Diary of a Wildflower

by Ruth White

  March, 1928

  Samuel is with me in the kitchen after supper as I give Lawrence a bath.

  “Beyond the mountains,” he says, “the people have a real smart way of talking, and I want you to learn it, so that when you go away you won’t sound like a hillbilly.”

  “But I am a hillbilly,” I say.

  “Not really,” he says. “Caroline remarked that you are one of the few people she knows who actually uses the rules of grammar we all were supposed to learn in school. I’m proud of you for that. But in spite of your good grammar, people who live elsewhere will notice your accent, and they will make fun. I won’t have them laughing at my little sissy.”

  He seems so sad and serious that I wonder if someone laughed at him when he was in Richmond. I ask him as much, and he finally tells me the truth about Lucille.

  “Yeah, I was made fun of. I pretended it didn’t bother me, but it did. A lot, in fact, when Lucille was around.”

  “Well, she didn’t bust up with you on account of your accent, did she?” I ask.

  “No, but it didn’t help. She was from a family that saw themselves as up-and-coming in the social world, know what I mean?”

  Thanks to Jane Austen I do know what he means.

  “Her dad owned a business there in Richmond. Her brother went all the way through college, and Lucille went all the way through highschool. They were big on education.”

  “But you are self-educated, Samuel. I remember how you used to read, and you would tell me all about the stars and planets. You are probably better educated than any of them.”

  “I have read only three books in my life,” Samuel says.

  “What!”

  “All were astronomy books that my eighth grade teacher loaned me.”

  Where did I get the idea that Samuel read tons of books in school, and knew more than anybody about everything?

  “That can’t be true.”

  “Afraid so,” he continues. “Lucille loved me anyway. It was her mom and dad and brother who considered me unfit to be in their highfalutin’ family.”

  “Nobody is too good for you, Samuel. If they don’t see that, then they are just dumb! Besides, you have Caroline, and she’s prettier and smarter than anybody. Are you ever going to propose to her?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve told her I’m not sure I will ever get married.”

  “But she still wants you.”

  “Yes, she loves me, and I love her too, but it’s different from what I felt for Lucille.”

  “Different? How?”

  “I love Caroline as I love you and as I loved Mommie.”

  “It’s not the same as being in love?”

  “Yes. Once you’ve loved in that way,” he says, “with your whole body and soul, you can never marry anybody else. Your heart’s not in it.”

  Samuel has never made a secret of the fact that I am his favorite sibling, and he has always communicated his thoughts and feelings to me, even when I was a little girl. Still, he has never opened up like this before.

  “But don’t you get lonely, Samuel, for someone to share your life with?”

  “I share my life with Caroline, with you and the young’uns.”

  “That’s not the same as having a family of your own.”

  “I’ve seen too many babies born. I don’t want to see any more.”

  I take Lawrence out of the bath and start drying him.

  “Don’t worry about me, Lorelei,” Samuel says. “I’m happy enough with my life. Now, we’re going to concentrate on yours.”

  That’s how it happens that a few days later Samuel comes up the mountain with Abe the mule pulling the flat bed wagon, and hauling something in a wooden crate. Charles helps him carry the crate into the kitchen and set it on the table. Samuel opens it up. Of course we have heard of radios and seen pictures, but this is the real deal. It’s almost as big as the dresser in the big room, and it’s made of a nice dark wood, with an arch of sturdy gray fabric in front where the sound comes out. Samuel places the crate in a corner of the kitchen, throws an oil cloth over it and hoists the radio on top.

  “We don’t got juice for that thang,” Daniel says.

  “The juice is in the batteries,” Samuel explains. We watch as he twists the on/off knob, then uses a second knob to search for a signal. “The salesman said we should get good reception up here on top of this mountain.”

  At that moment we hear a high-pitched screech that hurts our ears, a squeal, a lot of static, and finally a man’s voice. We all gasp at the same time.

  That’s when Dad walks in. “What is this dadlamed thang?”

