddings and baby showers.  We teach young ones what it is to be family.  We stand at the funeral home, arms around each other, and bid farewell to ones who are leaving us behind.

We pore over faded photographs, Confederate muster rolls, fragile letters, and lengthy genealogies.  We visit abandoned homeplaces and wander through old cemeteries.  We pass along treasured heirlooms and the memories that accompany them.  In a Southern family, we sing the same songs and tell the same stories over and over (and laugh just as hard every time).  We have the same cowlicks, twin toes, or goofy grins.  We pride ourselves on how fast we all run, how well we all sing, or how good our coconut cake is. (It’s Mee-Maw’s recipe). Family gives us deep roots, ever-spreading branches, and the ability to grow straight and strong.  We rest in its shelter with all the other nuts who look like us.

Southern hospitality is real.

The Southern host has a knack for offering come on in and set a spell comfort. Although the Southern hostess may have been preparing her inviting home, beautiful flowers, monogrammed hand towels, and extravagant amounts of food and drink for days-she is able to convince her company that she has gone to no trouble at all.  She hopes everyone likes the banana pudding- although she is afraid it isn’t fit to eat, it’s way too brown on top.

True Southern hospitality is not about putting on the dog, although a great deal of thought and effort goes into making guests feel valued and welcome.  The secret of Southern hospitality to help friends relax and feel at home, not as guests, but as one of the folks.  They may even help with the dishes.

Southerners love to linger around the table and talk about everything under the sun, especially religion and politics, but a courteous guest knows when to skee-daddle.  When a Southerner stands on the front porch, waves good-bye, and calls “Y’all hurry back,” the chances are good he means it (unless the guest has worn out his welcome by lingering too long around the table).  The guest is eager to come back, because not only did he tell and hear some great stories, but that was the best banana pudding he ever put in his mouth.

Independence is fire in the heart of the Southern character.  Proud and self-reliant, Southerners do not take kindly to being bossed.  A Southerner feels his common sense, courtesy, upbringing, and conscience are good guides; therefore, he doesn’t need anyone sticking a nose in his personal business.  He firmly believes that everyone ought to get down off their high horse and tend their own knitting.

A Southerner will park his truck in the middle of his front yard if he wants to, and he will be angry and offended if anyone tells him he should move it.  A Southerner will rear her children, speak her mind, fire her gun, burn her trash, and make her personal decisions in the manner she deems appropriate. Bureaucrats, paper-pushers, busybodies, “know-it-alls,” “tattletales,” “nit-pickers,” neighborhood association officers, and especially “Yankees” who fall into the former categories, fan the Southerner’s independent spirit into a hot blaze.

A Southerner is generous and quick to help others, but strongly resists receiving any help himself.  A Southerner wants to stand on his own two feet, and resents encroachment on personal liberty.  When someone tells a Southerner what to do, he takes it as a personal attack.  The person who is giving the order (or suggestion) thinks he or she is smarter or better than the Southerner (in his mind), and this insult cannot be borne.  When giving advice to a close friend or family member (the only people it’s acceptable to advise), a Southerner will not say, “You need to move that old washing machine off your porch.”  He will instead say, “If I was you, I might think about carrying off that old washing machine.” The person receiving the advice will then think about moving the washing machine off his porch instead of throwing the adviser off his property. Come to think of it, maybe we are courteous because we are also easily offended. Hmmm…

A Southerner will make his own decisions and pay for his own mistakes, although he usually will not admit he made one.

Southerners “speak to people” whether they know them or not.  They smile, have a quick sense of humor, and a way with words.  They know how to shoot the breeze with anyone they meet.

Weather is always an appropriate topic when shooting the breeze.  The Easter Snap, Blackberry Winter, or Dog Days provide conversational interest during their appropriate seasons, but most of the time the comment, “Fine weather today,” (temperature under 85 degrees) or “Reckon it will get hot later?” (90 degrees or above) is appropriate.  Southerners love sports, gardening, hunting, fishing, cookouts, and most outdoor activity.  The weather usually cooperates, except for a few days in January.

Sports are another good topic, provided both members of the conversation are in agreement over their favorite SEC team, or at least friendly in their rivalry.  An ill-advised “How ’bout them Dawgs?” or “Roll Tide!” make provoke a hostile response, Southern courtesy notwithstanding.  An always-appropriate light conversation starter outside football season is: “I heard the Braves almost won a game last week!”

