Appalachian Porch

Rocky Mount, Virginia home

Some of my most cherished memories are of my grandmother’s porch. Extending around three sides of the early 1900’s large wooden house, it has been the scene of many chapters of my life. The two porch swings on either corner have been there since before I was born, looking out on Court Street, in Rocky Mount, Virginia. I’ve just returned from a summertime visit.

Here’s Thomas telling one of his stories from the porch swing, Sept/07

This is my mother today. In my mind there’s another picture of a much younger woman on the swing beside my once-handsome father, reduced to skin and bones by cancer in 1984 but still with those same intense blue eyes. And way before that, the 1944 wedding pictures on the porch and all the beautiful bridesmaids in their pastel dresses. There are all the memories of coming to visit Aunt Ebby and Mammie/Mama Emma/Miss Emps. Of playing on the porch with cousins, and finding neat places to hide in the wonderful expanse of bushes and paths, and little secret places. Of the 2 gigantic elms that used to tower above the porch, and the Franklin County red dirt. Listening to the wonderful night sounds and catching lightning bugs. And most of all the feeling that there was so much love around me that no matter what I would always be cherished.

Appalachian red dirt

There was the year my first two children and I spent with Mom and my sister Ebby, when I needed a break from an abusive marriage. I have a photo of 7-year-old Cosmo in cape, tights and underpants, Superman about to fly from the porch rafters. Then there was the summer Cosmo bought an old van so that teenage Josh and Will and I could drive across the hot, humid continent - we finally got cool on the porch swings. Grown up Tamaya brought her handsome beau from North Carolina and his handsome dog Cisco to sit on the porch swing, before she brought them home to BC.

Maybe it was the cold spring and summer on the north coast that made me unable to resist this summertime visit to a beloved place and people. It's my sister Ebby's house now and she's doing a wonderful job of restoring a much loved home.
This is cousin Emma, one of Franklin county's best loved teachers. She's now retired but all ready to give nephew Matthew a chance to learn about taking pictures - of the porch swing.

Niece Kristy and Jenna and Ryan with grandma on the swing.
So many cousins have spent time together on this porch!
Freckles the cat was a stray that chose this porch, and family, for her own.
The ministers came for dinner – John and Rachel are the husband and wife clergy team at Trinity Episcopal Church (my father’s first parish)
John and Rachel's son Boyden loves watermelon

and so does Matthew.

Mom appreciates her walking partner Susy
and the return home to the porch.

Ebby and John's wedding anniversary on July 11, same day as my mom and dad's.

This time of year it’s hot in Virginia

Nephew John keeps cool on Court Street
The pond behind the school was rumored to have trout -
but they must have been hiding in the cool pond bottom

Too hot for a zebra even – nephew John knows we love animals and wanted us to see some different ones at the drive through animal reserve near Natural Bridge, Va.

It’s still wonderful to visit Mama Helen – now at the Franklin County nursing home. Here with Mom, my sister Ebby and cousin Randolph.

We also visited Uncle Skeeter. And had our traditional smorgasbord lunch at the Dutch Inn in Martinsville – now how did they know how to fix Mama Helen’s brown beans and corn bread?
Uncle Skeeter has long been a gardener, and knows every bird in southwestern Virginia. I had to ask him about that sweet singing mockingbird that calls me out to the porch swing every morning.
Here’s Ebby’s garden. From it we ate tomatoes, cucumbers and green beans – a real treat for me on my 100 mile diet!

Virginia full moon July full moon shines on Ebby’s garden

Here’s a website link for anyone wanting to learn more about the joy of local food.
http://animalvegetablemiracle.org/index.html

One of my favourite authors is Barbara Kingsolver. She’s the one who restored my love of literature with The Bean Trees. Then came Prodigal Summer some years later. And what do you know – she set this wonderful book in a fictional county next to my own Franklin County. And now guess what she’s done – moved to the Appalachians herself! She and her husband and 2 daughters are on a local food diet, and growing most of their food. There’s some challenging stuff and lots of new inspiration in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, A Year of Food Life. From her website (above) we found a source for locally grown heritage turkeys. We 've ordered one for the family reunion at Thanksgiving.


An important part of the live-aboard lifestyle are the book exchanges along the coast. Reading material comes along in its own way. When I opened Up from Slavery, written in 1901 by Booker T. Washington, I read: “I was born a slave on a plantation in Franklin County, Virginia.” I slipped the book into my pocket. Being also born in Franklin County, some 90 years after him, Booker T. Washington feels like a familiar part of where I come from. He would have run barefoot in the same red dirt. As a child we often drove past the Booker T. Washington Memorial, and I learned in elementary school that he founded the Tuskegee Institute, but what a vision he had! His own struggle from illiterate slave to world-renowned educator gave him great confidence in education for others. He writes of “this experience of a whole race beginning to go to school for the first time.” (I was reminded of Pablo Friere and the powerful literacy movement of popular education in the 1980’s in Central America.) He had a way of powerfully challenging and uplifting without being confrontational. It was the respectful approach needed during the chaotic reconstruction period in the South. It was right for his times, and he was able to accomplish major fundraising – people from so many perspectives appreciated his work at Tuskegee.

What I loved most was what they did at Tuskegee. The students learned practical skills along with their academic education. They built their own dormitories, and beds, and ran the laundry. They built all the buildings at Tuskegee, and made the bricks in the foundry they built. He didn’t think to even mention that of course they grew their own food.

Booker T. Washington had a combination of compassion, vision, intelligence and unstinting hard work. And now in our century we have such another among us. I just wish I could find my old US Social Security Number so I could register to vote for the Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama.