About Dad--when we were very little he would come home early from work and take us on a
cookout party at a river in Earlysville. We would swim --he would try to teach us to swim--Pervis (oldest son) was a good swimmer. I was not as daring as he. We would cook out --steaks, potatoes cooked in the fire. That's what I
remember-- then marshmallows cooked in the fire--also potato chips. He also would take us to a lake
on Sunday -- I remember one summer--I sat in the Sun--actually it was cloudy--and I did not realize
that the sun could burn you as badly as it did.
He (Edward) really was a good person --Although he did not want
me to get up above my raising. I am glad I did. Somewhere there was alcoholism in the family. When we drove out in the country on a Sunday afternoon, Dad would take every kid who came
around asking to ride with us. I hated that. I guess I was selfish. I wanted to have a family trip. He wanted
to give the children in our neighborhood a chance to have an experience they could not have with anybody.
These are some of the good things that I remember right away. Maybe I can remember some others. --dated December 2010.
Questions to follow up: would Grandma come along on the picnics? Do you remember Grandad going hunting with his dogs? What would he bring home? I seem to have a memory of eating squirrel at the house on Todd Avenue in Charlottesville, and I remember a pen of hunting dogs, 'coon hounds.
At Yancey's Mill, Grandad kept chickens that laid the most delicious eggs when they were fried up in a black iron skillet on Grandma's big black wood-burning stove. He kept two or three pigs (a dreaded horror: pig-killing time in the fall), and some cows for milk. There were always cows muching away at the lush bottom-land grass and the bucolic clang-clang of cow bells. There was an apple orchard that supplied delicious fried apples too.
No comments:
Post a Comment