It’s fine to shoot the breeze in the grocery line by remarking to a stranger: “That’s a pretty bag there in your buggy.  Who does your monogramming?”  It is not fine to nod toward someone farther up in line and whisper, “Look at that get-up.  Bless her heart, she must have got dressed in the dark.  I wouldn’t be caught dead in that.” Shooting the breeze is supposed to be light and pleasant; besides, “she” could very well be the stranger’s second cousin.

For serious conversation, ask a Southerner about religion.  Election or free will?  Immersion or sprinkling?  Once saved, always saved?   The small-town or rural Southerner will have an opinion on most theological or moral questions and many will pull out a well-worn Bible to prove the point. Southern towns are so full of churches, you “can’t stir ’em with a stick.”  They are mostly Baptist, Methodist, or Presbyterian, but there is also a wide selection of other Protestant congregations- from Episcopalians to Pentecostals.  There might also be a Catholic Church and a synagogue.  Out in the country it’s still possible to find a tiny, weather-beaten church where a snake-handler tests his faith, if one looks hard enough.

Sadly, they are becoming scarce as hens’ teeth, but If you find a Southern church where the members call their pastor “Brother Dwayne,” shout “Amen!” when he makes a particularly stirring point, and sing parts, be sure to attend the Fifth Sunday Singing and Covered Dish Dinner.  (Dinner is the noonday meal).  It won’t be easy, but pass up seconds on the fried chicken, creamed corn, collards, and sweet potato casserole, go easy on other “vegetables” like macaroni and cheese, and get on that pecan pie like a duck on a June bug.  It’s Mee-Maw’s recipe.

And that’s “where I’m from.”

Charles Dickens penned the perfect description: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”  He was talking about the tumultuous years of the French Revolution.  I am talking about camping.

Some of my friends joke that they “camp” at the Holiday Inn.  Pshaw.  That’s another humdrum hotel stay.  Pack more gear for a weekend than a family of twelve stuffed in their covered wagon to travel the Oregon Trail- and head out. There will be a story to tell when everybody gets home.

The first time I went camping was a family trip to Vogel State Park in 1967.  I don’t remember why my parents chose to spend our vacation in the mountains instead of at the beach- (unless my dad got to pick that year)- but I do remember the trip. We had a big blue tent that had a lot of poles and stakes- and was hard to set up.  Luckily, I had only to steer clear during the process and remember not to touch the sides if it rained.  I refused to get out of the lake until I turned blue. There was a tall, rickety metal slide in the water that insurance companies and lawyers have since removed, but I went down it a thousand times before they got to it. It was fun.  I had the best of times– and learned to swim.  Mother said she had never worked so hard in her life.

The Girl Scouts of Troop 1210 were not only cheerful, thrifty, and clean in thought, word, and deed- but were badge-worthy campers.  I remember riding to camp-outs in a caravan of station wagons, with flashlights, sit-upons, sleeping bags, dunking bags, ponchos, mess kits, and hobo suppers- and everybody looking forward to banana boats around the campfire. We could always count on s’mores, playing “sardines,” and terrifying tales of “the chicken lady”- “Step… drag.  Step… drag.”   Nobody wanted to sleep next to the tent canvas where the chicken lady might rip through with her chicken-foot and…get you! Once our troop camped in platform tents in slumber party sleeping bags when the temperature unexpectedly dropped below minus fifty, with a stiff north wind. That miserable experience happened at Camp Maynard.

Camp Maynard- more than one miserable experience happened there- but we had a lot of fun, too.  A steep bank fell into the creek and everybody liked to scramble up and slide down- so the seat of almost every camper’s shorts stayed dirty and our Keds were always wet.  Inside the lodge, big glass jars filled with snakes suspended in formaldehyde lined a shelf. (Memorable, but why)? Summers, we went to day camp at Camp Maynard.  We rode a bus, belting out either “Found a Peanut” or “I’m Leaving on the Midnight Train, La-ti-da, Uh-huh, Oh Boy.”  We went on bird walks around the lake with Mrs. R.E. Hamilton (a remarkable denizen of another time).  We painted sticks and clacked them together in a Hawaiian song I am still able to sing, and we played in the creek.  I liked day camp- but the summer after sixth grade, we were old enough to stay overnight- all week.