  “It’s a radio,” Samuel says very calmly. “I bought it for the kids to help with their education.”

  Dad slams his fist on the table, and Jewel shrinks into the corner behind the stove. “You can’t even ask before you bring this modern contraption into my house?”

  “I knew you wouldn’t mind,” Samuel says, still calm. “I know you want what’s best for your family.”

  Dad and Samuel stare at each other for the longest time, and I feel there is something going on between them that the rest of us know nothing about.

  Suddenly music fills the room. Not the church piano or the banjo, or the Jew’s harp. Real music. I can’t even identify what the instruments are. I only know that waves and waves of achingly beautiful music manage to override this undercurrent of dark emotions, and Dad abruptly leaves the room.

  As Bea, Jewel and I prepare supper, everybody else except for Dad sits at the table listening. Nobody speaks. When supper is ready, we turn the radio off, and call Dad to eat. Our meal begins as the quietest one we’ve ever had.

  Finally, without looking up from his plate, Dad growls, “Well, if we have to have one of them thangs, I wouldn’t mind hearing some more of that music.”

  Excitement breaks out as Charles, Daniel and Clint clamor to turn the radio back on.

  “Hey! Sit down, all of you,” Samuel commands. They do as they are told. “Lorelei is in charge of the radio,” he goes on. “It’s her radio until the next one goes to highschool, whoever that might be.”

  Jewel grins. She knows she’s the only other person here who is interested in highschool. Now they are all looking at me like I’ve just been elected president of the United States. I get up and turn the radio on. This time I can’t find any music, but what I do find is a show called Sam and Henry. It’s about two colored men who own a taxi. We try to finish our supper while listening, but soon give up, because all of us, including Dad, are laughing so hard, tears stream down our faces. Even baby Lawrence, who can’t possibly understand the humor, laughs with us.

  After Sam and Henry, a news show featuring our president, Calvin Coolidge, comes on. Dad doesn’t miss a word.

  As Bea, Jewel and I clean up the kitchen everybody is still sitting around the table listening to the radio. I catch Samuel’s eye and we smile at each other. He is happy. I am elated. Tonight there is laughter in this old log house, and music for the first time ever.

  April, 1928

  I move through the chilly spring with my radio, and with Emma, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion. I’m disappointed that Jane Austen wrote no more, but the six books she did write are enough to change me. I read Pride and Prejudice for the third time. The mountains melt away before my very eyes and are replaced by a picture show screen, where I see myself in Jane Austen’s world. There I am, a lovely British aristocrat, wearing my stylish 1810 gown with its high waist and low neckline. I am gliding through an English garden with Mr. Darcy, and he is taking my soft, white hand into his. With his other hand he touches my cheek and we gaze longingly into each other’s eyes. Now his lips are against my lips. His kiss lasts even longer than Rudolph Valentino’s screen kiss at the end of the tango scene.

  Ten

  May, 1928

  On a beautiful spring day Mr. Harmon takes our junior Biology class on a field trip, the objective being to collect specimens in identifying the indigenous plan
ts of Southwest Virginia. I learn that mountain laurel, rhododendron and azaleas are all in the same family. If I had not become a highschool student, I would have to spend my whole life in ignorance of this fact. I also learn that the bloom of the dogwood tree is a protected species, because it’s the state flower. It’s against the law to cut it.

  More important, I learn that when you get Mr. Harmon out of the classroom, he is not at all stuffy. He wears corduroy britches and a red plaid shirt instead of his usual suit and tie. He laughs and jokes with us, and shows us that he is warm and funny.

  We go up the Gospel Road creek, carefully walking on its slippery banks, gathering specimens. We are scattered all over the place so that I find myself nearly alone when we reach that special site which I have christened Roxie’s Park. It’s where Trula and Ford met me and Samuel and Jewel on that April day when my heart was breaking for Roxie. We have since met here often in warm weather. One time Mack came along. He and Trula and their two boys seemed like a perfectly normal, happy family that day.

