Reflecting 2001
Ah, the gentle breeze that drifts across this front porch in the early morning. It’s so easy to get lost in thoughts in this setting and remember how it used to be.
At this time of year some sixty or seventy years ago, vegetable gardens were reaching their peak and canning was in full swing. How well I remember washing the dirty jars in a wash tub out by the well and then taking them inside for yet another washing in a dishpan, using Octagon soap, to be scalded with water poured from a steaming kettle. It was always so hot in our kitchen, facing east, and without air conditioning – air conditioning my eye – we didn’t even have electricity. That old wood range had to be fired to keep the green beans simmering in the black pot which had been dropped down in the hole left by removal of the stove eye. When have you every thought of an “eye lifter?” That’s what it took to remove the stove eye so the pot could be lowered closer to the heat. At the same time the beans (usually with fresh potatoes and maybe a few pods of okra on the top) were cooking, cornbread would be baking in an old iron skillet in the oven. We had to get all the mileage we could from an arm loaf of stove wood.
When the corn was ready, we would always have company to eat and when we had corn, which we called “roas sneers” (translated roasting ears), we always had hot biscuits.
No wonder I’m so fat! It was starch, pure and simple! In the days of the Great Depression my folks ate “roas sneers” for breakfast and even afterwards,as long as Mother was able to cook, some time during the “corn season” we would have “roas sneers” for breakfast. Um — good eatin”.
Crops were “laid by” about this time of year and farmers could get a brief respite from the field chores. And, also, it was about this time that churches in the community would have their revival — back then called “Protracted Meetin”. Today it seems that churches schedule their revivals the very same week, but in years past the Baptists and Methodists would visit each other’s revival and the house was always full. Windows were raised and the funeral home fans were put into operation. There were morning and evening services and usually the “meetin'” lasted two weeks. Ladies would try to outdo each other with their cooking for the visiting preacher.
When it was Mother’s turn to feed the preachers she would always lecture Daddy (a died-in-the-wool democrat) about not discussing politics at the table. Her efforts were futile and the subject always came up — much to her dismay. As a teenager, I was allowed to spend a few days visiting my cousins at Skirum during the “Protracted Meetin’.” Of course, we all walked to and from services and at night it was such a thrill to walk back to their house. The road was full of young folks talking and laughing. Sometimes there would be couples paired off together and walking some distance from the crowd.
It was at this uncle’s that I was introduced to “soakies.” At breakfast they enjoyed biscuits soaked in hot coffee. I don’t remember just what I ate — I didn’t and (still don’t )drink coffee. I wanted to drink it as a child, but Daddy wouldn’t let me — he told he it would make my face black. Years later when I told this story to the janitor at my daughter’s school, he assured me it wouldn’t turn my face black if I put cream in it. He further stated that he drank his coffee black. I’ll never forget Sylvester — he was a jewel.
Too many chores await to try to name them all and here I sit on this cool porch remembering how it used to be with that style of country living.