We set up floorless pup tents on a hillside beneath tall loblolly pines, under the direction of our leaders, hard-nosed sisters who had recently been kicked out of the Marines for being too tough.  We had come to earn the Campcraft badge, and earn it we would.  We hiked with packs and compasses.  We tied knots and lashed sticks together.  We identified flora, fauna, and insects.  We individually built a regular fire in three minutes with two matches, and together we built a ceremonial fire.  We cooked inedible food using various methods.  We safely used pocket knives.  We lay on the ground at night, hoping all the snakes had made it into the jars of formaldehyde.  All this was nothing.

One hot, muggy night, we huddled in our pup tents- filthy, sunburned, chigger-riddled, and hungry.  Thunder rumbled.  While our leaders were absent, gone to shower in the lodge, a terrific thunderstorm exploded around us.  Heavy winds whipped up the ceremonial fire, spreading it to pine straw between the tents. Tall pines above us bent and tossed. Lightning flashed and cracked- and thunder boomed. Girls were screaming and crying- one fainted- (we got to practice our first aid skills), and torrents of rain rushed down the hillside- through our tents.  We fled toward the lodge.  Our leaders met us along the way. “Good Scouts are not afraid of a storm!” they shouted, herding us back to the campsite, where we spent the night- filthy, sunburned, chigger-riddled, hungry, and drenched.  It was the worst of times- almost.  Our method of cooking breakfast the next morning was to wrap a canned biscuit around a stick and toast it over the fire- except there was no fire- only smoke from thoroughly soaked wood.

Incredibly, I kept on camping.

Tent technology improved and it became possible to set up a tent in a few minutes without instruction booklets, awkward pole configurations, and frustrated outbursts.  In our young couple days, we often met friends near the Nantahala River, set up our nifty domed tents, built a fire, roasted hot dogs, pulled out the guitar and sang Country Road, Take Me Home, rehashed our river adventures, solved the problems of the world, and made s’mores.  For ten years, it was the best of times.

Then there came a night beside the Toccoa River when I was done with tent camping- and perilously close to being done with all camping.  Enough rain fell that night to float the ark and overflow the nearby “comfort station.”  An angry, pregnant woman who cannot abide unpleasant odors, two small children, and all the family’s wet camping gear is a tight squeeze in the back of a Datsun pickup with a camper top.

Our next trip was in a brand-new pop-up camper.

The best of times returned.  We camped frequently- in a mob of friends where children outnumbered adults- and we collected stories: of bikes and bears, hikes where we lost a kid or two (we got them back), tubing (some had better tubing stories than others), rafting (mostly right-side-up), skits and games and hickory nuts falling so hard and fast everyone wore bike helmets in the campsite.  We laughed, sang, made s’mores, and dropped buzz bombs into a roaring fire.

During those years I loaded a new generation of courteous, loyal Girl Scouts, with their flashlights, sleeping bags, sit-upons, dunking bags, ponchos, mess kits, and hobo suppers- into a caravan of minivans, and took them camping.  (Happily, they didn’t know about the chicken lady- and I didn’t tell them).

Sure, there have been a few mishaps- But a good Scout isn’t afraid of bats in the camper, yellow jackets in the t-shirt, tornado warnings, or sharing the shower with flying woodland insects the size of small dogs.  Some of our favorite “sayings” come from camp-outs: our friend Chuck, whose words are few, speaking up while eating his dinner beside a sputtering fire in driving rain on a trip he advised against: “This was a bad idea,”…  Little Kristen, who had never heard a bullfrog, calling out in the dark: “Mrs. Debbie…Is that a bear?”  And the ranger, dramatically pronouncing sentence on a rabid skunk: “You know what this means, girls, I’m gonna have to eliminate him.”  

The pop-up is no longer new, and we need a fresh log book- but we’re still good to go. Pack your flashlight, sleeping bag, sit-upon, mess kit, dunking bag, and poncho, and let’s go.  You may never work so hard in your life- but you’ll come home with a story.  It will be the best of times– unless it rains.  Be a good Scout- and don’t forget the marshmallows!