Altar Call – Opelika-Auburn News
Walter Albritton
September 28, 2008
Forgive
an old man for cherishing memories of boyhood days on the farm
Younger folks can
skip this column today. I don’t want to bore the young with talk of my
childhood. But maybe the older generation will understand why it is important
to look back now and then. Yes, I know, we must not live in the past. We need
to look to the future. But there are some things about the good old days that we
must not forget.
Family reunions were always
fun. My mother was the oldest child of
the Seth Johnson clan and I was the oldest grandchild. By the time I was eight
or nine, there was quite a crowd at the annual gathering. The occasion was
usually the Saturday nearest the fourth of July.
The old home place
was a beautiful country home just off the
Few families can afford
to maintain a home big enough to raise 13 children. The house served its
purpose and was gone in less than a hundred years. Life goes on. Change takes
its toll.
His friends may have called him Seth, but the
only name I ever heard my grandfather called was “Papa.” He and my grandmother,
for whom my sister
The pump house was
one of my favorite spots. It was in the back yard, not far from the steps
leading up to the kitchen. I loved to go inside the pump house and listen to
the old water pump wheezing, coughing, and sputtering as it struggled to pull
cold water out of a deep well. I believe the old pump was powered by a gasoline
engine. .
My cousins and I
shared many adventures during those daylong reunions. One of our favorite
sports was to find a yellow jacket nest, disturb those stinging devils, and run
for our lives. The slowest ones sometimes got stung. I remember being stung a
time or two.
Our uncles would
lecture us about messing with wasps and yellow jackets, then
treat our stings with wet tobacco from a cigarette. We were proud of those
stings. They were our badges of courage. I guess we thought our bravery
impressed the girls.
No reunion passed was
complete a good time playing in the hay barn. It gave us boys a good place to
hide and smoke rabbit tobacco. That was exciting for a few years, but we gave
that adventure up after burning down one of the barns.
None of us ever owned
up to being the guilty party. I guess the truth is we were all guilty. Our
parents must have thought so because we all got a whipping, one of the worst
ones my rear end ever suffered. My dad said I was more responsible than anyone
because I was the oldest. Makes sense I guess.
One aspect of growing
up in a big family was the teasing we endured from our uncles. To survive we
had to learn how to deal with friendly ridicule and sarcasm. They taught us
many lessons, often through the art of embarrassment. If we were too loud, or
impolite, or unwilling to wait our turn, we were sure to get a stern reprimand.
No sin was left unnoticed.
In my late teens I
brought my girl friend to the reunions. Having been raised in a small, quiet
family with no boys, Dean was shocked by my boisterous family. She blushed with
embarrassment when one of my uncles said, “Walter Junior, is that your girl
friend? She’s cute. Where did a country boy like you find her? Has she let you
kiss her yet, Walter Junior?” Both of us wanted to die.
My grandmother saved
the day. She liked Dean and made her feel welcome in her home. The two of them
developed a special relationship that lasted until grandmother died of cancer
in the early fifties. Dean admired the inner strength and strong faith of this
courageous woman who faced her impending death without whimpering. As much as
anyone we have ever known she showed us how to face the harshness of life
without losing faith in the love of God.
At each reunion every
family brought loads of food. The only tables I have ever seen to compare with
those meals were dinners on the grounds at country churches. Sumptuous meals
they were.
Desserts were as
plentiful as meats and vegetables. There were chocolate cakes and apple pies
and banana pudding and always a juicy German chocolate cake. But the main
dessert was freshly frozen, homemade ice cream.
When my cousins and I
were old enough, it was our job to turn the cranks on the ice cream freezers.
It was hard work but our uncles saw to it that we turned those cranks as long
as we could. Then one of them would take over and give the crank a few more
turns to show us how weak we were.
Those were the good
old days. I would not want to go back to the way things were then, but looking
back is good for the soul. Nostalgia has its value. We just need to be careful
not to reminisce too much and neglect the greater value of looking ahead. + + +