  I sit down on one of the flat rocks and look at the spot in the woods where Trula and Ford came out from hiding that first day. I remember our joy at seeing each other again, and the picnic on this very rock. I am deep in reverie when somebody sits down beside me.

  “A penny for your thoughts,” says Mr. Harmon.

  “Oh, I was thinking of another day when I was here at this place,” I say. “It was a nice day, but also a sad one.”

  “Why was it sad?”

  As I start to tell him about Roxie, my lip begins to tremble.

  “It’s okay, Lorie. You don’t have to go on.”

  “But I have to learn to talk about it without crying.”

  “Why?” he asks.

  “Because it happened. No matter how hard it was, it happened and it’s part of my life story now.”

  I manage to get the rest of it out without falling apart.

  “I’m sorry you had to go through that, Lorie,” he says, and touches my hand where it rests between us on the rock. “Truly sorry.”

  We sit in silence for a few moments.

  “Lorie!” Opal calls me from the woods. “Come see this huge lichen!”

  “In a minute!” I call back. “I’m resting.”

  Mr. Harmon says, “Lorie, I consider you a very special friend.”

  My heart swells with pride. It’s such an honor to have an educated man like Mr. Harmon consider me a friend. “Oh, thank you, sir. I think you’re special too.”

  “Come on, Lorie!” Opal calls again. “You’ll want to get a sample of it.”

  “Okay!” I call back. I leap to my feet, feeling re-energized.

  Mr. Harmon remains on the rock, staring at the sparkling water. “I’ll be along in a minute,” says he.

  ********************

  When the novelty of the radio has worn off for the kids, I am able to spend time alone with it, listening to the news and interviews with famous people such as Charles Lindbergh. He talks about his flight to Paris in The Spirit of St. Louis a year ago. I look at the far horizon. God, I want to soar with the birds too!

  In preparation for my own journey, I decide to concentrate on learning to speak properly, as Samuel suggested. I listen very carefully to the announcers and repeat back to myself what they are saying in precisely the way they are saying it. The first thing I notice is that the people on the radio are not lazy about enunciation the way mountain folk are. I learn that it is important to pronounce every syllable of a word. You can’t drop your ing’s, and there is a right and wrong way to say your vowels.

  ********************

  With blond hair and shining blue eyes, Uncle Ben’s Opal has always been the brightest Starr on the mountain. Now she is seventeen, almost eighteen, and has developed into a real beauty. Uncle Green’s Vic is also a good-looking boy and pursued by every girl who isn’t related to him. Yet, like me, neither of them has a sweetheart. With this in common and the three of us being serious students in the first highschool class at Deep Bottom, it’s inevitable that we come together like the three musketeers as final exams approach.

  Both Vic and Opal want to meet in the kitchen of my house to study together. I have never had friends to visit before, and even though they are kin and live on the mountain, I am thrilled that they have chosen my home. Of course the radio helps. Uncle Green, who is always ahead of his brothers in everything, has had electricity at his place for a long time, and he had a radio before we did, but his house sits down in a hollow, making his reception poor.

  Dad is friendly to Vic and Opal. They are, after all, his brothers’ children. I think he is actually pleased to have them here. He and Bea and the kids leave us alone in the kitchen. We turn the radio on low and listen to music while we study. Sometimes we tune in to a funny show, and we start laughing so hard we forget to be quiet. At these times Dad might come in and tell us he is trying to sleep, or if he hasn’t gone to bed yet, he’ll say this does not sound like studying to him. We apologize, but I can tell he is not really mad.

  One night Vic and Opal decide to teach me the Charleston. The first thing I learn is that being quiet is next to impossible while doing this dance. Still I am doing great until we get so tickled we have to slip out the kitchen door and walk around in the dark to stop our giggling. The next Saturday in class Vic and Opal tell Mr. Harmon that he should have seen Lorie doing the Charleston.

  “She picked it up like a pro,” Vic says.

