They ain't much very special
About little ol' towns
Hidin' deep in the mountains
Not much business around.
Why, they can't even afford
A single stoplight in some
They roll up their sidewalks
Before the sun ever sets.
Folks still sit out on porches
Ol' men whittle an' wait
Drinkin' sody pop an' Moonpies
Chewin', spittin' to boot.
They tell lies, swap knives
Laugh at their own jokes
Their wives still are pesterin'
While they sit a' jesterin'
Women still gossip over coffee,
Tea and a fresh baked crumb cake
They rant, rave an' rail on
At the messes their husbands make.
Ornery youngin's wander yards,
Back alleys an' half empty streets
Prankin' an yankin' a little gal's hair
Hootin' an' hollerin', fillin' the air.
It ain't much of a place
To raise youngin's ye know
Ain't even no movies
Not many places to go.
Yet as they talk of their town
The place they was raised
Folks get all misty, red eyed an'
Weepy, rememberin' how it was.
Arnett Homeplace, Double Creek, Kentucky - home of my Great Aunts Mag and Bess and Great Uncle Bill. This is something I wrote 8 years ago (7/7/2004) as I dreamed of the place
Cousins,
It is so easy for me to close my eyes and go back to
those summer memories. Somehow about 40 years fall off and I am 11 and
it is July in the hills of Kentucky.
Double Creek is
where my Grandma moved after my Grandpa (my namesake Steve Hollen) died.
I should say she moved back to Double Creek because that is where she
was born. My Uncle Bert built his Mama a log cabin right across the
creek from the Arnett homestead. Family tradition says that Grandma's Grandpa - Tom Arnett built the log cabin
back after the Yanks and Rebs kept coming by and taking anything that
wasn't tied down.
The creek that ran through the little
valley was the center of my day. My brother and I waded into the creek
early each morning and wandered up and down about 2 miles of Little
Double Creek as we played.
Crawdads were a favorite
catch for us as we bent over shallow pools filled with sand and small
rock for our prey to hide under. Our hands wrapped around rocks as we
cornered them or waited patiently as they would scoot backward into our
waiting grasp. Our girl cousins were often chased by one or both of us.
Hands full of crawdads were a wonderful prize! We didn't care that their claws dug deep into
our tender palms as long as we could terrorize a sweet mountain girl.
Down
where Little Double and Big Double Creek split off was out swimmin'
hole. It was the deepest spot on the creek. It was also the most
distant from Grandma's house at over a mile away. That wasn't much of a
problem since everyone along that creek was kin. We waved as we walked
the dusty road. Cousins, Aunts and Uncles waved back and sometimes
called us in for a cold Coke or maybe some blackberry cobbler with sweet
cream poured on top.
The family names along that creek
were like a genealogy lesson...Hollen, Arnett, Gilbert. Smith, Bowling.
All settlers in the early 1800s. All family on one side or the other.
The
swimmin' hole was also the place where folks were baptized when the
circuit ridin' preacher held services in the one room school house on
Double Creek. He came once a month, preached, had dinner with folks and
in the afternoon would baptize any folks that got saved in the last
month or two.
Seems like my brother, my cousin J.M. and I
practiced baptizin' each other a few times in that swimmin' hole.
Sometimes it was solemn and sometimes we would just grab someone and
dunk 'em quick and hard.
As we would walk home the
yellow dust from the road would cover our feet like magic shoes. We
would run, fleet at the whitetail deer that would often stand on the
hillsides. They would pause under the shade of a sweet gum or sourwood
and watch as we raced home.
A quick stop at the creek
to wash off the dust and we would run into the cabin or to Grandma's
house to change and get ready for supper.
Supper might
be fried chicken, mashed or fried taters, slow cooked green beans with a
big ol' chunk of ham, plenty o' tomaters, green onions, fresh slaw and
maybe even fried poke or maybe wilted mountain greens with chopped green
onions and covered with a dressing of vinegar, bacon grease and a
little sugar to cut the "whang" of the vinegar. Cathead biscuits with
real churned butter and sorghum or home made jelly
would be our bread. If there was time to bake we might be surprised
with butter rolls - sweet and filled with sugar, cinnamon and swimmin'
in a buttery sweet sauce.
Cousin, even tonight I close my eyes and I
float down that creek, back through 40 years to a simpler
time. Jump in here with me, enjoy the cool creek water and let's float back
down the creek together.
Aunt Mag and Aunt Bess won't mind me bringin' friends home for supper. I do it all the time. They'll be proud to see y'all.