  “She looked like she was born to dance,” Opal agrees.

  Mr. Harmon smiles at me. “I’d like to see that. Maybe I will someday.”

  The evenings with Opal and Vic turn out to be some of the happiest times of my life so far, and I am almost sorry to see the school year end. We three, along with the Cole twins, pass our exams, thus becoming proud seniors.

  June, 1928

  Nell has almost quit corresponding, but she can’t resist writing to tell me that she has finished her training to become a nurse’s aide. The sanitorium has released both her and Helen as patients, and has hired them as staff. Now they are looking for a place to live away from the institution. I guess she wants me to be jealous, and I am, but I answer her letter with congratulations and good wishes.

  I tell her that I have only one more year of highschool before I too will go away and seek my fortune. After sealing the letter in an envelope I take my money from its hiding place and count it. I have seventeen dollars. I can go anywhere I want. But I know even that much money won’t support me for long in a strange place. I really must have a job or the promise of a job waiting for me. That’s the hard part.

  ********************

  After bathing at the spring on a soft, summer night, I go to the loft and find Jewel sitting cross-legged on her bed going through her drawings. She has maybe fifty of them that she has found worthy of saving over the years. She does not use scrap paper anymore. I told her long ago that somehow we will find the money for her to use clean paper for her art, and we have done that.

  “Can I see?” I ask, and sit down on the bed beside her.

  “Sure,” she says, seeming pleased.

  Caroline and I are the only people who encourage her drawing, and I feel guilty that I don’t do it more often. She has a lot of sketches that I haven’t seen before – one of the mountains and one of our house, others of Mutt the dog, Abe the mule, also Barney, who died a year ago, and Molly, one of the cows. She has kept her best birds, chickens and pigs, some of which are new to me. She still has the one of Rudolph Valentino doing the tango, and of Sylvia the beggar in her shawl, holding out her cup.

  “Poor Sylvia,” I say, as I look at the picture. “Imagine having to beg for food.”

  “Bea told me that Sylvia had a good man who was a coal miner,” Jewel says, “and they had four little girls. They lived in a camp where the coal company owned all the houses, so when her man was killed in the mine she had to find another place to live. She had no family to help her out. She tried to find
a job, but couldn’t. So when she ran out of money, she took to begging.”

  If Mack should be killed, I am thinking, Trula would be like Sylvia. Dad would not let her come home. In fact, he would be gleeful in saying that she has made her bed, and now she must lie in it. Mack’s wife and first three kids would get his part in the store, and Trula would get nothing. What would my poor sister do?

  Jewel has sketches of me and other members of our family, and I can actually tell which one is which. The ones of Trula, Nell and Mommie are not quite as good as the others because, as she explains, “I couldn’t draw people real good when they were living with us, so I did them later from memory.”

  Suddenly I find myself looking into the face of Roxie. It is so like her it makes my heart ache. There’s that golden hair, that sweet smile.

  “When did you do this, Jewel?”

  “Christmas before she died.”

  “It’s…it’s simply wonderful.”

  Jewel is beaming.

  “Will you do me a favor?” I say.

  “Anything,” she says.

  “Will you make copies of this picture? One each for me and Samuel and Trula? I don’t want us ever to forget her face.”

  “Yes, I will.”

  I shuffle through the sketches. At the bottom of the stack there is a drawing of a man I can’t identify. I hold it close to the lantern light.

  “Who is this, Jewel?”

  “Oh, that’s Randal, but it’s not much like him. I had to do it from memory too. And this is his wife, Doris, and their little girl, Willa.”

  “But who are they?” I ask.

  “You know! It’s Randal and Doris and Willa. Remember them?”

  “No. I don’t know these people.”

  “We used to know them!” she cries, seeming a bit agitated.

  “But when?” I ask. “Where?”

  Her pretty face takes on a confused expression. She begins to tug at her blond hair nervously. “I don’t know, Lorie. Didn’t we used to know them?”

  “I’ve never known anybody with those names, Jewel.”